“I’m fairly certain I never mentioned kidnapping unwilling subjects,” Nikolai countered. “Everyone involved in our trial is here voluntarily. The same cannot be said for you.”
My head snapped up.
Elias sighed. “Also, not my decision.”
“Do you make any decisions?” Nikolai sneered with a laugh. “Or are you only simply capable of thinking thoughts that your Alpha puts into your addled mind?”
“They kidnapped girls,” I added. “Three girls went missing from GPA, Elias. They’re … kids.”
The old man frowned. “I had heard that, yes. But it was not—”
I groaned, throwing up my hands as I rolled my eyes so hard I might’ve sprained a socket. “We get it. It was all Damien’s fault. You’re completely blameless in all of this. Poor, poor Elias.”
Dimitri chuckled, hiding a grin behind his hand as he rubbed his jaw. Even Nikolai smiled.
“I would have thought if anyone understood this, it would be you, Skye,” Elias told me quietly.
“Me?” My eyebrows shot up to my hairline.
“I’m doing this so our people can have a future. So that shifters can have hope.” He lifted his weathered hands to rest them on the edge of the table, his chains jingling. “It may seem dark now, but this was to protect people like you and your mother.”
My eyes narrowed into slits. Was he actually serious?
God, he was.
He actually believed the shit coming out of his mouth.
“What you did was enable men to do exactly what they had been doing for years,” I ground out. “Whatever they fucking wanted in the name of saving us all.”
“No!” Elias cried, his eyes suddenly more alive than they had been the entire time I had known him. “Damien knew what was happening in Long Mesa and assured me that he was planning on stopping it. You, your mother would have been freed of that wretched place. What he has planned is a new order that will help us.”
My jaw dropped as I stared at him.
He was actually out of his damn mind.
“My heart broke listening to those testimonies,” Elias added softly. “Even Damien was disturbed by what I told him. Skye, what you suffered is not lost on us. Our pack does not support the idea of an omega house where people like your mother are raped multiple times a day for years just for the sick, perverse pleasure of a few vile men. You won’t have faced the same fate as her.”
It was like all the air was sucked out of the room in a giant vacuum that left me breathless. The sudden stillness froze everything in the air.
I turned my head to see Dimitri’s hand land futilely on Nikolai’s shoulder as the older man shoved up from the table with a roar that made me jump and shove backwards.
Nikolai’s hand lashed out, catching Dimitri in the chest and hurling him into the wall with a grunt. The table was shoved forward, pinning a gasping Elias to the wall as his chest was crushed under the pressure from the metal.
I scrambled back as the side door opened again and Alexei and another man rushed in. With the help of Dimitri, they wrestled Nikolai from the room. I jumped out of the way as Nikolai’s foot caught a chair and sent it careening in my direction. It smashed against the wall hard enough to shatter the chair and crack the wall.
Without Nikolai holding the table, Elias managed to push it off of himself with a rattling gasp. His chest heaved, wheezing as he struggled to catch his breath.
Shaking, I turned and looked at him once more. “I don’t give a shit what you or Damien think. You kidnapped women and children. Maybe they aren’t being raped or abused on a daily basis, but you’re not the hero here, Elias.”
I started for the door as Tate stepped into the doorway with wide eyes. She looked as shocked as I felt.
“Skye,” he called softly. “Wait.”
Damn I didn’t want to, but I did. Some sick, hopeful part of me was praying there was any other explanation. Or maybe an apology that would take the sting out of his betrayal.
“There was one last test I wanted to run,” he confessed. “Your mother … when she bonded to your father, she was young. But it triggered her estrous cycle. It's why she became pregnant. It frequently happens to mates when they bond.”
Everything in me went cold. All I could do was blink.
He smiled softly at me. “I would say, due to your age and the rapid