Page 15 of Feral Alphas

“What? That old fart?” He hisses in disgust like I knew he would. “Bastard gave away all his earnings instead of supporting his family. Stop listening to a fucker like him.”

We share a wry grin, because we both know I’ll keep listening, and his hatred of the renowned composer is only half-hearted.

“You want to hear something crazy?” Colt breaks the seal on his water, releasing a hiss of carbonation. “Felina told me to sample thehaze evidence. Can you believe that woman? One of these days it’s gonna be her sitting on the other side of the interrogation table.”

I snort. “Sounds like her, but she was probably just enjoying the shock on your face.”

He scoffs. “Come on, I’m not that rigid.”

I chew on my lip to hide a smile and jot down the numbers to complete a row, dragging my pencil lightly across the page to the next empty square.

“I hope you’re not laughing at me, Luka.”

“Of course not, Sir.” Best to change the topic before I get myself in trouble. “Any leads on the case? You said it was an underground fighting ring?”

His knee jiggles up and down. “Chatter claims it’s forced alphas fighting and there’s some big match happening here in Darinian. You know anything about that?”

I stiffen, hating anything that relates to a walk down memory lane. It’s never a pleasant stroll.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No, I’m the best person to ask.” I set my pencil in the spine with a sigh and scratch my forehead. “If it’s for fighting, they’ll be adult males. Hard to control, so most likely a long-term unit raising them from kids. They could use drugs to control them, but that’d risk dulling their fighting instincts.”

I click my tongue, remembering past days when I’d attended those matches. “The Bureau needs to watch the roads. Transporting a fighting team of ferals would be a logistical nightmare. You can’t sit a bunch of fighting dogs next to each other on a bus, so look for big trucks or shipping containers entering the city.”

He swivels in his chair, knees brushing my back. “Dogs?”

I shrug. “That’s what the handlers call them. They’re treated like animals and barely have any sanity left.”

His voice lightens with curiosity. “You ever been to one? A match I mean.”

“Yeah.”

“Different to an MMA match?”

I shudder. “Yeah. You and I, we grow up learning to hold in our musk at least a bit. Ferals have barely any consciousness. The air reeks so strongly of them you can taste it, and that alone is enough to send half the audience wild.” I crack my blackened knuckles. “And there’s no referees. They fight until one stops fighting back.”

“Fuck! To the death?”

“Depends on the alpha who wins. If he breaks the spine or whatever, that’s it. Some of them walk away once the other alpha stops moving.” A tremor runs through my hands as I pick up the pencil, making it scratch a line on the cream paper. “You think the haze is related?”

Colt grunts. “Long shot. Really, I’m clutching at straws. But I am sure it’s a new distributor.”

I shake my head. “I’d hate to think of an omega being anywhere near a pack of ferals like that.”

“That’s why we have to shut it down,” Colt answers darkly.

I want to warn him that the underworld is more dangerous than he can imagine, but he knows—it’s his job to know. That’s how he found me, after all, and patched me back together, as good as I can be.

Now I get to wait at home each day hoping he comes back to me in one piece.

Chapter six

Rose

The hours blur together, punctuated by the whirring of the heavy bunker doors and the screams of the crowd watching the fight in the arena beyond. Petrov and his helpers chase the alphas out one-by-one and they return bloodied, battered, and panting, snarling at my growing scent cloud between swollen lips. Petrov keeps an impassive eye on me as he coordinates via his radio and watches the matches on his tablet.

Through it all, my belly burns and the sheets stick to my skin as sweat soaks them. I thought heats were beautiful and holy things, but this is pure agony. I try to silence my whimpers because every time I cry the feral alphas renew their crazed howling, but I can’t hold it all back.

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