Chapter 5
Broken Basement, The Institute
It must have been hours since the guards took Millie, although it’s hard to tell time stuck in this cell without windows or a watch.
Lark is still growling.
He’s marching from one side of the cell, tightly coiled. One of his arms is wrapped around his chest like his ribs are cracked.
I’ve never seen an Omega look as tall or as dangerous.
Or as distressed, even if he’s attempting to hide it with his rage.
Fletcher must have ordered that Lark be parted from his daughter.
My ex did this.
What if Lark discovers that truth?
Sweat drips down my neck. I struggle to push myself up to rest my back against the hard wall.
Lark’s heavenly scent has turned sharp with his rage, flooding the cell and making me wince.
I wince even more, when I study Lark’s face. His right eye is swollen, and there’s a deepening bruise along his fine cheekbone.
Lark actually fought the Betas!
Admiration surges through me.
Would my mom have fought for me?
I don’t know.
I’ve always been taught that Omegas should accept what Alphas and Betas decide is best for them.
Yet Lark hasn’t.
I never craved to be a mom like I was told Omegas were meant to. I wanted to stay by Thomas and Gabriel’s side and work with them. It didn’t make sense that I couldn’t.
I like Millie, and it makes a happiness that I can’t explain light through me to see the way Lark looks after and plays with her.
He’s a great dad.
It killed me inside not to be able to protect Millie as well.
I get the instinct now.
Perhaps, it’s that I didn’t only want to be a mom. I wanted the freedom of choice.
When I see Lark like this, I know that I’ll do anything to help him get his daughter back. It’s like the heart has been ripped from his chest.
“They’ll bring her back,” I say, quietly. “She’ll be okay.”
Lark ignores me.
I try again. “You did everything that you could. Can’t we…plot or scheme or…something?”
Finally, he stops mid-step. His growling cuts off.
When Lark turns to fix his piercing stare on me, it’s unnerving. “Plot? So, what’s your plan to break out of this cell and get my precious daughter back?”
I swallow. “I don’t know. But there must be something.”
He tilts his head, and his hair falls over his face, which is in shadow. “Why are you here? What did you do for your Alpha to break your bond? I don’t understand. You’re perfect.”
I can’t tell him, can I?
I mean, won’t it freak him out to know that he’s sharing a cell with a criminal like me on top of everything else?
Even if Millie is returned to the cell, he’ll never trust me around her again.
But then, he does deserve the truth.
“I committed treason,” I whisper.
Then I steel myself.
Lark’s eyes widen, before he snorts. “Fine, don’t tell me the truth. Keep your secrets.”
I huff in annoyance.
Typical.
Then Lark’s fierce expression simply becomes weary. “You don’t understand what’s going on here. That bastard Sheriff Ace, who runs this hellhole, is writing a case study on Brokens. I can only guess that he’s decided to find out what will happen to me, when I’m separated from Millie.”
My guts clench. “That’s…”
“Sick, twisted, sadistic?” Lark arches his brow. “We’re his broken toys, before he becomes bored and auctions us off. I didn’t want to tell you, until you were stronger.”
“He’ll return her though, won’t he?” I say, hopefully.
Except, then I remember what Fletcher told me, and I blanch.
The girl is a little too young to be moved to the Companion wing of the Institute to be trained and then fostered. So, we have a week or two to study father and daughter together…
Has he taken Millie away to be fostered?
I can’t even tell Lark without admitting how I know. But how can I keep something like this from him?
For the first time, Lark sits on the side of the mattress. His head hangs low.
I throw myself forward to loop my arms around him, nuzzling against his neck as I always did to comfort Gabriel when he’d been dropped off at our house with yet another black eye.
Lark allows me to soothe him. Slowly, some of the tension melts out of him.
He’s coming out of the feral fury by slow degrees.
He slides his elegant fingers up and down my back, as if the movement is calming him. “Millie will be so scared. What if they keep her, until it’s time for her to sleep? She needs me. My scent. I’m the only pack that she has now.”
“She has me too,” I say, fiercely.
I mean it.
The strength of the feeling surprises me.
Lark pushes back to look at me. I don’t understand the expression in his eyes.
