Chapter 7
DIANA
The walk to confront Judge is anything but comforting. This place once used to feel so homey, so much like a sanctuary, but now my bubble of pretending I’m a beta feels more fragile than ever. If we ever get an alpha, none of us omegas ever treats them.
Here I am, waltzing on in.
My hand slides into my pocket, where I have a few of the pills lying there. I don’t want to take any of them now because I’ll smell like suppressants. There’s a sweet spot where I don’t smell like chemicals and also don’t smell like an omega, so I usually take them at night for that reason.
But I’m not above popping these in if I need them. I’m sure I’ll come up with some kind of story.
It’s like walking through a nightmare when, through a window, I spot a few bikes in the front courtyard, Dominion men and women standing at the entrance.
When I approach the hall with the Emerald room, it reeks of Dominion.
Of leather. They all stand outside the room, with Maggie standing by the door.
She clears her throat and motions to the ones who look back at her that they need to leave. Slowly, they all pile out, and I try everything within me to not look at a single one of them.
Maggie steps forward, rolling a tray of medical supplies with her. “You will go first,” she says, nodding to Selene. “He said the smaller one will go second. Selene, you will administer the penicillin. Diana, you will tend to his twisted foot and re-bandage his wounds.”
I throw a look at her like she’s personally wounded me. Why the fuck can’t I give a shot? That’s fast enough for me to get it done in a single breath hold. “It’s his orders,” she clarifies.
“Is he safe to be near? From the blight?” I ask, like it’s one last lifeline. “Like, can it affect us in any way that he was recently in there?”
“You’re safe from it,” Maggie affirms.
I clench my fists so tight because this dick fuck thinks he seriously can control me like this? Make us all bend to him? Selene doesn’t hesitate and rolls in with her gaze low, the door shutting behind her. The windows that one could peer through are covered with blinds.
Breathing rapidly, I completely zone out, unaware of the world around me as I clench my jaw.
I shudder with a slight gasp when the door opens, darting my gaze around in a panic.
Selene’s chest rises and falls like she just got confirmation that her patient lived.
“Okay, done. Trolley is in there.” She places her hand on my shoulder. “I love you, Diana.”
“Love you, too,” I say, the words choking me. I haven’t said that to someone in a very long time, and yet it comes out easily this time.
Selene leans into me. “There’s a benz injection at the bottom of the trolley.”
That helps me focus, clinging desperately to that out.
Opening the door, the room reeks of alpha.
I mean, just stained with him. His head is back on the bed like he’s fucking comfortable.
The first thing I examine is that he does actually seem chained to the bed with his left hand, while the right one is free.
That doesn’t count! He can grab me with that!
The door shuts behind me, and we both make eye contact.
His face is as I expected—rugged and weather-worn. A deep scar splits his brow, and his jaw is dusted with uneven stubble. But his eyes are the worst part, as they are a cold, pale gray. Abnormal color.
He doesn’t leer or smile. He just watches me like I’m the one chained to the wall. Judge rotates one arm slightly, testing the chain’s slack. No grunting or screaming like most do when they realize they’ve been bound.
And that’s the part that gets me. The stillness.
Of the man who terrifies so many without lifting a finger. The kind of alpha who rewrites a city just by breathing in its air.
I glance at his form. That twisted ankle is wrapped, and the gash across his stomach is deep enough that thick bruising surrounds it—probably infected with how it’s raised, red and swollen.
His shoulder’s torn up like he got dragged through shrapnel, and there’s a hematoma rising behind his ear.
A concussion, for sure. And even then, the way he rests there doesn’t feel like a man who has been broken.
It’s just a temporary setback.
Alphas like him aren’t made normal. They’re made wrong, by war and greed and the systems that kept letting them rise. Then, the bastard smirks, like he’s proven something he was curious about.
He’s a monolith to many. No room for emotion, especially not in public. And yet his omega would see it all. Make her way underneath all those layers, even if he didn’t want her to.
He will need her.
If there’s any humanity in him, maybe I can plead to it.
“I was told I am here to clean your wounds and tend to your ankle,” I say with a cracking voice.
His head tilts. “That’s a place to start.”
I roll the cart closer, thinking about the injection I might need, looking at his free hand. “That doesn’t count as chained,” I say, clearing my throat. My heart is pounding relentlessly, but I need to treat him like he’s just another patient.
