Page 52 of Stream Heat (Omega Stream #1)

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Kara

There had been a weight in the room when I woke, notifications buzzing on my phone, but I hadn’t been interested.

Not yet. Not with Theo’s body slotted so naturally against mine, the length of him pressed up between me and the wall, one arm thrown over my waist like he had a claim he didn’t want anyone to miss.

I let myself relish the ache between my legs. It was a good one, deep and warm, a reminder not just of what had happened the night before in the kitchen, but of everything building between the six of us since I had joined the team.

I was still deciding whether I wanted to wake Theo or let him sleep when the door slammed open like we were in a sitcom, except the tension wasn’t funny. Not even a little bit.

“Have you seen–” Reid froze halfway in the doorway. That precise Alpha energy of his twisted sharp and tight. His scent spiked, cedar and the promise of a coming storm.

Theo’s head lifted from the pillow, sleepy grin morphing instantly into cocky. “Morning, fearless leader,” he said, squeezing my waist like he was staking his territory. “You need something?”

Reid’s jaw clenched so tight it could have probably cut glass. “There’s a situation downstairs that requires attention.”

I was out of the haze and wide awake. “What kind of situation?”

“Some anonymous troll posted graphic comments about you on the group stream VOD from last week,” Reid said. “It’s picking up steam.”

Shit. I rolled my eyes and reached for my phone. “What were they saying?”

“Nothing worth repeating,” Reid growled, and the darkness in his scent was impossible to ignore.

Theo was instantly alert; that lazy-morning attitude was gone, replaced by a cold fury that poured off him like wildfire. “Who was it? I’ll dig through their digital footprint so fast they’ll wish they were a bot account.”

“Already being handled,” Reid cut him off. “Ash was tracking them. But there was something else.” The way he looked at me when he said it, I couldn’t read him, which was usually a bad sign. “We have a group stream in an hour. Tournament qualifier prep. We need to decide if we are still doing it.”

Cancel, and everyone would know the troll got to me. Go live, and the whole world would watch me eat shit from some loser who’d never seen a real fight. It wasn’t much of a decision.

“We’re doing it,” I said. My voice didn’t even shake. “I’m not hiding from trolls.”

Reid didn’t look surprised. There was a flicker in his eyes as he glanced at Theo, then back to me. “We’ll talk about… this. After the stream.”

I nodded. “After.”

He was gone almost as suddenly as he had arrived, but his scent lingered. Theo dragged me back to his chest the second Reid was out of range. “You sure you wanted to do this? The assholes on chat could get pretty bad.”

“I’ve had worse,” I told him, and it came out flat, factual. “I survived eight years on suppressants. A public heat crash. This isn’t what’s going to break me.”

Theo’s smile had been all teeth and pride. “That’s my girl.”

It wasn’t long before we were all gathered around the streaming tables.

Six of us in total, mics checked, cameras on, everything perfectly staged for maximum visibility.

We’d done this a hundred times, but it had never felt like this.

The pack bonds were tight, humming with defensive energy, protective instincts so loud I was surprised they didn’t short out the mics.

Reid sat straight down the row from me. Even when he pretended to focus on the screen, his gaze drifted back to check on me.

Theo was to my right, vibrating under the surface with surplus adrenaline, and on my left Jace was steady and solid, the team’s anchor.

Ash hovered by his technical setup, fingers dancing over the controls; behind him, Malik rounded out the group, profile calm but scent telling its own story.

Five Alphas. One Omega. If that painted a target, so be it.

“Live in three, two, one…” Ash signaled, and it was on.

“Welcome to the Pack Wrecked tournament qualifier prep,” Reid said, voice all business, cool and confident. “Full squad here today. Ready to dominate.”

The banter came easy, all of us falling into roles, the class clown, the silent assassin, the brooding strategist, the wild-card, the tech genius, and me, the ‘surprise addition’ who was actually a ringer. For a minute, I almost thought maybe it would be fine.

Then the first toxic comment popped up on the screen, courtesy of a moderator who had missed it by seconds.

how’s the suppressant junkie pretending to be human today? still faking your way through tournaments?

It was like someone jammed a thumb into a bruise. I lost track of the conversation for a second, and then the rest of them felt it, too. Five Alphas, pack-bonded, and every one of them went silent.

Reid’s posture snapped rigid, eyes darkening to the shade of midnight on the coast. Theo was still as death, attention laser-sharp and edged.

Jace shifted, muscles tensed, the sharp tang of his scent like steel.

