by Addison Cain
All the while his lips brushing over hers as if they were lovers and not the bitterest of enemies.
Chapter 10
Dress in shambles, bodice shredded down the middle in a way Wren would never be able to mend, she broke from Kieran’s hold when at long last his knot subsided. The panting male still hovered, tensing when she shuffled away—yet this was what he’d continuously demanded from her each time he fucked her in Caspian’s den.
“Get off me. Others do it better.”
Wren had no doubt that they did. And she’d never cared about impressing him.
She just functioned because she had a goal. Save Alec. Heal Mikael.
Survive and try not to smirk at the scars she’d set into their skin in her rampage—avoid staring at their healing noses and black eyes.
Yet in the foggy dim of the Warrens’ night, it was not a sneer twisting Kieran’s lips when she pulled away. It was a frown.
Shivering from the loss of his heat, a light groan accompanying the movement that rammed a jagged bit of scrap against her spine, she shifted her attention from him—from that pained expression—and took a good hard look at herself.
Caked in drying mud, more naked than clothed, warm semen slipping from her slit to instantly chill on her thighs…
And healthier than she had been in years.
Hip bones no longer jutted out. Her bared breasts had fullness and weight.
She shivered.
“You’re cold.” It was as if he gnawed his tongue, biting back unspoken slander. “You will go inside your home and you will not come out.”
Wren shuffled back even farther, lavender eyes leaving her filthy body to take in the Alpha.
The Alpha tucking away his somehow still hard dick.
Kieran fought the teeth of his zipper before scrubbing his jaw with his palm. “Knowing Toby, he’s already prepping a transport of food and water for delivery.”
Doubtful. Wren could feel her bones shaking with his madness. Toby was ripping rooms apart and screaming at the sky, nowhere near the right state of mind to organize such a thing. But that didn’t matter.
Trying and failing to cover her breasts with the remnants of her bodice, Wren nodded anyway.
“If I find out that you didn’t heed this order, if I hear a peep about you scavenging or trying to run, I’ll cut off a whole lot more than the kid’s hand.” This was the domineering Kieran she knew, the one whose words dripped malice. The one who stood over her and threatened. “Do you understand me, Jax?”
There was no argument. Only an idiot would scamper around the Warrens with her tits hanging free. Just smelling of Omega was a recipe for a violent death. She told him as much when she gestured toward her exposed chest and pussy.
When green eyes lit on cold pebbled nipples, drifting lower to where his seed leaked out, they came alive with more than just anger. “What does it feel like, that bond you got with them?”
Hmmmm.
Curious Kieran would have been slightly amusing had Wren not been shivering in the cold. Tired, and thirsty. Her body had grown spoiled by access to life’s necessities and already complained about the lack.
Hugging herself to preserve warmth, she gnawed at her lip and felt exactly how Caspian’s and Toby’s half-formed bonds worked against her.
“Well?”
No point in brushing it off, she pointed to her guts and mimed a twisting cramp. That was Caspian, who even from this distance she could feel fumbling through the pinging in his guts with women and a great deal of drink. Each climax that erupted from his cock Wren felt like a ghost of sensation building at the base of her spine to burst and leave her insides completely unfulfilled.
She knew he suffered.
She knew he could not comprehend the cause.
He didn’t sleep though the hour was late.
He felt the foreign pings of worry.
Lacking the ability to feel her out properly while gorging on his lustful appetites—it distracted him. Because he felt something was missing though he had surrounded himself with everything.
She wondered if he’d even jolted at her earlier burst of gratitude toward Kieran, or if he’d been too busying knotting his entire pen to grasp that that wondrous emotion had come from her.
Had he recognized her orgasm with his Second was not part of his physical pleasure?
Probably not.
That would require him to look past his own selfish interests and see her as more than just property. He would have to actually care to tune into the tiny two-way connection between them for more than a self-indulgent reminder of a terrible victory.
And a man like him, wasn’t capable.
Next Wren ran her palm over her shoulder, her arm, pointing to joints to signify the bones underneath. This was where she felt Toby. Bone deep, resonate, the frame that held her together utterly affected by him.
Male obsession tingled in a constant state of vibration. There was also adoration, determination, and guile.
Were she not certain he raged in the Waterworks, she wouldn’t be surprised if he were standing in the shadows watching her now—watching this with a smile.
Twisted guts and endless tingles, that ebb and flow and subtle taste of other emotions. And this was not even a full bond.
To explain to Kieran his effect on her, she caught the tip of a nail against his neck, drawing it slowly down until the Alpha broke out in gooseflesh.
Openly shivering, he closed his eyes, and let his head fall back while she extended the sensation.
Purring without thought, shoulders relaxing, it seemed he begged for more attention, but her lesson was over.
She was tired.
Voice soft as it had been that first time he’d seduced her on the floor of her home, Kieran said, “Go inside. Don’t come out.”
***
No food or water arrived that night.
No clothing or a source of heat.
Lying where she’d once had a nest, ancient linoleum under her body, Wren spent the night in icy cold.
