Page 162 of Ruled By The Alpha

Leaveandnever come back?She thought to drive him out at gunpoint? Chase him away from the mate that fate had sent directly into his arms? Who did this Omega think she was?

Determination, indignation, and irritation edged any fear aside. Mirroring her movement, Samson unfolded his body offthe bed. Adrenaline propelled him a step forward, then another. “Whatdid you say?”

A tense silence enveloped the room. Rosemary breathed in shallow, quick gasps, her eyelids flickering, but her gaze firm. “You’re well enough to travel. It’s time for you to be on your way.”

Ignoring the gun, Samson slid forward another step, his eyes focused only on her face. A spare dozen feet separated them, enough for him to see the stubborn set of her chin and the flinty sheen in her dark eyes. Despite her bold words, an acrid tang marred her verdant scent, her uneasiness on display.

“Don’t come closer,” Rosemary barked, her tone betraying her panic.

He folded his arms across his chest. “You really want me to go? After what happened last night?” His lips parted in a sour grin. “You didn’t seem so anxious to get rid of me when you were grinding your pussy on my face. What’s going to happen? Huh, Rosie? You gonna shoot me?” He paused, gratified by the tremor touching her blanched and pale lips. “You want me dead? Could’ve just left me to die by the creek… but you didn’t, did you?”

He lowered his arms and prowled forward, fear giving way to resolve. If she shot him, she shot him, but he wasn’t going anywhere without a fight. “You didn’t want that on your conscience, leaving an Alpha to die in the mud like that, did you? But now you expect me to believeyou’regonna put a bullet in me and live with that?” He shook his head, “That’s not you. No Omega’s gonna put a bullet in her Alpha. Ain’t gonna happen.”

“Isaiddon’t come any closer.” Rosemary cocked the gun in a quick, fluid motion and brought it up to shooting position. “And you’renotmy Alpha. I don’t—I don’t knowwhatyou are, but—”

“Stop fucking around,” he snapped, his patience at its end. “I know you’re very clever and can read books, butthis—” Hepointed at the floor. “—is the new world, andyou’rea part of it whether you like it or not.”

She adjusted her hold in the gun, her lower lip trembling.

“You think your body responded to me by someaccident, by somewhim? Or did you convince yourself thatyou’rein control? That you crawled on top of me for no reason other than curiosity?” He huffed a bitter laugh, then lowered his chin to fix her with a deadly stare. “Maybe you were in control when you had me tied to that bed. But you’ve made a big mistake, little Omega, because you let the Alpha loose, and he’snotgoing to leave.”

Sweat glistened on her brow, but her hold on the weapon never wavered. A thread of respect wove through the complicated mess of emotions knotting his chest. Whether she knew it or not, Rosemary was a brave Omega. Like his mother. Like his sisters.

And she washis. Three long strides would bring them face to face, and he was done having a weapon pointed at him.

“Enough,” he growled, and launched into action.

Between the first and second step, an ear-shatteringboomrocked the cabin. The bullet whizzed by his left ear and wood exploded behind him. Reflexively he spun toward the sound, where a cloud of dust and insulation and smoke cleared to reveal the outside world stealing through the hole in the wall.

His gut seized around an immovable mass of shock and cold fury.

She’d fuckingshotat him.

Chapter 9

Rosemary

The blast rang in her ears, deafening her to anything but the flailing of her frantic heart.

She’d missed the shot.

Buthadcome dangerously close to hitting Samson.

She’d never imagined he would balk at a quiet exit. In fact, he’d outrightrefused, taunting her with his words, with his scent, with hisnakedness. As if flaunting the perfection of his form to challenge her decision to drive him away.This?he seemed to say.You’re going to reject this?

In the dark predawn, her plans had made sense —set him free, send him away, go back to her life, pretend she’d never spent an evening climbing him like a tree and riding his face like a sex-crazed monster. But with the ear-shattering report from the gun, her world shifted on its axis again, and she became absolutely certain shedidn’twant to hurt Samson. Hysteria loomed like a coming storm. Now he’d surely leave and what if she didn’t want that, either?

Pain from the gun’s kick wrapped around her shoulder like an iron fist. She ought to move, to run, to dosomething,but the murderous expression on Samson’s face sealed her feet to the floor.He thundered across the floorboards, and between one blink and the next, plucked the gun from her grip as easily as picking a dandelion. With a snarl, he flung it across the room, sending it crashing against the wall and clattering to thefloorboards. Nostrils flaring, he stared her down, the mounting tension of the moment like a cresting tsunami ready to crush her under its weight.

“Howdareyou?” In one fluid swoop, Samson grabbed her arms, lifted her body, and pinned her back to the nearest wall. His face contorted into a glowering mask of rage, but Rosemary couldn’t look away. Raised to eye-level, a high frequency quiver spread up her chest, her nerves teetering on the knife-edge between fear and arousal.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t want—I thought you wanted toleave.”

His breaths blasted short and fast, suffocating gusts on her face, and his hands kneaded her upper arms, restless in his barely restrained frustration. “You thought I would pack up and leave an Omega alone in the woods for the next bastard who roams this far?” His head angled back till he looked down his nose at her, an arresting vehemence in his tone. “Do you know what the wrong person, abadperson, could do to you?”

“No one has come this far in decades,” she argued weakly. Innumerable things imperiled her daily existence—accidents, injury, fire, starvation, just to name a few. A stranger wandering through hardly ranked in the top twenty.

“Icame this far,” he snarled. “Starving and lost and nearly dead, something brought mehere, to your doorstep. How do you explain that?”

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