“Are we pack?”
“You’re my songbird.” I grip his chin, brushing away a single tear that’s trailed down his cheek. I don’t think he even knows that he’s shed it. “Maybe we’re a broken pack, but who the fuck cares? We can be strong together.”
“Songbird?” Lark’s expression is fragile. “Your songbird.”
“Mine, remember?” I want to kiss Lark, but his pain is still too large; it’s suffocating. It draws the air from the cell. “And is the man who calls me cupcake really complaining?”
“Not that man.” In a move that makes my stomach swoop, Lark pushes me back to lie on the mattress. The air rushes from my lungs. I remember suddenly just how weak I am. He cages me with his arms, and his inky hair falls over me, draping me in shadows. “Just the man who knows someone else who likes to call me a bird with broken wings.”
Shit, shit, shit.
Fletcher calls him that.
My breathing stutters.
Lark knows.
He has to know who I am.
“Lark…” I try.
“Something to tell me, cupcake?” Lark’s expression is unreadable.
I’m shivering. “I didn’t know how to tell you. I mean it about wanting to become a pack with you. I’m just…ashamed…that I ever belonged to a pack who’d hurt Millie and you. I’ve been wracked with guilt because I had no idea how to tell you…”
“That you’re the Sheriff’s Omega? Oh, was that meant to be a secret?” Lark says, dryly.
I stare at him, before I growl.
The growl is impressive enough to make Lark startle.
Then he grins. “I’m clearly a bad influence. Growl again. It made me all tingly.”
Just because it felt the best thing in my entire fucking life to let out my emotions, I do growl again.
“That’s it.” Lark’s expression gentles. “Omegas are told that we must smother our feelings. We’re caged by rules from the moment that we’re born. At the same time that we’re told we’re too emotional, we’re forbidden to show those emotions. But they’re ours to feel, show, and have respected. I taught Millie that because I always wish I had been. I spent my life hiding how I felt, and look what it got me: A Broken Bond. So, growl away.”
Except, now I don’t want to growl anymore.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’m not…we’re not enemies. I didn’t—”
“Don’t apologize.” Lark presses his hand to the scar on his neck. Then he gently glances at the scar on my neck, where my old bond mark was, and my hand instinctively reaches up to touch it. I yelp, pulling my hand away. The scar’s hot and throbbing, oversensitive still to the touch. “Our Alphas hurt us in the same way. You’re not my enemy. There’s no one else in this entire country who understands what we’ve been through, apart from each other. We’re united in this. I hate that you’re here, but at the same time, you’re a precious gift. I’m not alone now. I’m sorry for everything that you must have suffered in that man’s house. I understand, and if you need to talk about anything, then I’m here.”
My chest is tight.
I didn’t expect him to react like this.
I believe that he understands.
Even Thomas, my own twin, couldn’t offer me this. As an Alpha who hadn’t been forced into a matching, he couldn’t truly understand my life.
Yet Lark can.
And he’s not blaming me for the pack that I’m from.
Looking up into his long lashed eyes, my heart swells.
I’m falling for him.
My cheeks flush. “How did you know? Was I talking about Fletcher, when I was delirious?”
“Fletcher?” He snorts. “You said some interesting things in your fever. So, you fantasize about riding the knot of someone called Gabe, huh? Kneeling and sucking his huge cock? Kissing the petal-soft lips of your lavender eyed Alpha…?”
Oh, fuck.
And now I’m wet.
I flush, pushing my thighs together. “See, delirious ranting.”
“Huh.” Lark smirks. “Actually, I know about Fletcher because the creepy Sheriff was with you, when you were first brought to the cell. He was crying. I didn’t think he was capable of that.”
Lark is watching me closely.
My lips thin. “Our relationship was complicated, but I didn’t choose it. I was forced into the bond and I hated everything that he did in this Institute.”
“Hence the treason…?” Lark says, shrewdly.
He’s smart.
Alphas are idiots for treating Omegas as less capable and denying education past high school.
It strikes me that Lark is the type of man who’d be an impossibly powerful CEO…or revolutionary leader.
Fuck, I didn’t know that thought could make me any more turned on.
Lark appears to catch my thought, and his expression becomes steely.
