Chapter 15 #2
“That is inaccurate. He kept you locked away and resentful. You exaggerate your influence, and that’s why you brought me here.
” It wasn’t said with malice, Brenya didn’t work that way.
But she absolutely struck a nerve, Lucia scowling as Brenya muttered, “You might be superior at sexual congress, and you might be experienced with politics, but I am the you keep pressuring for favors. And I am the one who will refuse.”
There was a moment of silence, and then there was hysteria—the Omegas collected facade unsustainable when confronted with Brenya’s deficiencies and perceived coldness.
“This ridiculous woman is who you think can help us?” It was the blonde who’d hung all over Jacques again, who’d given her all and still failed to win his favor.
“Lucia, we’re doomed! How is that going to be able to do anything?
My younger sister was eleventh on the list of potentials for Bernard Dome, Lucia!
She’s out there right now suffering Gods only knows what—”
“So are at least two of mine!” Lucia snapped back.
“So we keep our heads, and we… explain things to our Commodorina. It’s not her fault her brain is…
. This is new to her, so we practice patience, hmm?
We are the only other Omegas she’s ever met, and we were not exactly chosen for our gentleness, were we, girls?
We were chosen for our ambition. So be nice. ”
This was not the same Lucia from breakfast. This was not the woman from the elevator who had slapped her.
There were no performative speeches or sneering threats.
Not in that moment. She was floundering, but continued, “And Brenya here has been suffering separation sickness for weeks. Our Commodorina needs a proper meal; she needs sisterhood. So we serve her, or we get nothing.”
A snap of her fingers and Lucia began issuing orders, urgent and just as rude to them as she had always been to Brenya.
It all happened so fast: Brenya forced to sit upright, pushed into the plush back of her chair, a tray set on her lap that had to be balanced or spoil Annette’s fine rug. A spoon to her lips, so many hands patting and feeding and smoothing her hair.
The females worked like one many-armed machine.
A pack.
Even humming Omega song as they shoved some kind of green fruit down her throat and pressed a cup of spiced tea to her lips.
All while Lucia orchestrated the attack. “No, not that one, Gertrude. Look at her face. She doesn’t like the taste. Try the other one, the melon. Hurry up, we don’t have all day.”
In especially poor French, a petite brunette asked, “Can we cut hair?”
“Gods, yes. It’s too heavy at the ends.” Lucia crooked her finger at another one of the women, calling her over to wield the scissors.
“You should never grow it out, Commodorina. That neck needs to always be on display. Trust me on this. The more Commodore Havel sees the bite, the more he will obey.”
A snip and a hank of brown hair fell on Brenya’s lap, then another, the shock of what they were doing leaving Brenya wide-eyed and furious.
“No, Carmen. Do not remove her hideous outfit. That’s the Commodore’s blood.
It stays on her. Her nails. They are sharp and bloody, clean them.
No, no, do not let her feed herself. More tea.
We keep this up until she needs to urinate.
Let’s get all those hormones out of her system.
I cannot imagine the headache you have right now, Commodorina.
I told Jules he took it too far. You should have been taken to Jacques weeks ago.
You’re his mate; demand he take better care of you! ”
“Ouch! She bit me!” the blonde again… Gertrude… whined, sucking her finger to ease the sting.
In the midst of a nightmare of physical touch and overstimulation, the growl that came from Brenya’s chest, whatever that sound was, it made them stop.
And Lucia smiled like a proud puppeteer, taking the seat across from her with a flourish of her skirts and a beautiful smile.
“It’s natural, this response. You’ve been very sick, easy to manipulate all dazed and passive.
Omegas are not passive. We do not let the males rule us.
No. We bite back, Brenya. When they push you around, bite hard.
It reminds them they are puppies tussling at our feet.
It makes them wag their tails and sit up for more. ”
It was the first time Lucia had addressed Brenya by her name.
And that… that… got her attention.
“Waking up now, yes?” There was more, Lucia leaning closer and looking deep into Brenya’s eyes.
She even seemed to soften, only half the viper she usually was.
“No one is coming to save you. The guards are not interfering. If you think Commodore Havel did not influence and coerce, and—what is the word in your language?—massage the events that led to this entire meeting, then you are woefully outmatched by your mate, Brenya.” Reaching forward and threading her fingers through hers, Lucia gave her hand a little squeeze.
“He wants you to be here, or you wouldn’t be here.
He knows we are doing this. And yes, I will be punished for slapping you, but I really needed to do it.
I won’t even complain when he slaps back…
figuratively, of course. Havel would never actually hit me. ”
Jules had encouraged this encounter?
And he’d dressed her in the scratchy jumpsuit and taken her from her nest.
Ignored her terrified screams and hauled her off to Jacques.
Brenya suddenly salivated with the craving to bite him all over again. Harder this time.
Grinning, Lucia was tickled by whatever she saw in her face, but the rest of the females in the room were far entertained by something else.
The blonde giggled, glancing at Lucia under her lashes before going back to aggressively filing Brenya’s nails. “You hit her?”
“Yes, pretty hard.” Admitting it with a smirk, Lucia accepted the accolades she felt she deserved.
“Good,” Gertrude purred.
And then Lucia’s pretty eyes went right back to Brenya, explaining the unspoken rules of their kind.
“Had I hit you in secret, I would be dead now. But I slapped you with his soldiers watching. Hi, Andreas,” the foreign Omega said with a flirtatious smirk and wink toward one of the larger, unimpressed males positioned around the room.
A man that did not so much as glance Lucia’s way.
“It’s about intent, nena. The Commodore knows I don’t like you.
He knows you hate me. That’s why this will work. ”
But Brenya didn’t hate her. “I don’t—”
“Yes, you do. You just don’t want to admit such dark feelings live inside your perfect little want-to-be Beta brain, you innocent little bitch.
” Another squeeze of Brenya’s fingers, half gentle and half threatening, as Lucia softly added, “I say this with respect. I don’t think there was ever a time in my life that I was so…
guileless. I envy your simplicity. You envy my…
everything. But you need me. I need you. That is what we are. Family.”
No. What Brenya needed was to…
To…
She didn’t know, and that confusion made her feel very unsafe.
It led her to mutter, “I am the reason Ancil is dead.”
It wasn’t meant to be cutting. It wasn’t meant to be cruel. It was plain fact, spoken by Brenya as if reporting to her Overseer. Pair-bonds were tethers; they were fixtures. And Lucia’s had been destroyed. Which meant Lucia was broken. Her family was gone.
But not as broken as Brenya. “Jacques beat him to death because he hit me… just like you did.”
And there it was. The rage under all of Lucia’s act. There was the bloodlust, and she curled her lip and growled lowly, “Ironic, isn’t it?”
And then gone.
One blink and malice vanished as if it had never existed.
But Brenya wasn’t done, there was so much more to say. “You hurt Annette… for personal gain. And I find myself sometimes thinking about how you will die. It’s upsetting, the things I’ve imagined. I miss her.”
“Since you prefer not to filter your thoughts, I won’t either.
” With a toss of her dark hair, Lucia lowered her chin to her chest and sneered.
“Your friend was well-bred and trained, but she would never have been able to handle my Ancil long-term. He would have digested her slowly, made her life a living hell. Probably killed her before she hit forty. As I said, it takes an Omega to reign in an Alpha with that much… ambition.”
That word again. One of the most useless words for those born in Beta Sector.
“He was evil. Lucia, he—”