Knot My Break (Knot My…Omegaverse #2)

Prologue

LANI

Why is it always the smallest things that push us past our breaking point?

My father’s footsteps are slow and heavy behind me, slurred curses hissing from his vile mouth as he crashes into furniture in his inebriated state.

His scent – bitter whiskey, sweat, and something rancid with anger – clogs my throat, making it hard to breathe.

Tears make my vision blurry as I race through the house, seeking the sanctuary of my bedroom.

I’ve endured far, far worse at his hands, but tonight something in me has snapped. The tiny proverbial straw that broke the mighty camel’s back.

But even as the tears stream down my face and I hope that the flimsy pathetic lock on my door holds him back for a few seconds, I’m actually praying that what my father’s just told me isn’t true. Somehow.

Please let it be a lie.

Frantically, I drag items out from under my bed until there’s a space large enough for me to crawl through.

I wiggle on my belly, the cheap, threadbare carpet scratching at my stomach where my top has ridden up.

Something instinctive screams at me to find shelter, to disappear – instincts I was always told were theoretical, vestigial, something my body would never actually need. But I have nowhere to run.

In the far back corner of my room, I peel back the carpet and lift the loose floorboard. Maybe my father is lying, but that doesn’t explain how he knows about my secret hiding place.

With dread pooling heavy in my gut, I reach down and retrieve the small, battered tin that once housed my mother’s sewing kit.

I can’t sew to save my life, but I couldn’t bear to part with it either.

I have so little of her left – besides our shared similarities in our looks, and the designation my father insists I was never meant to inherit – that I cling to whatever memories I can salvage.

Too impatient to crawl out from under the bed, I prise open the lid from my hiding place.

My breath catches. My mother’s scent should still be there, even faintly – warm sandalwood and sweet jasmine, a comfort that used to soothe my instincts as a child.

But it’s gone. Overpowered by the acrid scent of my father’s intrusion.

Dismay punches me in the throat so hard I forget to breathe. A sick wave of realisation crashes over me.

Not only have all my savings gone – my ticket out of here in the autumn – but my father, in his unbearable cruelty, has even gone so far as to replace my savings with three tiny brass buttons.

Worse somehow, is that my application to Alderbridge university, renowned for protecting and supporting unbonded omegas, has also been taken.

Yes, I could get another application form. But that’s not the point. Without the funds to go, the missing paperwork sends a clear message: I’m trapped here. I’ll never escape my father’s hold over me.

I’m just a science experiment to him. Something to be measured and monitored.

Charts pinned to the fridge. Blood taken too often.

Pills I was told would keep me stable. Injections he called preventative.

Something to be poked and prodded, suppressed and studied.

A commodity to be sold to the highest bidder when he proves his theory works.

He always said my body was a success story. Proof that nature could be overridden. That fate could be corrected – before it ever had a chance to go wrong.

A painful sob breaks free from my chest, raw and despondent, at the same time my bedroom door crashes open, banging into the wall behind.

The sharp scent of whiskey and rage fills my space, making my stomach churn.

My body locks up, something screaming in protest as my father grabs my ankle and pulls me out from beneath the bed.

A shudder wracks through me – pure, primal fear taking hold.

There’s no hiding the tears on my cheeks or the pain in my eyes.

This is so much worse than his fists.

He’s stolen my future. My dream of a better life. My hope.

Now I finally have nothing.