Teeth chattering, mud freezing until she might crumble it off with her hands, she faced the kind of chill that killed.
Had she been warmer, she might have sensed grievous danger.
Had her joints not been locked in stiffness, she might have made it out.
But the ground had already been shaking long before her chattering teeth realized it was not just her body that rumbled.
The home she knew was destined to sink, was already descending into a torrent of mud. It oozed through the bars on her windows, ran in a river through her buckled front door.
And buried her no matter how she flailed and fought the tide.
Sucked under, encapsulated, Wren was caught in the drift.
Her pale arms flailing in the onslaught was the last view of his mouse Caspian saw before his cameras cut out, the Alpha screaming for his men to muster and dig her out.
But it was too late.
Several floors of Wren’s sinking building had been claimed by the mud before they arrived.
And she was gone.
Chapter 11
Chest expanding, the human leather of his coat stretched and creaking with each great pant, Caspian shot daggers at the sunken shit heap. Thirty-four floors still stood, Dale City’s engineers bracing the building far above the stink of the Warrens… while simultaneously doing nothing for those who had lost their homes in the mud.
Warrens rats were beneath their notice.
Just as they were beneath Caspian’s.
All but one, at least.
Every inhale was laced with sharpness, every exhale burdened with an angry growl. No one neared him save Toby, who clawed at his shaved head, mattering beneath his breath as he manically paced.
The Third Alpha had already torn long gashes into his scalp, clawed his veined forearms to shreds—self-mutilation keeping him level enough to shoot his First Alpha a hateful glare.
“Twenty-four hours you said. A whole fucking day with
no food or water. No blanket—punishment for being the perfect Omega who loved her brood. Had you not interfered, I would have been here with her, boss! She wouldn’t have died!”
“Watch your tone.” The warning had been spoken lowly, but it seemed the hundreds on the scene froze.
Toby, nostrils flaring, showed his teeth. “You murdered our mate.”
The barest of flinches. Knuckles cracking, Caspian looked away from the bubbling mud for the first time since arrival and set the full weight of his displeasure upon the seething Third.
Mindlessly picking at an oozing cut, Toby narrowed his eyes. “And now she’ll never know estrous. I’ll never fully bond her. And you… the ghost of your marking my sunshine will always ping in your chest. You’re half-bonded to a dead Omega. Only way to wipe her clean from your corpse is to fully bond another. And when you do, I’ll see her drowned in mud.”
Kieran stepped between them. “You know how he gets, sir. Pay Toby no mind. A day or two and he’ll remember his place.”
There were eyes on them, eyes that would report to rival gangs. To government. To his own men. They could not show dissension. But later… Toby was a dead man. “Leave.”
“Try and move me, and you’ll have a show on your hands that will echo through the city for fucking years.” And his Third meant every word, digging his feet into the soggy ground and bracing to be charged. “I’m not leaving until they pull her body out.”
Her body…
The thought of a limp, lifeless mouse hanging from a worker’s arms like a rag, stole Caspian’s next breath. She’d be blue under all that mud. Stiff.
How much water would it take to wash her clean?
Odd feelings accompanied such thoughts like barbed wire corded through his belly, squeezing as it cut deep. Vomit came to Caspian’s mouth, swallowed back down by an act of pure willpower.
“They won’t find her, sir.” Kieran crossed his arm over his chest, looking to the building. “To dig down that far… she’s buried with her children. I think that’s what she’d want.”
Brow cocked, Caspian turned his glare to the handsome one. “What?”
Was his Second growing fucking red-faced?
“I asked you a question, Kieran.”
“The kids she found.” Clearing his throat, the Second pointed to a patch of mud now littered with massive debris. “The ones who died. A dozen, maybe more, are buried there.”
Reeking of jealousy, Toby shoved forward. Inches from the Second, his finger kissing the trigger to the firearm hanging from his shoulder, he demanded. “She doesn’t talk to you. You can’t read her hand signs. How do you know that?”
“The dying kid in the hospital told me.” The answer came on a hiss, a bristling Second unflinching before the manic Third.
Kieran was lying, Caspian could always tell. And had Toby been in his right mind, he too would have seen the tick that betrayed their pack-mate.
“Enough.” There had been more than enough antagonism. More than enough insubordination. More than enough of that vicious feeling pulverizing his guts to a pulp. “The men keep digging.”
***
Fingers fighting the clasp, the rusty thing finally gave and the cache’s lid groaned open.
Reaching for a canteen of drinkable water, the top was twisted and brought to cracked lips. Swallowing all she could, Wren gagged, spit up gritty mud, and bought that rust-flavored nirvana back to her lips.
Every muscle shook, strained and aching now that panic had subsided.
The rest of her dress she’d lost swimming for the hatch. Clothed only in dirt, fucking staggering and tired and sick, she’d dragged her tired bones away from a building that might tear free of its moorings and fall.
No Warrens rat would scamper near a sinkhole. They always got worse. Those fresh fools who came to scavenge always died.
