That was all Riot registered: someone had thrown something at his head, someone was making noise, someone was standing near him and his Omega. Someone who needed to be eliminated.
He turned with a snarl, keeping Cass pressed against the wall behind him. His body shifted into a combat stance, his hands curling into fists that made his split knuckles stretch. The pain barely registered. Nothing registered except the threat.
But something was wrong.
There was no scent. No pheromone signature at all. Just a void where a person should be—a blank space in the air that made him hesitate, confused by an enemy he couldn’t categorize, like trying to track something that cast no shadow.
What is she?
Behind him, Cass made a sound—not fear.Frustration. A soft, desperate whine that went straight to Riot’s hindbrain and made his spine stiffen with the urge to turn around, to give his Omega whatever that sound was begging for.
“He’s fine,” Riot snarled. “We’re fine. Go away.”
“I wasn’t asking you,güey.” The woman’s eyes fixed on Cass. “I’m asking him. And from where I’m standing, this looks a whole lot like a Berserker taking advantage of an Omega in heat.”
“It happened?” Cass’s voice was small and wondering. “I’m really in heat? All the way?”
Something about the innocent confusion in those words—the genuine bewilderment of someone who didn’t even know what was happening to his own body—cut through the golden haze.
The woman lowered the thermos slightly, staring at Cass like he’d said something impossible.
“Dios mío,”she muttered. “They really did a number on you, didn’t they?”
The tone hit Riot like a slap. That mix of horror and pity and resigned familiarity—he’d heard it before. He had used it himself, talking about Protocol Endeavor survivors. Talking about people whose minds and bodies had been fucked with by corporations that didn’t see them as human.
“Lilac?”
Her eyes snapped to his face, sharp and assessing. “You back with us, Riot? Or do I need to keep throwing things at your head?”
The golden haze retreated further. Lilac. Fellow survivor. Not the same as the other survivors exactly, but close enough. The only person from the Endeavor experiment who could walk into any situation and not trigger anyone’s instincts, because she had no scent to trigger them with anymore.
Gensyn stole that from her.
“I’m—” He shook his head, trying to clear the fog. “Mostly.”
“Good enough.” Lilac descended the rest of the stairs, her scentless presence creating a strange pocket of calm in the pheromone-thick air. Her gaze swept over the scene—Riot barely controlled, Cass pressed against the wall in nothing but soaked underwear, the obvious evidence of what they’d been doing glistening on both of them. “We need to move. Now. Before someone walks in on this.”
“I know.”
“Can you walk, golden boy?” Lilac asked Cass, her voice gentling.
Cass nodded, though his legs were visibly trembling. He peeled himself off the wall and immediately shifted his weight, pressing his thighs together, his face flushing darker. The movement sent a fresh wave of his scent through the stairwell—sweet and desperate and frustrated—and Riot’s hands clenched so hard his knuckles cracked.
Lilac shrugged off her oversized flannel, revealing muscular arms covered in faded scars that Riot recognized. “Put this on,” she said, holding it out to Cass.
Cass took it with shaking hands, wrapping it around himself. It hung past his knees, swallowing his smaller frame, but at least it covered the worst of the evidence.
“What floor?” Lilac asked.
“Second.”
“You walk in front of me, Freckles.” She glanced at Cass. “I’ve got him.”
The walk back was torture.
Riot led the way, hyperaware of every sound behind him. Cass’s unsteady footsteps on the worn carpet. The soft, uncomfortable sounds he kept making, whimpers and catches of breath that Riot felt in his spine. The wet, sweet scent that filled the hallway and made his mouth water.
The suppressants in his jacket pocket pressed against his chest with every step. I should take a dose now. I should dose before I do something I can’t take back.
