Chapter 216 Don't You Dare Apologize
Leela couldn't stay anchored. The sheer, suffocating gravity of the nightmare spread across the mahogany desk was too heavy. With a sudden, desperate surge of adrenaline, she planted her hands flat against Fennigan’s massive chest and pushed herself backward, forcing herself out of his protective embrace.
She needed to breathe. She needed to see the truth, no matter how much it burned.
Fennigan immediately dropped his arms, his silver eyes wide with panic as he watched his mate step back up to the edge of the desk.
Leela’s trembling fingers reached out, moving the glossy photographs around on the polished wood. She bypassed the financial ledgers and pulled the images of the dead boys closer. She stared down at the dozens of boys with silver-tipped hair and familiar jawlines, all slumped against cold concrete with single, execution-style bullet holes in their heads.
Damon had slaughtered them like they were nothing more than defective equipment. Like they weren't even people.
But as Leela stared at the blood-matted hair and the lifeless faces, her Luna heart violently shattered for them. Yes, they had been born in a sterile, subterranean lab. Yes, Damon had engineered them to be empty shells. But looking at them, she couldn't strip them of their humanity the way her psychopathic father-in-law had. They were still Fenn and Jax. They had worn her mate's face, they shared his blood, and they had died terrified and alone in the dark.
Tears finally breached her eyelashes, spilling hot and fast down her pale cheeks. Her hands were shaking so violently that the paper rattled against the wood as she pushed those photos aside. Her gaze was drawn, like a moth to a devastating flame, to the images of the holding tanks.
The ones that held the replicas of Caspian and Briar.
She sifted through the starkly lit images of the fluid-filled tubes until her fingers suddenly froze on one specific, horrifying photograph. All the remaining air completely vanished from the office.
It was a wide shot of two suspension tanks sitting right next to each other. Floating inside the pale liquid were the tiny, soulless bodies of the toddlers. But it wasn't just their milky white eyes that completely broke her mind. It was their hands.
The tiny, lifeless replicas were positioned near the glass of their respective tanks. Their little fingers were splayed out in the fluid, looking exactly as though the babies were desperately reaching out for each other through the glass, trapped in a cold, watery hell.
The psychological horror of it—the cruel, twisted, agonizing mockery of her twins' beautiful, unbreakable bond—slammed into her exhausted mind all at once. Her pregnant body simply couldn't process the sheer magnitude of the trauma. The system completely short-circuited.
"Oh," Leela breathed, the word nothing more than a tiny, broken gasp.
All the color instantly drained from her face. Her silver eyes rolled back into her head, her knees completely buckled beneath her, and she collapsed toward the floor in a dead faint.
"Sparky!" Fennigan roared.
Moving with blinding, terrifying Alpha speed, Fennigan dove forward. He caught her before she ever hit the ground, his massive arms wrapping securely around her limp body and pulling her flush against his chest.
Jax spun around, holding the real, breathing twins securely against his chest, his eyes wide as he watched his brother drop to his knees with his unconscious mate. Elana gasped, her hands gripping the wheels of her chair.
The darkness only claimed her for a fleeting, merciful moment.
Leela’s eyes fluttered open, the thick, grounding scent of pine and smoke rapidly pulling her back to consciousness. She was cradled completely securely in Fennigan’s massive arms, his broad chest rising and falling in rapid, terrified breaths beneath her cheek. He was kneeling on the rug, holding her against him as if she were made of the most fragile glass.
"I've got you," Fennigan rasped, his voice trembling with a raw, desperate relief. "I've got you, Sparky. You're safe."
Leela blinked, the warm light of the office slowly coming back into focus. She looked up at his panicked, soot-stained face.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, her voice still incredibly frail.
"Don't you dare apologize," Fennigan growled softly, bringing a large, shaking hand up to gently cup her pale cheek.
"It's just..." Leela swallowed hard, a fresh wave of tears threatening to spill as the horrifying image burned itself back into her mind. She turned her head slightly, looking toward Jax, who was standing like a stone statue, holding the real, breathing Caspian and Briar safely against his massive chest.
"It was that picture, Fenn," Leela choked out, the absolute tragedy of it crushing her chest. "I thought of how the twins sleep. They always sleep tangled together. And those... those things in the tanks... they were reaching out for each other through the glass."
A devastated sob finally broke past her lips. "Even without souls... their bodies still instinctively wanted to make the baby knot. They just wanted each other in the dark."
The sheer, heartbreaking tragedy of it hung heavily in the quiet office. Behind the desk, Elana bowed her head, her jaw tight as she forcefully fought back a fresh wave of tears. Jax squeezed his eyes shut, pulling his niece and nephew just a fraction of an inch closer to his racing heart.
Then, it happened.
A sharp, distinct flutter pressed against the inside of Leela's stomach. It was immediately followed by a hard, unmistakable kick against her ribs.
Zephyr.
The strong, life-affirming movement of her unborn son instantly severed the paralyzing grip of the trauma. It was a visceral, physical jolt—a stark reminder from the Goddess of exactly what was at stake. The terror and the helpless horror completely washed out of Leela's silver eyes, instantly replaced by the cold, unbreakable, and terrifyingly protective fire of a Luna.
She reached down, pressing her hand flat over her belly where Zephyr had just kicked, and looked back up into her Alpha's face. Her tears stopped completely.
"Fenn," Leela said, her voice dropping into a fierce, steely whisper that left absolutely no room for fear, panic, or hesitation. "We have to stop them."
Fennigan’s breath hitched. He looked down at his fiercely resilient mate, feeling the sudden, incredibly powerful shift in her energy sweeping through the mate bond. The protective, violent rage of the mother had completely eclipsed the horror of the victim.
A low, lethal rumble began to vibrate deep within Fennigan's broad chest. His glowing silver eyes hardened into unbreakable ice, reflecting her own unyielding resolve.
"We will," Fennigan vowed, the Alpha promise echoing in the room with absolute, remorseless finality. "We're going to burn the High Council to the ground."