Page 7

I’d tried escaping in the way I knew best, but unfortunately, that wasn’t the right way. I should’ve known, dealing with Alphas, they would’ve had traps of all sizes to accommodate for omegas oof all shapes and shifts.

Vasilis’s bedroom, where I found myself was incredibly warm. He’d left after talking at me about how he was trying to protect me and save me. I tried my best to claw at him where possible. And while he was out of the room, I claws holes through the bedding where he’d put me. I rarely spent so much time in my animal form.

The door opened with a mechanical crunch, like metal folding in on itself. He walked inside and smiled at me. Blood on his lips. He wiped them with a sleeve and sat on the bed, placing his hand over the latch that kept the cage locked tight.

“You want out of here, right?” he asked. “I know you do, obviously. But I’m going to need you to make some promises to me first. And you can nod if you agree to them. Understood?”

I shook my head for him. I understand what he was asking, but that didn’t mean I was going to agree to what he was going to request.

“Firstly, you’ve got to quit asking about this place. You’re here, you’re going to get yourself killed if people find you. Secondly, you’ll need to wear my clothes to stop smelling like you. And third, now that you’re here, you’re probably unlikely going to leave, so you’ll be staying in this room.”

I nodded. I just wanted to be free from this cage, and from this form. I couldn’t communicate under these conditions.

The moment he unlatched the cage, he noticed the scratched up linens beneath it. I leapt free and off the bed. From my tiny form into my five-nine with good shoes, I never felt so relieved, and seeing Vasilis resting on his bed propped up on an elbow. I realized I might’ve made a mistake.

“You’re lucky the bedding is changed regularly,” he said, patting the bed. “I think we might have something to talk about now.”

I’d seen the way he came in and I knew the path we’d taken from the parking lot to here. I could’ve ran for my life and tried getting out, but I couldn’t be sure I knew the actually route. And this place was a hub of serpent activity. The belly of the beast. “Well, unless you plan on freeing those omegas you were talking about, we don’t have anything to talk about.”

He shrugged. “That’s not my business,” he said. “My business is doing as I’m told, obviously. You haven’t been paying attention, Soren.”

“I have,” I snapped back at him. “You’ve had as much choice to do what you want as anyone else in a position of power like you. To say that you don’t is actually laughable.”

He patted a hand on the bed that I’d scratched up when I was in my shifted form. I wished I’d done even more damage to it now. “I’m not the enemy. I’m far from it. I’m not having soldiers walk in here and drag you out. You know, some people might see you coming into the compound an act of wanting to be killed.”

I sat on the edge of the bed. I didn’t want to die, but I wanted to see the omegas back out there in the arms of their families where they belonged rather than in whatever situation they’d been forced into. “So, what’s your plan, now that you’ve got me here? Are you going to tie me to your bed, gag me, force me into your sick little game?”

Vasilis’s smile, a smirk, always got my stomach whooshing. “I had thought about tying you to the bed, but then you’d be in a position I only reserved for those who ask for it, and I’m not stupid enough to—to do what’s already been done to them.”

“So, you are hurting them?” I asked.

He sighed. “Nobody is being killed here. We—”

“Tell me.” I reached out and grabbed his hand. “Tell me what you’re doing and I’ll try my best to understand. And then, all I ask is you let me see them. It’s all I want to do. Please.”

He pushed his fingers between mine and held my hand, squeezing my palm to his. “It’s too dangerous for that,” he said. “These omegas are here for research, they’re here because they’re being paid for it. And we—”

“What research?”

“Rotmor,” he whispered. “My family carry it in our venom. We were hunted for a long time to eradicate it because it—it—”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard about Rotmor, but there wasn’t a library of conditions and afflictions for our kind like they had for the humans with their influenzas and poxes. Ours seemed to be more dangerous, and now, I had more reason to be worried. “So, you’re making them into weapons?”

He nodded, the thin smile on his lips returning as he dipped his head slightly as if to hide it. “I never said people weren’t dying, but these omegas aren’t going to die by our hands. They get paid to take on the disease, and then they get paid more when they can—”

Yanking my hand from his, I didn’t want to hear anymore, even though I could’ve guessed what he was about to say. “There’s no cure,” I said. “So, you’re just sending them out to die? Like bombs. You’re setting them off and letting them go to explode in—in what, small towns?”

“No. Not specifically. They’re pumped with venom, they take on as much Rotmor as they can handle, and then we send them to the clans that hunted us all those years ago. And that’s why I didn’t want you around, but since you’re here, and there’s no where for you to go, what else do you want to know?”

I backed up against the wet mossy wall, my fingers resting in the soft texture of it, almost calming on my senses. “My family,” I said. “Did we ever hunt you?”

He laughed. “Without coming off in any way offensive to you, Soren, your family have never been a threat to anyone, even big aviation companies never found your family threatening.”

I shook my had, still trying to come to terms with everything he was telling me about the Syndicate’s plan to go around killing all of its enemies and spreading this disgusting disease. “What do you tell these families?”

“Well, this is only the second time we’ve carried out this plan,” he said. “The first time was in Arizona. We had an entire town of desert wolf shifters wiped out. The omegas we sent in were all voluntary from the Syndicate loyalists.”

