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Chapter Six

Sloane

A fter we’d showered and got dressed, I floated downstairs at Jace’s side in a haze that was just…

lovely. A small, uptight part of my brain screamed hysterically at that, this feeling of surrender so bloody alien, but as long as his arm, my alpha’s arm, was wrapped around me, I could shove those worries to one side and just be.

People looked up as we emerged out of the elevator, not in the bar, but in a large communal living area.

They were eating breakfast, a stout woman swinging out from between two doors with platters groaning with food, my stomach rumbling in response.

“Hungry, baby?” Jace rumbled, looking down at me with a warm smile.

“C’mon. Ma makes the best breakfast with all the trimmings in the entire city.

” And so I was shepherded over to a long table, wooden benches set up either side and the eyes of everyone sitting there on us.

“Guys, this is Sloane. Sloane, this is…my family.”

Not literally, I assumed, as most of the people seated seemed to be in their twenties or thirties and they didn’t appear to have anything in common physically.

Well, except for them. Two guys sat together, and there was no way to miss them, their bodies huge and hulking compared to everyone else.

They also possessed an odd kind of stillness, especially him, with his grey blue eyes that seemed to stare straight into me, eradicating all my warm fuzzies, and mid brown hair that had gotten too long, scraped back from his face by a big square hand.

“Tone it down, Ryder,” Jace snarled.

“So she revealed as an omega.” Murmurs went up around the table. “And she’s unmarked.”

“She’s not to be marked.”

Jace’s voice, that famed alpha bark, was like a slap across the face of everyone here, silence reigning supreme. My mind was playing catch-up with the marking comment. This had all escalated swiftly, the hazy bubble holding me in its protective embrace wobbling a little.

“She has to be marked,” the darker haired guy sitting next to Ryder snapped back.

Somehow, he was even bigger, with more than a five o’clock shadow across his square jaw.

“A free roaming omega in the zone?” He shook his head, then glanced at the others.

“We’re gonna have to lock the place down and assess what weapons we’ve got.

No one goes in or out for fear of someone outside of this place getting a sniff of her, and if she goes into heat? ”

I swallowed. I hadn’t even gotten to the delicious-looking food, and now my throat was dust dry.

Part of me knew that Tall, Dark, and Super Grumpy was telling the truth.

Everything I’d been told about omegas outside the zone was that our scents were potent, enough to drive an alpha insane.

He’d be maddened by lust, able to commit superhuman feats to remove any obstacles between him and the object of his affections.

A small whine escaped my lips, making me instantly flush, and Jace’s arms tightened around me, a faint rusty purr coming from his chest in answer.

He was purring for me.

I’d found the idea positively ridiculous when I was told about it in sex ed, but right now? I was nestling into his chest, trying to find a soft place in all that hard muscle, because that sound? It felt like it washed over all of me, like a big strong hand stroking my back and settling me.

“That’s it…” he crooned between purrs. “Good girl.” I was lowered to a bench, dimly aware that people were moving out of our way to give us a spot, but Jace, he didn’t let me go for a second, even when other people around the table seemed intent on intruding on our moment.

“Look, Jace, I don’t want to be a prick, but we have to put our heads together. Better that she’s marked like the others. If you don’t, Snake and his crew, they’d give their left nuts for someone like her, especially a classy piece of arse?—”

“Shut the fuck up, Dane.”

“And what’s going on here?”

I forced my head up and off Jace’s chest, even as I felt the need to stay exactly where I was. The stout woman was standing by the table holding the platters up, looking up and down the table.

“You okay, love?”

Beta me would have bristled at that, at the sweet comment, at the warm tone, at all the sympathy and protective bullshit poured into those three little words, but omega me? I stared at her, and then god-freaking-dammit, felt my eyes begin to sting.

“Oh, sweetheart…”

The platters were put down with a clatter, people waved away, and the strange woman came and sat down beside me, wrapping her arm around my shoulders and squishing me in her soft embrace.

Part of me wanted to hate this, fight this, shove off this woman with her patronising bullshit and sit at the table, elegant as a queen, but that wasn’t the Sloane who was in the driver’s seat.

