Page 66 of Filthy Beginnings

But who? He’d been so fucking careful. Only take food and drink from…

His head snapped up, his gaze landing on the locked storage drawer. The water container. A container no one had touched but him… and Scarlett.

Disbelief hit.

Whirling back around, his gaze locked with hers.

Her despair and guilt were easy to see. Even easier to feel through their bond.

It was her. She’d done it.

She wasn’t even pretending now. Darkness swirled within her, stretching toward him through their invisible bond, all her beautiful colors gone.

All his hopes for their future blacked out too.

But why?

Rage and pain explode inside him.

I know you can win.

Her earlier words to him.Can.Not will.

She’d known it all along—and she’d sent him into the ring anyway, and now Crex was dead and Stormhart was the only other fighter left in the ring.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Stormhart charge.

He didn’t have time to give a fuck.

He stumbled toward her. “Why?”

Despite the laser bars between them, she stumbled back a step, right into the body of the male at her side.

Her eyes overflowed with tears.

He felt his fill as well.

Crack.

It was almost a relief when Stormhart’s punch landed and the darkness took him.

16

Damien awoke with a groan, the vibrations from the shuttle jostling every sore muscle—which was pretty much all of them.

But he was alive.

Which is more than he could say for Crex.

He tried to shift—only to have metal bite into his throat.

He might be alive, but they’d shackled his throat, wrists, and ankles to the hull.

The consortium was taking no chances.

Just off to the side, he counted six mean-looking Alphas escorting him from the premises, their shock sticks already fired up.

As if he had any interest in drop-kicking their asses anywhere.

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