Page 100 of Knot Gonna Lie
Every step took us further from witnesses, from the illusion of safety that crowds provided. The air grew cooler, tasting of metal and ozone.
Movement exploded.
Stella broke through first, a streak of red hair and rage. Her fist cracked against a gamma’s jaw, sending him reeling. Maia ducked low, smaller frame slipping between hands, her fingers stabbing pressure points with clinical precision.
“Subdue them.” Alpha Zeke’s voice carried no heat, no anger—just the mild inconvenience of swatting flies. “Gently. They’re under my protection now.”
The gammas shifted from containment to assault. One caught Stella’s next strike, twisting her arm until she gasped. Another swept Maia’s legs, dropping her hard onto oil-stained concrete.
Rage ignited in my chest, hot and sudden as a solar flare.
Mine.
The word reverberated through bone and blood. My betas. My family.
These were my betas, my clan, my family.
Training from yesterday surfaced—weight distribution, momentum, the soft spots even trained fighters left exposed. I wrenched against Zeke’s hold, twisting free, and drove my elbow into his stomach. Not enough to cripple, but enough to earn a grunt and loosen his hold. The nearest gamma turned toward me, reaching—
My teeth found his wrist.
Blood filled my mouth—copper, salt, wrongness. Not pack. Enemy. He howled, jerking back, and I spat red onto concrete. The taste lingered, coating my tongue with violence I’d never thought myself capable of.
“Magnificent.” Zeke’s laugh rolled like thunder. “They told me you were meek, broken by the station’s conditioning. They lied.”
Three gammas converged on me at once. I kicked, clawed, bit—feral in ways that would have horrified my station-trained sensibilities. My fist connected with a nose, sending blood cascading down white robes. Nails raked across another’s cheek, leaving parallel wounds that would scar.
But I was one omega against trained warriors.
A hand tangled in my hair, yanking my head back. Another caught my wrist mid-swing, pressure points screaming as fingers found nerve clusters. The ground rushed up to meet me, concrete scraping palms as they forced me down.
“No!” Stella’s voice splintered the air. She still fought, held by two men but still reaching. Maia stilled, a gamma’s hand at her throat—a silent threat.
“Enough.”
Alpha Zeke stepped into my line of sight, producing a silver device from his robes. Not quite weapon, not quite medical.Something worse. My instincts screamed. “You’ve proven your spirit, little omega. But this ends now.”
Cold metal touched my neck. Sweet-sick scent flooded my senses. Not chloroform—something engineered for our enhanced metabolisms, our resistant physiologies. The world blurred at the edges, colors bleeding together like watercolors in rain.
“Luca...” His name escaped as whisper, as prayer, as the last thread connecting me to consciousness. Through the bond I shoved everything—I pushed every ounce of terror, of rage, of location.Find me. Find me. Find—
“Sleep now.” Alpha Zeke’s voice crawled through my skull. “Your alpha will come for you. They always do.”
Darkness swallowed me whole, but not before I heard Stella’s scream—raw, promising vengeance.
And then Luca’s rage tore through the bond, like distant thunder, growing closer with every heartbeat that dragged me under.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
LUCA
The tropical breeze carried salt and jasmine, but beneath it lurked something sharper—Eli’s fury bleeding into the evening air. I’d chosen the beach pavilion deliberately, far enough from the villa that his scent wouldn’t contaminate the spaces where Elara moved. Her heat approached like a storm on the horizon, and I wouldn’t risk another alpha’s presence tainting what should be ours alone.
My brother stood rigid against the late afternoon sunlight, his silhouette a mirror of my own. Same broad shoulders, same aggressive stance, but where my eyes held icy blue, his burned sapphire dark with betrayal.
“What can I do for you, Brother?” I kept my voice measured, leaning back against the stone balustrade. The casual pose was calculated—dominance through indifference. “You know I’m on vacation.”
“Call it what it is,Luca.” His snarl twisted the air between us. Those sapphire eyes had gone nearly black, alpha rage crackling beneath his skin. “I know what you’ve done.”
