4. Madden
Madden
“ I hope this doesn’t take too long, I’m fucking exhausted,” I say, yawning as I park the car in the parking lot of the train yard.
“Me too,” Kane says, pushing his door open.
“Yeah, but you’re always fucking exhausted,” I tease.
Kane’s sleep is always shitty. It’s a running joke that if anyone needs anything at an absurd time of night, Kane is the one to call.
Like now. I’d ask him if this shipment of supplies is really that important that it can’t wait until morning. But I know the answer. That’s why I’m here with him at two AM.
We’ve gotten quite a few new high-profile clients who want the process of things expedited, so getting started on moving these supplies to our warehouses is essential.
Kane’s brows furrow as he pulls out his phone from his back pocket.
“We’re here now, why’re they calling?” he murmurs. “It’s not like we’re late.”
He picks up, putting the phone on speaker.
“We’re in the parking lot,” Kane says. “Is there something wrong with the shipment? ”
“Boss! Thank god you’re close. We’ve got a fucking problem. There was an omega or something in one of the train cars and she’s kinda freaking out.”
“What?” Kane growls.
What is right. An omega? In one of the train cars? What in the world is going on?
“We’ll be there soon,” Kane says.
“You gotta hurry, boss! This doesn’t feel right, I think she may be hurt.”
Kane hangs up, his jaw clenched. We start jogging towards the train yard.
“What in the world do you think is going on?” I ask. “Why would a hurt omega be in an industrial train car?”
“I don’t know,” Kane says. “Where was this shipment coming from?”
My blood goes cold. “It came up through the Southside,” I breathe out.
That makes both of us run faster. My feet crunch against the gravel and the air is cold in my lungs.
I’ve never met an omega from the Southside. Most Southside omegas elect to go through the interview process given their families usually don’t have enough connections or money to find good matches.
But I remember my life in the Southside. The hunger. The powerlessness. The shit I had to do to survive.
I can’t imagine the Southside would be much kinder to an omega.
A terrified scream pierces the air. And they keep going. Desperate screams.
We make it to the train with our stuff and my eyes instantly hone in on a loose crowd of our guys surrounding the crumpled form of an omega.
She’s in nothing more than a blood-stained nightgown. I can’t see where she’s hurt but the knowledge she is hurt burns through my veins.
Kane looks just as pissed.
“What the fuck is going on here?” I yell. “Why is there a screaming omega on the floor?”
The poor omega makes a strangled sound at the sound of my voice, starting to sob quietly instead, and I instantly regret yelling.
We’re close enough that I can finally see her features. Her hair is a dull gold, covered in dust and grime. Her skin, where it’s not covered in bruises or dried blood, is so incredibly pale it’s like the sun has never touched her. Her body is trembling, probably a combination of fear and the cold.
Her scent hits me like a fucking truck. Even with the sharp, bitter notes of her terror, the soothing balm of her peppermint scent still covers me from head to toe. I’ve never scented a perfume this intoxicating before. It only makes the blood flowing through my veins pump harder.
This girl is special. Mine .
And then it hits me. Is this what a scent match feels like? If she’s our scent match, she’s bound to have scented me by now, why is she still trembling on the floor?
I’ve had dreams about us meeting our scent match before. She’d be sunshine and light, and she’d love us all. She wouldn’t be afraid of me.
The omega at our feet is definitely an angel, but she’s also very obviously terrified.
“We found her in the train car, she was hiding behind pallets of fences, so I brought her out,” one of our guys, Casey, says, rubbing the back of his neck.
I know him, he’s a good guy, but anyone can see that she’s freaking the fuck out.
“Screaming and kicking like that?” I ask him, my jaw clenched.
“I—I didn’t want anything to fall on her. ”
“Calm down, Madden,” Kane says, squeezing my shoulder. “Let’s just get this taken care of so we can all get out of the cold.”
The omega at our feet shifts, still keeping her face hidden away from us. A growl rises in my throat when I see she’s fucking bowing at our feet.
“P—please,” she says, her voice soft and trembling. “Please don’t hurt me. I’ll—I’ll be a good omega for you.”
I can’t keep my growl in. “What the fuck,” I hiss. What in the world has she been through to think she has to beg at our feet?
She flinches.
Fuck, I seriously can’t do anything right around omegas. All of them either hate me on sight because they don’t want to risk their bloodlines being tainted with any Southsider blood or they’re scared shitless.
“I’ll—I’ll be good, I promise,” she says, continuing to beg at our feet.
“Hey there, little one,” Kane says, his voice comforting. He kneels in front of the omega. “You don’t have to bow like that.”
I’m a bit jealous of Kane sometimes.
Now is definitely one of those times.
He always seems to know what to say or do, especially around omegas. Not that he’s really shown any interest in any omegas in the past, but still. He has options should he want them. And he should want them. It’s in our nature to want an omega to protect, to provide for, to care for.
She slowly raises her head from the ground. Her golden hair serves as a curtain between us. She keeps her gaze fixed solidly on the floor.
“What’s your name?” Kane asks. “I’m Kane. This here is Madden.”
“L—Luna.”
“You don’t have to hide your gaze, Luna.” Kane reaches out, hesitating before brushing her hair away from her face. He must be worried about spooking her even more .
