Chapter 10
“Acat?” Zed was absolutely livid. “You almost got Kyan killed for a fucking cat?”
I could barely hear him as lights from Vegas streets flashed in the window. “Why isn’t she moving?”
“She’s fine.” Kyan sounded defensive. He scratched her head and I heard a low purr rumble to life.
Oh, thank God.
“This isn’t a fucking joke,” Zed snarled.
“We scared them off.” Kyan sounded unperturbed as he drew Lucy closer, examining her carefully. “Was a cinch.”
“Kyan—oh for fuck’s sake. You can’t—” Zed tried to snatch Lucy from Kyan’s arms, but Kyan growled, drawing his jaw along her fur. His lightning storm scent filled the car like a scent bomb—to me, anyway. I knew that to everyone that wasn’t me, Kyan smelled like autumn persimmon. That was just how it had always been.
“Did you just scent-mark a cat?” Knight demanded as Kyan drew her close enough that Zed couldn’t wrangle her away.
“Don’t hurt her!” I snapped.
“She’s gonna love me.”
“You knocked her out,” I hissed. “She won’t.”
“You’ll eat those words.”
“Stop talking to her,” Knight growled from the front, levelling a death glare through the rear view at me.
We finally came to a stop at a huge warehouse, which, it turned out, was their home, though only after Kyan had demanded they stop on the way for ‘cat stuff’. Knight had been the one to go into the store, since he was the only one mostly blood free.
Reality was slowly sinking in, though, and the relief of getting Lucy back wasn’t near enough to fix the mess I was in.
Zed, it seemed, was completely serious about not letting me go, and clearly dragging me here had nothing to do with affection. He’d grabbed a shirt from the seat beside me, shredded it with my own knife, and tied it around my mouth as a gag when I hadn’t stopped demanding Kyan give me Lucy.
It was still tight around my mouth when the truck stopped, and he showed no sign of removing it. I’d forgotten what a fucking cunt he was.
Where they lived was apparently an old warehouse which suited them entirely. It was messy, with a huge main space, and a faded wall of graffiti on the far end.
Cuffs and gag still firmly in place, Zed led me past a huge open space with a scattered gym and graffiti wall, into a more insulated living room that still spanned at least five of my High Roller rooms. There was a makeshift kitchen on one wall, a cove of couches and TV on another, an old wooden dining table, and other rather randomly scattered items of furniture. There was also what looked like a woodworking bench in a far corner, and doors that I assumed led to bedrooms. But they were like… box rooms, how offices sometimes were in warehouses, where the flat roof only reached halfway up the roof of the outer space.
This was where my mates made their home?
How many times had I wondered what living with them would look like? What my life would have looked like?
And the answer wasn’t at all what I’d thought. Nor was it… bad, somehow.
“You going to deal with Kyan?” Zed asked, gracelessly tossing me onto the couch. I let out a snarl of derision, struggling upright with the cuffs, but neither Alpha was paying me attention.
Knight was looking at Zed with a raised eyebrow.
“I’ll deal with Kyan if I don’t have to go near her.”
Kyan, who’d already placed a box of litter and was running water into a dish, glanced back at us all. He set it down, then folded his arms. “I don’t need dealing with.”
“You scent marked her fucking cat,” Zed snorted. “If I tell you not to go near her, will you listen?”
“Don’t go—what?” Kyan spluttered a laugh like Zed was joking.
Zed gave Knight a ‘told you so’ look, but Knight was already crossing the room toward Kyan. Kyan’s reaction surprised me. He backed up a pace then turned, leaping onto the kitchen counter, reaching for a metal grate attached to the wall.
“Oh no you don’t,” Knight growled, pouncing after him in a second. Kyan managed to get his second hand on the grate before Knight had his fist in his hair and began dragging him back down rather ruthlessly.
I straightened, eyes wide as the grate groaned. With a growl of fury, Kyan released it, tumbling back into Knight’s grip. Knight barely stumbled. Kyan was tall and ripped as fuck—feeling pretty big next to me, but he wasn’t in Knight’s weight class, and all it took was a hand clamped around Kyan’s neck and nothing Kyan did seemed to matter.
“Tell me you’ll listen to Zed?” Knight growled. “Or we’ll do it right fucking here.”
Kyan spluttered another laugh.
“You won’t touch her.” Zed’s voice echoed around the bones of this strange home that we’d just entered. “You won’t go near her. Is that fucking clear?”
Kyan raised his eyebrows with a smile, eyes sliding to me. He pressed his tongue into his canine, grin widening, but didn’t answer.
“Kyan!” Knight growled. “Say it.”
He wrinkled his nose, cocking his head as he stared at Knight. “Nope.” He popped the ‘p’ arrogantly, just like I remember him doing when we were younger.
There was a struggle as Knight dragged Kyan toward the scratched up table that was bright with spray paint. Knight pinned him over the table in moments.
Holy. Shit.
Things had definitely changed since I’d last been around them.
Kyan struggled, muscles taut, a snarl on his lips, but Knight’s fist curled in his hair and he slammed Kyan down hard enough to make me jump.
