Kidnapped
Chapter twelve
One minute I was sound asleep, the next, something was pulled over my head. I was wrapped tightly in my thin blanket that suddenly seemed very strong. Someone threw me over their shoulder, knocking the air out of me.
"Don't make a sound or you're dead meat!"
It was one of the guards. Was this a test? Had I fucked up again?
I racked my brain for any transgression I might have committed while the beta moved rapidly through the halls and down the stairs. I bounced against his hard shoulder and could feel the bruises forming.
Counting the flights of stairs, I realized he wasn't taking me to the basement. For a moment, I breathed a sigh of relief. Until I felt cold night air on my bare feet as he pushed through a door.
Before I could think, I was dropped into something and a lid clicked down over me. The surface under me felt plasticky and rustled when I moved. The smell… ugh, he'd put me in a garbage can.
The can rolled along the concrete and the guard whistled as he went.
We stopped and there was some thumping, then I was pulled out and tossed hard onto another surface, this one rough and smelling like gasoline.
Thunk. A trunk. He'd just shut me in a trunk.
This was going from bad to worse. I'd always heard not to let a kidnapper take you to a second location, but not only was I incapable of fighting, it might be easier to escape from another place.
I could hear him throwing the garbage into what sounded like a dumpster, before he left again, whistling.
It only took a couple minutes of wriggling to free myself from the blanket. I ripped the bag off my head. I was definitely in a car trunk. This couldn't be good, but if I screamed, the guards would think I put myself in here and it would be another stint in the hole.
Just thinking about being back in that cell made my heart race and I started sweating.
No, I'd wait until we were out of the compound and then figure out how to escape once we stopped.
There was no way being kidnapped in the middle of the night was a good thing, but maybe it would give me more of a chance than being locked in the heat dens.
When the guard returned, I felt his weight shift the car. The engine started and we drove out of the compound and onto the open road. The pavement hummed under the wheels and nearly lulled me back to sleep. As it was, I dozed lightly, waking at every turn or bump.
It was hours before we finally turned onto a gravel road. That instantly woke me up, because the only places that would have gravel were places that were out in the middle of nowhere. What was his plan?
The car lurched to a stop and I hit the front of the trunk, banging my head. Once I was certain this was where we were really stopping, I twisted and turned until I was in the best position to attack whoever opened the trunk, on my back, with my knees pulled to my chest.
Male voices were talking outside and footsteps on the gravel approached.
My stomach churned. There were too many of them. I could hear at least three voices. This was a suicide mission, but I had nothing left to lose. I would fight as hard as I could for as long as I could, I decided.
The second the trunk was lifted, before I even saw who was opening it, I kicked out with both feet as hard as I could. My bare feet hit directly in the man's sternum and he grunted as he lurched back.
With strength I didn't know I had, I pushed myself up and out of the trunk and took off running. The gravel bit into my feet, but I ignored it. I'd dealt with a lot of pain lately, I could handle this, too.
The sun wasn't even up yet, but the sky was that funky gray that comes before dawn.
It was just enough to let me see that we were in a gravel parking lot in front of some sort of warehouse.
There were trees to the left of the building and that's where I was running to.
Maybe I could lose myself in the underbrush there. Hide in a hollow tree or a hole…
It was no use. Pounding footsteps sounded behind me and a thick arm swooped around my waist before lifting me, kicking and screaming, into the air.
"Calm down," the man snapped. "We're not trying to hurt you."
"NO!" I screamed. "HELP!"
"No one can hear you out here anyway. You'll tire yourself out."
"I don't care." I kicked back with my foot and connected with his thigh.
"Careful, you nearly lost your ability to have babies there," the guard called out, laughing. "She's a feisty one."
"She's underfed and weak," the alpha holding me said. "Why wasn't she properly fed?"
"This one earned herself a month in the hole for trying to escape. Not my fault she looks for trouble." The guard stood with his hands in his pockets as we walked back toward him.
I was already wiped out, hanging from the alpha's one-armed grasp and too pissed off to think.
"Give me the cash and she's yours. Just maybe keep her hidden for a few months until they forget she exists."
"Zephyr, give the man his money. We should get a discount because she's damaged goods," the man holding me muttered.
Zephyr grabbed something from an SUV parked nearby and handed it to the guard who gave a little fake salute.
"Nice doing business with you, gentlemen. Let me know when you break this one and we'll work something out." Then he was gone, his car rattling back over the gravel toward the main road.
Now that I was alone with the two hulking alphas, everything seemed much more terrifying. At least at the heat dens, I knew the score. Here, I had no idea what they wanted from me, besides the obvious.
