Knot The One They Want

ORACLE POV

The glass barrier separating me from the outside world is smudged with greasy fingerprints and scratched from years of desperate hands pressing against it. I sit on a hard, cold metal stool, the chill seeping straight through the thin fabric of my orange jumpsuit. Across from me sits a man in a sharply tailored charcoal suit, his pristine silk tie looking entirely out of place in the grimy, oppressive stench of the central enforcement precinct’s visitation room.

He is a high-priced defense attorney. I do not even need to ask who hired him. It is deeply ironic, isn’t it? Torin is the one who had me dragged in here and locked behind bars in the first place, and now he is actively spending a small fortune trying to haul me back out.

The lawyer picks up a thick black pen, tapping it rhythmically against a stack of official legal documents spread out on his side of the metal counter. He speaks into the small wall-mounted intercom box, his voice coming through the tinny speaker near my ear.

"Mr. Spade, I have reviewed the initial arrest report and the formal charges filed against you," the lawyer says, his tone completely professional, devoid of any real warmth or emotion. "I will soon submit an appeal directly to the High Court regarding your case. Frankly, the state’s foundation is paper-thin. There was nowhere near sufficient evidence that would legally convict you of the crime of stabbing Lorali Alma. It was a domestic dispute with zero third-party eyewitnesses and a compromised crime scene."

I remain completely still, staring at the polished cuff of his suit sleeve.

"All I need from you today," he continues, sliding three stapled forms across the small desk gap toward the narrow slit beneath the glass, "is a signature on these three lines right here. Once you sign, I can submit them to the High Court immediately and initiate your bail application. We can have you out on electronic monitoring by tomorrow morning." I do not touch the pen he pushes through the slot. I do not even look down at the paper. "No," I say into the receiver, my voice dry and raspy from days of silence. "I am not signing anything."

The lawyer pauses, his hand hovering over his briefcase. He blinks, clearly unaccustomed to clients refusing freedom. "Excuse me? Mr. Spade, if you just sign the bail request—"

"I am not going anywhere," I cut him off, staring directly into his manicured face through the scratched glass. "I am staying right here. I am paying for my crimes."

He stares back at me as if I have completely lost my mind. And maybe I have. But even with a busted lip, a split chin, and two swollen black eyes from the yard fights, even with a crushed nose that throbs with every single breath I draw and a body covered in deep purple scars and angry bruises from the inmates who hate my surname, none of it matters. None of it can ever amount to the crushing, unbearable pain I have caused Lorali.

All of this carnage was born from my own cowardice. It was my reckless, unforgivable action of placing a crude bond mark on her neck in a moment of desperate territorial instinct, only to turn around and reject her right afterward because I could not man up to my own sins. I left her ruined. I left her stuck with a venomous bond.

I know what I have done now. Sitting in this cold cell for days with nothing but a small dim light, I spent every hour reading countless medical text books and ancient omegaverse physiological treatises provided by her as promised. I understand it all quite well now. I know exactly why she never left our penthouse during those agonizing six months she was being tormented by our pack.

It was because of that bond.

Chapter eight, paragraph nine of the classical text states it plainly: *If the weaker designation, usually the Omega, is rejected by an Alpha fated to her after the Alpha delivers a provisional bite but before the full pack bond is officially forged, it will create a venomous bond. The weaker designation will be physically and mentally incapable of moving a significant distance away from the Alpha who placed the mark. Until the bond is fully rectified or severed, the rejection will continue to spread its toxic venom deep inside the weaker designation’s bloodstream. This venom spreading will physically manifest in dark, vine-like veins branching outward across the skin from the point of entry.*

Lorali could not leave us even if she wanted to. My bite chained her to the very house that was breaking her spirit day by day. I unknowingly inflicted an unfathomable amount of physical torture on her. Because of that hideous reality, I deserve every single fist that hits my face in this courtyard. I deserve to rot in this prison cell where every guard and inmate is my sworn enemy.

And according to the medical books, the horror does not even stop there. She was missing for two full months before she resurfaced. According to the texts, there is only one crude, violent way to temporarily stop the spread of a venomous bond without the Alpha’s presence: the victim has to physically cut off the bonded skin where the bite was delivered and burn the open wound with hot iron to cauterize the nerves.

That is the only way she could have survived those two months away from me. She had to slice into her own neck and burn her own flesh to escape the poison I put inside her.

"Mr. Spade, please be reasonable," the lawyer’s voice crackles over the small speaker, snapping me out of the horror echoing in my own mind. He leans closer to the glass, tapping the paper hard with his finger. "You need to get out of this facility. Legally speaking, you are an innocent man until proven guilty in a court of law. Staying in a maximum-security remand facility when you have the resources to post bail is absolute madness."

