Page 102 of Knot the Alphas' Feral Omega

Pacing...whoever else was in the house with me was waiting for me to wake up.

The thought of being in the same room as my kidnapper made my heart rate spike, and I bit back a squeak of fear. I didn’t know who had kidnapped me, so I had no way of knowing if I was dealing with a shifter who would sense the moment I was awake from my breathing and heartbeat. Maybe it was just a psycho human who had decided that stalking me was what he wanted to do with his time. I didn’t know...

The pattern of footsteps changed, and this time, I did let out a cry of fear.

Because they were strong and purposeful now, making their way directly towards me, and I wasn’t naive enough to assume he was just coming to check on me. He’d known that I was awake—shifter, then.

I swallowed and forced myself not to panic even further as I straightened up and planted my feet on the bed on either side of me. I tensed as the steps of the person who had kidnapped me rapidly approached until they were on the other side of the door.

I wasfinallyable to shift my ears, and my hearing immediately sharpened as they paused outside the door. Their heartbeat wassteady, the breaths even—whoever was out there wasn’t afraid of me, not even a little bit.

As I listened, I finally heard something else—the sounds of another person, their heartbeat sluggish, somewhere far below my feet.

Fuck.

The sound of a key in the lock of the door made my heart rate spike again, and I quickly shifted my ears back so I looked as human as I could be. I didn’t want whoever was out there to know that I knew I wasn’t alone with them in this house, especially if the other person was as drugged as I had been. I had to keep as many secrets as possible to make it out of here alive.

The door clicked and then opened, and I swallowed hard as a man walked through.

He was middle-aged, roughly, with streaks of gray at his temples. His eyes were big and blue as he looked at me, though the spark of life that I’d come to expect from...well, people, was missing, and he looked empty despite the smile that stretched across his face. He wore a loose pair of jeans and a T-shirt that hung off his shoulders, and there was a hollowness in his cheeks that I wouldn’t have expected from someone healthy.

Everything about him made me shiver with unease.

His eyes flashed gold briefly as he watched me before inclining his head. “Lilah. You’re awake.” He offered me a smile and then stuck out one hand for me to shake. “I’m Hunter Randall.”

The blood drained out of my face so quickly that my head spun for a moment, making me dizzy, and I swallowed, forcing myself to stay sitting where I was, not moving even a muscle.

“You’re the Slicer,” I said, looking at his hand pointedly until he dropped it back to his side. My voice was flat and emotionless, and I deliberately folded my arms, closing myself off from him.

There was a spark of irritation in Hunter’s eyes, but he let out a low chuckle, folding his arms over his chest and mimicking my stance. “Ah, yes. Well. I never did like that moniker. I thought it was a bit unoriginal.”

For a moment, I couldn’t think of anything to say. I sputtered a little, then managed, “Your only issue is...that you don’t like the name the press gave you? Not that...you’re a serial killer?”

He shrugged and took a step closer to me again, letting his arms drop back to his sides. “People die, Lilah,” he said softly. “Does it really matter whether I’m the one that helps them over the finish line or not? The end result is all the same.”

Horror filled me, and I stumbled to my feet, taking several steps back and trying to maintain distance between us. “That’s...yes, it fucking matters! It matters whether or not a person spends their last moments in horrifying agony and terror compared to, I don’t fucking know, dying in their bed after a long illness!”

My mind immediately flashed to Mom with my words, and I was filled with even more horror as I realized that Hunter had snatched me from the house that Mom and I had shared for years. Heknewwhere Mom lived.

Hunter cocked his head to the side, and the smile on his face turned sly. “Don’t worry, Lilah,” he said, his voice low and smooth. “I have no interest in hurting Katrina. Even if she did betray me in the most heinous way by keeping you away from me.” He frowned, almostpouted, and took a step closer. “I missed out on all these years that I could have been a father to you.”

I sputtered, unable to contain my indignation even as my heart rate skyrocketed. “You missed out on being a father because you were a murdering psychopath! Surely...surely you see that, right?”

I tossed out the last sentence in a desperate attempt to see if any sort of humanity could be reached in him—anything that might indicate he wasn’t the horrible monster the newspapers and reports had painted him to be. He was even more terrifying in person than he had been in my head, especially now that I had eyes on him and knew that...he was just a normal guy.

Since discovering he was my father, I’d read many stories about Hunter Randall that described his crimes in great detail, but since he’d never been caught, the police had only ever been able to speculate about the person who had perpetrated them.

Now that he was standing in front of me, I had the horrible realization that there was no way he would have ever been caught, even if someone had seen him. He was too plain—not handsome enough to catch anyone’s eye, not distinctive enough to be remembered.

The perfect serial killer.

And I was in a house with him. Not alone—I still didn’t know what was going on with the other person in the house—but alone enough that I was terrified I wouldn’t make it out alive.

Hunter shrugged again and cocked his head to the side. This time, when he looked at me, there was a flicker of disappointment in his eyes, which was only emphasized when he sighed. “Your mother and her rigid sense of morals,” he muttered.

He reached up, ran his hand through his hair, and took another step closer to me. I swallowed, the backs of my thighs hitting the bedside table, and he took the opportunity to march up to me and grab my wrist—not too tight, but enough that I couldn’t get away if I wanted to.

Then he turned around and walked out of the room, dragging me behind him. I stumbled a little, suddenly grateful that I was still wearing the jeans and sneakers I’d been wearing to go and visit Mom, and managed to steady myself on my feet when an alpha growlrippedthrough the air and he glanced over his shoulder with his eyes glowing gold.

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