by Addison Cain
Senator Kantor had been trying to prevent such an outcome. He’d been trying to save as many lives as possible. He had tried to outthink a man far smarter than him.
Corday repeated himself, robotic and unable to even hint at what was going through his mind. “We need to take this body to headquarters.”
Leslie softened her eyes and offered a sad smile. “No, darling Corday. There is no more time to hide away. I will not hand our city over to the inept hands of Brigadier Dane’s failing leadership. There is another place we can go, a place my uncle refused to consider. Inside there might be food, supplies, guns, ammunition... everything we need to take a stand and end this.”
Eyes bone dry in their sockets, feeling as if all life had been sucked from him, Corday made himself engage. He knew the very place she suggested and understood why it was off-limits. “During the breach, while my fellow Enforcers were trapped in the Judicial Sector, dying from plague, Callas’s home went into lockdown. For all we know, the contagion was let loose behind that steel barricade. To force the gate could expose the population and kill us all.”
She turned her back on the blood in the room, moving to the dwelling’s small window and its slice of sunlight marking the ground. “There is another way inside, Corday, a small, secret entrance. Like my uncle, I know where it is.”
The information did not surprise him. In fact, he, others in the resistance, had suspected there must be secondary access—an escape hatch in case of emergency. It had been Senator Kantor who fervently refused to risk the lives of millions to find out what might lie within the Premier’s home.
Leslie answered his silence, turning her head to see him motionless, the corpse of her uncle wrapped in plastic and cradled in his arms. “If nothing is done we are going to die. The proof is in this room. Salvation might wait beyond Callas’s door, and Shepherd would never suspect the resistance would gather there. Let him think he’s won, that we’ve disbanded while we rally behind walls he cannot penetrate. This is our only chance, Corday.”
There was another roadblock, the woman the resistance would look to for leadership. “Brigadier Dane will stand against you on this.”
“That’s why we are going to open it, you and I, before we go to her. When we come to the resistance, we come bearing hope, or we die as we should for our ineptness.” She sounded so much like her uncle in that moment: imperious, confident. “Now, put him down. Leave my uncle here. He would not want us to waste time or endanger ourselves simply to cart his body to be gawked at by the people he loved.”
He put the remains down on the room’s only table, took a step back. Spinning the golden ring on his finger, twisting it around and around, Corday turned his furious attention to Leslie Kantor. “If you are wrong, we will unleash the virus.”
“That was my uncle’s argument as well. Well here is mine: consider where Shepherd is from, how he thinks. The man created an army, still recruits to swell his numbers. He wants to rule, he has total control.” Leslie’s passionate words put a stop to Corday’s endless spinning of the ring. “An animal like him would rather die fighting than submit to death by infection. Do you really think he would leave the virus lying around where it might be set loose to ruin all he has built? Even Judicial Sector, once exposed, was purified by incineration protocol. What virus infected those charred halls was destroyed the instant Shepherd’s point was made. The people of Thólos saw the suffering, they saw the flames. But, we have not seen what happened in the Premier’s Sector. Why? Why keep the population in the dark?”
She was as good an orator as her surname implied. Even shaken as he was, Corday could feel a small spark of lost hope threaten to chase away his despair. He wanted to believe she might be right.
“We can end this, Corday.” The Alpha female edged closer, she offered her hand. “Come with me. Help me.”
Possibility warred with the chance that obliteration might lay down the road Leslie would lead him. Something felt wrong, but life was wrong, the resistance had been wrong, and it was time to put his faith in something new.
The Beta took her offered palm and sealed the fate of the Dome.
Chapter 2
Shepherd ignored the blood drying on his skin, possessed no eagerness to clean the wound Claire’s teeth had created. He left her claiming marks to crust and drip sluggishly, far more intrigued with discovering each crimson drop smeared on his mate—making a game of tracing them once she was spent and exhausted, tangled up in him and slumbering.
When they woke, reeking of sex, Shepherd made no move to bathe before he dressed, proudly displaying the scent of his injury and the smell of his mate on his body. Claire watched from the mess of the nest, a part of her itching to clean away the bloodied sheets and rebuild her burrow. Instead, she sat like a lightning struck tree, reeling from what she had done, awake and aware, and completely confused.
Her determination had backfired. Every part of her had wanted to bite him... no questions asked... even the parts poisoned with resentment for her mate.
Watching him dress, watching him watch her, it was clear whatever she had done in marking him came with consequences more severe than a beating or subjugation. It came with his apparent joy and her budding fear of herself.
How could she have let this happen?
Shepherd knelt before her, startling her from scattered thoughts when a warm, damp cloth was used to wipe her body clean. The complacent male purred for her. “There is no need to be upset by what you’ve done.”
Unsettled, her voice moderate and full of lies, she agreed, “Of course not. I was angry and wanted to hurt you. That was the nearest place I could bite.”
As if she had not spoken such an obvious fallacy, Shepherd continued. “Omegas rarely mark their mates. I am honored you did so.”
