Chapter Sixteen
Casey sat on the edge of the bed, watching Adam with wide eyes.
“This will only take a few minutes, Casey. Then you can rest for a while.”
Ro returned with a basin of water and a wash cloth. Adam helped the young Omega slip off his shirt. He was thin enough that Adam could count each rib with ease.
“How about we start with your hands?” Adam suggested, seeing that as the least threatening starting point.
He soaked the cloth in the warm, soapy water and wrung it out before holding out his hand. There was a moment's hesitation before Casey placed a hand in his.
Adam gently dragged the cloth across the back of Casey’s hand, then his knuckles and down along his fingers.
“See, that’s not so bad, is it?”
Casey shook his head.
“You can do the rest yourself, if you like. We’ll just help if you need it. Maybe with your back, it looks sore.”
It didn’t look any better today than it had yesterday. Adam showed Casey how to rinse out the cloth as he went along and they changed the basin water twice as he washed. Adam did his back, going as gently as he could over the beaten skin.
Ro had found some clean clothes for Casey and the look of awe on his face as he put them on was tough to watch.
“I’ve never worn clothes like these before,” he said, running his hands along the sleeves.
“How about a nap while we wait for Alicia to get here?”
It took a bit of coaxing to get Casey to lie down in the bed but he fell asleep quickly.
“I’ll stay with him,” Ro said. “Why don’t you go check on Ben and Xander?”
Adam did, finding Xander asleep in the room they were staying in and Ben sitting motionless on the end of the bed, his head in his hands. Adam sat next to him, slipping his hand into Ben’s. His mate didn’t lift his head.
“He’s asleep. You were really good with him.”
“I can’t look at him without thinking of Noah. If this will be all that’s left of him by the time we find him.”
Adam wrapped his arms around Ben, knowing he had no words of reassurance, nothing to convince his mate that his fears were unfounded. Every minute Noah was gone, the chances of them finding him dwindled. They hadn’t interrupted his abduction, they hadn’t found him when Gray Valley were transporting him or when they handed him to Tobias. And they hadn’t found Tobias as he traveled, so the man had had time to go to ground.
“You need to get some sleep,” he said, trying to rub some of the tension from Ben’s shoulders.
“I know. James will be here first thing. He’s bringing Luke with him. He thinks we need to act against Gray Valley soon, whether the Council come on board or not.”
“But that’s not going to get Noah back,” Adam tried to argue.
“They’re our best lead, Adam. Hell, they’re our only lead.”
“There must be some other way. Tobias doesn’t work alone, someone knows…”
“We tried that, remember? We looked for the people you talked about and we never found any of them. The one lead James did find, the guy wouldn’t talk, then disappeared. He hasn’t turned up since. Chasing Tobias’ people is like chasing rabbits. It seems like they just dive down a rabbit hole and even if you can follow, you can’t find them in the warren.”
Adam was torn between sitting in on the conversation between the Alphas and talking more to Casey. He settled for speaking to the Omega. Despite Ben’s assertion the previous night, he wasn’t sure he believed chasing Tobias through his associates was a dead end. There had to be someone, somewhere, who’d be willing to help them get Noah back. While most of Tobias’ people had done exactly what he’d told them to, no more, no less, there had been exceptions. Like Jason, throwing them in those tatty third-hand books. Like Lacie, who’d risked a lot over months and years to teach them to read.
Luke came with James but gave Adam and Casey some space. Adam worried about the effect seeing another Omega like himself would do. At least Adam had some distance. He’d been away from Tobias for years even before Ben found him. But Luke had only been free for months.
Casey ate his breakfast as if he expected someone to try to take it from him at any moment.
“Slow down, there’s plenty more where that came from if you’re still hungry.”
His words earned him a glare at first but when Casey finished his pancakes and his eyes strayed to the rest of the stack, Adam was quick to push the plate towards him.
“Have another one,” he said. “But take it slow.”
It wouldn’t do any good if they wound up making him sick. Casey took another pancake and managed to eat that one marginally slower. Adam toyed with the idea of offering him another but the Omegas hand was already rubbing across his stomach.
“How about we got for a walk outside?”
They’d already been out before breakfast so Casey could shift form and spend some time as a wolf. It seemed to have settled him a bit, and he wasn’t as skittish and jumpy as he’d been when he’d woken.
They sat on the grass, soaking in the sun, a cool breeze blowing.
“Casey, I need to ask you some stuff. About Tobias. About where you and Duncan lived. And about the other people you know, the people who work for Tobias.”
“To help you find Noah and Duncan?”
He found himself under careful scrutiny by the young Omega.
“That’s right. Anything, no matter how small, might help.”
“Shouldn’t an Alpha be asking me questions?”
It might have been funny if the idea hadn’t been so sad. What was sadder still was that Adam would have asked the exact same question, if he’d been brave enough to ask those kinds of questions at Casey’s age.
“The Alphas are busy. And they don’t know Tobias like you and I do. So how about we compare notes, see what each of us knows.”
Casey leaned back on his hands, looking up at the blue sky and the white, fluffy clouds being pushed along by the breeze.
“Okay. If it’ll help find Duncan.”
“Thanks, Casey,” he said, settling down on the grass next to him.
Two hours later, and Adam was close to despair again. Other than the routine and the basics, there was very little familiar about the people and place that Casey knew. They’d lived in a basement too, but the layout was different as were what little colors there were. And the woods outside the house were different too.
Other than Tobias, they didn’t have any people in common either.
“Are you sure there was no-one else, Casey? No other name you heard mentioned or person you saw, even just once?”
Casey lay back on the grass, his face a mask of concentration. But after a few minutes, he relaxed and shook his head. “I can’t remember anyone else.”
He sat up, glancing over at Xander and Chloe who’d come out to play and Ro who was keeping an eye on them. He blinked, turning his head to the side as he watched Chloe skip across the grass.
“Wait. There was someone. She had hair like that.” He pointed to Chloe’s blond curls.
Adam felt a spark of hope.
“Do you remember her name? Or anything else about her.”
“Not really. She wasn’t there long, and she didn’t come into the room much. She looked scared a lot. Maybe Tobias was strict with her too.”
“Do you remember her name?”
Casey thought again, chewing on a fingernail. “It sounded funny. I only ever heard it once or twice. It was like… laces.”
“Could it have been Lacie?”
He nodded. “That sounds like it. But it was a very long time ago. Before Duncan. A lot before Duncan.”
Adam’s hopes fell at that. There was one connection, one overlap, but it sounded like she’d been gone even before Fenrir’s Warriors had started looking. He’d given them the name Lacie along with the others. Another dead end.
“Thanks, Casey,” he said, trying to mask his disappointment.
Xander and Chloe ran over. “Can we watch a movie?”
“Why not,” Adam replied, getting to his feet. “Would you like to join us, Casey?”
“What’s a movie?” the Omega asked, clambering to his feet and brushing off the bits of grass that clung to his clothes.
“It’s a lot of fun. Why don’t you come inside and see?”
It would be one of many firsts for Casey in the coming weeks.