What kind of pack had to kidnap an omega? They had to be the worst types of alphas. The thought terrified me, but when I tried to pry myself out of the alpha's arm, he just sighed and hoisted me higher.
"Want me to drive and you carry the wildcat?" Zephyr asked in amusement.
"Guess so. I don't trust her not to throw herself out of the truck."
He dragged me into the backseat of the SUV and true to his word, the alpha switched me to his lap, his arms banding around me and keeping me firmly in place. Steel restraints had nothing on this man.
As Zephyr pulled away from my sellng point, I tried to memorize what I could about my captors.
The man holding me was muscular, but stronger than he looked.
His black hair was long enough to reach his ears and he had a shock of white in the front that should have made him look silly, but only added to his threatening aura.
His arms were both inked all the way down to the wrists and one hand had a single black slash over the first knuckle of all four fingers.
"Cat got your tongue?" he teased, his mouth way too close to my ear.
That's when I realized something. My fear had blocked out their scents for the most part, but now that I was paying more attention to the details, I realized that these men smelled like smoked cinnamon and sandalwood. The same scents from my room that one day.
"Were you in my room?" I asked, suddenly terrified. What if this wasn't a random kidnapping? What did they want from me?
"No."
"You noticed the scents?" Zephyr asked, glancing at me in the rearview mirror. "I had Josh slip a couple shirts into your pillow for the night. Did you notice anything else?"
Frowning, I shook my head. My heart rate was already slowing, but I wasn't sure why. The situation hadn't changed. I was still in danger, but my nose assured me I was safe. "What's going on?"
"You're our mate," the man carrying me said.
"So desperate you have to buy mates?"
"Our scentmatch," he corrected, dipping his nose into the space behind my ear and sniffing deeply. "You smell like heaven."
"I'm really confused here…" I turned my head and took a tentative sniff. He was the one who smelled like someone had just toasted cinnamon sticks over a campfire. "Why am I here?" The scent somehow calmed me, despite the situation.
"That's a long, messed up story," Zephyr snorted.
"We'll explain later. Right now, you need to know three things.
First, you're our scentmatch. Second, there are two other members of the pack and we hope you're matched to them, too.
Third, you're ours and you're not leaving, ever.
Don't even try. We will hunt you down and bring you back every single time. "
My brain couldn't even process that information, so I latched onto something a little simpler. "What's your name?"
"I'm Kienan. That's Zephyr. Our other alphas are Vale and Dean."
"What's your name, wildcat?" Zephyr asked. Dark eyes watched me in the mirror. He had a slight Asian look to him and his eyes were nearly as black as his hair.
"Olivia."
"I like it," Kienan said, burying his nose in my hair. "Our little Livy."
"Nope, nope, nope. I do not answer to Livy unless you are my grandmother," I informed him.
"Noted. Olivia."
My stomach was flip-flopping and not unpleasantly. This was insane. There was no way I could be attracted to the two men who had literally bought me just half an hour ago, but here we were.
I should be running. Fighting. But all I wanted was to snuggle into Kienan and lick him. What the hell was happening to me? Maybe they'd drugged me. There was no way a couple of scents could affect me this much, was there?
Zephyr finally pulled up to a house down a long driveway. There didn't seem to be any neighbors. This place had to be expensive. Were my scentmatches rich?
"Come on, let's meet the guys." Kienan opened the door and climbed out with me still in his arms.
"I can walk."
"I know you can. I saw you run. Barefoot. On gravel." He let out a growl, making me jerk away from his face.
"Your feet are fucked up now and I don't like my omega being damaged."
With a sigh, I let him carry me into the house.
Inside was much less impressive, but still decent. It felt like no one had really moved in yet, though there were pieces of furniture scattered around and every wall I could see was painted off white.
"Vale, Dean, get your asses downstairs!" he bellowed, making me jump.
There were footsteps upstairs and two men appeared at the top of the stairs, both wearing nothing but their boxers.
One had bright pink hair and a face full of piercings, while the other peered down at us, running a hand through longer curly hair, a more classically handsome alpha. "What the… who's this?"
"This is our omega, Olivia." Kienan pushed me toward the stairs, but I froze when the pink-haired man lifted his nose and sniffed the air.
"Mate," he growled.
"Vale, don't attack her," Zephyr warned, as Vale started down the stairs, his eyes focused on me.
I started to back up, but Kienan was right behind me, blocking me from escape.
Vale leaped the last several stairs and landed with a thump in front of me.
I immediately dropped to the ground and curled into a ball.
"What the fuck?" Slender fingers caught my hand and he tugged me up to face him. "Don't hide from me."
"This is too much," I managed to croak. "You can't just… just buy omegas!"
"What did she just say?" Vale growled.