Chapter Three – Mercedes
The ballroom is an impressive, wide space decked out with chandeliers that give off enough light to make it feel like it’s daytime and not, you know, after dusk. The omegas are all situated at their own tables scattered throughout the room, their sponsors nearby. Waiters and waitresses bus between the tables, bringing out drinks and food, if it’s ordered.
There are enough alphas here tonight that multiple packs have to wait around until their turn with the omegas. It’s like a speed-dating night: alphas sit down at the tables, talk with the omega—drool over the omega—and then rinse and repeat. Musical chairs with an alpha and omega twist.
Since I wasn’t registered, I’m basically a ceremony crasher, my table is smaller and off to the side of the ballroom. You can tell it’s an extra folding table they had tucked away somewhere; the white tablecloth doesn’t quite fit and hangs closer to the floor.
Which is just fine with me. There are still plenty of alphas to go around. When they sit down across from me, the last thing they’re focused on is the table and how it doesn’t match the rest.
No, it’s typical alpha bullshit the moment they sit down. Four chairs on the opposite side of the table, allowing entire alpha packs to cloud me with their scents all at once. The organizer was right—most of them do smell good. Most of them smell nice enough that certain parts of me bristle and heat up, and it takes a wicked amount of restraint from me to ignore the way my thighs want to squeeze together.
The ballroom is a haze of pheromones, from both the visiting alphas and the omegas looking for a match. Damn near everyone here is attracted to everyone else. It’s just the way nature works. Biology at its finest.
There are so many conversations happening all at once in the ballroom that I can’t hear how the other omegas are handling the waves of alphas at their tables. I don’t know if I’m handling them differently or what, but based on the looks many give me after I ask the most important question of the night, I can safely assume no other omega is asking the same thing.
And what is that question?
“What do you want?” I ask the new pack of three alphas across from me. They’re handsome and tall, with muscles that make me want to get up and walk around this table so I can sit on one of their laps. Nothing too special, since that’s the typical alpha build.
The alpha in the center blinks at me. A blond with hair that has been neatly swept back and crisp blue eyes that a girl can easily get lost in. “What do I want?” he echoes the question, sounding confused. He isn’t the first to echo the question and give me a look that asks me if I’m all right in the head, and I doubt he’ll be the last. “Don’t you want to know who we are?”
I shake my head. “That depends on how you answer the question.”
He glances at his two packmates. The way the other alphas defer to him, I can tell he’s the top dog in their pack. Even among alphas, some are über alphas. What they say goes. They can assert their dominance on everybody, even other alphas. In a pack where alphas are supposed to be on the same level, it doesn’t surprise me they always wind up with a de facto leader.
When he finally answers, he speaks slowly, enunciating every word, “We want an omega to complete our pack. We want to shower our chosen omega with everything she needs and then some. We want someone to protect, love—” His answer is honest, which is more than I can say for a few other packs that were at my table previously.
And, you know, if I was a different girl, a different omega, I might swoon at his answer. I might sigh and flutter my eyelashes at him, let his honeyed words sweep me off my feet.
But I’m me, and I’m not looking for any of that.
“I’m so sorry, can you excuse me? I need to pee.” With that, I stand and start walking away, causing each of the alphas at my table to drop their jaws to the floor. I don’t have to look back to know they all watch as I walk away.
I’m not the only one in the restroom, so I don’t linger longer than I have to. That last pack wasn’t bad—their answer was fine enough, but I just… I don’t know. Handsome enough as they were, pretty faces and sweet words can only do so much. Could they protect me from Jay should he find me and try to get to me?
I… I just don’t know.
Standing in front of the sink, I must wear my emotions on my face, because the omega who comes out of another stall says as she moves beside me to wash her hands, “That bad tonight, huh?”
I give the omega a half-hearted smile. “Not bad, just…”
She soaps up her hands and scrubs under the running water. “Not what you wanted?” She wears a sparkling golden gown, looking like something plucked out of a movie about princes and princesses. She must be from another well-to-do family, an omega who knows nothing about what it’s like for the ones born with no name.