I nod.
“I knew that I’d made the right judgment about you,” Lark says. “I bet that the Sheriff’s found it fascinating that I’ve cared for what he’d classify as an enemy Brok. I’m hoping for a chapter in his book on Brok solidarity, instead. What about you?”
“Yay for Brok solidarity.” Then my eyes narrow, and I whisper, “Wait, are you being subversive to get the resistance word out within Fletcher’s own study? Like a cuckoo within the nest?”
Lark attempts to look innocent. “A Lark within the nest. Isn’t it also quite the revenge? He wants Broks to look weak. But what if we show them the opposite? The only way to fight back at those who’ll tear us down is not to let them. Live in a cell like it’s a mansion. Find love in a place of misery. Laugh, when they want you to cry.”
“You’re amazing.”
Lark’s eyes crinkle at the sides, as he smiles. “I offered as a suggestion for the book title, Broken but Not Down: The Modern Day Brok Bites Back. The Sheriff wasn’t amused.”
“Acehole never is.”
“Acehole? Oh, you’re just the gift that keeps on giving. You know, he made a big mistake putting his ex-Omega in here with me. Now, he’s taken my daughter, he’s turned me into his greatest enemy. And you know more about him than simply rude nicknames. You and me, we’re going to get our revenge. If not today, then one day. I promise you that.”
I tug on Lark’s arm, and he collapses to lie next to me on the mattress.
I curl to rest my head on his shoulder, and he wraps his arm around me, playing with my hair.
My scalp tingles.
This closeness and his touch is fucking everything after a year of being touch starved.
I push into his hand, melting.
Surprised by my reaction, he hesitates for a moment and then starts to rake his fingers through my hair more firmly.
I could purr from that alone.
“Now, we really are sharing one bed.” I burrow closer to his hard chest, taking a deeper sniff of his shirt.
This is heaven.
We’re also sharing body warmth and comfort.
He tangles his long legs around me.
He’s truly my new emotional support bird.
It feels like nesting with another Omega, and I didn’t know I was missing that in my life until this moment.
I never want to let go of Lark.
His arm tightens around me. “So, in the name of Omega solidarity, tell me more about yourself. The more we know about each other, the stronger we’ll be as a pack.”
“I’m an Aries.”
Lark scrunches up his nose. “I haven’t been on a date in….actually, I’ve never been on date…but that seems to be setting the bar low. I mean…” He suddenly looks uncertain. “…I wasn’t intending to imply… I was only…”
“It’s okay,” I let him off the hook, although it’s fun to see the normally in control Omega squirm. “You’re mine, remember?”
Lark’s gaze becomes sharp. “Only because I choose you to be mine as well.”
My cheeks flush. “Of course. So, since we’re both date virgins, why don’t you just…?”
“Fashion,” he blurts. “It’s a passion of mine. I wasn’t allowed anything but hand-me-downs for years as I was growing up. So, when I was matched to an older billionaire female Alpha, called Sydney, having just turned eighteen, I indulged in suits. Clothes were one of her few approved interests for me. She liked me to look pretty on her arm at elite events. Plus, I have impeccable taste.”
I run my hand down his bird waistcoat. “And you wear suits so well.”
He inclines his head. “So, that’s my good points, now to my bad habits.”
I cock my head. “I’m not certain that a date should be like an auction.”
He looks confused. “Why not?”
“I don’t know, but it seems more romantic in the movies with men wearing corsages, the woman being klutzy and falling over every scene, and lots of kissing.”
Lark’s gaze becomes heated. “We can get to the kissing. But this is about forming the first ever Brok pack. Isn’t it more important for you to know that my worst habit is that I’m a calendar-holic? I like to have one on my phone, computer, and a physical one stuck to the fridge (the Empty Cage Omega rock band because fuck, those two singers are hot).”
Huh, makes sense.
“My turn.” I listen to the steady beat of Lark’s heart through his shirt. I love the way that this is distracting him from his grief. I know that he’s letting me give him this. We’re both comforting each other, and I’ve never felt anything like this. The connection is intense. “For the last year, I’ve been trapped in a house, which was luxurious but still a prison. Fletcher had this bound brochure with over one hundred house rules. I was allowed to do nothing but clean all day and not permitted to take one step outside. Fletcher’s so possessive that he didn’t allow anyone to touch me, even my own brother.”
