Page 2 of The Demon's Pet

“You stay right there,” he snarled.

I stood but dropped my heavy groceries as I turned to face him.

As an omega, it was my job to do whatever a beta or alpha asked of me.

No limits.

Any refusal could be met with death.

With his shifter strength and deftness, Zane strode across the street and got to me in mere seconds. Before I could blink, he grabbed my hair, uncombed and tangled as usual (because what was the point of looking good for these assholes) and jerked my head back so I was forced to look up at him.

Tears bit at my eyes from the pain, and my neck flared in agony, but I held it all back and gave him the flat, unresponsive glare that I knew would deprive him of any enjoyment.

Any of the power he usually felt from putting someone down.

With a snarl, he shoved me away from him, so hard that I stumbled back and planted down on my ass in the dry grass beyond the sidewalk.

He circled me and then stopped as I realized others were coming to join us, their footsteps echoing on the pavement as their shadows danced toward us in the waning evening light.

“The mating ceremony is tonight,” Zane said, bending over to grab my hair again. “If you want me to pick you, you’d better decide to be nice.” He leaned his head in closer, closer, his lips coming in threateningly, slowly, as if he expected me to kiss him, opening his lips and letting his dog breath assault me.

I head-butted him, using the hard part of my upper forehead to crush his nose the way my karate teacher had taught me.

Before I’d been assigned my official omega status and was forced to quit, martial arts had been the best part of my life.

Zane’s nose made a satisfying crack, and his blood spurted out on my shirt as he flew backward, landing on the ground but quickly pulled up by two of his lackeys.

“You bitch!” he hissed, swiping the quickly flowing blood from his nose even as I watched, mesmerized, as his shifter healing slowly moved the crooked bones back into place with little popping sounds, like a tent being assembled, the blood flow slowing.

In seconds, he looked normal again, except for the crust of blood around his nose.

“Typical omega, can’t even hit that hard,” he said, and several of his goons laughed.

The betas he ran with all looked the same to me. Handsome, built wolf shifters in their early twenties, with clean, expensive clothing and smiles built from other people’s pain.

I smirked. “I’m not the one who called for backup.”

His gaze darkened, and I knew I’d hit my mark.

One of the betas near me slapped me across the face for my impertinence. My heart stung more than my cheek as my face swung to the side.

I had grown up with these people. I wanted to be one of them. Ever since I’d been assigned to be an omega, I’d become nothing to them.

Less than nothing. Something to squash under their feet.

“How dare you talk to Alpha Zane that way?” Grayson, one of the betas, spat with a hiss.

“He’s only alpha of the college,” I grumbled.

I hadn’t been allowed to go to school past high school. Educating an omega was seen as a waste.

I thought educating Zane was a waste when he could be perfectly suited to serving the community as firewood.

“And I’ll tell your family alpha about what you did to him,” Allison said, another beta who licked Zane’s balls every chance she got.

“Come on, Cleo,” Chris, a beta who never bullied omegas much despite hanging out with Zane, stepped forward, wringing his hands nervously. His red hair was damp with sweat as he looked between me and the angry alpha. His freckles stood out on his pale, wan face. “Just cooperate, please.”

“Everyone else can accept their place here. Why can’t you?” Brittany, another beta, chimed in, throwing her perfect blond hair over her shoulder. “My little sister is a perfect omega. Pretty. Quiet. Seen but not heard.” Her lip curled in disgust as her green eyes raked me over. “Look at you. You aren’t even trying to catch an alpha.”

---