The ones who have nothing, like me.
All I can do is shrug.
She shrugs with me. “Hey, if you’re not feeling it, you’re not feeling it.” She finishes washing her hands and steps to grab a towel to dry off. “If your matches aren’t out there, don’t force it. This is my fifth one.” The way she says that last part so off-handedly makes me choke on air.
“What? Your fifth?” I can hardly believe it.
She shrugs again. “Yeah. Pretty crazy, right? My aunt’s been forcing me to come to these things ever since I turned twenty.”
“And you haven’t found a match yet?” The shock is plain in my voice; I can’t even hide it.
“No. I mean, sure, there are some delicious alphas, but eh. None that are my style, you know? I’m not just going to pick a pack to pick a pack. I hear the record for number of ceremonies is seven. It’d be fun to break it and become an Omega Garden legend.”
I can’t even imagine coming to seven of these things, let alone five. One is enough.
The omega gives me a warm smile. “Well, I hope you find whatever it is you’re looking for tonight. Good luck.”
As she walks away, I call after her, “You, too.” Although, maybe I shouldn’t be wishing her luck since she made the comment about breaking the record. I still can’t believe this was that girl’s fifth ceremony. Whoever she was, she definitely has to come from money. I can’t see a normal, run-of-the-mill family being okay with that many fruitless ceremonies.
Then again, what do I know about any family? Nothing.
I spend another minute or so in the restroom, pumping myself up to go back out there and rejoin the alphas at my table. For someone who always had a certain alpha watching over me, you’d think I’d be used to the thick pheromones—but honestly? Jay didn’t smell good to me. He smelled rancid, sour to the point where it was all I could do to not get ill when in his presence. Fighting him always proved stupid. I learned that many bruises ago.
I’m not proud of myself, but it comes to the point when you realize you have nowhere to go and no one who cares enough to protect you. You have to choose to keep going. The fire in me hasn’t been put out just yet.
When I finally walk out of the restroom and return to the ballroom, I find the alphas I left at my table have gone, probably given up on me while I was away. Which is fine; I wasn’t too smitten with them, anyways. Someone who wants an omega to cherish and protect would only be disappointed in me.
I want protection, yes, but I don’t want to be cherished. I don’t want to be kept like a prized possession. I want so much more for myself.
A sigh leaves me as I sit down in my chair and reach for my glass of water. I can’t order any food or anything else; it requires payment, which I don’t have. The other omegas have credit cards and sponsors who are willing to pay, but I am a broke ass bitch, for obvious reasons.
I don’t look at the other tables, at the other omegas and the alphas posturing for them. It’s only a matter of time until another pack sits down across from me and the silence of my table is broken, so I should try to enjoy this moment of relative quiet.
It takes less than a minute for an alpha to sit across from me, and a second alpha to sit beside him. The second alpha drags his chair a bit, angling it towards the first alpha, and when I look at him, I find he’s not even looking at me—he’s busy surveying the room.
Hmm. Maybe he doesn’t even want to talk to me.
“Hi.” A gentle, masculine voice speaks, and I meet the eyes of the other alpha… and just like that, my senses are hit with a wave of recognition. The scent of warm, caramelized sugar fills my nostrils, and I immediately recognize the alpha across from me as the one who helped me get in the front door.
I sit a little straighter, though I don’t know why.
The alpha who said hello smiles at me, a warm gesture. He radiates something the other alphas I’ve met tonight didn’t, something that pulls me in instinctively. Handsome, with a clean-cut square jaw and a head of thick, short brown hair. His eyes are a pure black, but they don’t feel cold. No, they’re warm and inviting. He wears a simple black suit with a white undershirt, the suit hugging his muscles like the fabric was made to put him on display. If I have to guess, I’d say he’s in his mid-twenties.
He’s hot, okay? He’s very hot.
