Page 181 of Ruled By The Alpha

Looks like I don’t get the easy way out after all.

It doesn’t take long for one of the bastards to secure me to a pole, and my body screams in agony the entire time. I’m nothing more than a sweaty mess by the time I’m left swinging in the air from thick rope around my waist. The damned thing bites into my bruised flesh without mercy, suspending me a good five feet off the ground while I grit my teeth.

It fucking hurts.

There’s not one part of me that’s not throbbing. My death won’t be easy, either; they’ll hang me here while I slowly die without food and water. I’ve seen it happen to a few others, and it’s never pretty. The damned alphas like to check back in every so often to beat the beta they strung up, just to laugh at their abject misery. All I can hope is that they don’t notice my true designation because it will make everything so much worse for me.

No one in low zone will help me. They won’t risk the wrath of the alphas for one measly rebel.

No.

I’m on my own.

Even when Wes eventually stumbles upon me hanging here, he too will stand by and watch me wither into nothing. He has to. For himself. For my sisters. For me. If he helps me now, he’ll find himself strung up beside me, just as bruised and bloody as I am.

My vision is a blurry mess from the blood that’s seeped into my eyes. My breathing is labored, and a sharp pain inside my chest tells me they likely punctured something or broke a rib ortwo. Not that it matters when death is the only thing waiting for me now.

The alphas, two of whom I still haven’t gotten a good look at, finally leave me to swing in the faint wind. The clamor of the crowd dies away, and the steadydrip, drip, dripof my blood against the execution platform below me echoes in my ears. My head throbs in time with my frantic heartbeat and my thoughts spiral.

I’m going to die.

I’m going to die and leave everyone I love behind in a world that will use them up and tear them apart.

Chapter 3

Weston

Every time she leaves, I fear it’s the last time I’ll see her. I watch her go with barely disguised anxiety and a heavy heart. Her work with the rebel faction is dangerous, and she’s such a small omega. The betas will easily turn on her if it suits their agenda, and I have no doubt that they will someday soon. The rebels breed their own form of monsters.

I just hope she’s free of the rebels long before that day arrives, because I can’t lose her. She’s my whole world, and I love her—likely more than I should as an omega. We are destined to bond to alphas, though the very idea sends chills down my spine. I’ve heard stories of what they do to the rest the occupants of low zone, and it’s ugly. I don’t want to catch their attention; that’s why I bundle up the way I do, even in the hot summer months where I feel I’m a second away from heat stroke.

Evie bundles up too when she heads out, thank the gods. She dresses in stinking rags to help hide her blooming scent, but it won’t work long-term. The more she embarks on her dangerous mission to mid zone and high zone, the more at risk she is of perfuming and drawing in an alpha.

And since I spend so much time with her when she’s off, my own scent is starting to mirror hers. The two of us will keep playing off each other until either one or both of us enter estrous. Then all bets are off, and all the starving betas in low zone will sell us to an alpha to raise their own status.

Luckily—or unluckily, depending on how you look at it—due to an unbalanced and inconsistent diet, my body isn’t getting what it needs to support an estrous, otherwise I’d have experienced my first heat in my late teens, and so would Evie. We’ve been able to avoid our heats for years, but our luck will only last so long.

Rustling from the other room draws me out of my thoughts, and I finally turn away from the closed front door just in time to see Leah stumble out of her room. I stand and flick the lock before picking up the seven-year-old. She melts into my arms as I fall back on the sofa and gently rub her back. It doesn’t take long for Avery to stumble out next and curl into my side.

“Evie is out on a run for food. She’ll be back in a couple hours,” I say gently as the churning in my stomach grows stronger.

Ignoring it, I push the twins up and grab the last can of expired peaches, pop it open, and pass it over. The two eat without complaint, even though it’s not nearly enough to sate their hunger. When the world fell to shit, the walls we built to keep the infected out cut off our food supply too. We have a few farms left inside the dome, but they’re all regulated by the high zone, leaving those is low zone completely without. Only those in mid zone get a taste of relatively fresh produce, and that’s only when the high zone alphas pick through the selections first. Mid zone gets all the bruised and nearly spoiled goods, and low zone gets nothing. We’re left to trade among ourselves, and it’s a wonder we’re all not dead yet.

Alphas go on runs outside the walls every once in a while for supplies, but for the most part, they’re self-sufficient, with their own wells and cattle too. They’ve built themselves the perfect life while the rest of us suffer. Unlike Evie, I don’t hate them for it. They are doing what they need to in order to survive, just like therest of us. The alphas are simply blessed enough to be superior, and that means they get the cream of the crop.

What I can’t forgive them for is their heartless hunts they embark upon in the low zone. They kill low zone residents for sport, as if our lives aren’t hard enough as it is.

Before I know it, the sun is setting and Evie still isn’t home. She should have been back long before now, and that sinking feeling in my gut has grown impossible to ignore. Something tells me she’s in trouble, and the only reason I’ve let it go on this long is because it’s not unusual for her to get called in to join the rebels on one of their last-minute missions.

However, she did say that another faction entered mid zone last night and it didn’t go as planned. It’s not unusual for the rebels to fail, and when they do, they lie low for a few days until things cool down. Sheshouldn’thave been called in so soon.

It’s times like these where I don’t know what to do.

Making a hasty decision, I tuck the twins into bed and tell them to get some rest, and that I’ll be back soon. I put my cap back on and shrug into my smelly outer layer of clothes until I’m once again bulked up. Slipping out the door, I lock it behind me and rush down the crumbling stairs of the apartment complex, then left into the alleyway behind the worn building.

The towering complex blocks the sunset, encasing the alleyway in inky blackness. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust, not that I stop to let it happen. Instead I keep running, hand scraping the wall to guide my progress until I can better make out the shapes in the alley.

I’m heading toward the market when my body prickles with a strange sort of awareness that makes me freeze. I feel as if I’m suddenly not alone, and I shiver, knowing better than to discount that sensation out here. There’s an odd charge to the air that I can’t explain, and it’s making me nervous.

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