Lark lets out a growl. “Bastard. That just gives me one more reason to kill him. It also explains why you’re so touch starved.”
Instantly, he begins playing with my hair again.
The embarrassment is worth it for the delicious tingling in my scalp.
“When I was young, I wanted to be an astronaut.” I tense, waiting for Lark to laugh.
Instead, he looks impressed. “I bet that you could have been one. Wouldn’t the first Omega in space be something? I want Millie to live in a world where she can dream she can become that and…”
“Not have everybody mock her…?”
He nods.
“I love books and music. I can sing and play the guitar. I’m not really any good, but it gives me an escape.”
“Favorite song?”
This one is easy.
“X Ambassador’s “Renegades”,” I immediately reply.
“I should have guessed. You rebel,” Lark murmurs.
I shiver, as his plush lips graze my ear.
The pride that infuses a word, which has always filled me with fear and shame — rebel — twists it on its head.
It becomes a badge of honor to wear.
A flag to wave.
A finger up at Fletcher, the Alphas who’ve rejected us, and prejudiced society.
For the first time, hope begins to stir inside me that somehow (and I don’t know how yet), my life isn’t over because Fletcher has decided it is.
I’ve survived Broken Bond Syndrome.
I’ll survive whatever’s thrown at me next.
I don’t know how to express something as huge as that to Lark, so instead, I say, “My bad habit is that I always steal the last of any chocolate ice cream.”
“Shocking.” Lark pulls an exaggerated shocked face. “Can I steal the mint?”
“Deal.”
“See, Omegas can compromise. It’s Alphas who are tyrants.”
“Not all of them.”
An image of the other time that I’d felt like I’d had pack flashes into my mind.
Gabriel and Thomas always wanted me to be the one to tell the stories to them, as we snuggled together on Thomas’ bed.
Once, when Gabriel demanded that I tell them a story with lots of dragons, I laughed.
“Lazy Alphas,” I said. “You just don’t want to be bothered choosing a book and reading it.”
Gabriel shot me a shy smile. “I like how you do it, Mer. You make it feel real. Like I’ve escaped into that other place.”
It didn’t make sense and yet, at the same time, I understood.
Thomas nudged me. “And you do all the funny voices. It sounds magic.”
Now, I smile. “I had a best friend who was an Alpha. He was kind. So’s my Alpha twin. Thomas is a good man. Both of them had a tough childhood and unfair expectations placed on their shoulders. The problem is rooted not in the dynamic but the institutions and society. And that view is why I’m on the President’s shit list, I guess.”
Lark pulls back to look at me with a stern expression, and it’s my turn to squirm. “The President? Good to know that you don’t do things by halves.”
I let out a laugh that may be a little hysterical. “Uh-huh, and to think that last month, my main concern was how to catch the dust bunnies underneath the bed or making sure that the rim was as sparkling as the rest of the toilet.”
Lark stiffens. “Quite, yes. Those evil, breeding bunnies and there are many ways to clean…lick rims…wait, what are we talking about?”
I splutter with laughter. “You’ve never cleaned anything in your life, have you?”
“That’s right, make fun of the pampered, City Omega. We had a legion of Beta servants at Blade House who did the cleaning. I lived there with Sydney’s brother, Cygnus, and his bonded pack. Cygnus was my only real friend. My role was to kneel for Sydney, worship her, and produce and care for her heirs. She never loved me, and since Millie’s an Omega, she never loved our daughter.”
“I wish that I could kick her ass.”
“Believe me, I’d never allow you near her. She was used to kicking other Alphas’ asses.”
“Hey,” I protest. “Let me at least enjoy the fantasy.”
“I’m an orphan.” Lark avoids my gaze. “Companion House here in the Institute was held over my head my entire life. My wealthy aunt, who reluctantly took me in, would threaten me at least once a week: if you don’t eat those greens, improve those grades, stop that backtalk, then I’ll be dropping you off at Companion House. It was terrifying to know that with one wrong move I could lose all my status, rights, and protection by becoming a Companion. Sydney knows that it’s my greatest fear: To end up here. For my daughter to. I took her mistreatment for years but I still never dreamed that she’d do this to me.”
