Kieran rubbed his eyes as looked at the comms he had pocketed from Cait’s belongings when she was asleep, he had cloned it and later he would place it back in her bag.
He was curious about his sister.
Her comms painted a grim portrait of her life.
There was message after message left from her ex-boyfriend.
Border line threats, bargaining, demands.
Missed calls from friends in Breakwater asking her to contact him.
Daddy 11:37am> Cait, I haven’t heard from you, are you okay?
A sneer formed on Kieran’s face.
As the message came through, his thumb paused hesitating as to whether to open the messages.
If he read it, it would seem like she was just ignoring him.
But if he left it, would he be concerned enough to visit her at home?
‘We’ll have to send our Guard to her place.
A shame.
I wonder what her room looks like?’ Kieran thought with a sigh.
Messages from her former lover kept coming through.
He thrummed with aggravation as messages came in.
He decided to treat Henry Thwaites as a suspect in Cait’s poisoning.
There’s no way he was innocent.
“Hmmm.” he hummed as he looked, he knew he was invading her privacy, he had to know whether it got any better for her outside the notes in the file.
Sporadic notes of concern and praise from precursory to adolescent education.
She had fallen through the cracks.
The notes from her first year of Adolescent level schooling came close.
When they discovered she was a girl.
Somehow the investigation into why she was forced to pretend to be a boy at the time was dropped.
There was a formal complaint that was close.
It seemed like there was only one or two people that actually cared enough about her.
Maria Bonne was listed as her emergency contact and for years she excelled.
Until she had to work.
“Shit. This is bad.” Kieran said with an exhausted sigh.
It must have been hard..
Cait was actually younger than she knew.
The identity she held was six months older than what she should be.
They celebrated her birthday on the Winter Solstice.
His fingers moved as he went through the information of the device.
It was not connected to her aural comms bead.
He stopped suddenly.
The device buzzed as the contact name and picture populated.
The device rang in his own ear, he shifted the device from palm to palm like it might burn him.
He turned off the holo.
“Caitybug, where are you, baby girl. I brought your meds.” the deep raspy baritone of a man called out, slightly impatient.
Knocking sounded.
“She is asleep, tired as hell. Wrecked. Drying out at my place from that whack herbal shit. You her father?” Kieran retorted back in a calculated fashion.
Adopting his mother’s accent.
“Who are you?” Caleb rasped suspiciously, she knew Cait and Henry had broken up.
The cameras and his men did not report a new man to him.
“A coworker, maybe more. You know?” Kieran said with a sneer.
“We started working together with her not long ago, after Henry dumped her from work I picked her up, she’s still in bed if you get my drift.” .
“Oh, so you work at her office?” Caleb said and paused.
If she made nice with some dome level twit it would make things harder if she survived the withdrawal symptoms.
“Are you an accountant?” he asked probing.
“I’m in corporate security. How about you?” Kieran said, it was truthful, but he regretted it.
He needed to get more information from this man.
He was raising his sister and he was the man that helped Yvette escape after she nearly killed their father.
He helped her plan this all, to have a child with an omega.
But for what goal?
“Logistics. Listen, I will leave her drugs and credit chips in her mailbox. Can you pass that along? I got to go out with the next train.” Caleb said calmly.
Caleb gritted his teeth, security at a corporation like that would be outside of the network as they would do background security checks.
He would have to let this slip by, either way she was most likely toast.
“Yeah, I can ask her the address when she gets up and has a shower. She keeps sweating through the sheets. But I don’t care if she’s got her vices, you know?” Kieran responded hoping to rescue this.
If he could stay put long enough he could get the guard to pick him up.
“Too bad you have to go? I could take you to pleasure domes up here that will dry you out.” Kieran said, wincing.
“Hahaha, good boy.” Caleb laughed, “Too bad. Well I am sure we’ll meet soon enough.” Caleb ended the call quickly while looking around.
He looked at the bag in his hand and felt a little unsatisfied looking at this.
He wanted to look at her one last time.
Down the stark white corridor, in a furnished meeting room, Owen faced Albert Rose.
Albert wasn’t just the lord of the traverse; he was her father, a man he had crossed before.
