by Nora Ash
“No, he does not. None of them do.” Dr. Axell returned my gaze with a calming smile. “Not yet. But it is our working theory that if we can get them to claim a mate while in this state, they will be much easier to control. We keep the woman with us, safe and sound, and her alpha will obey every command given.”
“But…” About a thousand questions tumbled through my brain, but I found it hard to word any of them. An esteemed researcher like Dr. Simon Axell would never break the strict codes of conduct every person employed within the sciences swore an oath to uphold, and I didn’t want him to think I was accusing him of doing anything of the sort. Yet this…
“How will you find the women to bond with these men?” I finally asked.
“We already have.” Dr. Axell nodded toward where the central, glass-paned room curved around. When we’d entered, I’d noticed a door leading out of the room on that side. “Inmates at several women’s prisons across the country were given the option of shortening their sentences by taking part in this research. Those who accepted were given a physical before they arrived. Every one was deemed in a fitting physical state to participate. Don’t worry, Miss Dorne. Everything is above board. I would never ask fellow researchers to partake in anything that could harm their careers.”
“I wasn’t implying that—“
He put a hand on my shoulder. “I know, my dear. And I want you to feel safe in confiding any concerns that may arise during your employment here. We take the welfare of our employees, as well as our test subjects, seriously.”
I offered him a brief smile of gratitude that he responded to with a quick squeeze before he removed his hand and turned away from the caged alpha still pacing in his cell. “Now, if you will come with me. I’ll show you your work station. You won’t often have need to come down to the lab, but on occasion, someone will forget to jot down the relevant numbers in the reports you’ll be given. If that’s the case, you can always come down and read them off the cells. Just be careful not to come within reach of the bars.”
I nodded shakily, my gut clenching at the thought of being close enough to one of the feral alphas that they might reach through the bars and grab me. One final look at the still-pacing 351 made it very obvious I wouldn’t like the outcome of an encounter like that.
3
I settled into a rhythm at my new job quickly enough. My colleagues were friendly, if a bit aloof, like most researchers tended to be. I was the most junior member of the team, and a newcomer, so I didn’t mind too much that I spent most of my time alone by my computer. I was determined to prove myself the best analyst Dr. Axell had ever employed, hopeful that I’d improve my standing with the accomplished alpha enough that he’d eventually consider me part of his core team.
So I worked overtime hours from my second week, staying later than anyone else to catch up on the pile of work that’d been accumulating while they didn’t have an analyst employed. Spreadsheets and bio measures haunted my dreams.
It was a full month into my employment before I had to return to the lab.
It was past 8 PM Friday night, and I was the last employee left in the whole compound, save the guards patrolling the upper layers and surrounding grounds. I’d decided to run the last few numbers on the latest test results from Subject 351. But as I sat yawning in front of the computer screen, staring at numbers that slowly began to look like ants to my tired eyes, I realized Dr. Axell had forgotten to fill in the alpha’s daily calorie intake for this past week. Either I had to wait until Monday to get the numbers, or… I had to go read them off his chart myself.
A small jolt of nerves made me grimace. I’d been in plenty of labs before—that this one contained several aggressive alphas really shouldn’t make me flinch like an intern. They were safely locked up. It didn’t matter that I’d be the only staff member down there—not if I wanted to get this report done for Dr. Axell to hand over first thing Monday morning.
After only a moment’s hesitation, I snatched pen and paper off my desk and made my way to the lab. Impressing my new boss was far more important than the dumb animal instincts nagging at my spine at the prospect of being all alone in a room full of alphas.
The lab was only half-lit when I stepped in through the sliding door after having swiped my card on the scanner. I briefly considered flicking the bright fluorescent lights on to make it easier to see the numbers on 351’s chart, but a quick glance at the nearest cages made me decide against it.
In contrast to when last I’d been here, the alphas within view weren’t pacing restlessly. Instead, they all seemed to be in some state of rest, and I didn’t want to disturb them.
I walked as quietly as I could down the left row of cells, but even though I didn’t go unnoticed, no one growled at my presence. A few got to their feet to watch me as I passed their cage, alert but unaggressive. I scented the air and blushed at my own lapse into primitive instincts. I was usually much better at ignoring the small, primal urge to smell for pheromones that always jabbed at the base part of my brain when around alphas—but then again, it wasn’t often I found myself surrounded by this many of them.
Despite the heavy smell of disinfectant in the air and the relative calmness of the lab’s inhabitants, the bitter note of alpha aggression still hung above it all, a silent reminder of the much different atmosphere the other staff members saw during regular working hours. Faint as it was, it still wreaked havoc on my nerves, and I sped up on my way to 351’s cell. The sooner I got this over with, the sooner I’d be able to get out of here.
Subject 351 sat against the near wall when I got to his cage. His eyes snapped open when I stopped in front of the door where Dr. Axell’s notes were attached to the concrete separating his cell from the next.
“Hey,” I said, feeling halfway stupid talking to a feral alpha who’d likely rip me apart if he got the chance—but also too uncomfortable under his dark stare to pretend like I didn’t notice him. Besides, the sound of my own voice calmed my frayed nerves, if only a little. “I just need to get your stats for the week—Dr. Axell forgot to complete them.”