The cloth was already stained, hardly doing more than smearing the mess on her chest into little swirls of pink. Aware Shepherd was focusing right over the bond, Claire could not determine if he was trying to soothe or gloat. A massive part of her wanted to slap his hands away and rage, to undo all her hard work with a monumental meltdown.
He who wishes to fight must first count the cost. –Sun Tzu
She suppressed the rage, the disgust and self-loathing, and embraced the fact that backsliding would be both stupid and pointless. Rubbing her eyes, giving herself a moment, Claire tried to come to terms with the new nature of the bond, unsure why she felt so vulnerable when nothing but reassurance was flowing through it.
Testing herself, Claire put her hand on his arm, cupping the bulge of muscle. Shepherd stilled and waited to see what the woman would do.
“I, um,” a wave of burning anxiety made her stammer, “I didn’t mean to bite you... I don’t know what happened.”
Setting the stained cloth aside, Shepherd’s fingers burrowed against her scalp. He tugged gently and purred, did all the things which normally calmed her. “It was possessiveness, little one. I felt what was in you—the longing for devotion and happiness. You feel insecure in my affection, so you placed your mark where others will see.”
Pulling the neck of his shirt aside, Claire inspected skin swollen and scabbed from her bite. “My motivation was not affection when I did this. I was angry, Shepherd. Furious.”
“Yes, an assertive Omega disciplining her mate—reminding him of his place and duty... as I did when I bit you after you fled.”
Unsure what to say, feeling uprooted, Claire grumbled. “If I wanted to discipline you, as you so rightfully deserve, I would have bit something else.”
Reacting with no anger to her taunt, Shepherd urged her chin up. “You are nesting properly now, no longer ill, even content on occasion when you forget your self-imposed and unnecessary penitence. My attentive presence and our mutual effort has been the cause. You cannot tell me, little one, you have not noticed the adaptations I’ve made in my behavior towards your keeping. I will even admit many things are foreign and difficult for me to understand, but I do them to please you.”
Shepherd tensed, muscles flexing as if he’d been insulted. “I never treated you as a pet. I treated you as a mate, approaching the situation of our bond instinctually—as all Alphas do.”
There was that word again. Looking back at the mark her teeth had left in his skin, she said, “Your instincts and my instincts say very different things.”
His counter was so quick, it was clear he’d thought through the issue beforehand. “You do not follow your instincts, little one. You live entirely in your ideals. Therefore, I have researched the subject of pairings under the Dome and tried to adapt to what you anticipate as much as I can allow. I want you to be happy even if the circumstances are unfavorable and the goal requires massive effort.”
There was something between the words, something she could not put her finger on. “You dislike the changes?”
“Many things suggested are unsafe for you.”
Claire could not help but imagine a long list of horribly cheesy romantic interludes the man had probably read as if studying for war. Utterly sarcastic, Claire muttered under her breath, “Such as walks in moonlit gardens and dates to watch old films? Yes, those are indeed incredibly dangerous moments in life.”
He didn’t answer.
Claire looked at him as if he were something totally alien, seeing the man raised underground. Even crouched he was so damn big, looming, and too close. The male was playing the part of the attentive, well-meaning mate. That was not Shepherd, not the Shepherd she’d known—no matter the alterations, or the bite… or the suddenly wide-open connection between them he was waiting for her to acknowledge.
Before she just started crying in confusion, Claire dared an honest question. “Can I ask you something?”
Shepherd took her hand, enfolding their fingers—another thing he had recognized was important when communicating with his female. “You may.”
Unsure where to begin, she blurted, “I cannot imagine you were so possessive...” She looked away for a moment in consideration. “That might not be the right word. Obsessive maybe.” Starting again, making herself look him in the eye, Claire said, “I cannot imagine you were so obsessive with Svana. Her autonomy must have been respected. I also assume, and I am admitting this is an assumption, that you disregarded her negative behavior within the confines of your relationship quite easily. I saw how you looked at her...”
“What is the question?” Shepherd growled, not hiding his distaste for the direction of their conversation.
Claire rubbed her lips together and tried again. “Aside from the fact I am an Omega and you consider my dynamic inferior, why are we regarded so differently?”
Though muscles of his neck bunched, the man remained quiet, thinking. Speaking abstractly, Shepherd began, “I do not believe Omegas are inferior. I believe they are precious and delicate. Your purpose and roles are different, and thus your treatment must reflect that.”
“Precious?” Claire’s voice dropped dangerously low. Considering how he’d used Omegas in the past, she could hardly believe his gall.
Irritation flashed in Shepherd’s narrowing eyes in instant reaction to her challenging tone. “You are very rare. Alphas vastly outnumber you.”
Indignant, Claire pressed. “So you are telling me that because of your archaic view of social strata, you expected your Omega mate would respond well to a lifetime of imprisonment... based on instincts and your concept of preciousness?”
He took her chin, less a sweet gesture and more an act of dominance. “Your scent intoxicates all who breathe it. My Followers are well-trained and loyal... but animal impulse can cloud rational judgment. I will not risk your exposure to harm or tempt their lack of focus.”