“Is it a habit for you to interfere in my family?” Albert asked.
He was raging.
His daughter had spent two decades being tortured by Yvette and that man.
Silver streaked his darker silver hair in highlights more than it did the decade ago that they last argued, but his high level omega presence was undiminished.
It felt like physical weight pressing against the sterile air.
His eyes, the same storm-gray as Cait’s newly acknowledged ones, burned with fury.
“I have not interfered with ‘your’ family. I have interacted and have relationships with ‘people’ from the Rose family.” Owen corrected him quickly.Owen rubbed the bridge of his nose, the jasmine pheromonal scent stung, it was a power play.
‘What a pain in the ass.
I wish Elias sent her to deal with this.’ Owen thought.
“She is her own person, like Kieran. Let me remind you.” Owen said.
Albert Rose was such a pain in the ass to negotiate with.
He poured himself a cup of coffee and placed the pot down on the table.
At least it was decent.
He watched as Albert emphatically moved his hands.
“The genetic testing should have happened first.” Albert griped.
“She was dying.” Owen said and slapped the table, “You are being absurd again. You are just pissed off that it was me. If it was another prince or diplomat it would have been fine.”
“There’s no way I will let you be with my daughter.” Albert growled, the words vibrating with suppressed violence.
“You ruined Kieran. You won’t ruin my daughter. Her mark is on you. I swear to the Gods, I will burn it the hell off.” Albert shook as he loudly talked.
He loathed Owen Thorne; first he forced his way into the European academy in Dublin.
Then he impressed his rebellious attitude among his sons.
Then he took his youngest son away from an arranged partnership with Ryder Dubois.
He then took Kieran to another Traverse system and they did not come back for years.
The battle between both families ended up in him not contacting him for years as well.
The relationship suffered so much that it almost affected trade between the two continents.
‘What if she leaves?’ Albert thought.
It hit him like a punch in the face.
“We will see how that all goes when or if the time comes, Albert. She is not some pawn you can move around the board.” Owen said.
“She is my daughter, my heir and you know what the Accords states about female heirs. You just can’t run off with her.” Albert shouted.
” I don’t intend to run away with your daughter.
I know the Accords.
I am protected by them too.
I was rendering aid, and we were compatible.
It was consensual.” Owen corrected him.
Owen stood with deceptive calm, his own aura a contained vortex.
“You should have waited for the test to finish for familial permission.” Albert shouted.
“Well, I had it. Kieran sent me a comms me to assist when he found her. He is her brother, right?” Owen responded.
“A technicality.”‘ Albert sighed in exasperation,”You know damned well that was sheer luck.” Albert fumed.
Kieran had been there to represent the family.
In fact he, and Owen had been coordinating her care.
He hated this.
“Unbelievable.” Owen rasped, “She was dying, Albert. The poisoned suppressants, and the rut collapse were killing her. The protocol demanded my assistance, which I gave. I provided stabilization so urgent medical treatment could commence. Have I not provided her with the finest? Did I not have Kieran contact you after we moved her closer?” He met the older man’s glare unflinchingly.
Albert snorted, “Oh what a huge favour you did me. Clinging to her after letting her mark you. You know how mate bonding means that Kieran will need to find someone else? You abducted him before he could go to therapy for his ‘condition’, who will he exchange with?” Albert jabbed his finger in Owen’s direction as he screamed.
“Kieran is fine. He understood the consequences before he called on me to help” Owen said with an exasperated sigh.
“Listen, the biological responses were… unforeseen. By both of us. She dominated ‘me’ and lashed a mark on my neck.I have been claimed by her, it is not the other way around. Her marking me without my consent is against the Accords.” Owen said as he undid his collar.
He showed off the perfect Rose sigil.
“What in the ten hells of Diyu.” Albert hissed and grabbed his collar.
“So you are going to pursue injuries with my family?”
“You know how a mark is made, it’s painful. ” Owen retorted.
He had no clue how she had done it, his skin wasn’t that easy to damage in the first place.
It had hurt, but everything else was, life changing.
It was a whirlwind of primal frenetic activity.
He had no idea how she over powered him.
She was short, skeletal thin, barely able to lift herself before..
It was like she ensnared his brain.
