56
Scarlett
“ S car, please open your eyes?” I think fingers brush against my cheek, but I can’t really feel them.
My body has gone numb, which is probably a good thing since I’m pretty sure my leg is broken.
Happened sometime yesterday when I’d tried to scramble away from Harlan during one of his lessons, and he’d stomped down on my calf to stop me.
I distinctly remember the crack of bone echoing around the room, but I don’t recall anything else. I blacked out after that. I think I’m just now waking up after that incident. He hasn’t been back since then.
I should probably be thankful for that, but the period between his lessons is the worst. It’s the point when he has time to think of even more sadistic ways to make me come to heel.
“Please, Scar. I need to make sure you’re OK.” My eyelids finally flutter, but only because I want to erase the tremor in Kate’s voice. I try to open my mouth to tell her I’m okay, but my face is so swollen that I can’t. My vision swims for a moment before her face comes into focus.
Kate is perfectly whole, thank fuck. All of Harlan’s rage and attention has been focused on me, and I’ve made sure to do everything I can to keep it that way. She doesn’t need to be punished by my own demons. He makes her watch, but that’s about it, and for that, I am thankful.
“Water,” I croak, wincing when my voice cracks. The amount of screaming I’ve been doing since I’ve been dragged back here has made my throat and vocal cords raw. Kate shifts over to grab the tin cup of water that had been left for her by Levi earlier.
She helps me lift my head, and her hand only trembles slightly when she tips the cup to my cracked and bleeding lips. I whimper when the cool liquid washes over my tongue and down my ruined throat. I let my head fall back before I can drain the entire cup, and Kate frowns.
“You need some, too.” My voice is much steadier when I speak.
Kate’s jaw flexes. “I had a few sips earlier. You need the fluids more than me.” The strap on the lingerie piece she still wears slips from her shoulder, and I reach up to adjust it before it can go too far.
I hate to ask, but need to know. “How many days has it been?”
Kate smooths hair back from my face, lifting the tin cup back up so I can finish the water. I don’t fight her. “At least two days. Maybe closer to three. They had me under too when we were transported.”
I nod, and she lowers my head back to the floor. I’m just thankful I’m not still strapped to Harlan’s favorite metal table. “He’ll return soon. He’ll sense I am conscious.” I warn just before the doors swing open. It would appear that my senses aren’t as well off as they should be.
Harlan’s shiny black loafers click against the hardwood floor at his approach, but Kate remains where she is on her knees beside me.
When his hideous face comes into view, he smiles down at me like a snake.
If he had a forked tongue, I’m sure it would be flickering away in the air to taste the scent of my broken hope.
Levi is with him, but Jacob is suspiciously missing.
“Perfect timing, pet . I’m in the mood for a song.” He snaps his fingers, and then that jackass appears, pushing a smaller piano through the large doorway, making me wish I hadn’t wondered where he was.
Kate bares her teeth at Harlan when Levi moves to haul me up off the floor. I block everything out at the feel of his hands grasping onto my naked breasts. I’ve long since been stripped of all barriers so that Harlan could have every inch of my skin at his disposal.
Blocking it out is the only way I can survive.
Thankfully, she doesn’t say a word as I am deposited onto the bench Jacob pushes in front of the piano.
My leg starts to throb, breaking through the numb barrier in my mind, but I grit my teeth through it.
I know the drill. Hopefully, I can pull off this next performance, and then the three of them will leave us in peace for a while so I can rest.
It’s hard, but I manage to dance my bloody, nail-less fingers over the keys, striking the first chords of Harlan’s favorite song. However, I only get through the first verse before the asshole is slamming his fist down on the top of my right hand.
I scream, body folding inward and I barely stop myself from lashing out with the hand he doesn’t have pinned to the keys. If I hit him right now, it’ll be game over. “You sound atrocious, pet .” He snarls. “Start over. This time, it better be smoother.”
I do as I am told, fighting through the pain when he lifts his fist to allow me to start over. My fingers take a moment to start moving again, but just as I am about to open my mouth to sing again, a loud, urgent knock sounds at the door, tripping me up.
Thankfully, Harlan is distracted by the interruption.
He growls, taking a step forward before he flicks his wrist to Levi.
I try not to look over to where Jacob is standing way too close to Kate, but I fail.
I miss Levi opening the door when my eyes zero in on the hand stroking over my best friend’s dark curls.
I grit my teeth, about to open my mouth to say something, but the look Kate shoots me gives me pause. Then, Harlan’s barked curse cuts through our stare down, drawing my focus to what I’d missed before.
“Impossible! They never should have been able to uncover the tracks.” He snaps to the man standing in the doorway. To Levi and Jacob, he barks, “Grab the omegas and head up to the chopper. I’ll deal with the clean up.”
Jacob’s hand knots in Kate’s hair, dragging her up to her feet.
She curses a blue streak while Levi grabs me underneath my arms. He tosses me over his shoulder like I am a sack of potatoes, and I can do nothing when his palm slaps against my bare ass cheek in the process.
My ribs ache in this new position, but my body is so broken that I can’t do much about it.