"I am exactly where I need to be," I say coldly. "Take your papers and leave."

The lawyer’s composure finally cracks. A flush of red creeps up his neck, his eyes widening in pure agitation. "My job is kind of on the line here, Mr. Spade! You do not understand. If I do not get you out of this jail, Torin will literally have my head on a spike by sundown. He paid me a massive retainer to bring him signed bail forms today!"

I look at the sweating attorney, feeling nothing but a dull, hollow emptiness in my chest. I slowly place the plastic phone receiver back onto its heavy metal hook. "Tell Torin it was entirely my idea," I say aloud, knowing the heavy glass muffles my voice just enough. "Tell him he was very wise to send me here."

Without waiting for another word, I stand up from the cold stool. The metal legs scrape loudly against the concrete floor. I turn my back on the lawyer, pulling my bruised shoulders back as two heavy-set prison guards unlock the heavy iron door behind me. I step through the threshold, the thick iron door slamming shut with a heavy, final clang behind my back, locking me away where I belong.

---

TORIN POV

"What do you mean he refused to sign?" I snap into my cell phone, leaning my forearms heavily against the edge of my desk.

"Mr. Spade, I tried everything," the lawyer’s frantic voice echoes through the phone speaker. "I brought the High Court appeal documents directly to his visitation stall. I explained the lack of evidence. I had the bail structure completely laid out for him. But he flatly refused. He wouldn’t even touch the pen. He told me to leave him there. He said he is paying for his crimes."

I grip the sleek metal casing of my phone so hard my knuckles turn bone-white. Shock and sheer disbelief surge through my chest, making my jaw clench in raw frustration.

*What on earth is Oracle trying to do?*

Is he really refusing to accept my help simply because I was the one who handed him over to the enforcement officers in the first place? Is he trying to make some kind of twisted, self-righteous martyr out of himself? Is he actually mad enough to willingly stay in a filthy, dangerous prison cell surrounded by criminals who would love nothing more than to tear a lawyer like him apart?

I let out a harsh, exhausted breath, leaning back deep into the leather cushion of my high-backed office chair. I pinch the bridge of my nose, feeling a massive headache blooming behind my eyes.

"Listen to me very carefully," I command, my tone dropping into a low, non-negotiable growl. "I do not care if he refused to touch the pen. I am paying you to be the best legal mind in this territory. Find a legal loophole, file an emergency motion, and proceed with the High Court application without his explicit signature on those preliminary sheets. Get it done."

"I... I will see what the magistrate says, Mr. Spade, but without the client’s explicit consent—"

"Make it work," I bite out, and slam the end-call button on my screen before he can give me another list of excuses.

I toss the phone onto the desk pad with a dull thud. Stress tightens like a vise around my shoulders, radiating straight down my spine. I rub my tired eyes with the palms of my hands, sitting up straight to force my attention back onto the bright glow of my computer monitor.

I pull up the live market data dashboard. High-frequency trade lines zig-zag across the dark screen in bright neon green.

Against all reasonable odds, Spade Industries’ stock prices are steadily rising. The downward spiral from earlier this week has completely halted, replaced by a sharp, aggressive upward curve. The live press conference I gave hours ago did exactly what it was designed to do: it stunned the press, silenced the immediate corporate panic, and projected absolute, unyielding Alpha dominance to our nervous investors. By publicly claiming Lorali under the sacred authority of the Moon Goddess, I turned a potential legal and social disaster into a display of divine destiny that the public cannot easily dismantle.

A slight, fragile glimmer of hope flickers in my dark, chaotic world as I watch the numerical values tick up second by second. We are surviving. The company is holding its ground.

Yet, as I stare at the green numbers on the screen, my mind instantly shifts away from the stock market and lands squarely on Erin. Erin is the sole reason any of this was even possible. He was the one who dragged me out of my downward spiral, forced me out of that penthouse bedroom, and gave me the tactical blueprint to face the media storm head-on. But ever since we walked out of that press hall, he has been acting strange.

He looks dazed and is so quiet, he hasn’t said a word since the press conference, I know he is hiding something from me. I just don’t know what.

Sitting alone in the quiet expanse of my office, a cold feeling of dread slowly fills my stomach, heavy and uncomfortable. Erin never hides things unless the secret carries the weight of a catastrophe. I narrow my eyes, watching the green stock tickers rise on my screen, making a silent mental note to confront him the second he walks back through my office door. I will ask Erin what his problem is later.

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