She quickly brushes the rest of her hair away from her face, turning to meet both our gazes.
The moment our eyes meet, I’m a goner. She looks like an angel straight from heaven. Big blue eyes, rosy red cheeks, and pillowy lips that call to me.
I’m so enamored with her beauty that I just stand there like a fucking idiot for far too long.
I immediately take off my leather jacket and take a slow step forward so I don’t scare her even more. She has plenty of time to tell me to fuck off before I rest it against her shoulders, cloaking her with the thick fabric.
I take a step back, not wanting to intimidate her any more than I probably do.
She stares up at me, her eyes growing wide with shock. Her jaw clenches as if she’s biting the inside of her mouth a few times before she speaks.
“Thank you, Alpha Madden,” she says, her voice a bit strained from all the terrified screaming she was doing earlier.
I can’t help but smile when she grabs the front and closes it tighter around her body, almost like she wants to bury into my scent.
My alpha hindbrain definitely likes the thought of that.
It also really likes the way she looks in my clothes.
I also don’t miss how her perfume sweetens just the slightest bit in response.
“Just Madden is fine, no need for the whole alpha formality,” I say.
Kane seems to be dumbstruck like I was, whether that’s by her scent or how gorgeous she is, I don’t know, but it takes him a while to get his senses back.
“Well then, Luna,” Kane says, clearing his throat. “We should get you out of the cold. How does bringing you to our car sound? Then we can talk about what to do next.”
He glances down at her feet, which are still visible past the hem of my jacket and his brows draw down in concern. Her legs are all sliced up and covered in dried blood like she was running over this sharp gravel barefoot.
Luna glances around, seemingly to take stock of the train yard we’re in, hesitating before giving Kane a quick nod.
She winces as she shifts her weight like she’s planning on standing on her own. Kane’s faster than I am, sweeping her up into his arms. She lets out a startled squeak at the suddenness of his action.
“You—You don’t have to carry me, it’s okay I?—”
“You don’t have any shoes, little one. We wouldn’t want you getting any more hurt than you already are.”
She seems to settle a bit at that, at the very least accepting there’s no way we’re going to let her hobble over the rest of the train tracks when either of us can help her.
Luna remains silent as the two of us make our way to our car. I slide into the driver’s seat, letting Kane take the lead with her in the backseat.
She’s obviously been through a shit ton and the last thing she needs is to be trembling in terror next to a fucking monster of a guy like me. I just turn the heat on and take whatever solace I can from the fact she’s wearing my jacket right now. Even as the car warms up, she doesn’t take it off.
“So Luna, where were you trying to go?” Kane asks, settling into the seat on the other side of the car from her, giving her space.
“Away,” She whispers, staring at her hands.
“Away from what?” Kane asks, his jaw clenching as he glances at me.
Considering the state she’s in, the two of us can definitely have our suspicions about what she was trying to run away from. She’s a drop-dead gorgeous omega. It’s not hard to make a guess.
She bites the inside of her cheek, almost like she’s trying to figure out what she wants to say.
“You don’t have to tell us now if you don’t want to,” I grunt. “Just tell us where you want to go and we can help you get there. ”
She glances up, meeting my eyes in the rearview mirror. Her expression is hesitant and wary.
I know that sort of expression. She’s wondering what kind of stuff she’s going to have to give in exchange. I know that feeling all too well.
“Where are we now?” she asks quietly.
“We’re in the Northside of Riverwell,” Kane says.
Her shoulders appear to sag slightly when she hears where we are.
“Do you have anywhere to go?” Kane asks again.
Her shoulders tense right back up again.
So much for her relaxing a bit there. I don’t know why Kane’s asking her that.
If she’s from the Southside and was desperate enough to hop into a train to run away, it’s obvious she probably doesn’t have anywhere to go.
Most people from the Southside are poor enough to never move out of that part of town.
She shakes her head, the shame she’s feeling clearly written on her face.
“Well then how about we try and see what we can do to help you?” Kane says. “We should get you to a hospital and get you checked out.”
“No!” She clutches my coat around her, her eyes going wide with desperation.
“You need medical attention, little one,” Kane says softly.
“Please, I—I don’t want to go to the hospital.”
Kane purses his lips like he’s trying to figure out how to convince her to go with us to the hospital.
“We can get someone to come to us to help you,” I suggest.
She probably doesn’t trust us as far as she could throw us, but if she’d prefer not to go to the hospital, maybe we can help her.
She glances up from her hands, still trembling in her lap, her knuckles white and her gaze darting between us as if weighing her options.
“Th—thank you. I’ll be good, I promise. ”
“You don’t need to promise to be good,” Kane says, trying to reassure her. “Can’t you feel it between us? The connection?”
He’s braver than I am if he’s already ready to talk to her about her being our scent match.
She shifts nervously in her seat. “I—I don’t know what you mean.”
Kane meets my gaze in the mirror, his gaze a bit shocked.
Fucking hell, whatever she’s been through, someone did a number on her.
Based on the way she’s acting, she either doesn’t know that we’re her scent matches, or she’s so terrified of any alpha that she doesn’t care.
Either way, there goes my perfect fantasy of finding our scent-matched omega.