Run to higher ground.
And if they were wise, sneak to a stash.
Because those who knew this dump had lost at least one home over the years. Starting over with nothing was a death sentence.
Wren had four ancient canteens of water. She had clothing for herself and her boys.
There was even a single pricy package of rations she’d hidden away.
But this place was not safe.
Which was entirely why she’d put the small case of treasure here.
Ancient wallpaper sagged on moldy walls, flocked with growing fungus and faded by time. There was water in the pipes. Tainted water enough to wash half the mud from her unsteady frame.
There were stairs that led down into a half sunken foyer of what had once been a grand hotel. There were bodies rotting in the muck.
This was a dumping ground for the dead.
Unclean. Infested.
And also her salvation.
Pulling coarse fabric over her damp arms, Wren found warmth for the first time in hours. Choking down the precious rations, she found a belly that no longer ached.
Stuffing her face almost brought with it a feeling of guilt, but it’s not like she could take food with her. She’d be murdered the instant someone thought there were edibles to be found in her pockets.
So long as the lids hung off to show they were empty, drained canteens she could hawk for supplies.
Goggles were a necessity.
Tools for salvage.
First on the agenda was finding a new home. Someplace where she could wait out her finger bones healing. Until then, there was no point in going back to the males.
She had to be able to say her piece.
Caspian owed her a years’ worth of water. He owed her coin.
And by their original agreement, she’d only had to serve until he was tired of her.
Since he’d cast her off, she was pretty sure that was that.
Of course, he’d probably kill her the instant she demanded payment for whoring, but Alec and Mikael needed funds to get out of this hellhole.
Mud clogged her ears, her pinky finger gently trying to dislodge what a rinse in old pipes had only pushed deeper. That ate up the hours of her day.
That and a great deal of restless sleep.
She would get through this, just as she’d gotten through the torrents of mud looking to pin her down.
Just as she’d survived abandonment and squalor.
Just as she’d survived the Waterworks and the Alphas who haunted them.
Two boys were counting on her. And she was going to see them safe.
Chapter 12
Flexing under dirty bindings, Wren stretched her healing fingers, clenched them against the brace, and hissed when an ache shot down her arm.
Bones seemed ready to be free of uncomfortable splints, the bruising had almost totally faded, but muscles were weak.
And so very stiff.
A bit of old leather between her teeth, and she continued the exercise, breathing through the irritation until her fingers grew too weary to follow commands.
Then it was the next hand’s turn.
Four days she’d stuck near a new, unfurnished hole. Sleeping alone for the first time in years, Wren had felt a strange liberty in the solitude.
How much simpler it was to score food when there was only one mouth to feed.
Though she was perpetually thirsty, she’d found more than enough water to keep her alive.
And the ease of it, the relief she had only one person to see through to the next day, left her in a state of deep guilt that she’d enjoyed the respite.
So she punished herself with hard labor. Despite her fear, Wren crept up to the outskirts of the Waterworks every dawn and dusk, eyes peeled for a boy who might have been cast out.
Not a single sign of Alec was found.
Nor had Mikael been thrown out into the mud.
But she could not trust Caspian to keep either of them much longer. Not when his end of their link jittered and shook.
Inebriated. Pussy drunk.
Disgusting.
Tormented.
Raw.
Just like he liked to think of her—a raw mouse with so much to devour.
Toby’s echo in her bones wasn’t much better. All she sensed from him was anger. The cunning kind that held a smile on its face and a knife at its back. Neither seemed ready to forgive her outburst. Neither had a moment’s peace.
Even though it had been days.
Putting Wren in a difficult position. How was she to face them if they would not hear her? How was she to negotiate for riches that had been promised?
Left with the niggling thought that the only way to keep her boys alive was to steal them back, she debated avoiding the raging males at all costs. But if she were caught…
Spitting out the leather, Wren’s teeth worked her lip as she deliberated.
Caspian was a liar of epic proportions who cared only for himself. There was a large chance he would never pay her her due.
How many times had he already gone back on his word?
But he had also marked her with myriad bites in his furious passion. Bites she would make him see when she came for her due. And if approached before his men, their First Alpha would lose face for denying his bonded Omega.
Such action made him look weak, and that was her greatest weapon against his damaged character.
But she needed a voice. She needed her hands so Toby might translate.
Yet they still fucking ached.
Frustrated, Wren studied the honeycombed splints, her nails only just starting to grow back.
Sitting there in the dark, flickers of the battle stole into her thoughts. When these hands had been broken, she’d made the men roar. And if there had been only one brawny Alpha to face? He would have died.
But three, moving in tandem? Three circling and countering her swinging rebar?
Indomitable.
The memory of smashing that cement crusted pole right into Caspian’s snarling face bubbled up. Smiling, Wren laid down on her side and almost felt pride.
Sheltered inside a gaping crack along the outer walls of a sinking building, little wind reached her. There she waited out the sun, hours left before she might forage safely.
Cement was still cold, but she had layers to warm fattened limbs.