Chapter 41
Gage
“Sh-she’s what?”
Olly swallows audibly. “Pregnant.”
“And you’re certain?”
He nods. “One hundred percent. I’ve rerun the tests a half dozen times, and it’s the same every time.”
Auryn’s pregnant. Our ome–our alpha. Pregnant.
She’s pregnant.
I want to respond, to give Olly some much-needed reassurance. I’m sure he’s freaking out just as much as I am right now, but I’m in charge; I’ve got to make sure everyone else is okay before I can allow myself the leisure of losing my shit.
I’m in charge. “Well, have you told her yet?”
Olly’s face turns bright red. “No.”
Crap. That means I’ve gotta break the news to her. “Well, she’s going to be disappointed that she’s going to miss tonight’s raid. If we didn’t need all available hands on deck, I’d suggest you stay here to keep her company.”
“But Gage, she–”
“Yeah, I know, but we can barely spare Auryn. We can’t spare you, too.”
“No, Gage, that’s not what I was trying to say.”
He stands up straighter and takes a deep breath. “Auryn won’t stay. You know this as well as I do.”
Well now he’s just being silly. “We’re not taking a pregnant woman on such a dangerous mission. Guns blasting, a dozen knotless alphas waiting to gut us, Sneed … We can’t bring her. It’s as simple as that.”
“She’s an alpha in her own right, Gage. She deserves the chance to get her revenge, just like Em does.”
What the hell is going on? First he says Auryn’s pregnant, then Olly is … standing up to me? I don’t get it. “Olivander, it’s too risky.”
“What’s too risky?”
Diego wanders in, hands in his pockets, looking as relaxed as he can given that he’s already geared up for the mission. “What’s too risky, boss? We come up on a snag in the plan?”
“I’ll say. Olly says Auryn’s pregnant, but he’s not listening when I say she’s gotta stay put.”
My second-in-command throws his head back and laughs. “You think you can stop her, jefe? I love you, Gage, but my money’s on Auryn. She’s a pistol, and you’re already hesitating. She’ll kick your ass nine ways to Sunday, and we’ll end up leaving you here instead of her.”
Has everyone lost their damn minds? “But Diego, she’s–”
“Smart, capable, and determined. Just accept that you’re outnumbered here, Gage, and let’s get this show on the road.”
He pats my shoulder and wanders back out, shaking his head and chuckling.
“He’s going to tell her, isn’t he?”
Olly nods. “Yep. And he’s right, you know. We can’t keep her from this.”
Great. Not only is the woman I love pregnant, but no one seems inclined to convince her to hold back from a dangerous, life-threatening mission because of it. Am I the only one here who’s sane?
Since I’m getting nowhere with Olly and Diego, I figure I’ll go to the source. Maybe Auryn’s maternal instincts will kick in, and it’ll knock some sense into her.
I’m only a few seconds behind Diego, but somehow when I leave the lab he’s already long gone. When I finally find them in the training room with Emmett, Auryn’s beet red with her tiny hands balled into fists at her sides as Diego hugs Em, who looks like he’s just been given the most shocking news of his life.
I suppose that might be the case. After Sneed’s men mangled him, he might have assumed he’d never be a father. That still might be the case; it’s probably way too early to tell which one of us sired Auryn’s baby. It could be any of us.
Striding up to the trio, I focus my attention on Auryn. “Auryn, baby, I know this is a lot to take in, but if you just listen, I–”
The smack she delivers to my face reverberates in the training room.
What the hell? “Auryn?”
She puts a hand on her hip and points a finger in my face with the other hand. “If you think I’m hanging back because of this, you’re nuts. Sneed and his men did things to me that I can’t even put words to. They altered my DNA. Whether you approve or not, I’m going along tonight, and I’ll kill Sneed with my own two hands, pregnancy be damned. If you even try to stop me, if you so much as lift a finger to keep me here, I’ll make sure you join him in a shallow grave.”
Her vehemence startles me, but more than that, her words humble me.
Auryn’s right. I can’t understand what Sneed did to her, can’t really ever comprehend. Nobody can, except maybe Em.
I look at Emmett, who stares defiantly back at me.
Fuck. I’m outnumbered four to one.
My shoulders sink as I sigh with resignation. “Fine. But the second Sneed’s dead, we’re torching the place and booking it back home.”
To my surprise, Auryn stretches up on her toes and kisses my cheek. “I knew you’d see reason eventually. Don’t worry. Everything will work out. We’ll rescue the omegas, kill Sneed, and be home in time for one of Diego’s delicious breakfasts.”