He didn’t respond, obviously, but he didn’t move closer to the bars either. I relaxed a little and pulled out my notepad, intent on getting the task done.
Dr. Axell’s writing wasn’t the most legible at the best of times, and in the dim lab, I had to squint and lean in to decipher the numbers and notes he’d scrawled on the alpha’s file for the week. I was so absorbed in my efforts that I didn’t realize I’d taken a step closer to the bars—nor did I notice the alpha getting to his feet. Only when I took another step and my shoulder brushed against the metal did I notice what I’d done—and by then, it was too late.
A large hand, with strength to rival a freight train, closed around my upper arm. Hard.
I shrieked and flailed, dropping my notepad and pen. My heart pounded in my throat so hard I thought I might throw it up, and I pushed at the bars in a vain attempt at getting free. I might as well have tried to dislodge a boulder.
“Key!” The snarled word hardly sounded human.
“I-I don’t have any keys!” I whimpered. “Please, you’re hurting me!”
The alpha growled and pulled me closer, slamming the full length of my body up against the bars in the process. I whimpered as pain lanced through me at the impact, and the errant thought, “I’m going to die,” flashed through my brain with merciless clarity.
But when Subject 351 grabbed at me through the bars with his free hand, it wasn’t to tear me in half. He held me firmly in place, stopping me from squirming, and then pushed his hand into my lab coat’s nearest pocket. The material slid across my body at his violent rummaging, and I bit back an undignified gasp when his large hand basically rubbed right across my private parts.
The alpha didn’t give two shits about what was underneath my clothes, though. Another growl, triumphant this time, vibrated from his chest when he pulled out what he’d been after—my pass.
So that’s what he meant by “ke
y.”
“I don’t have access to the cells,” I said, hoping with everything I had that I was right. There was no reason for me to have clearance to unlock the cages, but the entire lab might be under the same security level. “Please, just let me go.”
He didn’t. He kept his grip on me as he shifted behind the bars, moving so he could push his arm out of the cage and slap my keycard against the card reader attached to the door. It beeped, flashing a red light, and relief flooded through me all the way from my toes. A relief that was instantly squashed when the alpha roared, clearly furious, and clenched his hand so hard around my arm the bones creaked.
“Ow, stop!”
My pained cry died on a wheeze when he slammed me back against the bars and snarled, “Open!”
“I-I can’t. Please, I’m telling you the truth. I don’t have clearance.” I twisted a little to try and look at him, and hopefully plead with whatever humanity was left within him. However, actually looking at him this close did nothing to calm my own racing heart. He was so big, his bulging muscles tensed with unleashed fury, and there was hatred painted all over his carved features. Under different circumstances—mainly not being trapped and reasonably certain I was about to lose an arm to his anger—I might have found him very handsome, even if he was very clearly all alpha. He had even features with high cheekbones and full lips that were currently pulled into a snarl, dark, buzz-cut hair, and the most startling pale, blue-green eyes. However, right then, all I could feel for the man was fear. Sick, gut-wrenching fear.
“Please. Don’t hurt me. I haven’t done anything to you.”
He growled low in his throat in response and tugged hard at my white lab coat. “Always hurt.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant I was like the other people in lab coats, and therefore he wanted to hurt me, or if they hurt him. Regardless, I knew distinguishing myself from the people he undoubtedly blamed for locking him up in here was my only shot at getting out of this mess in one piece.
“I’m not them. I only run the data through a computer. You’ve never seen me down here because I don’t… I’m not part of the hands-on research. I just do my job,” I babbled, twisting further to catch his gaze.
“Once. With him.” The way he spat the last word out, there was no mistaking the loathing.
“Dr. Axell?” I blinked, remembering my first day—surprised my brief visit had even registered with him.
The alpha snarled furiously in response, and I whimpered and braced for being slammed against the bars again. But the impact never came.
I raised my gaze to plead with him once more, finally managing to catch those piercing eyes of his—and felt the words die on my lips. An odd buzz at the base of my spine made me shiver as I stared into what looked like two perfect flecks of ice.
His growl cut off like someone had flicked a switch, and I vaguely noticed the small gasp that escaped his lips before his pupils blew wide, and something entirely primal welled up from deep within my core in immediate and entirely involuntary response.
It felt like electricity snapped through my veins instead of blood, hardening my nipples into painful peaks within the confines of my sensible cotton bra—and down low, an unmistakable heat began to radiate up through my abdomen.
What… the hell?
There was nothing sexual about being threatened with dismemberment from a feral alpha—a fact I’d been completely on board with not two seconds ago. So why was my body suddenly responding to the huge man as if… as if I wanted to…?
The deepest blush of my entire life flooded up from the tips of my toes and covered my body when I realized exactly what kind of ideas my body seemed to have gotten just from looking into his now darkened eyes. A test subject! How entirely inappropriate!
I flinched, trying to distance myself from the source of my perverted urges. To my surprise, he let go this time, letting me slip out of his grip as he continued to stare at me with a mix of confusion and… something else I couldn’t put my finger on.
