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“Wh—what?” I blink away the sleep, trying to remember what’s going on. My teeth start chattering as I glance around.

I’m still stuck in the basement Alpha Niall threw me down into. But it isn’t him kneeling in front of me.

There’s an absolutely stunning omega, her raven black hair falling around her face in expertly done loose barrel curls. Her storm grey eyes are outlined in eyeliner so sharp it could cut a man if he got too close. Her scent is also earthier than any of the other omegas I met at the center. It reminds me of the smell of everything right after it rains.

I do my best to push myself up, but my body is sore from sleeping on the ground. Plus, any movement reminds me I have a hole in my arm and the killer headache I have, probably from banging my head against the concrete wall.

She’s dressed casually in a pair of leggings and an old, threadbare hoodie, a small bag tucked under her arm.

“You don’t have to do that, Bambi,” she says, shifting her weight.

“B—bambi?” I croak out.

“Yeah, you’ve got these big innocent eyes. You look like a deer.” She shrugs.

“Who—who are you?”

“I’m here to help,” she says, offering me a small smile that feels so warm in this cold basement. “I heard you were shot?”

I nod, shifting my position to nod down at Madden’s old t-shirt still tied around my arm.

“Can I take a look at it?” She asks.

“Are—are you allowed to be in here?”

Her jaw clenches and her left eye twitches before she shrugs again.

“That’s not something you’ve gotta worry about, Bambi. Let’s worry about getting that hole in your arm cleaned up.”

“My—my name isn’t Bambi,” I say, my teeth chattering. “My name is Luna.”

“Cute.” She starts unwrapping the t-shirt tied on my arm as gently as she can, but the dried blood still sticks to me, making me cry out. “Shit, I’m sorry about this.”

My hands fist the t-shirt I’m wearing as I clench my jaw shut.

“What’s—what’s your name?” I pant out, trying to make conversation because the silence means all I can focus on is the pain.

“My name is Reyna,” she says, pulling out a professional-looking irrigation bottle that she uses to start washing out the wound.

“Do you—do you wash out bullet wounds often, Reyna?”

She lets out a huff of laughter under her breath. “I’ve done it before, but I’m normally cleaning up the kinds of wounds that come from fistfights. One of the jobs I work is as a ringgirl at a fighting ring and some of the guys need some help getting patched up after fights.”

She seems to pick up on my dislike of the silence, which I’m really grateful for because her working on my wound is painful in a way I haven’t experienced before.

She glances up warily at me before sighing. “Okay, I’ve got it all cleaned up now, but the next part is worse. I’m going to have to pack the wound so it drains properly.”

“Pack it?” I ask, my chin wobbling. Whatever that means, the way she’s saying it makes me feel like it’s not going to be good.

“Yeah, pack it. I’ve got some gauze and some antibacterial stuff here with me, but I’ve got to put it in the hole. Sometimes with bullet holes like this, they heal the outside first and it traps a whole bunch of nasty bacteria in your arm. That’s a bad idea in a place like this.”

I feel faint at the idea of it. Pretty sure all the blood drains from my face.

“So you’re going to stick stuffinmy arm?”

She winces. “Yeah. It’s gonna be bad. I’m sorry, but I don’t have anything for you to take for the pain. I promise, it’ll be better than you having to lose your arm, later.”

I swallow hard, blinking away my tears. “O—okay.”