My muscles are weak, but I roll myself on top of Lark, needing to feel as much of him as I can.
He blinks up at me, as I lie on top of him, in surprise. “This is definitely not like a date in the movies.”
I grip his cheeks, staring into his eyes. “I don’t care if she’s twice as tall as me. I’ll still kick her ass.”
Lark’s expression becomes soft with wonder. “Maybe you can set those scary sounding dust bunnies on her.”
I nod.
He probably thinks they’re some kind of savage creature.
“Why would Sydney break your bond though?” I ask.
Lark’s lips thin. “The irony is, I didn’t do anything. She and her corrupt father did. When I was chosen by Sydney, I was meant to be grateful and act the role of the dutiful Omega. All I could focus on, after Millie was born, was protecting my child. Then the ice hockey team got caught out in criminal activities that I don’t fully understand because Sydney snatched us and fled, leaving her dad to take the fall. He’s being punished in the Alpha Center now. We just traveled from hotel to hotel in secret. She became more and more paranoid and desperate…”
I draw in my breath.
Lark bares his teeth. “Finally, the press caught up with Sydney, cornering her. She snapped, turning feral. I only raised my arm to shield Millie, but Sydney was screaming that I was fighting her. The Beta receptionist called the cops, and that was it. I was pinned to the floor by three Alpha cops, while Sydney broke the bond.”
My heart breaks at the thought of Lark being encircled and held down, while something as intimate as that happened in public.
I understand now why he doesn’t want to be near Alphas.
“I never thought that she’d reject her own daughter as well,” he whispers. “But then, I hoped at least that it’d mean Millie would be safe with me.”
“May I accept Millie into my pack? Adopt her?” I meet Lark’s gaze, tracing down his jaw.
Lark’s breath catches. “You don’t need to feel like you have to.”
“I don’t. But while we still have a choice, I want to.”
“That’s a relief. Because she chose you days ago. She likes you.”
“She’s a good judge of character.”
“Don’t be too cocky. She also adopted the monster that lives in the shadows and a beetle that she named Raisin.”
“And are you adopting me?”
I hardly dare breathe.
Lark lifts his hand to wind it through my hair. “This is the best date that I’ve ever been on, and although it’s also the only one, the incredible thing is that for the first time in my life, I have a choice who I love, choose, or have in my pack.” He balls his hand into a fist, tightening his hold. “I choose you, Mercy. Let’s make a pact. Omegas only from now on. We make our own Omega found family, as long as we can.”
I nod. “The Brok pack.”
Hope, joy, and love.
In the midst of our imprisonment and uncertainty, finding each other is allowing emotions that I thought were long dead to blossom.
Finally, Lark’s scent becomes rich and heavenly again.
I breathe in deeply and sigh. “May I kiss you?”
He nods.
I lean down, acutely aware that I’ve never asked that before.
I’ve never wanted to.
Lark’s large eyes are as wide as mine.
Is he feeling the same as me? Is this the first kiss that we’ve both truly chosen?
His lips are soft and open sweetly to me.
I forget in a flurry of nerves and sensory overload how to kiss, but Lark takes over, licking across the seam of my lips and then slipping his tongue into my mouth. He coaxes me in a tangle of tongues, and slow, languorous desire.
I moan, unable to stop myself humping my hips against him.
He drags me back by the hair.
He’s purring, deep and rumbling.
Lark’s pupils are blown wide but he scans my face like he’s assessing that I’m okay, before he commands, “Again.”
Then he drags me into a deeper, more passionate kiss.
I’m floating, lost in his scent and mind-blowing touch.
I’ve never been kissed like this.
It feels right.
As if everything is finally falling into place, when before, it’d felt so wrong.
I never want to stop kissing him.
I slip my hand down between us, palming across his crotch.
He’s hard.
Lark moans against my lips, and it’s such a delicious sound that I rub across his hard cock again.
“Omega on Omega action on my first day, lucky me,” a bright voice says with a laugh from outside the cell.
I startle in fear.