Chapter 48
There is no way out
I make it back to the building, but Cadel appears out of nowhere before I can cross the road and enter it.
He grabs me by the throat and pins me to the side of a building.
I think if I were anyone else in the world I might be terrified, but I’m not afraid of him.
Strangely aroused and fighting to suppress a moan, but not scared.
His eyes are narrowed with red flames in their depths.
Danger ripples through his aura with deadly menace.
“Where were you?” Three words spat out through his teeth, full of rage and jealousy and obsession. “That’s twice I’ve woken up to find you gone, Omega,” he growls.
I melt.
I try to answer, but I can’t focus when he’s leaning in like the minute I tell him someone looked at me, he’s going to kill them. His tight hand around my throat is a collar, a brand that screams to everyone, but especially me, that I belong to him.
His scent is slamming into me, stronger and faster with each breath, the heat of his temper flooding the air.
“I had to do something—”
His fingers tighten, cutting off my words.
“There is nothing that could warrant you running off in this city, Kaida,” he says in slow menace.
“You could have died, been captured, fallen and hurt yourself. Anything could have happened, and we wouldn’t have known.
” He punctuates that statement by slamming his free hand against the wall, right beside my head.
I don’t take my eyes off him. I reach up and slide my fingers along his stomach, feeling his muscles tense. With a wicked smile, I lean into his hold on my throat.
“I know, and I’m sorry,” I say in a husky voice. My eyes widen. “You didn’t think that I was running away, did you?”
Cadel snarls.
“I wasn’t,” I protest. “Cadel, I could never be scared of you. I would never leave you. But I needed to lead him away.”
“Him?” Cadel barks, his nostrils flaring. “Who is him?”
I swallow hard and debate how much to tell him. “You know I grew up with the Warden, right? I couldn’t let him find you.” I run my own fingers up against his throat, the lightest touch, an apology and a plea.
He leans in, growling, his fury sparking in the air.
I bite my bottom lip and close my eyes, holding perfectly still as he runs his nose down the side of my face.
I turn my face to his, but he pulls back, leaving me disoriented and panting.
The smell of my slick is turning the air sweet, but he’s still mad. He’s not even…I let out a whine.
“Alpha,” I plead.
“So you…” Cadel trails off, his face turning dark.
“Led him away, that’s all,” I murmur in frustration.
“You led him away?” Cadel echoes, and his fingers twitch on my throat.
I almost offer to show him the photograph, but then I remember he’s not in it, and I hold my silence, but my arousal eases, letting my head clear just enough to really get a look at his face.
“I didn’t want him to hurt you,” I try to explain. “You were all so tired. I just wanted you to be safe.”
Cadel leans in and lets out a fierce and frustrated growl that has my knees going weak. Only his hand on my throat keeps me upright.
“Cadel, you have to trust me,” I whisper, licking my lips. “I lived all these years alone. I have survived so much. I know him. We met up, I escaped—” I slam my teeth together as he pulls back, his eyes glowing an eerie and terrifying red.
“You met up with him?” The words are an explosive hiss of pure rage.
“Well, it wasn’t intentional,” I say quickly. “I was trying to hide, but he knew where I was going and was waiting for me. Luckily—”
“He was waiting for you?” Jarek echoes.
I look past Cadel and see my mates. The bonds on my shoulder and breast throb in a happy welcome. The omega side of me wants to get on my knees and crawl to him, easing that unhappy look in their eyes.
I take a breath and quickly huff it out, realising that breathing their combined furious scents was a massive mistake.
“Yes, it was annoying that he was waiting for me. We talked and yelled at each other, and then I escaped.” I try for humour, but it’s hard when I’m whining and talking in a husky voice, my thighs clenching together as my slick gathers.
“Kaida, what were you thinking?” Mordecai hisses.
“I was thinking, I know how this guy works. What do you think I was thinking? I wanted to lead him away from my exhausted and sleeping alphas and protect the people I care about,” I snap at him, losing my temper.
“We’re a pack now; we don’t do things like that on our own.
What if you needed help? Did you know we could feel you?
We were going insane. Your fear, anger, and panic were like a mix inside my brain that I couldn’t switch off.
If it had gone on any longer, I think I might have stormed the Path’s lair just to check to make sure you hadn’t been captured. ”
I stare at him, and it finally sinks in. “I’m sorry.”
