His Forbidden Omega (The Royal Omegas Book 1)

by Kristen Strassel

  A rebellious wolf will bring this shifter king to his knees…

  She changed my life as soon as I saw her at the party. No one knew who she was, but I didn’t care. I’d make her mine, no matter the price.

  This beauty threatened to cost me everything.

  She’s a lowly omega. The class of wolf my father declared the enemy at the beginning of this endless war. I’m the king now and breaking the rules for her could cost me my crown. Mating with a strong-willed omega is the least of my problems.

  Will Zelene, with her dreams of revolution, bring the kingdom together or tear it apart?

  His Forbidden Omega

  THE ROYAL OMEGAS

  Book One

  By

  P. Jameson

  Kristen Strassel

  PJAMESONBOOKS.COM | KRISTENSTRASSEL.COM

  His Forbidden Omega

  Copyright © 2019 by P. Jameson and Kristen Strassel

  First electronic publication: August 2019

  United States of America

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, redistributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in any database, without prior written permission from the author, with the exception of brief quotations contained in critical reviews. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this work may be scanned, uploaded, or otherwise distributed via the internet or any other means, including electronic or print without the author’s written permission.

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Cover Design: Sotia Lazu

  Formatting: Agent X Graphics

  P. Jameson | Kristen Strassel

  www.pjamesonbooks.com

  www.kristenstrassel.com

  Chapter One

  King Adalai

  Another battle was won. Another enemy trampled under my watch. And the excitement it bred in my blood was like a drug I never wanted free of.

  I stomped to my balcony, stepping into the night and threw my clenched fists into the air in triumph as I looked down at my people crowding the streets below. The rumble of a fierce growl grew in my chest until it exploded from my throat, vicious and inhuman. And the resulting thunderous roar from below told me the others were drunk on victory too.

  Tonight, there would be much fucking.

  Tomorrow, there would be a celebration. A feast worthy of a king and his court, to show the people of Luxoria their leader was powerful enough to bring down the great humans who wanted to capture and study them.

  For the first time in too long I, King Adalai of the Weren, was deserving of my place on the throne.

  I was alpha. I was powerful. I owned the fucking ground my people walked on.

  And unlike my father, no one would ever take it away from me.

  I turned back to the meeting room where my closest advisors awaited my command.

  “Report,” I growled, pacing the floor. My cock was hard from the battle. Only killing made it this way. I’d need a female tonight. Perhaps a curvy beta to knot in. I would have one brought to me after business was complete.

  Evander, Solen, Cassian, and Dagger stood, bloody fists clenching, chests rumbling just like mine. Each of them an alpha in their own right, they likely needed to rut away the battle just as I did.

  We’d make this quick.

  “The troops came at us from all sides, including the south,” Evander announced.

  “The south. They approached the Badlands?” The territory to the south was reserved for the omega shifters. Those who were banished after The Division. And it was a dead barren waste.

  Dagger, who was in charge of the south, nodded. “A mistake of course. The omegas had them on the run before the royal forces even arrived.”

  “Losses?” I asked.

  “A mere eight from the east,” Solen practically roared.

  “Twelve from the west.” Cassien grinned, his eyes flashing dark with bloodlust. “But ask me how many we took down. Because that number is much more impressive.”

  Evander growled a warning. “Four from the North,” he said. “Two of them younglings who were coming into their alpha year.”

  A shame. But the ones weak enough to die weren’t strong enough for the pack.

  I looked to Dagger. I already knew his number but I waited for him to answer anyhow.

  “Zero from the Badlands.” He looked satisfied. “The omegas grow stronger even as they grow weaker.”

  Which shouldn’t make the sick bastard happy at all. But Dagger wasn’t normal. It was what made him perfect for policing the Badlands.

  I looked around at my men. What was normal anyway?

  We were royalty, but we weren’t refined.

  We weren’t proper, and certainly not civil. But we were better than the filth that lived beyond the gates in the Badlands. We had technology that kept us fed and living in lush green land. Kept water flowing through our city. We had factories where omegas labored to produce the finest clothing and furniture and artillery. We had entertainment, soft beds, and all our hearts desired at the snap of a fucking finger.

  But it was all a grand scheme. A costume we wore.

  Because inside, we were all beasts.

  And it was no more evident than it was on the battlefield where we crushed our human enemies like dried clay in our fists.

  Beasts.

  Somewhere, deep inside each of us, there was a wolf locked away, unable to find its way out anymore. The ability to shift had been slowly fading away for decades, until the former king—my father—was the only one of us left who could. And for all our godforsaken technology and advancements, no one could seem to figure out why. Eventually even he had succumbed to the hindrance.

  Until we were able to shift and be our whole selves, we would never be truly satisfied.

  But fighting and fucking and drinking the wine of our people helped ease the sting. So that was how we spent our days and nights.

  It was an empty existence but it was better than beyond the gates. Better than that of the omegas. And the surviving humans we warred with.