He thought Cait was a trap at first, but she wasn’t.
She was different.
He ‘felt’ it.
At first the idea of brooding with some omega repulsed him.
He barely saw his own mother.
His father started sending females to him when he hit his rut.
Luckily Kieran was strong enough to exchange pheromones with him.
Although his father accepted Kieran, he still pushed female omegas, and female Alphas toward Kieran to end their partnership.
Albert’s lip curled.
“So with that you ‘First Mate’ status? By right of her ‘imprinting’ on you?” He spat the word.
The First mate agreement, and the imprint was a sign of the bond between a mated alpha and omega.
A territorial mark.
However the roles were swapped.
She had marked him.
She had called the biological dibbs.
“No, I have it. She claimed me as her first mate. Kieran was there when she and I consented by thumbing the ABO agreements. I am aThorne, I will honour the agreements I have made.” Owen retorted.
“You think a post board room rutting grants you rights to the Rose legacy?” Albert spat.
“What! Haha.” Owen laughed.
“Legacy? Do you actually think I care about Alba when I have my own vast territory, and wealth? That mate bond, that agreement, grants me a responsibility, to her and she to I.” Owen countered, his voice dangerously low.
‘How dare he think he was after money?
Did he completely lose his mind in the past years’ Owen thought.
“I helped Kieran escape that Rose legacy, prepared to support him for the rest of his life.
And her?
Although it’s not a claim I sought, it’s one I cannot ignore.
Her biology recognizes me as its primary protector.
Especially,” Owen added, the steel entering his tone, “considering you stopped looking.
She lived in your tunnels, being poisoned and abused, not even fourteen sectors away from you.
You made a movie, but she suffered for decades living a lie under your nose.”
Albert flinched, a crack in the granite fury.
The image of Yvette, running after stabbing him, running and even sacrificing her health to save their child from ‘him’, hung unspoken between them.
His voice, when it came, was rough, stripped bare.
“Benjamin Agneau, or whatever his name is, will answer for that. Slowly.” Then the fury resurged, directed at Owen.
“But ‘you’… You took advantage.”
“I prevented her imminent death; the rut with the poison was too much for her body to bear. She collapsed in an elevator in front of me. I did my duty so a drunk Alpha would not recklessly hurt her.” Owen stated passionately.
“The ABO authorized genetic confirmation is irrefutable. Your ‘Silver Rose’ lives. I do not care about the Queen, or Rose aspect. She is an omega in severe biological distress, bonded to me. The First Mate happened as it was intended, not in some political offering but her body ‘knighting’ me as her champion.” Owen continued.
Albert boiled with rage, bellowing laughter booming from his chest.
“Oh, please.”
“You can see the sigil on my neck, Lord Rose. Those thumbed agreements, your own son as a witness that it was above board. ” Owen said bluntly.
“Our relationship is protected by the Accords, and until she states otherwise. As her protector I am here on duty of care.” Owen paused and sipped the cold coffee.
“Your feud with a dead woman over custody of a child that has grown up, doesn’t supersede her immediate safety or that sacred authority.” Owen gently gripped the coffee mug, mindful of his emotions.
“How dare you?”Albert’s knuckles whitened on the edge of the steel observation table.
The sound was annoying.
Owen snorted.
“How dare I? That is rich, Albert.” Owen spat back.
“Listen.” Albert’ voice shook.
The sterile lights caught the faint tremor in his hand.
“This is not about her mother.” Albert scoffed, the sound raw.
Albert continued, “There is no feud. I loved her mother, Owen. I loved her even when she drove that blade between my ribs. I loved her when she ran, taking my child into the gutter.” His voice dropped, stripped of its earlier fury, leaving only a hollow ache.
“I thought I could show Yvette that we weren’t monsters. That and being Beta-Dominant wasn’t a curse. Not like Lord Engel, who abandoned her at birth. But she saw only him as a monster, his power… the shadow of Lord Engel on me, on all Omegans.” Albert said, rubbing his forehead.
He turned fully to Owen, the ice in his eyes thawing into something far more dangerous: grief.
“Finding out what that Beta did to her? To ‘my’ Cait? Poisoning her, hiding her, letting her believe she was nothing…” Albert swallowed hard, the aristocratic composure cracking.