What the fuck were they doing?
“Zed gets to touch her, why don’t I?” Kyan snarled.
Zed laughed, reaching for the gun still holstered at Kyan’s hip and removing it. I saw Kyan tense for a moment, the briefest flash of irritation in his eyes. Then Zed tapped the barrel against Kyan’s temple.
“Say it. I’m not letting you get her in your obsessed little sights.”
Kyan let out a manic laugh. “Fuck you!” He struggled again, palms flat against the table, but this time Zed took over fisting his hair and holding his cheek against the surface, shifting real close and pressing the gun between his eyes.
I tensed, suddenly on high alert.
Knight took the opportunity to readjust his position, and I swear he… wait, what was he doing?
Mother above…
Knight was tugging out his beast of a cock, and I had to fight my own perfume hitting the space as I saw it. Kyan snarled as Knight easily shoved the back of his shirt up and—Woah! Was he about to do what I thought he was?
Zed cocked the gun, and panic burned my veins. All eyes snapped to me. I froze, catching the low whine as it rose up my throat, not forming anything coherent through my gag.
Shit, shit, shit.
Kyan’s pupils were blown wide as he stared at me, lip caught in his teeth. Zed turned his gaze back to Kyan, tapping him on the head with the gun.
“Say you won’t fucking touch her,” Knight growled.
There was a wild grin on Kyan’s face. He dragged his hand to his mouth, made a V with two fingers, and slid his tongue through the gap in a vulgar sign, never taking his blown pupils from me.
I shivered, trying to stifle the crazy fucking response my body was having to that.
Zed sneered, taking a few paces back and letting Knight take over the grip on Kyan’s hair.
“Say it, you filthy rat,” Knight snarled. “Or you won’t walk straight tomorrow.”
Kyan wasn’t fighting Knight, though, or paying attention to the gun pointed at him. He was just staring at me. I would be lying if I said it wasn’t making my blood hot.
Kyan didn’t seem to even notice as Knight unhooked the chain from his belt, attached it to a cuff on his wrist, and latched it instead on matching metal on Kyan’s necklace—well, collar, actually. If I hadn’t been gagged, my mouth might have dropped open.
But no. Kyan was staring at me without a care in the world for the two insane Alphas around him about to?—
My eyes caught the movement of Zed shifting his finger on the trigger, and my heart skipped a beat. Another terrified sound of shock tore from my chest through the gag, but when he pulled the trigger nothing happened but for a small click.
The chamber was empty.
I only had a split second to process that, or the brief delight on Kyan’s face as he saw my terror, because then Knight slammed into him without prep or warning. A strangled growl loosed from Kyan and his eyes shut only for a moment, a twisted expression on his face. His whole body arched, struggling against the death grip Knight had on him. Then he was panting, low whines slipping from his throat as Knight bent over him and set a brutal pace.
“He emptied his clip for you,” Zed muttered as he set the gun down beside me. “How fucking precious.” He dropped onto the couch at my side.
I struggled away from him, eyes still fixed on Kyan, heart racing a million miles a second. I heard his breath of a laugh beside me and then he was dragging me onto his lap. “You should watch, Little Devil, or how will you sleep tonight knowing he might come in at any time?”
It was an unnecessary command. I couldn’t have taken my eyes from Kyan and Knight if I’d tried. The sounds Kyan was making, half wounded, half wild… and he still hadn’t taken his eyes from me.
“Your scent is giving you away,” Zed murmured, sounding far too pleased. “Once, we wanted you and you didn’t want us. And now…” Fingers closed around my throat as he drew me tighter against him, letting the silence finish the sentence for him.
I warred with my reaction to the feeling of his touch around me—even the one at my neck. Hostile as it was, it was filling a void that had been left to scab and rot. It was easier to keep my attention on Kyan than it was to consider how pathetic that made me.
Knight’s grip was closed around Kyan’s wrist, the other dragging his head back by the chain now wrapped in his fist, leaving him to scramble with his one free hand to find a hold, a low growl ripping from his throat.
“You’re never ready to take me, Rat,” Knight taunted. “But you always bait me, anyway.”
The sounds Kyan was making were getting more desperate, despite the snarl on his face.
“This is the part he hates,” Zed murmured, sounding amused. “Every fucking time.”
I didn’t move, unable to look away, not understanding what I was watching. “If he gets there before Knight, he’ll do what we want,” Zed breathed.
Kyan let out a low whine, his breaths short and sharp, his cheeks hot.
Fuck.
I clenched my legs together, but it was far too late for that. I felt every Alpha’s gaze snap to me. Knight even paused for a moment, a snarl curling his lips as he took me in.
It didn’t matter.
Kyan groaned, teeth bared as he inhaled the perfume I’d just released into the space. I could see the moment the orgasm took him, clenched fist trembling, and a feral sound sliced through the momentary silence.
I felt Zed’s scent shift from derision to fury, and he was on his feet in a moment. “Right. Show’s over.” He gripped me by the neck as he dragged me to my feet and into another room.