He shakes his head. “We all have to do better. We can’t have things like this happening.”
I bow my head, my fingers holding onto Cadel’s wrist. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have acted alone. It was a mistake. I apologise.”
Cadel leans forward; his lips brush over mine. My eyes close, but a sound yanks me out of it, and I turn my head, listening hard.
“What?” he hisses.
“Shhh,” I whisper, concentrating. My mouth drops open. “Hide!”
Mordecai and Jarek slam up beside us in the shadows. Cadel leans over me, his hand still locked around my throat. I look up and stare into his eyes, losing myself in him.
“What happened to the omega?” the Beta’s Claw asks the Warden.
They come into sight and just stand there. The Warden stares at the building we were in, but he doesn’t make any attempt to say anything for the longest time. Is he going to give me up? Is he going to hand me over?
He knew where we were, and he led me out and away.
My mind boggles with that information.
“She escaped.”
“How could she escape you?” The red mask is like a bloodstain.
He’s too quiet, too intense. His eyes are soulless.
I remember that much. He had no interest in me, not until I escaped.
I think I’ve become somewhat of a fascination for him because we’ve crossed paths multiple times over the years, but I’ve always managed to stay just ahead of him.
“She threw herself off a balcony and survived a fall of three flights to scuttle off into the dark like a cockroach,” Walker says in a bored voice. “Omega whore.”
He says it with such vitriol that I almost believe he means it.
The Beta’s Claw nods. “Her mother did exactly the same thing. I had her cornered on a building. Orders were to capture her alive, but she was standing at the edge, and she looked so pretty, so I kicked her in the chest and made her fly.”
Cadel wraps a hand around my mouth before I can make a sound. I don’t move. I want to, but it’s not just my life, and my mother is already gone. Long gone. This place has done nothing but hammer that truth in.
“You killed her?” Walker asks in a strangled voice.
“Oh, that’s right, you knew her, didn’t you?” The Beta’s Claw sounds like he’s smiling, but I can’t tell.
The horse stomps its foot, but Walker doesn’t push it into moving.
He turns his head and looks right at me, staring into the dark.
I know he can’t see me, but he knows I’m here.
Does he want me to hear this? Is he giving me this because of our history?
It doesn’t make sense, but then he never did do anything that did make sense.
Cadel squeezes my hand and shifts slightly, as if he’s preparing for a fight.
“She was very pretty for an omega and one of the highlights of my years. Her evasiveness was next to none; it took me almost the entire time we were here to finally corner her.”
His evil words unveil what I’d always known: the Beta’s Claw is as fucked up as the Beta’s Fang. One shows it outwardly, and one hides it, but they are both evil.
“I asked her if she had any last words. If there was anything she wanted to spit to the universe, and she nodded. Her hair was silver and floating around; she looked old and weak, but when she looked at me, I shivered. She said to me, ‘Your time will come, and they will give you no mercy’.”
He laughs long and loud; it’s chilling because, unlike the Fang, his counterpart, the executioner is charming; he sounds pleasant. He’s the true psychopath.
“It’s funny, she told me something else, too. I just remembered it,” he says and cocks his head to the side. He sounds confused and annoyed.
“What was it?” Walker asks with extreme disinterest.
“She said only love will break Walker. I never did find out who or what Walker is or what she meant, but she was old and traumatised, so maybe she was crazy already, who knows!”
Walker shifts, and I can see his impassive face.
Walker’s love? What does that mean? As far as I’m aware, his heart is cold, a dead rock in his chest. I don’t think he loves anyone anymore, and I don’t think there’s a person in this world that loves him, aside from me.
“It doesn’t matter; in two days, there won’t be a single person left alive in this city. It’s all going to be over.” The voice of the newcomer stops them in their tracks.
“Are we doing it, then? Setting fire to the city? I’m almost disappointed. I was looking for a challenge,” the resident psychopath says.
“Yes. Every alpha and omega left hiding in this forsaken place will pass in flames. The ones that got out won’t stay free for long, but the goddess wants this over. From spring onwards, she wants to move us into a whole new reign.”
The High King steps into view, his gold mask flashing. He’s wearing the same black robes the rest of them wear. Only his mask makes him different. What would happen if we took out the three of them here? I am almost tempted, my body quivering with rage, filled with a poisonous hate.
“Are you sure she’s still here?” The High King asks his executioner.