  “Go,” I told my men. “Find betas to warm your beds. You deserve them. Tomorrow, we celebrate.”

  Nodding, they filed out, wordlessly.

  Strolling to the bar, I loosened my groin-cloak and let it fall to the stone floor, giving my cock the room it needed. It jutted out before me hard and aching and unrelenting. The throbbing bulb at the end assured me it was too far gone to go away on its own. And the idea of taking a beta to bed again… didn’t leave me breathless.

  I poured a goblet of wine and brought it to my lips, savoring the rich flavor before crossing the room to sit on the lush couch that my beta squire insisted I have. It was rather comfortable, but it didn’t bring me the comfort I needed.

  The kingdom my father and others had built was under constant threat. And the safety of it rested solely on my shoulders now. I was King Alpha.

  Others wanted that title and fought me for it often.

  If I was any less of a male, I would give it to them and laugh as I strode away, knowing the sort of pressure they would then face.

  But I was not a lowly male.

  I was the fiercest male in the pack. Even if I had to constantly prove it.

  That’s the way you keep the throne. My father’s words were always and forever in my mind.

  Sipping my wine, I thought of the omegas that lived outside the city and what Dagger’s report meant. They grow stronger even as they grow weaker. />
  Once upon a time, omegas lived in the city as a thriving part of the pack. They were taken as lovers, treated as friends. Even chosen as queens. My own mother had been an omega before she birthed me and became my father’s beloved. I wondered what she might’ve thought of his declaration to let them all die out in the wilderness. Would he still have banished her kind if she’d been around to counsel him?

  My mind turned away from thoughts of my mother as I imagined what life was like in the city back then. When we were all one people instead of royals and omegas. Luxoria and the Badlands.

  I imagined what it would be like to take an omega under me. To react to her heat, that specific scent the beta females never had. For our hormones to clash and sizzle like our biology was meant to.

  The idea was dirty and forbidden.

  Unkingly.

  Wholly treacherous.

  But it made my cock beg for a squeeze of my palm.

  And I gave it that, as my thoughts wandered farther.

  How different it would be from the beta couplings I’d had, where there was no instinctive demand to breed. No urge aside from assuaging the hunger to rut. No connection, no burning need.

  No scent to drive me mad.

  No need to pleasure her again and again, hour after hour, night after night until she was swollen with my baby.

  Fuck.

  I sucked in a breath finally realizing how my grip had tightened over my swollen knot the same way a female would as she came. I thrust into my fist, furious for a release. Except this time, in my mind, an omega writhed beneath me.

  An omega begged me for more, begged me to go harder.

  An omega moaned my name.

  And when I came, spilling my release all over my hand, it was with a roar of miiine to claim my imaginary omega.

  When I was drained, out of breath, and limp with pleasure, the realization of what I’d just done struck me like a hammer to the chest.

  I fantasized about breeding an omega.

  The lowest of lows. The banished traitors of our kind. The ones who made my father crazy in the end.

  The reason we fought our wars with the humans.

  A dirty fucking omega was in my head.

  And it was the best relief I’d had in a long damn time. Maybe ever.

  No one could ever know about this.

  No one could ever find out about my forbidden hunger.

  It was a matter of life or death.

  Chapter Two

  Zelene

  The old woman behind the table looked nothing like she did before The Division. When I was a little girl, I spent hours in her shop, bored out of my mind while my mother and sister had dresses made. I wasn’t allowed to touch any of the beautiful fabrics with colors so vibrant they appealed to every single one of my senses.

  I still wasn’t allowed to touch the fabrics.

  I watched the woman carefully. An omega like me, she’d lost her shop, but she hadn’t given up. Those beautiful bolts lay on an open table. The dust from the desert barely dulled their brilliance. She was little more than a living skeleton now, with her graying skin stretched over gaunt features, and eyes like black holes, reflecting her soul. More like, the spot where her soul should’ve been. The omegas had lost many things in The Division. But I wouldn’t lose that. I would fight tooth and nail to keep my soul intact. No matter the cost.

  I moved my gaze to the brilliant bolt of cloth I’d had my eye on, and it was like she sensed my movement.

  “Not for you,” she snapped. Even in the Badlands, there was a pecking order. Survival demanded respect. The ones who made it happen outside the city had little patience for those of us who worked for the royals. “Unless you’re shopping for royalty.”

  I’d starved myself to buy this fabric. My lie wouldn’t make me any more uncomfortable. “I am. My lady needs a dress for the ball.”

  It wasn’t a total lie. I just wouldn’t tell her that I was the lady. It would take some getting used to. In the Badlands, females weren’t thought of in those terms. But I dreamed of it, just like I dreamed of turning this fabric into a beautiful dress worthy of a royal ball. All the soft comfort and gentle days that came with commanding such a title. I didn’t need to be a queen or a princess. A lady would do.