“You have to understand, Thorne. This rage? It’s not just posturing. It’s a father’s terror. That she was hurt. That she was ‘alone’. That I wasn’t there.” He leaned in, the scent of Jasmine filling the air, spicy pressing against Owen’s controlled pheromones.
Raising high.
“I understand that Kieran asked you to help her as a favor as your Omega. But she was not thinking.” Albert tried to backtrack.
“And when she says it is over, I leave and keep my distance. I am not an animal.Your son broke our bond to save her when he was a stranger to him. Same did I. We were both taught ‘noblesse oblige’ in the academy.” Owen retorted.
The ABO, Kieran and Owen made sure everything was done consensually.
It was preferable than the alternative of some unknown alcoholic alpha, who might even have a family or a sexually transmitted disease.
The young man was celibate before his daughter, and exchanged pheromones with his own celibate son.
“My duty now is to honor that sacred biological duty, to protect her from threats – including well-meaning fathers who might smother her with the weight of their own trauma and pain. She has just lost everyone in her life. She has nobody to trust, maybe that is the reason for this sacred tie.” He held up his hand, exhausted with Albert.
“Thorne’s do not take responsibility and the sacred contract lightly. Don’t hurt her because of our past.”
A choked sound escaped Albert, part fury, part anguish.
He looked back at the screen.
Cait lay still, her silver-blond hair fanned across the pillow, the monitors casting soft glows on her pale skin.
She was devoid of color.
Her cheek bones jutted out, her arms so thin.
The sight seemed to physically wound him.
“I would never hurt her.” Albert hissed.
“Her mother ran from me, Owen. Ran straight into the arms of a man who raised my daughter to believe she was a burden.” His knuckles were bone-white on the steel ledge.
“I just want the chance to treasure my daughter, to love her. Please. Don’t take her away from me. Not again.”
“I never took anyone away –” Owen was interrupted before he could respond with full indignation, the door hissed open, slicing through the tension that had saturated the room.
Kieran stood in the threshold, his smoke-gray hair tousled, as if the weight of the situation had ruffled him.
His grey eyes, bright and piercing, flicked between the two alphas, assessing their moods with keen insight.
‘There was more at stake here than just Cait’s health,’ Kieran thought, feeling the heaviness between them.
“Apologies,” he murmured, his voice smooth yet urgent.
“Dr. Jameson needs consent for the next round of toxin purging. Cait’s vitals are stable, but the residual poison and suppressant in her system are… problematic.” He paused, aware of the tension tightening around them, his fox-like features betraying none of the unease simmering in his chest.
“Authourize any procedures, if Jameson requires any specialized or expensive medication you may use my personal accounts and name to acquire them.” Owen said, his tone clipped as he reached for the pad, fingers trembling slightly.
He thumbed all the consent forms.
‘I need to do this for her, show my power.
She is going to need a strong impartial backing.’ Owen thought, heart racing as he thumbed the sensor.
‘What has gotten into me?’ his hand raised to his chest afterwards.
“You okay?” Kieran hesitated, the weight of familiar shadows creeping into his eyes.
“Yes, of course. Sorry I was deep in thought. Have you informed Elias that I am not going to be in office for a few weeks?” Owen asked.
“I did reach out to him, he has taken over operations with Martha.” Kieran said and cleared his throat.
It was clear Owen was hooked on his sister, whether he knew it or not.
“The thing is, she needs Remy Dubois. This cannot be fixed by pharmacology or resonance chamber.”
The unspoken implication hung heavily: ‘She and Remy were going to meet.
She needed another Alpha beside her, anyways.
So soon.
He could not buy ‘this’ treatment and its costs were huge, and he could lose his position.
This was a french ‘royal’ asset that rarely left Alba.
One that he had left on a bad note with many years ago.
“We’ll do anything to get her well.” Owen said.
He turned away briefly and walked toward the door pretending to pace.
He flinched as if he was going to be slapped, the truth of it cutting into him, ‘I’ll never be enough alone.
I will always have to be one of many.’ He had inherited strength, health and intelligence, but healing powers were not among his gifts, and the realization stung.