Ash went statue behind his monitor. Malik, for once, let the control slip, and beneath the calm, he was pure Alpha bite.

“Ban that account,” Reid said, so low and dangerous the words almost vibrated off the desk. “Permanently.”

The comment was gone, but the chat was stirring, waves of curiosity, the beginnings of a feeding frenzy. If I’d just laughed it off, maybe it would have faded. Instead, I tried to play along, but a new comment landed before I could finish the joke.

lol triggered the alpha bodyguards. bet they only keep her around for heat content

That one was even worse. Reid’s scent exploded, thunderstorm fury filling every inch of space.

“That’s enough,” he said, and the Alpha command in his voice was palpable, even through the screen.

“Let me make something perfectly clear. Disrespect toward any member of this pack will not be tolerated. Period.”

Chat paused, stunned. For a heartbeat, the only thing moving was the slow scroll of shocked emojis and question marks.

Theo broke in, sharp, “Ban him, mod squad. Or at least make it a hundred bucks per insult.”

I meant to laugh. It came out wrong, too thin. “He’ll bankrupt himself in an hour.”

It only egged the trolls on.

Next message, uglier.

Bet you still leak on cam. Is the pack keeping you dry, or do they just hose you down between matches?

I clenched my teeth hard enough to feel the crunch. The controller shivered in my grip, and this time, my shot was way off.

Malik heard it. “You okay, Queen?”

I nodded. He couldn’t see it, but the words were stuck. “Just a cramp. Keep moving.”

But the insults kept rolling. Each one perfectly targeted, folding me inside out. They dragged up the old school file, the heat crash, the time I nearly blacked out on stream and had to crawl off before throwing up.

And under it all, that animal certainty that everyone watching was just there for the moment I snapped.

I tried to bury it. I swapped to shotgun, kicked through a door, took out two enemies at close range. It helped for a moment.

Ash whooped, “Damn, Queen, where was that last season?”

I found the words, just, “Getting sabotaged by my own genetics, probably.”

The chat flipped, for a second it was nothing but #GeneticsGang, #QueenNeverFell, people spamming support. For a second I thought maybe the mods had it clamped down, maybe I’d survive two more rounds.

The next superchat hit, and it was nuclear.

A hundred bucks, and the filter let every word through.

Queen, do you get off on all the Alpha attention?

Or do you need the whole pack to keep you from popping a heat on stream again?

Bet your chair is drenched right now from being around all those Alphas.

Maybe you should go back to faking Beta, it was more believable. #SuppJunkie #NotEvenHuman #AlphaWhore

It pinned itself at the top of chat. All thirty thousand viewers, forced to see it loop and loop and loop.

Vision went tunnel. Breathing? Gone. Controller? I couldn’t feel it in my hands.

“Fuck,” I muttered, but the mic was hot and everyone heard.

Malik’s voice, low, straight for my nerves. “You can log off if you want. We’ll cover.”

But I couldn’t log off. My eyes were glued to the insult. The word “whore” cycled, hundreds of times per second. I couldn’t even feel my hands.

The mask slipped. And I knew it’d be clipped, replayed, meme’d by morning.

I tried to say something cool, make a joke, retake control, but all I did was stare at the waves of chat, drowning.

Last thing I spotted before I tried to shake myself out of it was the other four Alphas, all-caps, turning on the troll with a force I’d never, ever seen.

But it was too late. And for the first time in a year, the urge to quit wasn’t just background noise, it was in my marrow.

It wasn’t the first time I’d been trolled. But it was the first time it stung like this.

The pack reacted instantly, sensing how much the comment had hurt me.

Reid’s fingers clamped onto his controller; plastic creaked like it was about to snap in his grip. His arms were veined up, jaw fixed, murder in his eyes. On stream, he dropped the team’s whole strategy, broke cover, and drove straight for my avatar in a suicide sprint, blocking every bullet.

Theo was all noise, but the kind that made grown men duck. He banged his chair out, knees up, channeling every manic impulse into the team DM and the public chat. He was firing off so many lines I wondered if he had six hands. “Mods BAN. Ban. BAN. Nobody comes for Queen. Pack law.”

Jace? Not a word. He went stiller than still.

You wouldn’t catch the change unless you’d seen it before, the way his eyes blacked out, pupils swallowing the color, the way he stopped even pretending to type.

He was already tracking the troll, pulling their info, prepping to retaliate.

Surgical, emotionless, and ten times scarier than the yelling.