My heart starts to pound as reality sets in.
Levi follows Jacob out of the room, leaving behind the torture chamber that has been our entire existence for the last two days.
Fragile hope begins to bloom in my chest at the thought that maybe, our alphas have found us.
Harlan had certainly made it sound like something was going on.
Otherwise, why would he have us moved to a chopper for easy take off.
I lift my head slightly, trying to get a good look at my surroundings, but there isn’t much to go off of. The hallway we walk down is bare of everything except the occasional painting of generic photos framed along the walls on either side. The three doors we pass by are all closed.
A minute later, we are ascending a set of steps that are dimly lit with beautifully intricate wall sconces in the shapes of partially folded angel’s wings.
We are only in the stairwell for about twenty seconds or so before we emerge outside beneath a brilliant sky painted in the soft pinks, oranges, and golds of a setting sun.
It’s obvious we are on a rooftop. Off in the distance, I spot an endless, glittering ocean when I lift my head.
In this moment, it doesn’t even matter that I am gloriously naked and slung over the shoulder of a sadistic alpha intent on keeping me chained to his pack lead.
I see the ocean, and I immediately begin to weep.
“Crying isn’t going to work on me, omega.” Levi hums under his breath when he senses my current state, but I’m not crying for the reasons he probably thinks.
I’m crying because I never thought I’d see the sun and sea ever again.
And I soak it in, just in case this is the last time I do.
Before I know it, I am being deposited against a cushioned seat beside Kate. My friend curls her lip at the two alphas. “Can we get a fucking blanket? Her skin won’t survive the wind when we take off.”
Jacob just smirks at her. “The pet knows how this goes. No coverage. Pack lead’s orders.” He says, then he slips off the chopper, most likely to check in with said pack lead. Levi stays, staring at me in a way I really don’t care for.
“You know, the harder they look, the angrier it’s going to make Harlan.
He’s not going to hold back eliminating just one of them.
One by one, they are going to die because you couldn’t follow the rules.
” My chest pangs with unbearable loss at the reminder of Apollo’s demise, but I quickly push it out of my mind.
I cannot afford to be distracted right now. Not if an escape opportunity is about to present itself with this hiccup they hadn’t expected.
“I think you know as well as I do that one cannot ignore a scent match bond.” I retort, knowing I’m going to regret it.
Levi narrows his eyes. “Scent match, eh? Regardless of what you think fate has in store for you, that doesn’t negate the fact that you are bound to our pack lead. We own you, omega. They tried to take what did not belong to them.”
“The fact that you think purchasing a human being, omega or not, automatically entitles you to ownership is absolutely disgusting.” For the first time since we’d arrived here, Kate cuts in over me before I can respond, spitting venom back at Levi.
I want to be proud of her, but the look that twists his features makes my heart plummet to the bottom of my feet. He snarls, his hand snapping out to reach for her, but a gunshot cracks through the air before he can so much as get five inches away from her.
Levi’s body jerks, and I hear Jacob bellow something in the distance, but the only thing I can focus on is the perfect hole smoking between the alpha’s eyes as he falls to his knees, before slumping face first in the space in front of us.
Kate cries out when another gunshot cracks the air, and then Jacob’s bellowing is cut off. I gingerly lean forward to peer around my frantic best friend to watch the other alpha drop like a sack of bricks to the rooftop a few feet away from the chopper.
Holy fuck. Levi is dead. Jacob is probably dead.
“What the fuck-” Kate starts to screech, but then a body pops through the opening of the chopper, a man I don’t recognize, and dread fills my gut.
I’m jerking forward as he reaches for her before I can think it through.
I propel myself with enough force that my body slams into his before his fingers can touch Kate, and then the both of us are sailing out of the chopper.
I cry out when his strong arms wrap around me as his back slams into the pebbled rooftop, jarring my body in a way that tells me it isn’t a good thing.
My vision swims as every broken piece of me sings like a fucked up canary.
The scent of extra fragrant vanilla and sweet cream suffocates me, but the alpha is quickly releasing me when a ferocious snarl rips through the air.
“Fuck! I didn’t mean to touch her, man!” My body hits the ground as the man is yanked up and away from me. Then, a sob burst free from me as his scent washes over me next. Winter evergreen and rich, decadent dark chocolate.
When I look up through my curtain of tangled, blonde hair to see Caito holding the strange alpha up off the ground by his throat, my heart cracks and my lungs cease to work.
Kate is yelling, and I look over my shoulder briefly on instinct to see another man pulling her out of the chopper, but he isn’t being rough with her.
“For fucks sake, Archer! Drop Cash and help your omega!” The dark haired man now clutching a wildly thrashing Kate to his chest barks at my alpha, who drops the golden haired alpha so he can fall on his knees beside me.
I whimper when he gently pulls me up into his arms. Someone hands him a jacket that he tucks around me as best as he can while he pulls up to his feet with me cradled against his broad chest. I only have eyes for my alpha.
And with one whispered phrase, my body finally succumbs to the darkness. “ Mo chroí .”