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Abel chuckles. “Sure have. Gulf boys from out east finally paying a visit to the Rig, huh?”
“And thrilled to arrive with a prize,” Boyd says. “Have the Prime meet us at the dock with our pay—and Esther here is all yours.”
My hopes are dashed in an instant, knowing Gulf Pack loyalists will never help me. Even if Javi seemed to showa littlesympathy, these are people who have thrived on the subjection of omegas for decades—and they might be from a different platform, but at their heart, they’re all the same. I slump against the wall, trying to control my breathing as tears fill the corners of my eyes.
I have to believe my pack will come and save me.
I have to believe that somebody—Reyes, Tilda, Will, Charlotte, Elijah…thatsomebodywill take the risk and ride the waves to bring me home.
It’s the only way I’m going to survive.
“We’ll see you at the dock, boys,” Abel says. “Welcome to the Rig.”
CHAPTER TWO
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PEACHES
I can tell there’s no wolfsbane on the Rig…because I can sense the alphas all over this place.
Boyd comes over and fiddles with the ropes on my ankles, untying them and letting me move. I try to kick at him, but he just catches my foot with a laugh. I wish I was stronger—that I had taken up Tilda or Akari on teaching me how to fight—but I’m so, so weak.
Maybe I deserve this. Maybe I earned it.
I can sense the milling alphas as soon as we dock, Javi’s big hand wrapping around my bicep and pulling me to my feet. Boyd comes to my other side and they haul me up and out of the boat together, my bare soles scraping against worn wooden planks and picking up splinters the whole way. They don’t bother being gentle, so I have to assume my father doesn’t care.
What is he going to do to me?
Will he just kill me…? Or will it be worse?
Tears are streaming down my cheeks and soaking into the hood over my head by the time we hit the dock, where I’m assailed by familiar scent signatures. Abel is there, along with my oldest brother Ephraim, and three of my father’s other favorite men.
Javi and Boyd hold me still as footsteps sound, waves sloshing over our feet and ankles. The floating dock makes me unsteady, the only thing keeping me up the two men on either side of me. And the weird gravity isn’t the only thing that almost knocks me down—it’s also the menacing scent coming toward me.
My father.
“Let me see her,” he says, even though I know he must be able to scent that I’m family. The hood is abruptly yanked from my head, my red curls flying free, and I blink in the blinding floodlights shining from above.
The next thing I see is my father…and he makes me just as scared as he did the night I left.
His left eye is cloudy with blindness, a big scar left there by my mother gracing his brow and cheek. His other eye is pale blue, so different from mine that you wouldn’t be able to tell we were related if it weren’t for our lycan scents. His hair is just a touch grayer than last time I saw him, but otherwise, he looks almost exactly the same.
Huge, terrifying, scarred and mean.
He crosses his arms and peers down at me, his eyes narrow. I can’t help but cower, unable to look at him.
“Look at me, girl,” he barks.
I can’t obey.
“Abel,” he grits out. “Make her look at me.”
Abel is in front of me in an instant, reaching for my chin—but a big hand bats him away from my left side. I look over to realize that I’m looking at Javi for the first time, finding a bulky man with light brown skin, jet black hair, and a scraping of stubble across his jaw. He gives me a cursory glance before snarling at Abel.
“Payment first,” Javi growls.
“Right,” Boyd says from my other side. He’s shorter than Javi, with dirty blond hair and sunken eyes. “We need our fee,andour gas. And shelter while we resupply and rest for our next gig.”