And the alpha next to him isn’t bad either, even if he won’t look at me for longer than two seconds at a time. This one looks a bit older than the first by a couple years. His hair is a pitch-black hue, though the light from above gives it an almost bluish tint. His eyes are a watery azure, piercing and cold. He wears an all-black suit, with a black undershirt and a black tie, making him look quite devilish.
Aware it’s been too long, I finally greet the alpha across from me with my own awkward, “Hi.”
“The omega from the door,” the alpha says, flashing me a set of perfectly straight white teeth. Dimples deepen on his cheeks as he studies me, taking in my dress, my hair, my makeup; everything about me.
It was a lot easier to act aloof before, but for some reason, I feel like someone blindfolded me and spun me around, over and over. The world suddenly feels discombobulated.
“You’re beautiful,” he compliments easily, and he sounds so earnest. I want to believe him. I want to believe everything he says. “But I knew that even when you were wearing that hoodie. I’m Nic, and this is Warren.” He points to the man beside him, the one who won’t look at me for too long.
“I’m Mercedes.” Believe it or not, it’s the first time I gave my name to an alpha tonight. This one has me so caught off-guard, I’m thrown off my game of asking them what they want.
“Mercedes,” the alpha across from me echoes, and the way my name sounds on his tongue is unlike anything I ever heard. It damn near causes a chill to sweep up my spine, and it takes everything in me to hide my body’s reaction. “A name I could get used to saying.”
I shift my eyes to Warren, finding the other alpha’s blue eyes are on me—and staring holes in me—until I meet his intense stare, and then he quickly looks away.
As if sensing my confusion over his packmate’s standoffish behavior—because typically alphas want to be here and find an omega for their pack—Nic says, “Don’t mind him. He’s… uh, not in a very good mood tonight, but if you become ours, he’ll grow on you, I promise.”
Personally, I don’t understand how this guy can make a promise like that to someone he doesn’t even know, but I keep those thoughts to myself. “He seems intense,” I say.
“Oh, he is. If there’s one thing Warren does well, it’s intensity.” He laughs softly, and then, when he thinks I must not be looking, he kicks the nearest leg of Warren’s chair, causing Warren to give me a smile.
Although, his smile comes off more like a crazed, maniacal grin than anything else.
Nic opens his mouth to say something, but I cut in, finally in my right mind, “Let’s cut to the chase so we don’t waste any time. What do you want?”
Out of everything Nic could’ve said, I can frankly say his response is one I don’t expect, and one I didn’t get from any other alpha so far tonight: “What do you want?”
I only blink at him, and then I say, “I asked what you want.”
“Yes, and then I asked you what you want. I want to know.” He leans forward, dark eyes bright as they zero in on me, as if the entire ballroom has faded around us and it’s just us at this table. “What do you want, Mercedes?”
There are so many things I could say, so many things that would be true. I could also lie and tell him what I think he wants to hear: the typical omega desires of a pack who will dote on her and worship the ground she walks on.
But I never wanted any of that, and I won’t start wanting it now, so I simply say a single word: “Freedom.”
Now it’s Nic’s turn to be taken aback. For a few moments, we sit there, staring at each other, neither one of us saying a word more. The way he looks at me, I can tell he’s sizing me up anew, like he’s finally realizing there’s more to me than meets the eye. I’m like an onion, with lots and lots of layers, only with an omega’s scent, and not, you know, onion-y. Even Warren is looking at me now, his intense gaze a little less terrifying.
Since I can’t take the silence anymore, I repeat my question, “What do you want?”
The smile Nic gives me is an easy one, and it lights up his eyes in an effortless way. “If you would’ve asked me that ten minutes ago, I would’ve given you a different answer, but now… let’s just say I know exactly what I want.”
The breath that escapes me right then is a hard, heavy one, as if, subconsciously, I know exactly what he’s going to say—and yet, when he finally says it, it still knocks the wind out of me.
“You.”