Episode 16 Damsels, Distress and Deceit #2
“Do not bark at her,” I snap out first, using every ounce of alpha dominance I have to keep him from opening his goddamn mouth.
He shakes it off easily and whips his head toward me in outrage.
But I’ve earned the time to say, “she asked me not to bark at her in the trust challenge. I can imagine she would like it even less now.”
“Fuck,” Grieves curses. “That first night I baby barked at her, more suggestion than command and she froze. Shut down on me.”
A warning growl from Forsythe. “What the fuck did you order her to do?”
My brows jump. Sythe never swears, but I suppose this situation calls for it, because I’m also about two seconds away from throat punching Grieves and then having him hand me my ass, because I know I can’t beat him in a fight.
“Nothing bad,” the blond alpha protests. “Just-”
“We’re wasting time,” Thay cuts in. “Discuss it later. Right now we need to help her.”
Yes, my alpha agrees with a roar. Help our mate. Save her. Soothe her. Purr for her.
Everything in me—every alpha instinct, every human instinct, every part of my soul—is roaring the same words…
Go to her.
Go to her.
Go to her.
Piers sidles up next to me. Forsythe casts him a look. “What are you doing?”
Piers doesn’t take his eyes off Florence. “Do what you have to do, but I’m not leaving her in there.” Our Prime’s lips tighten the slightest bit then he nods.
“Isadora and Florence first,” he orders and then we’re moving. I shouldn’t be surprised that Piers, Thayer, and I head for Florence, while Grieves and Forsythe move toward Isadora. But I am, It feels wrong somehow. Like the five of us should be working as a team to rescue our omega.
And right now, my alpha seems to think Ren is ours.
The closer we get to the cages, the more distressed omega I smell. Not just Florence, but Petal and Tristan, on either side of her. Like Ren’s fear is rubbing off on them too.
There’s a combination lock on the door, and I have no fucking clue what the hell the code would be, but the answer can’t be far.
“Please,” Ren whispers, voice barely there. “Please. Please. Please.”
“It's okay, pixie. We’re coming,” I croon to her and try to send out soothing alpharamones through the suppressants I’m on. It doesn’t work.
She jerks at the sound of my voice. “Court?”
“Yeah, baby, it's me. It's us. We’re here.”
“Deep breaths, killer.”
“Thayer?” She pulls at her bonds again, making the ropes cut into her skin. “Please. Let me out. I can’t- I want out. Let me out.” Her omega whine is enough to set my alpha off. Fuck. This was a bad fucking idea.
I’m going to kill someone today.
“Do you know what we’re supposed to do here, little bird? To get you out.”
Ren’s chest gives a jerk, the chair under her is squeaking across the cement floor with the force of her trembling. “They told me a math problem… I’m supposed to… I was supposed to…”
“Solve it?” Thayer guesses.
A jerky nod. “But I don’t even- I can’t…”
“That’s okay, Pixie. Don’t worry about it. We’ll still get you sorted.” Gritting my teeth, I spin on my heel and march away, right to the fucking producer standing by with a tablet, aware of the camera following each step. “What’s the code to Florence’s lock?”
He pales at the growl in my voice, but he shakes his head. “I-I can’t tell you that. It's part of the game.”
Good on production for not equipping us with weapons, because I’m pretty sure if I had a gun in my holster, I would pull it on him right now.
Instead I settle for slamming a hand into his chest and driving him back into the wall.
Hard. “That omega is in distress, not fake but real fucking distress. She is having a panic attack and all of you have fucking ignored it.” I press harder as I lean into him.
“My fucking omega.” He pales further at the implications. “Give me the fucking code.”
There’s a loud crash, and I glance over my shoulder to see, Thayer and Piers have apparently lost patience and are tearing at the bars around Florence with their hands.
One of the other crew members makes a noise and steps forward like they might intervene, but then they must think better of it.
Good man. All of our alphas are very close to snapping and there’s no guarantee he wouldn’t bear the brunt of our rage.
The man who’s neck my hand is wrapped around shoves his tablet at me. I take it with my free hand and then scan my eyes down it. Taking in the list of combinations. “There now,” I say as I find Pixie’s. “That wasn't so hard was it?”
I release him and turn in the same moment, running down the line of cages and all but shoving Piers away from the door. The bitter scent of frightened omega sinks into my head, making my vision go spotty and red. My hands shake, making it difficult to do the fiddly work of turning the numbers.