  The old woman wanted money more than she cared about the validity of my story. She picked up the brilliant magenta fabric, gazing at it with much more respect than she held for me. “There’s just enough on the bolt to make a dress. The price is six gold coins.”

  Swallowing my surprise at her number, which was close to what I earned in a year, I reached for the coin purse that I’d secured on the inside of my skirt. The Badlands had yet to establish anything that looked like a real law. Evil wasn’t punished. I could grab the bolt of fabric out of her hands and make a run for it. There was nothing she could do to stop me. Just like there was nothing stopping her from calling my bluff and extorting me over pretty fabric.

  Quickly, I counted the coins in my purse. I didn’t have enough.

  “I have silver coins. The equivalent of four gold.” It was all the money I had in the world.

  She shook her head, hugging the bolt to her body. “A royal would have sent you with gold.”

  “She gave me silver.” Which was partially true. I was paid one silver coin a week. The equivalent of pocket change in the royal city. “Will you deny a royal what they asked for?”

  “Come back with gold,” she said.

  “She gave me silver,” I repeated. I expected a negotiation, but when it didn’t come, I walked away, disappointed. I’d find another dress to wear to the next castle ball. The fact that an omega like me could be killed for setting foot in said ball was totally irrelevant. I was going.

  “Girl.” At first, I wasn’t sure she meant me, and kept walking. “Girl. I’ll take the silver.”

  The woman gave me a toothless grin as I returned to her table. Anything was better than nothing, every omega in the Badlands knew this.

  My hands shook as I gave her the coins. For the next week, I’d only be able to eat when I worked at the castle. If any of the Collectors came to the shack I shared with five other omegas, he’d take his pay however he saw fit.

  But for a chance to step into the technicolor life of Luxoria, it was worth it.

  The woman lovingly wrapped the brilliant fabric in burlap.

  “Did you embroider this yourself?” I asked. “My Lady will want to know.”

  I prayed she didn’t ask who my Lady was. Yes, I worked as a servant, but if I used my access to royalty for my own gain, I could lose my job. Without my job, I’d be left to sell whatever I had on the Badlands open market. I’d die before I joined the ranks of the prostitutes who gave their bodies to the Alphas, hoping for a few copper coins in return. More often than not, the royal men took their fill and gave nothing in return.

  The old woman nodded, pride shining brightly on her face. “Yes. By hand. When I still had a shop.”

  “She’ll appreciate your work,” I said.

  As the old woman handed me the package, she pulled it back. For a moment, I thought she meant to steal from me. That she intended to keep my coins and my purchase.

  “Don’t let anyone see you with this until you get to the castle,” she said. “They’ll think you’re claiming to be something you’re not, and you will be punished.”

  “I’ll keep it a secret, like my life depends on it.” Because it did.

  ***

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” My sister Tavia stood in the doorway of our shanty, her reflection filling the empty space in the dusty mirror. She was going to get a mouthful of desert dust if she didn’t pick up her jaw. “If you get caught in the Lady’s dress, you’ll be punished.”

  “It’s not the Lady’s dress.” I might have been a little vague with the details when I said I brought the dress home to work on. I let my sister and the three other women who shared this cramped, dilapidated shack think I’d taken home sewing work
to make extra money. Not all of them worked in the castle, but everyone should’ve been smart enough to know my employers didn’t care if I made extra money. “It’s mine.”

  “Zelene,” she gasped. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “There’s a party at the castle tonight to celebrate the latest military victory.” I didn’t make the dress with this specific party in mind, but in the castle, it seemed like there was always a party. Rooms full of alphas, betas, and royals, all drunk and without a care in the world. As an omega, I’d worked many of them.

  Tavia shook her head. “You’ll get yourself killed.”

  Killed. As if I was actually living.

  “What is this?” I raised my hands. My dress—hugging my curves with rich magenta and gold—was the most glamorous part of the Badlands. Daylight shone through the crooked wall slats of our home, and everything was coated with a layer of reddish brown desert dust. It made life in the Badlands one-dimensional, sad, and hopeless. “This isn’t living. This is existing. But if I pull this off—”

  “You won’t.” Tavia recently got fired from her job in the castle, no explanation given, no second chances. Now she was scrambling to find something, anything not to fall into the trafficking ring that so many omega women were forced into to survive.

  After The Division, omegas were stripped of all shifter rights. Laws that protected the residents of Luxoria no longer applied to us. Rumors swirled that if King Adalai ever shifted into his true wolf form, he might lift his harsh rules on the Badlands. But if omegas knew anything, it was that dreams seldom came true.

  Working in the castle had offered us some protection, except for when we faced those who thought our jobs gave us privilege. There was a hierarchy among omegas too. And Tavia was desperate to not fall through the floor straight to the bottom of it.

  “Do I look like an omega in this dress?” I challenged.

  A wild storm of emotion swirled in her eyes. I knew what it was. Desperation. Exactly why I had to take this chance.