It all sounds a little too simple when she puts it that way, but I can’t argue. What’s the point? No one’s on my side, and I’d rather take extra precautions tonight than alienate Auryn and the others by being obstinate. At least this way, she’s in my sights. If I try to force her to stay, she’ll just go on her own, which would be ten times more dangerous.
“Well … we might as well get going. Sneed’s not getting any deader.”
To our surprise, the tunnel Auryn snuck out of is bigger than we all expected. We don’t really have to dig to fit, which bugs me. If this tunnel was really that big before, how did Sneed and his men not know it was there?
The dirt doesn’t look freshly upturned. It all seems like it’s been this way for weeks, at least as long as Auryn’s been with us. My hackles raise regardless, and I ready my weapon for whatever lies on the other side of the tunnel. Something smells rotten here, and it’s not just the stench of blood, vomit, and other assorted bodily fluids coming from the basement beyond.
Emmett goes first, followed by Diego and Auryn. Olly and I bring up the rear, and after an hour of crawling, we emerge in a musty rock-walled cell. The rusty barred door hangs on one hinge. It’s bent inward, like someone tried to break in rather than out. For some reason, that bothers me even more.
We check the cell, but there’s nothing here. No evidence of other omegas being held here, nothing but dried blood, tattered fabric scraps, and a battered bucket full of excrement. That must have been what Sneed gave Auryn to use as a toilet. I clench my gun tighter, hoping to God that Auryn makes that bastard die a slow death.
Past the cell door, we find row after row of small, cramped rooms. Each holds a terrified omega–or are they alphas? Since Auryn’s body chemistry has been altered, it stands to reason that some of these omegas might have started out as alphas, too. We’ll have no way to be certain unless Olly does tests, though, and there’s no time for that.
All in all, we discover five captive women. Olly herds them back through the tunnel while the rest of us press on.
The lack of guards or any other inhabitants is suspicious. Will we turn the next corner and find another wall of alphas like we did last time? Something’s wrong. I feel it in my gut.
As we move through the labyrinthine basement, the odor of rot and decay becomes almost unbearable. We all cover our mouths and noses, but it’s no use. The stench permeates no matter what we do. Auryn gags, and I pat her back. “Keep going. We can’t stop now.”
“I’m not planning on stopping,”
she hisses through gritted teeth. “I’m planning on puking the second this is over.”
Fair enough.
Two turns later, we come across a gruesome sight, and I silently commend Auryn for holding her stomach contents through it all.
In a large, crude chamber filled with exam tables and filthy equipment, Sneed’s pack of knotless alphas lie strewn about, stripped naked, their bullet-ridden bodies lying face-down on the ground.
What the hell? Was there a shootout? I don’t see any guns on the bodies, but I can’t fathom that Sneed would annihilate his own men. It doesn’t make sense.
Then again, nothing about this mission is making sense.
“Dios!”
Diego crosses himself and steps into the room, kneeling next to the closest body and looking it over. “They’ve been dead for a while. Possibly since we left last time, but I can’t be sure without Olly here to test them.”
“He killed his own pack …”
Auryn’s voice is hushed. She knows Sneed better than any of us, but she seems as surprised as the rest of us at the carnage here.
“That’s not the worst of it,”
Diego says as he rolls the body over. “He mutilated them. Looks to be postmortem.”
I’m not a squeamish man. I’ve seen some shit in my day, but the mangled crotch of the Orion alpha is almost gruesome enough to make me vomit. Whatever Sneed used to sever the man’s genitals, it wasn’t sharp.
“Jesus!”
Emmett gags, but he manages to hold his stomach contents. “That’s even worse than what he had done to me.”
“But why?”
Auryn asks.
A voice echoes from the far chamber, and a figure emerges from the darkness.
“Because, dear five-seven-six, they were a threat to my plans. I can’t have rival alphas running around impregnating my omegas. This is my pack, my house. I am the top alpha here, and now, thanks to your success and my own augmentations, we can finally start rebuilding the Orion pack to its former glory.”
Sneed Orion remains half in the shadows, but from what I can see, he’s as naked as the men lying dead around us. His chest bleeds from a savage tear, like he ripped something from his own skin.
“You’re not rebuilding anything with Auryn,”
I say, taking a stance in front of her to shield her with my own body if necessary. “And you’re not going to have much luck with your other omegas, seeing as how we’ve liberated them all. It’s time to admit that you’ve lost, Sneed.”
“Have I, though?”
He steps fully into the light, and I have to grab Emmett’s arm to keep him from bum-rushing the other alpha.
It’s bruised and swollen, oozing pus, but there’s no question.
Sneed’s wearing Em’s severed ring like it’s a Goddamned piece of dick jewelry.