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Chapter Nine

Ryder

B reakfast was going about the same as breakfast always did when you hadn’t had enough sleep. Dane was still brooding about me abandoning him, but the miserable fucker could get over it.

Then Jace had turned up with Sloane, Emma’s sister, and my mind blanked the fuck out. She was an omega. I could scent her from all the way over here.

What the fuck? She hadn’t been an omega last night, and Emma hadn’t mentioned it. I mean, shit like this didn’t happen. Omegas didn’t live freely on the other side of the fence, and they sure as shit didn’t waltz into the alpha zone and party in a club.

A fucking omega?

I was trying to keep my shit together, but inside, my beast was going nuts. I was staring at Sloane, but it wasn’t her I was thinking about. It was her sister—the cute as hell brat I’d booted out of my apartment after the mother of all put-downs.

Way to go, asshole!

I’d let her go. Why? Because my inner beast had snarled at me, telling me to mark her as mine.

If I’d pushed things, would she have revealed?

The genetic markers were buried deep and didn’t always manifest in the alpha or omega type.

Plus, it could skip generations sometimes.

She’d even looked like a fucking omega, small and fragile, although they came in all shapes and sizes.

Sloane was taller, the average beta, yet she’d just fucking revealed, if I was right.

And I must be right, because there was no other explanation.

Emma had taken everything I’d given her and begged me for more.

What the fuck had I done? The image of her sprawled out on my bed taunted me. Things had been going great until I’d shoved her clothes at her and all but tossed her out. No wonder she wasn’t answering my fucking calls.

“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.”

Silence cut through the room. The fucker had dared to use his alpha bark on me. I smoothed out my face. The asshole was frightening his omega.

Dane stiffened in his seat beside me. “She has to be marked,” he snapped back.

“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? ”

This was sliding downhill fast. I could feel the rage rolling off Dane. He and Jace were tight, but they still butted heads all the time. Mostly, it amused me. Today, my mind was clear and cold.

Sloane swallowed. The poor omega looked like she was about to throw up. Given the alpha vibes that Dane and Jace were tossing about, her reaction was hardly a surprise.

Finally, Jace, the asshole, redirected his attention to his omega, hauled her into his arms, and purred.

She softened instantly, and that shit sent my fucking beast into a spin. Emma had softened for my purr. She’d fucking submitted to me and everything, then I’d let her walk away.

What the fuck was wrong with me?

Jace was busy coddling his omega, while Dane was getting riled up.

No point in trying to head this shit off.

Some of my humor returned because their showdowns were always spectacular, and it would be doubly so, given Jace—the mother of all miserable anti-omega-touching douchebags—had, by all appearances, just claimed one.

“Look, Jace, I don’t want to be a prick,” Dane started, which was very much an indication that he was about 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 ass?—”

“Shut the fuck up, Dane.” Jace pinned him with a look, although I thought Dane had made a valid point.

The world moved differently for alphas and omegas.

There was no such thing as freedom for an omega once they revealed, as they needed an alpha to protect them from other alphas.

It was as simple as that. Dane and I were the ones who cared for the omegas when they went into heat, rutted them, and put a mark on them so that the rest of the lowlifes in Desparion knew that they were ours.

It never bothered me. It never bothered them, either.

I figured some of them viewed us as potential mates, but I wasn’t into them in that way.

I enjoyed the sex. Rutting an omega through their heat was sexual napalm. At least I’d always thought it was.

My beast fucking rumbled at me, moody bastard, reminding me once again that he’d understood what had been under our nose a short time ago.

“And what’s going on here?” As if on cue, Dane’s mom—known to everyone as Ma—breezed into the room.

I swear she had a nose for trouble. Ma didn’t take shit from anyone, although she was the first person you could count on in a bind.

She’d done a better fucking job than my mother ever had.

Ma was sweet and kind, even if she was a total busybody.

Dane grumbled about it constantly, but as far as I was concerned, the woman was pure gold.

It was Ma who’d bandaged me after Dane and Jace picked me up.

I’d been a mess, and she treated me with genuine care and respect—something that had been in short supply all my life.

I shoved a forkful of eggs into my mouth and stared straight ahead.

“You okay, love?” Ma homed in on Sloane like a heat-seeking missile on a large target.

Dane groaned, although Ma’s fussing was the least of our concerns.

Once our omegas got wind of Jace and Sloane, the proverbial shit would hit the fan.

None of them would be happy, given they’d had their sights set on Jace.

Now he’d been removed from the pool, so to speak, not that he ever took what was on offer, and he’d never brought an omega in. That he had done so now was telling.

“Oh, sweetheart…” Ma said, gathering Sloane up for a hug I wasn’t convinced she appreciated.

“For fuck’s sake,” Dane grumbled, going back to his breakfast and eating it like a fucking machine.

Sloane was clearly overwhelmed, and Jace had just dumped a newly awakened omega into a room full of people. What a dick!

My beast rumbled, reminding me of my less than sterling performance in aftercare.

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

And, you boys!” That was hissed viciously and in a way that encompassed every man in the room.

“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. Have something to eat, little omega?—”

“Sloane,” Jace interrupted through gritted teeth. “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.”

“Focused 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!”

“For fuck’s sake!” Dane muttered, shoving his fork down on the plate and turning toward me. “What the fuck is wrong with him? Why won’t he put his mark on her? Is he bringing her in? He needs to just do it. No fucking mark! What an asshole! What does this mean?”

“It means he’s claiming her,” I said, reading the situation for what it was. Jace’s body language, the way he curved around Sloane—there was no fucking mistaking that.

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

“God, Ma, stop!” Collective groans went up around the table.

“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…” Ma beamed at our newcomer. “You’re an omega.”

“Who’s an omega?” As if to throw a grenade into the moment, the door opened and our resident omegas sauntered in. Like Ma, all their eyes were on Sloane, noses twitching as they took in her scent.

“Sloane is,” Jace replied, getting to his feet. “One we need to protect. Fellas, you’re with me.”