Page 20 of Desperate Omega

But as I get closer to where Thorus is standing, I notice a queer expression on the older alpha’s face. Then my eyes drop to his pelvis, and I notice something else.

The front of his loincloth is bulging like he’s smuggling a spear down there.

“Uh… Thorus?”

He can see what I’m looking at, but he isn’t the least bit embarrassed about it. He simply gestures behind him and issues a stern command.

“Go around to the other side of the barn,” he says, “and tell me what you smell.”

I still feel as though this is a waste of time, but I do as my pack leader commands, and I march around to the other side of the burnt pile, inhaling deeply as I go, trying to figure out what the hell I’m supposed to be searching for.

About a quarter of the way around the pile, I find it.

My cock instantly turns to stone, my knot expands, and I fill my loincloth with the biggest load of seed that has ever come out of me.

“Fuck,” I growl.

“Do you know what that is?” Thorus asks.

I nod. It is not a scent I’ve ever encountered before, but I still recognize it immediately. My body’s reaction leaves no doubt.

“There was a second omega out here tonight,” Thorus says.

“And she was in heat.” I reply.

I turn to face my pack leader, and he looks down at the thick, white globs of manseed that are dripping out of my loincloth.

“Sorry,” he says. “I probably should have warned you.”

I’m not angry. I’m not even embarrassed. All I can think about is the omega in heat. We have to find her before the Farlanders do. We have to protect her at all costs.

“I don’t think the Farlanders set fire to this barn,” Thorus says. “Based on how burned down it is, and the freshness of the Farlanders scent, I would say it was already burning when they got here.”

“Do you think the other pack set it on fire?” I ask. “The one from the Central Ruins Tribe?”

“I don’t know. Possibly. All we can be sure of is this: that pack and the omega in heat ran in two different directions. Half of the Farlanders followed the pack. The other half followed the lone omega. I don’t think I need to tell you which path we’re going to follow. Now change out of that loincloth, and be quick about it. There’s an omega out there who needs our help.”

CHAPTER 9: SYRA

The bottom of the duct gives way beneath us, followed by the sound of breaking plaster. All of a sudden, we’re both spinning through open air. My stomach lurches into my throat. I see Markus land on the second-floor balcony, his fall broken by the bodies of the alphas who are up there, but my own body misses the balcony by a hand’s breadth, and I continue tumbling toward the ground floor below.

Time dilates, stretches, slows, and I’m able to take in every detail of the scene that is now transpiring around me. I can see the spacious ritual chamber, dark except for the ring of candles burning in the center of the floor, and the light from those candles reflects off the eyes of the hundreds of alphas and omegas gathered in the upper balcony and beneath it—eyes which, until a just moment ago, were focused on the ritual, but which are now fixed on my plummeting body. In the center of the ring, the three massive alphas, naked and aroused, have stopped sharing their omega mate and are now clustered around her protectively, thinking my sudden intrusion is an attack instead of what it really is—a very big mistake by a very foolish thirteen-year-old girl.

I’m probably going to get into a lot of trouble for this.

If I survive.

The ritual room is two stories tall, and while I don’t know the exact height, I guess it’s about like four adult alphas standing one on top of the other. I’m going to break a few bones at least. I might even die. Somehow, I have time to think all these things and more. I picture the crowd gathered around my broken body lying on the floor of the ritual chamber. I imagine my fathers weeping as they light my funeral pyre.

And for what? All because I wanted to sneak in and spy on the mating ritual. I should have turned back, like Markus suggested. I’m glad he’s okay, even though I’m still angry at him for kissing me.

Time speeds up again. The floor rushes toward me. I brace for impact.

It never comes.

Instead, at the last moment, a pair of enormous arms arrests my fall. The stop is jarring. It robs my lungs of air, and my heart skips a beat or two, but I’m alive, and there is no pain.

“Are you okay, little one?”