Page 21 of Auctioned to the Alpha

You mean arousing.

“Rabbits.” She chuckled bitterly. “That figures. Assholes.”

“It intrigues you, doesn’t it? What possesses them to want to experience our ways? To throw themselves at us, to surrender everything to our desires, only to have us discard them when we’re bored of them?”

“I think you’re getting that confused with disgust.” She intentionally clanged the chain of her cuffs against the bars. “Look, can we end this bullshit? At least turn on a light.”

“Why would I do that when I can see you—and those hard little nipples of yours—perfectly well right now?”

Her mouth went dry at that, and she hated once more being deprived of the use of her hands, the instinct to shield her breasts from his gaze, even in the inky blackness of the basement overwhelming.

“Do you imagine it? Even now? What might happen if you squeezed those tits between the bars of your cell? Those nipples aching for whatever pain or pleasure I might want to give them?” His laugh was a low vibrato. “You don’t fool me one bit, Stacy. I know who you are. What you are—even if you don’t. Not yet, anyway.”

“You don’t know jack shit about me, and if I have anything to do with it, I won’t be sticking around long enough for you to learn so much as my favorite fucking color. I don’tbelonghere. You know it, and I know it.”

It was confidence she didn’t at all feel, but in this situation, it actually bolstered her, calmed her nerves. Helped her avoid losing her shit.

The heat of him, the subtle change in air pressure against her skin, told her he was just outside her cell—and still she couldn’t see him. Her mind desperately tried to make out tiny movements, hints of shifting, dim light, but it was illusory. He could see her, and she couldn’t see him if he was even a hands breadth away from her. She understood what he was doing, a basic psychological tactic of emphasizing a captive’s vulnerability, of their perceived powerlessness, and their captor’s irresistible power, in a bid to begin breaking her down, to compel her surrender—or at least her docile cooperation.

But despite knowing what he was up to, there was no denying it was accomplishing exactly what he intended. She trulywasin serious trouble, and as yet, had no idea how she was going get herself out of it.

His voice broke her out of her thoughts. “Whether you think you should be in my hands or not is irrelevant. We don’t pick our fates—it’s chosen for us. We merely have to accept it.”

“Oh? And what about your fate?” She affected a derisive laugh. “I guess that means you’re a slave to fate as well. How does that work, mister big tough alpha?”

For a moment, he said nothing. Then his voice was even closer, and she imagined his mouth whispering against the cold cell bars as he spoke. “To claim a mate. A mate who won’t yet accept that she’s mine—even if her body already has.”

“Bullshit,” she said, her voice an angry hiss. “I don’t accept any of this. You kidnapped me, remember?”

“I took custody of you. Claimed that which is rightfully mine. Nothing more, nothing less. You’ll see that too, in time.”

“The only thing I look forward to is seeing this shithole in my rearview mirror.”

He made a tsking sound. “Here’s something else to look forward to,agent. When I come back for you, we’re going to have your inspection. You don’t know what that is, which makes it even more interesting for us.”

Her throat constricted so much, the word almost died on her tongue. “Us…?”

“Yes, us. When we retrieve you from your little cage there, we’ll display you where we can get a much better idea of the material we have to work with. Of what sort of training might best fit you.”

“Trainthis,” she spat, trying not to think about the hammering of her heart, the shaming wetness between the lips of her sex.

But he was seemingly unfazed by her defiance. “Inspections of a new omega are always conducted before the pack. To emphasize your place, your purpose. Just because you’re an agent, it doesn’t mean you won’t be treated just like the others. Here, you being an agent is utterly meaningless. Here you are female, you are property, you are acommodity. Here you will become what you always were meant to be.”

“And what is that?” Her mouth was bone dry, her heart in her throat, but she couldn’t help but ask it.

The grin was as clear in his voice as the morning dawn, the satisfaction of his tone both infuriating and unsettling her deep inside.

“What will you be? Oh, that’s very simple,agent.” His voice dropped to a rumbling growl. “You’ll be mine.”

CHAPTER10

Dmitri

Few things in his long life had prepared him for how stunning his new, not-quite-ready-to-admit-the-truth omega looked stretched out in her chains in the lodge’s “inspection” room. As he lead her up the stairs from her basement cell, the delightful vision of her taking tiny, halting, uncertain steps as the combination of the hobble at her ankles and the common central chain that made it impossible for her to stand straight up in her harness made for a rather arousing spectacle as with only a firm hold on the heavy leather belt, he helped guide her up the risers one by one.

In truth though, aside from preventing her from actually falling down, he made no real effort to assist her, rather enjoying the sight of her struggling mightily against her cruel, degrading bonds. Her gag—affixed to her the instant he’d drawn her out of her cell—and blindfold ensured she was a ball of inchoate, snarling frustration by the time he’d gotten her upstairs and out to the service garage, the chosen location of her inspection.

Ostensibly, the huge space was used for the trouble-shooting, maintenance, and repair of vehicles around either the pack lodge or the hotel—chiefly snowplows, snowmobiles, or one of the numerous light trucks and off-road vehicles (such as Knox’s favorite, his beat to hell, camouflage Gator) that were part of their life up in the mountains. Yes, wolves were exquisitely well-adapted to surviving and thriving in the wilderness, but more often than not, there was no substitute for the utility and convenience of human-designed machines.

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