Gulping hard, I looked for an exit, but there was only one present, and I didn’t like my odds of escaping. “You’re a terrorist organization, Vasilis, you’re—” I pulled out a clump of moss from the wall. “Where’s the guy I knew who was telling me all the things he was going to do once he was healed up? Who are you?” I threw the moss at him and tried to open the door.

It wouldn’t budge.

Vasilis grabbed me from behind, his grasp on me was strong as he pulled me down onto the bed and placed a hand over my mouth. “Like I said, you’ve not been paying attention. This isn’t what I want. This is what my family wants. You already know what I want, but I can never have it. I can never—have it.” His words were broken up with slight sobs. His muscles contracted around my body, squeezing harder against me. And then I was out.

My dreams were mostly panicked running through a maze where snakes were chasing me. The walls of the maze were the same metal tubing of the inside of the compound. They were slightly ridged with doors that never opened and when they did, more snakes came out. All types with bright striped scales and some large like river anacondas. They swerved in their unique pattern of attack until the caught me, coiling around my wrists and ankles.

I woke in a hot sweaty panic, my vision blurred and my limbs constricted like they had been in the dream.

Vasilis was above me, his head tilting slightly as he watched my eyes open. He smiled and spoke, but his words weren’t audible. My ears felt like they were stuffed with cotton, as did my tongue and mouth.Nothing came through to my senses until a crackle tickled over me and a fire breached my senses. It was relieving.

“What did you do to me?” I asked, tugging on my arms, but they were heavy and weighted.

“I’m not going to let you hurt yourself,” he said.

My arms were tried to the bed posts. “You—you—”

“You can thank me later,” he said. “I’m going to get something to eat. Do you have any preferences? We usually had meat sticks. Don’t ask me what type of meat it is, because I never know.” He shrugged at me. “I assume you’re probably going to go for whatever vegetables are on offer then.”

I didn’t want to speak to him. I didn’t even want to look at him, even though he had my gaze locked on him. That dark aura he carried around with him like an accessory. I would’ve huffed and folded my arms over my chest if I had any control over my movement.

Vasilis left the room warning me not to shift because the binds on my wrists would shrink with me, and since they were spaced apart for my body, they would tear me in two as a flying squirrel. I knew as much not to mess with that even if it was just his words.

This was the sort of situation everyone warned me I would get myself into. My family, my friends, even people I picked jobs up for, they all warned me I would end up in a no-win situation where I’d be toyed with by some unforgiving Alpha. Except, Vasilis didn’t want me dead, he’d said so himself. In fact, he wanted me alive, for what I could only assume was something sexual.

As I chased myself around in circles, mentally, Vasilis came back into the room with a silver tray. There were skewered meats coated in sauce, rice, veggies, and even a pudding cup. I looked him up and down. “Is this prison?”

He laughed, sitting beside me on the bed. “I know we’ve already done this one before, but if I let your arms free, will you actually just relax and stop trying to escape?” he asked. “I don’t want to feed you, and as much as I really appreciated you when you fed me, I think this is a different situation.”

Staring into his eyes as his pupils changed into vertical slits and back again. He was flexing his power in my face. “I don’t know if I can promise it,” I told him. “I’m here to free those omegas. I’ll buy them,” I let out. “I’ll pay you back what you paid them if you let them free.”

He shook his head and sighed. “You know, that’s not something we can do.” He grabbed a spoon and scooped up some of the rice. “If you’re going to keep asking for them to be free, which is something I can’t do, then we’re going to be going around in circles, and it’s best if I keep you tied here. Lucky for you though, this is when of the best beds in the entire compound.” He moved the spoonful of rice to my face.

I blew the rice from the spoon, scattering it all over the bed, and myself. “Then let me pay for you,” I said. “Let me pay your family for you. This isn’t the life you wanted. I can free you from it. Everyone wants money. Everything has a price.” IT was the entire reason they’d managed to go so many omegas in here, because of the impoverished state for many of them were in.

We fought on the topic of money for a moment, as we had back when I took care of him. He’d had a lot to say about how my family could live off the money we’d earned without having to work another day in our lives. I agreed, they absolutely could. I hated that I was lumped in with them, but it was better than being fodder for whatever operation was happening in this bunker.

By the time we got finished with our argument, I’d combated every spoonful of rice and vegetables to the point my chin was dripping in whatever oils the foods were cooked in, and not a single piece went passed my lips.

“I’m trying to keep you alive,” he said, waving a stick of cubed meats at me. “You need to eat. You’ll never leave if you’re dead.”

“Oh, I forgot, you don’t kill people don’t here,” I said, blowing air at my chin to get the hardened rice from my skin. “And if I can’t leave, then why are you trying to keep me alive?”

“Because I fucking owe my life to you,” he snapped, jumping to his feet and whacking the tray of food across the bed. “I don’t want to see you dead or diseased. I just want you to go back to Georgia, go back to that hospital you were working at, and then I know you’re safe.”

“Then take me there,” I said. “But free all those omegas first. People are going to come looking for me. People know where I am.” It was a bold faced lie, and I hoped he couldn’t see right through it. But if he really thought he owed his life to me, then he’d do what I was asking, even if it seemed counter intuitive to the Syndicate’s operation.