I scrambled a few steps back, breathing hard as if I’d just run a mile. I felt like it, too. Shaking like a leaf, I turned to leave—to put as much distance between us as I could.
“Key.”
I looked back up at him at the sound of his now much softer voice. He was reaching through the bars for me, my pass in his upturned palm. Fuck. I couldn’t very well leave the lab without it.
Hesitantly, I took a step back toward him, keeping my eyes on him to make sure he wouldn’t snatch me again.
The difference on his sharp features was like night and day. Before, he’d been a mountain of unleashed fury. Now, he looked like he was trying to appear smaller, as if he was… trying not to scare me? There wasn’t an ounce of the previous anger on his face, just that intense stare of his as he looked at me unblinkingly.
Slowly, I edged closer until I was exactly close enough to reach out and snatch my card out of his hand.
He didn’t try to grasp me again, only looked at me as I quickly stepped out of reach once more.
“Thank… you,” I said, not entirely sure why I was thanking the man who’d just tried to pull my arm off. Or whatever it was he’d been doing. It dawned on me that he hadn’t actually harmed me nearly as much as he could have, should he have wanted to. Sure, I’d be sporting some pretty nasty bruises tomorrow, but I could have been dead on the floor for whoever fed the test subjects over the weekend to find.
The alpha didn’t say anything, but I could feel his eyes on my back as I made my way out of the lab.
4
Subject 351 didn’t leave my thoughts the entire weekend. I couldn’t get his haunting eyes out of my mind, and, at night when I tossed and turned in my bed, I dreamt of him. They were disturbing dreams, filled with darkness and feral snarls, but despite the terror I felt as I slept, come morning I’d be aching and wet between the legs.
The shame from that particular bit was the worst part.
I’d never had this strong a reaction to an alpha before. Sure, I could appreciate them on screen as attractive on that primal level that spoke solely to the most primitive instincts in my body, but as soon as a male switched on the alpha aggression in person, all I felt was fear. I wasn’t like the women who flung themselves at any alpha who sniffed in their direction—I’d never seen the attraction of their dominance. They just scared me.
Sure, I could work with an alpha fine, as long as he was perfectly well-behaved—like Dr. Axell. But anything more than that?
I shuddered as memories I’d long ago repressed threatened to spill into my conscious mind. My step-dad had been an alpha, and he hadn’t liked taking care of another man’s child. I’d learned from an early age that it was best to give the aggressive ones a wide berth, and the well-mannered a cautious eye.
So why the hell did 351 make me toss and turn all nights with… with yearning, like a damn cat in heat?
These thoughts were still tumbling around in my head when I made it to work Monday morning, tired and disheveled from yet another bad night to finish up the report I hadn’t managed to complete on Friday.
My colleagues chatted quietly about a new female test subject they'd secured, while I stared blankly at 351's test results. My coffee sat next to me untouched despite my fatigue. Perhaps that was why I blurted out, "What do you do to them? During the tests?"
“Beg your pardon?” Dr. Axell looked at me over his shoulder, eyebrows raised in question.
“It’s just, it would be useful for me to know exactly what these figures are referring to,” I quickly added. Which was true, I sternly told myself. It was purely to help me do my job better. Not because the echo of the feral alpha’s voice growling out, “Always hurts,” had been playing on a loop all weekend.
“That’s a fair point.” Dr. Axell turned back to Dr. Urwin. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to let her oversee today’s tests?”
The other doctor smiled—I was pretty sure for the first time since I’d worked there. He looked genuinely excited. “
Yes, I think it would be brilliant to have a fresh pair of eyes on today’s proceedings. We have procured a very interesting female candidate. I’m expecting great results today. You’re very welcome to shadow, Lillian.”
* * *
The test took place in the circular room placed in the center of the lab.
Inside was a donut-shaped room with glass panes facing the central room. Dr. Axell flicked the lights on behind the glass and revealed a sterile-white floor and ceiling, and what looked like a padded bench or narrow table. It was roughly hip-height, with four legs and a flat surface.
Nothing else was inside the room except a heavy steel door with a grid on the far side.
I sat down in the chair Dr. Axell indicated for me, frowning at the empty room. “What’s that piece of equipment for?”
He glanced at me, a little surprised. “You do know how alphas claim their mates, right?”
My frown deepened. “They give them a claiming mark. But why—?” My voice died when I recalled the circumstances in which such a mark was usually placed. “Oh.” Really wish I’d thought of that before I’d accepted the offer to shadow their work!
Flushed, I looked back at the room. This was for science—it was no more awkward than mixing bacteria in a test tube. “Ah, why not… give them a bed?”
Dr. Axell snorted. “We tried that. Once. It got destroyed during the first test. This is much more practical. And sturdy.”
The steel door inside the test room clanked and was pulled open, and I frowned again at the state of the woman Dr. Urwin dragged in with him.
She was naked, which wasn’t particularly shocking after being reminded of what was going to happen—but everything else about her, from her wild look to her unkempt appearance, made my breath catch.