Page 84 of Roulette Rodeo
My whisky sits forgotten, watered down by melted ice. The storm rages outside my windows, and I know they're still out there, playing in it like children who've never learned that rain just makes everything harder.
Shiloh's falling for her.
No—he's already fallen.
Fell the moment he scented her in that storage closet, probably. Everything since has just been gravity doing its work, pulling him down until he crashes into her completely.
He's a goner. Lost. Her minion in her possession.
The thought comes unbidden, possessive in a way that makes me drain the rest of my whisky in one burning swallow.
She's not mine. She's not ours. She's a temporary problem that needs a permanent solution. A reminder of everything we can't have, shouldn't want, swore we'd never risk again.
"It's only a test," I say to the empty office. "She's only a toy. She'll show her true colors, and they'll be forced to acknowledge I was right."
The words echo off the glass and steel, sounding hollow even to my own ears.
But I repeat them anyway, like a mantra, like a prayer, like a lie I need to believe.
"She's temporary. She'll disappoint them. She'll break like they all break, or she'll run like they all run. She's not different. She's not special. She's not?—"
Dancing in the rain like it's a gift instead of an inconvenience.
Laughing with Duke like she's never had a dog before.
Looking at Shiloh like he's worth something beyond his capacity for violence.
I pour another whisky, this one larger, and settle back to watch the storm through my windows instead of my monitors.But I can't stop seeing her in my mind's eye—muddy and laughing and so fucking alive it hurts to witness.
Sophia had been beautiful, controlled, everything an omega should be according to the books.
She'd tried so hard to be perfect for us, to meet every expectation, to never disappoint. The pressure of it had crushed her, slowly at first, then all at once.
But Red doesn't seem to give a fuck about expectations.
She boxed in lingerie not to seduce but to fight. She claimed Shiloh in front of all Vegas, not to manipulate but because she wanted to. She's dancing in a thunderstorm, not for anyone's entertainment but her own.
Maybe that's what makes her dangerous.
Not her scent or her beauty or her virgin status that makes my cock hard despite my best efforts. But the fact that she doesn't seem to need us to be happy.
She was happy in that mud puddle. Happy playing with Duke. Happy in the rain that would have sent any other omega running for cover.
What happens when someone who doesn't need you chooses you anyway?
I don't want to find out. Can't afford to find out. Won't survive finding out.
"She'll show her true colors," I tell the storm, the words barely audible over thunder. "She'll prove me right."
She has to.
Because if she doesn't—if she's actually who she appears to be, this wild, free, joyful creature who finds happiness in thunderstorms—then everything I've believed for the last two years is wrong.
And I've built too much on that foundation of wrong to let one red-headed omega with a laugh like sunshine demolish it all.
"It's only a test," I repeat, closing my eyes and leaning back in my chair. "She's only temporary. She'll disappoint them."
I keep repeating it, over and over, like maybe if I say it enough times, it'll become true. Like maybe if I believe it hard enough, I won't have to face what I saw in that footage—a woman who might actually be strong enough to survive us.