His brow perks as his head slightly juts out, a small smile on his face. “What?”
“That hand is free.”
“I’m chained here, so you know I can’t get off this bed.” He shakes his head slightly. “I’m not chaining myself entirely, nurse.”
“Fine,” I grunt. “I’ll start with your foot, then.” It feels bizarre taking care of Judge. The closer I get, the more it’s like I’m living in an alternate dimension.
He’s driving me crazy because I can’t help the way his stupidAA smell is stronger than I’ve ever encountered, something primal in me screaming that I need to behave in front of such an alpha.
His musk is iron with something darker beneath, balanced with the sweetness of vanilla, like it will keep the calloused man gentle…
Ignoring him to the best of my ability, I start unpacking tools—sanitizer, stitching thread, gauze, salve, injectable pain relief.
Then, the medication Selene mentioned.
His chest rises and falls as I start to unbandage his right foot.
Which means not his shifting foot. Makes sense he was able to get here on his bike.
And I must be really fucking lonely because even the sight of his leg is doing something weird to me.
It’s the hair, the muscles, the scars, the litter of tattoos.
He’s as alpha as they get, and since I plan to run after this, it’s almost like a cruel joke to show me I could have found an alpha somewhere out there. That I would like it.
I’d never rest, though. I’d always fear for my alpha, worrying about monsters like Judge.
“You’re much more apprehensive than the other,” he states.
I know I am supposed to be hating him. Disgusted. But my omega side can’t help but focus on his sultry voice. The sound biology gave him when it decided to make one of the most impressive alphas in all of the wastelands—stop! Oh, I fucking hate being a slave to this.
No, this is all for the best.
I need to get to the Black Mirage and wipe my entire body clean of these hormones.
“I’ve been given the more comprehensive task,” I reply.
Or, you take over cities, kill people, and implement your rule of law. What else did you expect?
“So you’re not confident in your work?”
I nearly drop the bandaging, because fuck this asshole. At this point, he’s asking to be stabbed. “I watched you take over New Bunker with violence. It was the opposite of comforting.”
“You’re welcome.”
I’m nearly gritting my teeth when I say, “You’re lucky we take care of any and all.”
When he shifts to tilt his head, I nearly jump back as if he’s covered in poison, out of fear that he’s coming for me. “If you say you were in New Bunker, why were you there?”
I start working quickly, not giving a shit if it’s a piss poor job. It’s not like I’ll be around to see the aftermath. “Well, why’d you stomp a man’s chest in?” I quip back without a falter.
“Pft. Idiot attacked me. That was his fault.” His tone is more clipped, and there’s an edge to it that rolls into a growl.
Something in my body comes into harmony at the gruff noise, and my eyes widen when I realize I need to hurry up.
“Why were you in New Bunker, nurse? I know you visited Hozier. Were you looking for a very specific, small pill?”
Be bold. Don’t be an omega. He definitely knows we wanted suppressants.
I glance up at him as I give the final wrap.
“Obviously. Because someone out here is banning them, and we have a facility that takes care of all. If anyone is here for a prolonged period, they need more than we have. Maggie needs her own, too, given she’s an alpha. ”
“You do it for others,” he chides, narrowing those dark, scarred brows. “Other omegas?”
“They have a right to be treated,” I defend, briefly examining the neck tattoo of a skull with two daggers piercing it, encompassing the majority of his skin. “They exist just like the rest. It’s not shocking they come here.”
“Sweetheart, I’m not here because I have rocks in my brain,” he comments.
Even the way his scarred lips move, with a slight scruff on his cheeks and jaw, is making my head spin.
“We give you a calculated amount, which means if you need more, it’s because you have more omegas here than the random one that stumbles in. ”
The logic side of my brain prevails, as it always does. “Don’t call me that. You may call me nurse.”
“What’s wrong?” he asks, giving a crooked grin to reveal relatively straight teeth, with only a few slightly off.
“Don’t like when an alpha tries to calm an omega?
” My heart drops, and I scoot back slightly like I’ve just lost all sense of dignity.
He grins darkly. “Oh, I can smell that, nurse,” he comments, those eyes growing cold and dark.
“You’re coated in the tang of suppressants, but I know a fucking omega when I scent one.
I’m here to collect the omegas that work here before they flee. One of them already tried.”