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I ascended as Berserker three years later, before the other two females got their Alpha forms. I freed ‘em. They’ve been in my debt ever since and, when Barbero ascended a few years later, he joined my Six, too.
Whiskey fell in love withSierraback at an Alpha Ball, of all fuckin’ places, and brought her in. Peate earned my trust over the course of two decades apprenticin’ as healer to the triage doc, Blake. He retired and Peate took over as my main war doc, the only medic of my three lead docs — Ward, Loveless and Peate — who comes out with me into Paradise Hole. Paradise Hole’s too dangerous a place for women and Betas and Ward and Loveless are both. Can’t afford to lose ‘em.
Vi was the last one to come on.Found him only six years ago tryna drag his ass out of Paradise Hole to our gates. He was young — only eleven — and because he was young, he’d been used bad by a rogue Alpha gang despite bein’ an Alpha himself. I helped him heal and, a few years later, took him huntin’. We razed the gang from the earth together, just the two of us, and he’s worshipped the ground I walk on ever since.
I trust these fuckers, which is why they’re here. And it’s because I respect all of ‘em that I’m embarrassed as shit.
I slam my fist on the table, though there ain’t a lotta meanin’ behind it. “Omegas can’t bond and I did everythin’ I shoulda.”
“You sunk your fangs into her neck without her consent and you think you did everything you should have?” Ward blinks and the beads on the ends of her braids rattle in a way that I hate. I wanna rip ‘em all off.
Whiskey andSierragot their heads together again, whisperin’ and drivin’ me up the damn walls. “You got somethin’ to say,ladies?”
“We were just talking about getting out of here and doing a little biting of our own,” Sierra teases.
I frown. She still speaks with a Golden City accent which drives me fuckin’ nuts. “How long you been livin’ here and still talkin’ with that awful twang?”
Whiskey flutters her lips like a horse. “Don’t bite my mate’s head off just because you can’t control yours. Heard you’ve been fightin’ these past three days.” It’s been three days. And in the few hours she hasn’t been sleepin’, she’s been askin’ me questions I can’t say yes to.
Because the psychopath wants to go back into Paradise Hole.
She’s after some guy she saw in a dream who was in a cave. She’s not goin’ and she’s definitely not goin’ for a guy. If anything, I’ll go, find her cave guy and bring him to her in pieces.
“Shut the fuck up. Ward, gimme somethin’ I can work with.”
She holds her tablet up to her face and I can see little numbers and notes in tables and spreadsheets reflected in miniature off of her dark eyes. “Well, I’m still trying to synthesize the unusual properties of the poison in your blood…”
“Venom.”
“…so, at the current moment, I can’t explain thevenomof these alleged zombies who attacked you and your Omega…”
“Alleged?”
“…but I can tell you why biting her didn’t bond her to you.”
“Why?”
She balks, squawking like a damn chicken. “Is he serious?” She glances around. The only person present who isn’t one of the Six. I’m not sure how much I trust her, but I trust her expertise on this.
She looks at me when no one answers. “Areyouserious?” She makes a chuffing sound and twitches in her chair. The tablet in her hand tumbles onto the slate carpet and she makes no effort to reach for it. “I suppose you’d just stomp into an Omega’s nest uninvited, too, then? You’re a barbarian! Everyone knows that in order to successfully bond an Omega you have to be invited.”
Her eyes bulge out of her head as her face flames with heat. Surprised it doesn’t shoot out of her damn ears. Meanwhile, I’m sure my face is burning with equal embarrassment. “Fuck.”
“Just ran up to her and bit ‘er?” Vi’s scowl hurts even more than Ward’s outrage. In a grey thermal, his arms are crossed tight over his chest. His eyes blaze and guilt rams its way through me as I imagine the kinda shit he experienced when he was on the outside. Did Alphas bite him too, without his permission? Am I no better than the gang we razed to the ground?
I fumble, “She tried to kill herself. Stabbed herself in the thigh. I thought if I didn’t use my venom, she’d die and I didn’t want…” My voice breaks. I clench my teeth together and dig one of my shortened nails into the wood a’ Ward’s desk, gouging a chunk out of it that’s much smaller now than it woulda been if I hadn’t clipped my claws. “Didn’t want that.”
The room falls completely silent. It’s silent for a while…until the footsteps. They come stompin’ down the corridor and, judgin’ by their gait, I know who it is already. For as determined as my Omega is, she’s distracted easily by the things in these halls. Paintings, mostly. She doesn’t know they’re mine. I mean, that I painted ‘em. I like hearin’ her praise ‘em too much to tell her the truth of it.
Step, step, step, pause. Five more quick steps. Another shuddering stop. Another step. Three more. And then, “Adam! Adam. Adam, I want to go to…Paradise Hole…” Her words lose steam when she bursts into the room and glances around at the Six Alphas occupying it, and one fierce Beta, too.
“Jesus, what are you wearin’, Echo?”
I rise to standing and glare down at my Omega, struttin’ around my estate wearin’ nothin’ but a plush white blanket. She hugs it against her chest with her one good arm. And Jesus, dressed just like that she’s never looked more fuckin’ beautiful.
Had I ever thought her anything else? I’m momentarily shook. Color has returned to her cheeks, which are flushed a more robust brown and glowin’, makin’ every one of those damn freckles stand out in relief.
Her hair is washed and actually forms curls now that she’s run some conditioner through it. They drift halfway down her back in a massive waterfall that I get to comb out every time we shower. Even though the swellin’ in her bad arm has gone down and the doc says it’s okay to use it a little more, I don’t tellherthat. Whoever thought I’d like brushin’ a chick’s hair? Only she isn’t a chick, is she? She’s my wife. And she’s an Omega nearin’ heat standin’ in a room with six Alphas I’d rather not have to disembowel.
