Page 31 of Roulette Rodeo (Jackknife Ridge Ranch #1)

Something clenches in my chest at that.

Three years of recycled air and artificial light. Three years of performing for men who saw her as meat. Three years of saving tips in a broken compact, hoping for an escape that must have seemed impossible.

And her first response to freedom is to dance in a thunderstorm.

Shiloh's moving now, and I recognize his body language. This is Shiloh in hunt mode, Shiloh who's decided on a target. But it's playful, lighter than I've ever seen him. He's actually chasing her through the rain, both of them slipping in the mud, Duke barking circles around them.

When he catches her—because she can barely walk in those stupid big ass boots—he spins her around like they're in some fucking musical. She's shrieking with laughter, clinging to him not in fear but in joy, and when he sets her down, they both slip.

They go down hard, her landing on top of him, both now completely covered in mud.

And they're still laughing.

She props herself up on his chest, looking down at him with those garnet eyes that probably sparkle even more in the rain. Her hair is plastered to her head, makeup completely gone, mud streaking her face.

She's never looked more beautiful.

The realization pisses me off enough that I almost close the feed. But I can't look away from the way they're looking at each other. Like they're the only two people in the world. Like the storm around them is just background music for whatever's happening between them.

"Thank you," she says, and even through the camera, I can hear the sincerity in it.

Thank you for what?

For the chase? For catching her? For buying her freedom, even if it came with new chains?

Shiloh reaches up, pushing wet hair from her face with a gentleness that seems impossible from hands that have killed. They stay like that, her on top of him in the mud, rain still pouring, just looking at each other.

The intimacy of it makes me feel like a voyeur.

Makes me feel like an outsider in my own pack.

The reality that it makes me feel anything after I swore I'd never feel again ruins me.

I shut off the monitor with more force than necessary, the screen going black with a small protest beep.

My whisky sits forgotten, watered down by melted ice. The storm rages outside my windows, and I know they're still out there, playing in it like children who've never learned that rain just makes everything harder.

Shiloh's falling for her.

No—he's already fallen.

Fell the moment he scented her in that storage closet, probably. Everything since has just been gravity doing its work, pulling him down until he crashes into her completely.

He's a goner. Lost. Her minion in her possession.

The thought comes unbidden, possessive in a way that makes me drain the rest of my whisky in one burning swallow.

She's not mine. She's not ours. She's a temporary problem that needs a permanent solution. A reminder of everything we can't have, shouldn't want, swore we'd never risk again.

"It's only a test," I say to the empty office. "She's only a toy. She'll show her true colors, and they'll be forced to acknowledge I was right."

The words echo off the glass and steel, sounding hollow even to my own ears.

But I repeat them anyway, like a mantra, like a prayer, like a lie I need to believe.

"She's temporary. She'll disappoint them. She'll break like they all break, or she'll run like they all run. She's not different. She's not special. She's not?—"

Dancing in the rain like it's a gift instead of an inconvenience.

Laughing with Duke like she's never had a dog before.

Looking at Shiloh like he's worth something beyond his capacity for violence.

I pour another whisky, this one larger, and settle back to watch the storm through my windows instead of my monitors. But I can't stop seeing her in my mind's eye—muddy and laughing and so fucking alive it hurts to witness.

Sophia had been beautiful, controlled, everything an omega should be according to the books.

She'd tried so hard to be perfect for us, to meet every expectation, to never disappoint. The pressure of it had crushed her, slowly at first, then all at once.

But Red doesn't seem to give a fuck about expectations.

She boxed in lingerie not to seduce but to fight. She claimed Shiloh in front of all Vegas, not to manipulate but because she wanted to. She's dancing in a thunderstorm, not for anyone's entertainment but her own.

Maybe that's what makes her dangerous.

Not her scent or her beauty or her virgin status that makes my cock hard despite my best efforts. But the fact that she doesn't seem to need us to be happy.

She was happy in that mud puddle. Happy playing with Duke. Happy in the rain that would have sent any other omega running for cover.

What happens when someone who doesn't need you chooses you anyway?

I don't want to find out. Can't afford to find out. Won't survive finding out.

"She'll show her true colors," I tell the storm, the words barely audible over thunder. "She'll prove me right."

She has to.

Because if she doesn't—if she's actually who she appears to be, this wild, free, joyful creature who finds happiness in thunderstorms—then everything I've believed for the last two years is wrong.

And I've built too much on that foundation of wrong to let one red-headed omega with a laugh like sunshine demolish it all.

"It's only a test," I repeat, closing my eyes and leaning back in my chair. "She's only temporary. She'll disappoint them."

I keep repeating it, over and over, like maybe if I say it enough times, it'll become true. Like maybe if I believe it hard enough, I won't have to face what I saw in that footage—a woman who might actually be strong enough to survive us.

Strong enough to make us better.

Strong enough to make me feel things I buried with Sophia.

"She's temporary," I whisper to the empty office, to the storm, to myself. "She has to be."

Because if she's not— if she's permanent, if she's real, if she's ours —then I have to admit that I've been wrong. That…we deserve a second chance. That maybe an omega doesn't have to die for alphas like us to love her.

And that possibility terrifies me more than any enemy we've ever faced.

So I repeat my mantra, my lie, my desperate hope that she'll prove me right by being wrong for us:

"It's only a test. She's only a toy. She'll show her true colors, and they'll be forced to acknowledge I was right."

Again and again, the words cycle through my mind like a broken prayer.

Because surely…if I repeat them enough, I'll believe it too.