3. Gianna
CHAPTER 3
GIANNA
If the stench of motor oil and concrete dust hadn’t been enough to choke me into silence, the knowledge that my father had sold me to the Gallos certainly did the job. At least I had gotten a couple good hits in first.
I hated every single one of them. From Darius and Bianca all the way down to their spineless little bootlickers. I counted my father among them. He loved me, so he said, but he had also been waiting for an opportunity to hand me over to someone who could give him more authority.
If the man above me was in the Gallo ranks, I would hate him just as much as the others. My ass still stung, a smoldering burn not nearly as hot as my hatred. What was worse was the way his scent—bourbon and smoke, like the cherrywood we burned to flavor expensive cocktails—was unraveling the painful tension in my muscles and coaxing dead embers to life in my belly. Of course the universe would make evil smell delicious. Fucking rude of it.
My eyes watered as he hoisted me up by my hair. “Please. Let me run. You never have to see me again.”
“Absolutely fucking not. You’re not running from me again.”
He dragged me along with him, keeping a firm fistful of my hair and making sure I was tipped over so he had full control of my movements and I couldn’t even see where we were going.
“Mario,” he said. “Let’s get the fuck out of here before they bring in more guns.”
A second later he tossed me into a van and climbed in next to me. The door slammed shut and I swallowed against the swell of panic in my throat.
The van was packed, five men, myself, and the two women I’d been held with. No one bothered with seatbelts as they peeled out of the lot. Gunfire cracked in the air, the bullets embedding themselves in the back of the van. The other women screamed but I only ducked my head, too used to the sound, having grown up where I had. One of the men hung out the window, firing back. I closed my eyes, willing myself not to tremble. The man who’d dragged me into the van set an arm over my shoulders. Was he…trying to comfort me?
There was no possible world in which I could relax about any of this. Either I was going to an unknown fate with the ones who’d abducted me, or I was going to the horror story that was the Gallo compound.
Even if I got away, I wouldn’t be able to go home. That knowledge sat like an anvil in my gut. Did I actually belong to the man next to me, or was I going to be transported and handed over to Bianca Gallo? I couldn’t decide which I would prefer. She had a reputation for cruelty, but then I supposed most people in this life did.
I wasn’t the first of my family to be sold for advancement, and I knew I wouldn’t be the last. It was the way for families who could never seem to grab enough power. Selling their daughters and omega children to whoever could let them taste that power. I was unlucky enough to be born both.
The man to my right turned toward me, blue-gray eyes intense, the subtle hint of bourbon and smoke twining around me. I stayed stock-still in the way that prey often did, hoping the predator would forget they were there and move on.
My liberator and my captor.
We passed a certain point in the city and our pace slowed, like we had moved into the heart of enemy territory and the people who had taken me didn’t dare follow.
“Names?” one of the men asked the other women.
All I caught were their squeaked-out surnames—Conti and Russo. Both families that held territory under the Gallos along the river. Had the fourth omega they’d been waiting for been a Barone? That would cover all of the families besides the Gallos themselves that held riverside territory and bridges.
The van swerved into the ambulance bay of an urgent care facility, and the side door swung open.
“Two of you, out,” my captor said.
“Me too?” I asked hopefully.
He chuckled. “No. You’re staying with me.”
One of the other men pulled the trembling women out of the far back, and pushed them briskly toward the bay, where two paramedics were already running toward them. He jumped back in, and the van took off before the door was even fully closed.
I closed my eyes, trying not to think about what fate might befall me while trapped in a van with five strange men. My heart was ready to beat out of my chest when the van finally stopped. The arm still draped around my shoulders held me tighter, his scent making me lightheaded…or maybe that was just the malnutrition and dehydration.
“Sure you can handle her?” one of them asked. “You got a pretty good black eye going.”
“Fuck off, Federico. I’ll call for pickup when we’re done.”
Before I could ask where we were going, he was pulling me out after him, scooping me straight into his arms before my bare feet could hit the concrete. I didn’t recognize where we were from the brief glimpses before we disappeared into the underbelly of a building. The cacophony of scents down here was making me dizzy, my stomach squirming, and my skin warming.
I dragged the filthy neckline of my shirt over my nose and mouth, trying to filter some of the air, stifling it with the grime on the fabric.
He stopped to talk to someone in front of a set of doors, spouting off in rapid Italian. I caught bits of the conversation. Something about a suite.
The next door we went through took us to another world entirely. It was like walking into a full-on porno. People were fucking everywhere . Omegas were tied down over leather benches, alphas taking their pleasure on their bodies, so many scents and sounds assailing me that I almost came right there in my captor’s arms. He walked me through the crowd and I could feel all their eyes on me. I ducked my head against him to avoid their gazes.
We stepped over a threshold and the door closed behind us, granting us a modicum of silence, the air not much clearer in here, but not quite as potent. He let go of me and I kneeled on the plush carpet.
“I can’t take you back to the compound until we’re bonded.”
I whipped my head up, staring at him, not fully comprehending what he’d just said. “Excuse me?”
“Your father sold you to Bianca if we could get you back, and Bianca is giving you to me. Neither of us are allowed home until it’s a done deal.”
I growled, digging my fingers into the carpet. “Don’t fucking touch me.”
“I wasn’t planning on it.” He sat down on the end of the bed. “Not until you beg me, at least.”
Swallowing hard, I looked around the space, taking in all the soft fabrics, saturated with too many scents to discern. A bed dominated the room, with a door to a bathroom in the corner. There was little else in the space, but then, given the activities outside the door, I could only assume people only came here for one purpose. “Where are we?”
“Heat club,” he replied shortly. “Catch your breath. Once you’ve showered and eaten, we’ll go back out there until your heat triggers.”
As much as I wanted to curl into myself and give in to despair, I knew that wouldn’t make things any better for me. If he wanted to claim me, I was going to make him work for it.
“Tell me your name,” I demanded.
“It’s Marco.” He gave me a wolfish smile. “Might as well let you get familiar with it so you’ll have something to scream later.”
It should have revolted me. It definitely shouldn’t have sent a spiral of desire through me. I had been kept under lock and key for so long, and while I wasn’t a virgin, it had been far too long for my taste since I had last been touched.
He didn’t deserve to be the one who had me, but he was the one who did. Already the coils of heat were teasing me. Omegas triggered heats in one another, and while I had heard of clubs like this existing, I had certainly never been to one. He was right that I would beg. Soon enough I wouldn’t even know who I was, but I would know that I needed someone to fuck me. And here he was, so fucking convenient.
I hated being a pawn, and yet I had been moved into place by people my entire goddamn life, except this time there was no getting out. This man had caught me in a checkmate, and before I ever saw home again, I was going to belong to him.