Albert’s head snapped toward Kieran, a flicker of vulnerability quickly masked beneath a layer of aristocratic control.
“Remy Dubois?” His voice dropped
‘Of course, he’s chosen the best.
Isn’t that always the way?’ Albert thought.
‘Michael, will be hurt.
He has been trying to romance the ‘doctor’ for over a decade.’
“His pheromones are potent, refined, and ‘regal’.” Albert said as he gave a pointed look at Owen, as if to underscore the superiority of Remy’s lineage.
‘The Thorne’s might be wealthy, but they are anything but royal.
They were lucky, extraordinarily lucky.’ Albert thought, the competitive spirit igniting within him.
Owen snorted, “Hmm, from where I stand ‘regal’ pheromones smell like they have been drowned in scotch.” he retorted.
“Don’t bloody offer me a glass, and judge me for smelling like it.” Albert spat.
“Where I come from we elect our leaders based on intellect or skill, not birth right. Albert, I’ll be visiting her, we will talk about her treatment with Doctor Dubois before she gets home.” he asserted, his voice unwavering.
“I will be there, daily.” He felt exhausted, but by the look on Albert’ face, he had gotten through to him.
Kieran’s lips twitched in a ghost of a smile, perhaps amused by the friction crackling between them.
Owen was not intimidated by his fathers power, he was wealthier and had more power.
His family had become a power house growing crops and developing industry.
They held more surface territory and ran transit.
They had connections to the Canadians, but not as much as they did with the Americans and by proxy the Thorne family.
“Well, that’s convenient. Working remotely from the Rose estate does have its perks. At least your… affection means I get to see my brothers more often.” Kieran’s gaze slid pointedly towards Albert, the unspoken victory evident.
‘They think they can control everything,’ Kieran mused, amused by his fathers attempt of dominance.
“Though I suspect Michael might appreciate fewer surprise guests.”
“I’d go regardless,” Owen declared, the conviction in his voice undeniable.
Owen stood firm, unwilling to bend.
‘Cait needs me, and I’ll fight for her.’
“Negotiable,” Albert interjected sharply, wings rustling subtly against his tailored suit, an imperious gesture.
‘He thinks he can dictate terms, but I won’t back down.’ Owen thought.
Owen laughed and turned towards Kieran.
He rolled his eyes.
“Your old man still thinks he can control his children, and me.”
“Coincidentally,” Albert said, straightening up, “Remy Dubois is scheduled to visit Michael next week. A pheromone exchange. My children possess the finest pheromones on the continent. Maybe the world?”
The subtext was the same as it was when he and Kieran left Alba, he did not fit into their world, because he was not a royal and not from their line of the Traverse.
It was a stupid assumption.
“Oh is that how you try to use them as bargaining chips.
Fine pheromones, a superb product of the Rose family to be sold off to diplomats.” Owen responded, “The Thorne family does not barter their bodies and genes to get preferential treatment or ‘freebies’.” Owen snapped back.
‘Oh, I am just muscle, huh?
Albert thinks that I am just a meat head.’ Owen seethed inwardly.
He probably still treats Michael with kid gloves.
The little pompous prince.
“Stop, please Dad?” Kieran sighed, a soft, exasperated sound that seemed to draw in the weight of the room.
He stepped fully into the space, closing the door behind him with a quiet click.
“You have not even met her.”
“Have either of you considered asking ‘Cait’ what she wants? Or who she wishes to see?” He shot a pointed look at Albert, his grey eyes sharp and unyielding.
‘After all, this isn’t about us; it’s about her.’
Albert had not read as much into the files, he had only known that his daughter was still alive under forty eight hours ago.
Owen and Kieran knew her best, he looked at his son and took a sip of the whiskey in his hands.
“In due time, Kieran. Let’s give her time to process this. If she cannot handle it now, it is going to impact her health. But if she is coping, we can wait until her body can take it, to take care of her mind.”
Kieran looked at his father with guarded curiosity, searching for a hidden motive.
He was right.
He remembered when he was in the hospital, after getting carved up like that.
When his father suggested giving up on Yvette, that she was most likely dead herself, Albert had a cardiac event.
Kieran could only nod, as Owen fell silent.