I sank into her hug, taking a big breath before letting it out for a long, long time.

“That’s it, lovey, you just let it all out.

And, you boys!” That was hissed viciously.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, talking such nonsense around an omega who’s just revealed?

She’s probably feeling raw, crazy, like her life’s been tipped upside down and put back together all ad hoc.

” A big hand stroked my back, then squeezed my shoulders. “Have something to eat, little omega?—”

“Sloane,” Jace interrupted. “Her name is Sloane.”

“Then it’s time to have something to eat, little Sloane. I’m guessing that boy of mine has been running you ragged?—”

“Ma…”

“Focussed on your body, but not what it needs.”

“Ma…”

“Turning your head until you don’t know what is what. I taught you better than this, Jason Mark?—”

“Ma!”

I found myself jumping at the sound of his bark, my heart clattering in my chest. I wanted to roll my bloody eyes at that, but something, someone, had hijacked my body and its reactions. What was I now, some quivering little mouse?

“I kept Sloane safe, cared for her, looked after her needs, and made sure she stayed hydrated, even when she was fighting me about it. Does that meet with your approval?”

“Oh, well yes, that’s good then.” I was released from the soft, sweet-scented embrace and somehow felt lesser for it, but a big ceramic plate was placed before me. “Now, Sloane, do you have any foods you can’t eat or anything? You’ll need lots of protein to build your strength.”

“Hey!” one of the guys said as the platter of bacon was dragged our way.

“And carbs. You’ll need to load up for what he has in store for you.”

“God, Ma, stop!” the other guys around the table groaned.

“What? You think I don’t know why these strange girls appear around my table every morning?

Not exactly for Sunday prayers, is it? But, Sloane…

” I felt the woman’s gaze, her smile, and I turned towards it, like a flower turns to the sun.

She was a picture of motherly sweetness, her name a perfect descriptor. “You’re an omega.”

Somehow, all I’d achieved in my short life seemed to come a dim second to that.

Ma looked so damn proud of me, and for some reason, my heart swelled as a result.

I wanted that, for someone to pat me on the head and tell me I was a good girl, even as I knew how asinine that was, but my usual spiky shell was gone and couldn’t protect me against her, against anything.

Instead, I smiled up at the woman and pulled the plate over, nibbling on the delights piled there.

“Who’s an omega?”

My eyes flicked up, taking in the newcomers, a small group of young women, but they couldn’t really compete with bacon and eggs.

I felt their eyes on me as my stomach clenched hard, letting me know how much I needed food right now, especially with all the extra demands I’d put on my body.

So as the girls sat down at the table, looking at me, Jace, and the others, I didn’t really give it much attention.

“Sloane is,” Jace replied, getting to his feet but depositing a kiss on my head.

“One we need to protect. Fellas, you’re with me.

” A collective groan went up at that. “Blame Dane for this. He made some good points, ones we need to be ready for. Snake and his crew? They’d do a lot to get their hands on an unmarked omega.

” He bent down to look at me before he went to go.

“I’ll be in the next room, taking a meeting with the guys, but I’ll be back shortly.

Have your breakfast. Ma’ll look after you. ”

She might, but the other women around the table might not. I felt their collective gaze on me as Ma kept chattering on, piling more and more food on my plate.

“An omega…” one woman said in a hushed tone. “Jace hasn’t taken one since…”

“Since ever,” another said much more sharply as her green eyes, complete with beautifully executed winged eyeliner, looked me over. “He’s never voiced an interest in taking one.”

“And he’s not now.”

The last woman sat at the head of the table, fastidiously picking through the mounds of food to create a smaller approved selection on her plate.

She wore her bright blonde hair up in a ponytail, had the kind of fresh-faced, dewy complexion one would typically expect from an omega, and coupled with the light blue baby doll dress, she looked exactly what I thought she was—alpha bait.

Em used to follow the Insta accounts of high-end influencers who liked to descend on the zone, going trawling for alphas like a matador would bulls.

She glanced up at me coolly, her crystal blue eyes narrowing as she inspected me closely now.

Only she wasn’t an omega wannabe, she was an omega, like the other women…like me.