Chapter 4 #2
“Excuse me?” Freezing mid-shoulder-roll, Maryanne’s eyes widened.
Dumbstruck that he was so unmoved, her jaw ticked.
Her eye twitched. “What do I want? I’d like to take a shower…
but I can’t, can I? I can’t even get up to pee!
I can’t look away from these screens or the data relay for one second.
I’ve had to watch this absolutely disgusting crap escalate—because if I don’t, Jules will die! ”
Enunciating every word as if she were truly a simpleton, Shepherd let her see just how tolerant he was being of her meltdown, and just how close that grace was to ending. “Stop wasting my time with theatrics and speeches, Maryanne, and get to the point. What. Do. You. Want?”
To slap him. Really, really hard.
But that would be an even more painful death than the one that might be awaiting her if she couldn’t convince him to listen.
Drawing in a deep breath, Maryanne put fingertips to temples, as if rubbing little circles on that hollow flesh might do more than remind her that she was covered in a layer of grease and absolutely disgusting.
Which made her all the more angry. Because she knew he knew exactly why she had called him there.
Why she had waited until it got this bad to make her pitch.
Because Shepherd’s mind was fucking terrifying, and those menacing eyes could see right through her.
So why make her work so hard for it?
This was the only way to save Jules.
Her laugh was brittle, a woman at her wits’ end.
“Send me to Bernard Dome. Right now. This very second. And give me all the equipment I want. All of it. And weapons. And Georges Gerard. He knows Bernard Dome’s physical systems inside and out.
The ventilation, the power grid, the maintenance tunnels—everything I can’t cover while running surveillance and analysis.
Tell Central an influx of Omegas is arriving so they’ll let me land. ”
The movement deliberate, controlled, Shepherd unfolded his arms and placed his palm flat against the console’s edge.
Leaning over her, so close she could smell his soap under Claire’s slick and the unfortunate drying cum in his pants.
He held her eyes, made her tolerate the intensity of such a gaze, so she could hide nothing as he rumbled out a mean, “One word that there is a ship of Omegas en route to Central, and you’ll have hundreds, if not thousands, of Alphas lined up to fight over them.
Disenfranchised, angry males who have been denied their favorite sexual outlet for weeks.
Attempt to disembark without said Omegas…
and a mob will rip you apart.” He leaned just a hair closer, casting a shadow dozens of screens could not overcome.
“How many females have you chosen to traffic in this scheme to get out of your comfortable prison?”
“It’s not like that!” Shoving away from the console, her chair rolling back to slam against the wall, Maryanne faced off against her lingering hunched nightmare. “This—this isn’t about me! This is about Jules!”
“Is that what you’re telling yourself?” Rising like a mountain to tower over her, Shepherd looked down his nose at her.
As if she were just as selfish and grotesque as she had always been.
“Hidden under all your false outrage lingers hope that I might not notice the tremor of anticipation in your voice. That I would only smell fear, and filth, and rotting food in your room, not excitement. That I might fail to register the manic glimmer in your eye… the dream you’re clinging to that if you help Jules win the war, maybe, just maybe, you’ll have a new life.
Prestige. A fresh start far away from me.
Out of the shelter I have offered you. Away from my control. ”
Sputtering, she could offer no more than “I don’t—”
Knocking against her breastbone, Shepherd gave her three hard taps with his finger. Each sharp and mean, shaking her ribcage. “And you can help him hold Bernard Dome. You can help him conquer it. You know that, and you’ve weighed the potential payoff. Otherwise, you would never risk your neck.”
How dare he! After all the hours she’d slaved, after all the plots she foiled! “Millions of people in Bernard Dome will die when civil war breaks out. With my knowledge of the players and my skillset, they—”
“Will still die. But you’ll be on the winning side, ready to reap the spoils.”
Her voice failed. Maryanne pulled at her hair as if she might rip his accusations right out of her mind.
And then she glared. She glared with all her selfish human heart might offer.
“Yes! With my help, Jules will live. And he will have his Dome and his mate. And you will have your satellites. And I will have a new life… and I’ll be a fucking hero. Without me, he will die.”
“Perhaps.” Delivering his decree in a sinister pitch, the shadow of death itself, Shepherd spoke as softly as the ugliest sin. “How many females have you selected?”
“Thirty.” Her eyes widened at her own voice, at how natural the confession sounded on her tongue. And there it was. The truth. And with it, she could no longer meet his eyes or feign outrage at his condemnation.
Guilty tears streaked down Maryanne’s face, carving paths through days of accumulated grime, as she sold her soul for a second chance in life. “Thirty women that your Followers have shown no interest in. Thirty that are not particularly smart, well-connected, or useful.”
“Only thirty?” Every word was both punishment and a lesson.
A reminder that she might have lived her life playing petty games, but this was not a game.
It was war. And he’d already seen how loyal she had been to the cause when it came to her own skin.
“Why stop there? Do you think your upcoming actions in Bernard Dome will only cost the lives and dreams of thirty innocents? No, Maryanne. You need to inspire chaos. Take a hundred. I’m sure you have files already queued. ”
“No…” Shaking her head, Maryanne outright refused, pressing her lips together, suddenly looking so young. “I’m not taking one hundred women to suffer in Bernard Dome.”
Voice soft, almost conversational, Shepherd gave her his final lesson. “If you’re not willing to sacrifice one hundred innocent people to save millions, you are useless to Jules.”
Her hair hung lank and dull, unwashed for days, curtaining her face as she bent forward and began to sob into her hands.
The Alpha female was as pathetic on the outside as she felt inside and tried to tell herself she was not a bad person.
That there was a higher good. That Bernard Dome’s Betas had been enslaved, justifying in her mind that they should be free.
That so many more would suffer if she did not take this chance.
And that she deserved a real life. That she would earn it and make the scales even.
Tremor in her voice, Maryanne accepted his terms. “I’ll… I’ll take them.”
“And you will give ten unsuspecting women an overdose of fertility drugs once on board. Ten, Maryanne.” With a pat on her head like she’d been a good dog, Shepherd gave the order.
“You will need a riot on the landing pad to get your equipment and Georges Gerard to safety unseen. And wipe that mess off your face. Jules won’t have the time or inclination to tolerate your theatrics like I do. You leave in one hour.”
It was too much, far too much sin to ask her to bear. “You’re a monster.”
An acknowledged one with no shame… none at all. “Altruism doesn’t exist in people like you, Maryanne. Just as it doesn’t exist in me. Don’t waste time trying to sell yourself on a lie.”
With a sweep of her arm across her desk, plates, stale food, and weeks of scribbled intel went flying. Rot splattered the floor. Secrets she’d worked herself to the bone to collect scattering like trash. “I’M NOTHING LIKE YOU!”
Shepherd’s eyes dared sparkle, his mouth twitching as if amused, as he turned toward the unlocked door to leave. “On many levels, you’re exactly like me. Just exponentially weaker in mind and body.”