Darla laughs shrilly. “Risky how? No-one knows she’s here!”
“If you lot couldn’t keep a leash on her before the RDF was putting wanted posters on every billboard in the state, what makes you think I can? I’m a busy man, you know.”
The ringleaders seem to falter for a moment, looking between each other with panic. I don’t know whether to be excited or nervous. If this guy decides he doesn’t want me, I don’t know where that leaves me. Doomed to the ring, indefinitely? Or … worse?
Suddenly Hamish’s eyes light up. “I’d like to sweeten the offer, if I may.”
The old alpha looks at him.
“F-7 here …” Hamish drawls, “has a mate. Another rogue.”
The old alpha is instantly put off. “I thought you said you’d sweeten the offer.”
“He’s the key to keeping her in line. She ever gives you trouble, all you have to do is yank his chain. I assure you—” he cuts me a knowing smirk, “she’ll learn her place soon enough.”
“Plus,” Darla sweeps in, “two for the price of one? Not too bad.”
The old alpha scoffs. “My offer is generous enough for three of your rogues and you know it. It just so happens …” he presses his cane against the inside of my knee. Arousal, foul and potent, fills the air. “This one is special.”
I flash my teeth.
He laughs. “There’s my omega.”
Not your omega, I want to scream. Not your fucking omega!
“She’s quite something,” Hamish agrees, tautly.
“That she is.” The old alpha exhales. “Alright. You’ve got yourself a new deal—under one condition.”
“Name it,” Darla blurts out.
He smiles, and the sight of it makes me want to carve out my insides.
“I want to see her fight. Him, too. Just one last time.” He rests both hands on his cane. “Let them remind me what they’re worth.”
If I wasn’t so furious, I’d probably feel like crying. No, my inner omega moans. No more fighting. I did my time—won my hundred matches. I thought the nightmare was finally over.
And now I’ve somehow roped Fang into it, too.
Just thinking his name stirs something primal and ferocious inside of me. Without thinking, I try to leap out of my chair, biting air—wishing it was flesh.
“Holy fuck,” Hamish jumps.
The old alpha clutches his chest, laughing. “That’s the spirit!”
I’ll kill you. I’ll fucking kill you if you so much as put a finger on my mate.
No-one hears me. Without my hands, I can’t speak. Can’t say a word.
Exactly as they like it.
***
Fang is all over me the rest of the night. He tries to get me to talk to him, but the bunker is pitch black. Even if I had the energy to speak, he’d never make out the words.
“Your hair’s wet,” he growls. “They hurt you? I swear, if they tried anything—”
One of the rogues snaps at him to shut up. People are trying to sleep.