Claire knew better. “There are pills and soaps I am well acquainted with that mask Omega scent. Your argument is illogical. Intoxicates is also a very strong word that implies those around an Omega no longer need to claim personal responsibility for their actions. It reduces Alphas and Betas to animals.”
“You should embrace your dynamic.”
“No matter my feelings on my dynamic, you would still lock me in this room.”
Shepherd countered. “You are my mate. It is my duty to protect you—even from yourself.”
“Can you not see your behavior is extreme and unhealthy for us both?” Claire made herself hold his gaze, made herself still. “It is unreasonable and unnatural. So back to my original question you are so skillfully trying to evade. Why didn’t you treat Svana in the same manner in which you treat me?”
“Svana is an Alpha.”
Leading him to the words Claire knew he was avoiding, feeling there might be some small victory in this for her, she hounded further. “But you held her as your mate.”
“It is different.” Shepherd grew agitated, the male’s breath coming faster, swelling his great chest. “I will not risk you—”
“Me what?” One black brow arched. “Betraying you?”
“I regret allowing conversation!” Shepherd quickly reared to stand over her. “My answers will not please you, and you only seek to put tension between us because you are disappointed in yourself for marking me. I am fully aware of your motivation, Claire.”
Her point had been made—goading him further, even though she was very tempted, would be purposeless.
There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare. –Sun Tzu
Claire had to agree. She and Shepherd had reached a point where fighting was not going to get them anywhere.
“I’m sorry… I just….” Claire let out a sigh, confessing something that cost her dearly in an effort to gain a stronger position. “I will admit I don’t really know how to process my marking you, and I am overwhelmed right now. Causing a quarrel was not my goal. You’ve made an effort. I know you have. I have questions. That is all.”
Shepherd exercised a chilling tone. “Your questions are incendiary.”
Claire used Shepherd’s favorite argument against him. “Considering the history between us, that is inescapable, but necessary if you want to move forward.”
“Fine. Then answer this.” Shepherd’s massive hand gripped her shoulder, assuring she could not scoot away. “What is it you found so appealing in the Beta? You touched him freely and were open with him. You were absolutely different with him than you are with me.”
The question was an unexpected one. “You mean Corday?”
Shepherd’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Enforcer Samuel Corday, yes.”
“First off, I did not even know his full name. Secondly, you are hurting my shoulder.” Claire glanced down to where he grasped, Shepherd’s hold lessening considerably at her complaint. “Thirdly, I hardly know him.”
“Do not play games with me, little one.”
Exasperated it needed to be spelled out, Claire blurted, “He’s nice. The man had no agenda. He never tried to touch me or was sexually inappropriate. Corday respected my thoughts and wishes. He made me feel safe and unthreatened when I was very frightened and alone. He put himself at great risk and actually helped the Omegas...” Claire’s voice dropped, the thread whirled, and something long unsaid slipped from her mouth. “The reason I originally came to you, if you had forgotten. Imagine how different our connection would be had you done the same—instead of weaving your mind games and constant manipulations. Instead of infidelity and threats!”
An animal roar, a thing of great violence ripped past the Alpha’s lips. “Every last thing I have done, EVERYTHING, has been for your benefit—even knowing my actions cost me your favor. THAT IS WHAT A WORTHY ALPHA DOES FOR HIS MATE!”
Claire was struck speechless by the echo at his end of the link. Shepherd was not lying or hiding facts in justifications or outright deception. Whether or not she agreed with him, he believed every last word—passionately. In his mind, he offered r
epeated sacrifice for her and had gained nothing by it but the burden of her unhappiness and disdain. But there was so much more to his uncustomary outburst, layers of suppressed feeling that had to be difficult for a man like Shepherd to process—all there in the link, exposed where she could see.
Jaw dropped, Claire felt everything inside him.
Shepherd looked lost for a moment, the same expression he’d worn when he came to her in the bathroom after fucking Svana... when she had laughed at him.
His name came softly to her lips, Claire calling to him for a reason she did not understand. “Shepherd...”
His great paw seemed to hesitate, a resigned movement in lifting from her shoulder and moving to cup her face. Old habits die hard. He was already reaching for the zipper of his pants, but Claire’s small hands stopped him, and for once he did not brush them aside. She tugged on his arms, urging Shepherd down to the wreck of their nest.
Watching her with unconvinced wariness, Shepherd stiffly complied.
Arranging the male with gentle prodding, Claire placed herself on his chest, pulling the blankets over them both so they could lay still in the burrow and have the mutual solitude of the dark. He did not purr, not at first, instead she hummed her strange music for him.
He’d seen it with his own eyes. Leslie Kantor was right.
Access to the Premier’s Sector had not been a straightforward turn of a knob or a shifting bookcase hidden in the library of some neighboring house. In order to reach the second entrance, there was a series of tunnels, ladders—an ant farm sandwiched above the Undercroft and below the city’s foundation. From the look of them, those dusty, unused crawlspaces had been untouched for years.
Shepherd’s men had not left boot prints in the dirt; they had not unsettled the cobwebs.
Was that because they knew the virus lay at the end of the path? Or, could it be that the tyrant did not know of this secret passage?