As we turned down the hall, I kept repeating the number in my head, refusing to let it slip even slightly. Once inside the safety of my room, I closed the door behind us and turned to Lolita immediately.
“I need your handset,” I said urgently. “Please.”
She didn’t question me. She reached into her apron and handed it over.
I took it and told them to remain in the room while I went to the bathroom and made the call so no one could eavesdrop.
Inside, I closed the door, quickly typed in Gabriel’s number, and hit call. As it rang, my heart thundered. What if he doesn’t want to help? What if he betrays me and tells the triplets everything? I was terrified. Truly terrified.
“Hello!” came the familiar voice of Gabriel from over the line.
I swallowed hard and composed myself.
“Good morning, Alpha Gabriel… this is Olivia,” I whispered, biting my lip as I waited for his response.
There were two seconds of silence before he spoke. “Olivia? You’re calling? What is it, baby?” he asked, still playing in character with me.
I smiled but went on to speak. “Alpha Gabriel, can I trust you?” I whispered while lowering myself onto the toilet seat.
There was another second of silence before his response came. “Yes… You can trust me, Olivia. I swear with my life.” He sounded like it was a vow.
I bit my lip again before admitting, “I didn’t lose my memory or suffer from false ones. It was all an act.”
I waited for Gabriel’s response, but he didn’t speak until after a few minutes, when a soft chuckle came from the other end of the phone.
“Wow, Olivia… you acted so well then… even I myself believed it.”
I pressed the phone closer to my ear, my voice dropping to a whisper as if the walls themselves mi`t betray me.
“My plan…” I began, pausing for breath. “I want to leave this pack, Gabriel. I want out.”
There was a long silence on the line. I could feel his breath, shallow and tense, on the other side.
“I’m going to pretend I can’t live without you,” I continued, keeping my voice calm and low. “I’ll act broken… devastated. I’ll start to fall sick-emotionally, physically, whatever it takes. They’ll panic. And when they do, they’ll want to send me back to you, thinking you’re the cure.”
I swallowed hard, anxiety curling like smoke in my stomach. “That’s when I’ll need you the most. I need you to help me escape. Once I’m back with you, I’ll vanish. Far away. Somewhere they can’t reach me. A place I can finally breathe again.”
I paused, giving the words a moment to settle.
“And when I’m safe-when I’m far enough from their grip-I’ll tell them the truth. Everything. No more pretending.”
A lump caught in my throat, but I forced myself to finish. “Will you help me, Gabriel? Will you help me disappear?”
I hesitated, my heart pounding. “I’ll understand if you say no. This is… a lot. And it’s dangerous. I won’t hold it against you if you don’t want to get involved.”
For a moment, there was only silence. My heart raced as I waited.
Then Gabriel’s voice came through. “You think I’d let them keep you like this?” His voice was low, rough with emotion. “You think I’d let you go through all this alone? Olivia… the moment they send you to me, I won’t just help you escape. I’ll burn the world if I have to.” G
A shaky breath escaped my lips. I felt a tight knot in my chest start to loosen.
“I’ll get everything ready,” he continued. “Passports. Safe house. New identities. Whatever you need.”
“Thank you…” I whispered, my voice trembling now.
“You don’t have to thank me. Just stay strong. Keep pretending. And when the time comes… I’ll be there.”
“I’ll hold on,” I whispered.
“Good. And Olivia?”
“Yes?”
“You don’t have to fear. I will not tell the triplets. Trust me.”
I closed my eyes, gripping the phone tighter. “Thank you so much,” I whispered, genuinely grateful.
“You are welcome. Let’s keep acting, okay?”@
“Okay,” I said.
There was a comfortable silence on the line before Gabriel spoke again. “I’m ending it now… call me anytime.”
“Thank you,” I said, and the call ended.
A sigh of relief left my lips, but my wolf spoke. “I have a bad feeling about all this,” she murmured.
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
She stirred. “I don’t know. I just have a bad feeling about this, Olivia… you have to be careful.”
“I’ll be careful,” I whispered to my wolf while drawing my hand over my face. “I’ll trust Gabriel… but not blindly.”
A knock suddenly sounded on the bathroom door, and Lolita peeked her head inside.
“Luna, you have to come… the healer is here to check on you.”
I froze. My heartbeat raced.
The healer.
Shit. What if he finds out I’m perfectly fine?@
Olivia’s POV
I stepped out of the bathroom and found the healer waiting at the door. Our eyes locked, and I swallowed hard. I couldn’t tell whether he truly believed I’d lost my memory-or if he knew I was lying and had simply chosen to go along with it.
“How are you feeling today?” he asked.
I swallowed again, slipping into my act even though something deep down told me there was no need. “I’m… fine,” I whispered, taking a seat on the edge of the bed.
He nodded and glanced at Nora and Lolita. “Could your handmaids give us a moment?” he asked.
I blinked, confused. Why did he want them to leave?
“Is there a problem?”
The healer shook his head. “No… I just want a private session with you. That’s the same thing I told the
‘s Help
Alphas.”
I still didn’t think there was any reason for Nora and Lolita to leave, but I had to respect his request. I gave them a small nod, and they returned it before quietly stepping out.
The door clicked shut behind them, and an eerie silence settled between the healer and me. He didn’t speak. Just stood there, watching me with eyes far wiser than I’d originally assumed. I sat motionless, my heart thudding too fast.
He finally stepped forward, setting his satchel on the bedside table, but not opening it. Instead, he turned to face me directly, his expression unreadable.
“I’ve been a healer for over thirty years, Luna Olivia,” he said calmly, folding his hands in front of him. “Do you really think I wouldn’t recognize when someone is acting?”>
My heart dropped to my stomach.
“I… I don’t know what you mean,” I tried to whisper, but the words were dry, lifeless.
‘s Help
He smiled faintly, not unkindly. “You’re good. Very good. Most wouldn’t have noticed. But I’ve watched countless faces-real pain, real confusion, real trauma -and yours?” He paused, tilting his head. “It’s practiced. Controlled. Too deliberate. I knew the moment I examined you… you hadn’t lost your memory.”
I couldn’t breathe for a moment. My fingers curled into the bedsheets.
“Then why…” I finally managed to whisper. “Why did you go along with it? Why didn’t you tell them?”
The healer’s expression softened.
“Because I believe you have your reasons,” he said simply. “And more than that… I saw everything, Olivia. Everything that happened to your family. Your father’s arrest… you and your mother demoted to omegas.”
I blinked, my vision going blurry. My throat closed up.
“I was there that night,” he continued. “I saw the pain in your eyes when your father was sentenced to life imprisonment… I saw everything, and I knew he was
‘s Help innocent, just that I had no proof of it.”
Tears stood in my eyes… it was really nice to know that someone apart from my mother and I believed my father was innocent.
He took a small step closer. “I wished I could help then, but I couldn’t. So when you woke up pretending to remember nothing, I saw the eagerness in your eyes. That spark of someone with a plan. And I decided… if you were trying to survive again, the least I could do was not get in your way.”
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.