Chapter 39
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Halley
Our walk becomes more challenging as Shade leads me up a steep incline.
My tired legs stumble over loose rocks and I’m breathing heavily.
Without a word, he slows and moves to walk behind me, bracing my lower back when I waver.
Each time he touches me, a spark of delight zips through my body, and it makes the physical exertion worth it.
I more feel connected to him after our chat, and my developing feelings for the Beta Specialist are now full-blown infatuation.
He’s insanely smart, but also has the most tender caring side.
Finally, just when exhaustion sets in and I feel the tendrils of Omega sub-space wrapping around my foggy mind, we make it to a flat plateau.
As my knees give way, I collapse in a heap on the damp ground, feeling it sink beneath my weight. Leaning back on my hands, I stretch my aching legs out before me and take in the view while panting. The trees are starting to thin the more we climb, and the forest appears less threatening.
I sigh, a self-satisfied loopy smile slipping over my features.
As much as my body hurts, I don’t regret the trek up the hill.
I never realized how much I missed the beauty of nature.
The more I think of The Omega Division with its concrete walls and stifling rules, the less I think of it as a safe haven, and more like a detention center. A prison for defective Omegas.
Shade drops next to me. Our shoulders brush and my stomach does a somersault.
“It’s not a bad view, is it?” he asks.
It’s mid-afternoon, and the sun has cleared away the mountain mist. The sky is a brilliant blue, and the sun bathes us in a golden light. The trees are still, and the birds are singing.
“It’s beautiful.”
“It is,” Shade says with a nod, and I catch him looking at me with a peculiar expression. He quickly ducks his head to look at his boots.
“It’s quiet here,” he says, almost to himself. “It’s been a while since we’ve been away from the front lines. It takes a while to get used to the quiet and staying still, you know?”
“Oh? I thought you were based here.”
He looks down at me with a puzzled expression. “No… we arrived two days before you did to set up the camp and scout the area. We were based at Dunefold Fortress until Viper—”
He doesn’t continue. I know what happened to Viper.
I just don’t know how it happened. Everlyn has told me about the ongoing vicious battle at Dunefold Fortress, the human forces sending wave after wave at the weakest point in our border defense.
A lump forms in my throat thinking of the squad fighting day in and day out in such a dangerous place.
“Oh.” I frown. He cocks his head to the side and studies me in silence.
“Halley?”
“Yeah?”
“Didn’t Knox explain this to you?”
I shake my head. “No. He’s been rather cagey with information.”
“Ah, yeah, our Prime Alpha can be a bit prickly to outsiders.” Shade grimaces and traces a shape in the soil next to his feet.
“As a Prime Alpha, his training emphasized the importance of working with limited information and executing his orders without question. He struggles to understand that others weren’t born into this madness as he was. ”
I can’t help but snort. “No kidding.”
I didn’t realize Alphas could be ‘born’ into the military. Where were his parents? His family? I guess he has the same fate as me; na?ve to the way of the world outside of my own experiences.
Such a small insight into Knox’s way of thinking changes my perspective of him a tad. Maybe I could give his harsh leadership some slack. Well, only if he relented on the radio silence regarding my mysterious O-space powers.
“So, are you going to tell me where we’re going?” I ask, swiping the bead of sweat rolling down my neck before it can disappear beneath the bite collar.
“There’s a temporary communication tower on the hill. It’s been acting up over the last couple of days; transmissions from base haven’t been coming through. It’s the last thing we need to check for the day.”
I sneak another glance at him. I’ve been doing it all day and I can’t seem to stop. With a straight nose and high cheekbones, he’s handsome in an understated way.
His ethnicity is ambiguous, but he said he’s from the east. His eyes are narrow and his nose sharp. His black hair is cut short and the sun dances off his tanned skin. It makes me want to lick it to see if he tastes the way he smells – like dark chocolate.
With the cloying Alpha scents at camp, I didn’t notice Shade’s.
But, rut-damn, do I smell him now.
It’s subtle, and I only catch it when he moves, but I’ve been sucking down gulps of air to chase it. I can’t get enough.
At first I thought it was just notes of bitter chocolate, but after a while I realized the pine scent I’ve been smelling in camp wasn’t from the surrounding trees at all. In fact, there are no pine trees in the forest. It’s him.
He’s a square of dark chocolate melting on my tongue as I read a book in a pine lodge. Comforting, cozy, romantic.
His eyes flick to mine, and he frowns slightly. How have I not noticed how wise his brown eyes are? They seem to look right into my soul and see everything that lies there.
I feel my cheeks flush as he holds my gaze, and then he looks away again with his nostrils flared.
Frack.
My perfume. I’m turned on and he knows it.
I clear my throat and quickly change the subject, desperate to distract him from the arousal throbbing in my core.
“Just how far into the abyss is this camp?”
Shade plays along and chooses to ignore the sweet scent of Omega perfume.
“I can’t tell you where we are, this is a black site after all, but the comms tower allows us to stay in contact with base.”
“So, if there is an emergency, can I call for help to the outside world?”
“Sorry, baby girl. Contact with the outside is just for me and the boss man.”
I usually swoon when he calls me that pet name, but I’m struck by the startling realization that I really am alone out here.
The trees start to close in. They sway mockingly.
“So, I’m stuck in the middle of nowhere with a squad of super soldiers who hate me with no way of contacting the outside world.”
“Halley, I can assure you not a single person in our squad hates you,” Shade says before muttering something that sounds like, “it’s quite the opposite.”
I roll my eyes. “Prime Alpha Knox can’t stand to even look at me.”
“That’s not because of hate.”
“Why don’t I believe you?” I tilt my head back and sigh at the sky.
A flock of birds flies over us, cawing at each other in a friendly competition.
“I think you two have gotten off on the wrong foot. Knox is a lot of things, but hateful isn’t one of them. He’s been given an order – train you up as a soldier, and he’s going to approach it in same way we were trained.”
“And what’s that?”
“Grueling physical activity until you can’t take anymore. Strip away your identity. Make you question everything you’ve ever known. Then, when you’re broken and at your worst, he’ll rebuild you to be stronger than you ever were.”
“Fuck me, that sounds awful!”
Shade laughs with abandon. His head tilts backwards, his eyes close in mirth, and his mouth opens, showing straight white teeth and his tongue.
I blink rapidly and do a double-take. A small silver ball sits neatly in the center of his tongue. My whole body clenches, and my perfume explodes from me.
I can’t believe what I’m seeing, but my unprepared pussy sure can. I flood my panties with slick.
Beta Specialist Shade has a tongue piercing.