Florence whines. I growl.
Further down the line Isadora lets out a distressed sound that I can tell is one hundred percent fake. It doesn’t make my alpha scratch at me with the need to protect, soothe, care for, destroy, the way the desperate noises Florence is making are.
“We’re coming, little bird,” Piers reassures her. “Almost there.”
“Fucking open it, mate,” Thayer growls.
I take a deep inhale through my nose and force myself to focus, concentrate. Florence needs me to be as calm as I can be. There’s paint under my fingernails, and I focus on that, it helps to think of the canvas set up in my room, the image that had finally started to take shape. I don’t know why.
No, that's a lie. I know why.
Because the image is Florence, even if it's not her directly. It's that feeling of the moment of calm in the eye of the storm, her sitting in complete stillness as the chaos that is the other omegas rages around her.
The lock opens. I toss it aside and yank open the cage. I drop to my knees in front of her. She cries out and flinches when I touch her knee, shrinking away from me. Her breathing is even more ragged and I’m worried she’s on the verge of passing out.
“Breathe, Pixie. Please,” I reach up and yank off the blindfold. Her frantic eyes fall on me, tears streaming freely over her cheeks.
I try to touch her again, run a soothing hand over her thighs, while Thayer and Piers work on the ropes binding her, but she jerks. “Don’t. Don’t touch my legs,” she gasps out. “Please.”
I give a slow nod, even as my heart clenches and my alpha roars at me to fix whatever has her so fucking terrified.
“Okay, Pixie. I won’t touch your legs.” I can’t look too hard at what that means.
What might have happened to her when being tied to a chair and someone touching her thighs might frighten her this much.
If I spend too long thinking about it, I’ll probably tear the whole world apart. “Can I touch your face?” I ask softly.
She gives a jerky nod. “Yes.”
“Good girl,” Thayer praises her when she lets me cup her face, stroke my thumbs over her wet cheeks. “You’re doing so good, killer.”
“I-I’m sorry,” she whimpers. “I shouldn’t- The others-”
“Shh,” I murmur, leaning my forehead against hers. “It's okay. We’ll help them. But we need to help you first, okay, Pix?”
“Can you take a breath for us, sunshine?" Piers asks, then curses when her binds release. I want to look and see what caused that reaction, but I also don't want to look away from the terrified omega in front of me.
“I’m trying,” she pants.
“Nice and deep, Ren.” I mimic what I want her to do. “We’ve got you. You’re safe. Yeah? We need you to breathe.”
She wheezes instead.
Thayer swears. “Please, killer. My alpha is about thirty seconds away from obliterating every fucking arsehole in here who let you sit here in the middle of a panic attack without doing anything to help.”
A low growl pulls from my chest, at the reminder but I morph it into a purr. Florence’s eyes flutter closed. Her now free hands are clutching at my shirt. Piers and Thayer kneel next to me. Movement by my knees tells me they’re undoing the ropes around her ankles.
“Almost,” I tell her. “We’re almost done. You’re doing so good, baby.”
She whines and clutches at me harder. Breath puffing over my face in frantic little pants. I want to snap at them to hurry the fuck up, but I’m working on keeping myself calm for Ren’s sake. Only soft praise will fall from my lips, gentle words, soothing vibes.
“Okay, killer,” Thay murmurs. “All untied. Up you go.”
Before I can protest he’s looped a hand under her knees and another around her back, hefting her out of the chair and against his chest. She nuzzles into his neck, taking deep inhales like she’s trying to scent him.
It's in our nature to use scent to calm each other down, and that’s what she’s looking for, that steady reassurance from her alpha.
A little whine pulls from her chest when she doesn’t find what she’s looking for.
“Give her to me,” Piers says, holding out his arms.
Thayer hesitates, but then does as our beta asks, handing her over with the greatest of care, pressing a soft kiss to her forehead before stepping back.
It's a good call. He’s the only one out of all of us that isn’t on scent blockers, and while a beta’s scent doesn’t have the same effect on an omega as an alpha’s, it will help.
Florence melts into Piers, her nose buried against his neck. “That’s a good girl,” I murmur to her. “Nice deep breaths. Piers smells so good, doesn’t he, omega?”
A little whimper that sounds a lot more content than distressed pulls from her. “You should help the other omegas,” she says softly, barely lifting her head from my beta’s shoulder. “They need you too.”