Page 62 of The Night Movers: Season One

Ridley’s heart had been firmly lodged in his throat for two hours, stuck there like a pill he couldn’t swallow.

Rain’s hand sat sweaty in his, fingers threaded together as they walked flanked by six alphas.

Ridley hadn’t expected they would go top-side.

It had been so long since he’d walked above ground freely.

Or maybe it had only been a few days? The passage of time was strange for him now.

People gave them a wide berth, startled to see six masked alphas walking in broad daylight. It was a power move, for sure. Not even the New Guard patrolling the streets confronted them. But maybe that was because they were their biggest buyers.

If Ridley had seen something like that just a few months ago, he would have been scared to death. He would have gone home to Ren and complained about the audacity of alphas, about how he was grateful they were both unpresented. How he hoped they stayed that way forever.

Ridley now understood that the masks weren’t to hide their identity from those who were part of the underground network, but from those that weren’t.

Sometimes, Ridley forgot that there were betas who existed outside all of the secondary gender politics.

Sure, they had to deal with a world shredded by war, a government so corrupt they poisoned their own people, a sky so toxic it was a hazy brown more days than not.

But they were safe. Not from acid rain or poverty, but from being bought and sold like chattel.

Ridley had always envied them, had hoped against hope he’d be a dud, never developing a secondary gender.

But the moment Ren had presented as an omega, he’d known he wouldn’t be far behind.

And now, she was gone. She was gone, and Ridley had somehow tied himself to six alphas for life.

He swallowed down the aching hollowness in his chest. He fought to keep his head up, his eyes forward.

He refused to shrink when his alphas were striding confidently through the streets like they owned them. Maybe they did.

Just like before, other omegas watched, wreaking of envy, their faces pinched with anguish or frustration.

They didn’t know Ridley or Rain’s circumstances, but they saw they weren’t leashed, weren’t muzzled, weren’t forced to wear white, weren’t paraded around like trophies. That made them enviable in their eyes.

But Ridley didn’t feel enviable. He felt terrified. What did this curator want with him? What was he supposed to say? To do? Titus had been unbearably tight-lipped all morning. He’d barely said a word to Ridley, even stiffening slightly when he’d brushed his lips over his alpha’s cheek.

They began to slow when they reached the eighth ward. If the slums had slums, it was the eighth ward. Ridley began to imagine meeting Vesper in the seedy backroom of a bar or brothel. This Vesper was supposed to be rich and powerful. Why was he slumming it in the eighth ward? What was the appeal?

Ridley frowned when they stopped outside a large building with a flashing blue and pink neon sign that simply said Arcade.

Ridley had seen the gambling arcades. The ones that housed machines where people who couldn’t afford to lose, and gambled the last of their meager earnings on the off chance they might win.

The odds were never in their favor. The house always won.

This wasn’t one of those arcades .

They entered the building through two heavy doors that spilled into a warehouse-sized space lit by purple lights that made everything of color glow.

His alphas fit in well, which was to say, they blended.

They wore all black, the only color the neon glow of their terrifying masks.

All around them, other alphas stopped and stared, but his alphas paid them no mind.

Ridley and Rain struggled to stay in step, both of them trying to take in as much as possible.

There was a skating rink to Ridley’s left and a bowling alley to his right, and in the center was a sea of vintage games, dinging and clanging like they were seeking attention.

But they went ignored. All around, men in brightly-colored gear glowed like exotic birds, yet they did nothing.

They just lounged around like they waited for orders. What a waste.

It wreaked in there. The thick musk of alphas and the pungent smell of sweat and body odor was making Ridley’s stomach churn.

Rain lifted his hand to cover his nose. Clearly, Ridley wasn’t the only one affected.

Were these Vesper’s people? Did he have people?

He must. Rain said he was some kind of omega supplier.

A liaison between the elite and rare omegas. That required a network.

The hand not covering Rain’s nose clamped down tighter on Ridley’s, but he didn’t mind.

He held on tighter as well, shrinking inward as everyone turned and stared as they passed.

They didn’t look at them with curiosity, but with an almost cartoonish hunger.

Like a salivating dog might stare at a piece of meat.

It pinged Ridley’s lizard brain, whispering that he was unsafe.

No sooner had he thought it than the sensation receded, an almost overwhelming calm hitting him like a warm blanket.

His alphas were pushing out calming pheromones, counteracting whatever chemo-signals the strange alphas were emitting.

Normally, it would irritate Ridley, but in this one instance, he was grateful. These men made his skin crawl.

Ridley didn’t breathe again until they passed through two more sets of doors into a hallway that gave him a strange sense of vertigo, like they were walking down a steep slope and not horizontally down a long hall.

The sensation made him temporarily miss the chaos of the arcade.

He kept his eyes on the door at the other end, soothing himself as it grew closer.

Only, once they went through the door, they were met with a staircase.

They were going back underground, though now in a completely different part of the city.

When they reached the bottom, they arrived at yet another set of double doors.

These doors weren’t like the others. They were fancy, red with gold filigree details, flanked on either side by two brutish-looking alphas.

His six alphas gave a single nod in tandem, and the other men returned it while sweeping open the doors to allow their entrance.

They were expected. Sugar had said Vesper summoned them.

How powerful was this alpha that he could order around the six most dangerous alphas of the underground? Ridley truly didn’t want to find out.

The room they entered wasn’t a room at all, but a theater.

Not one that used to show movies, but one of the really old ones where people used to act out plays on stage.

The chairs had all been removed, replaced by black leather booths that curled around golden tables.

Opulent chandeliers hung from the ceilings, but the only current source of light came from the canned lights both overhead and lining the stage, giving everything a sallow cast.

Ridley was so busy looking around at the balcony and the mezzanine that he initially missed the man sitting on his golden throne at the front of the stage and the two alphas on the floor just before it.

Were they guarding him, or did the man wield so much power he kept other alphas as pets?

He suspected the former, but couldn’t shake the thought of the latter.

Beside him, Rain whined low in his throat, then melted into Ridley’s side. He understood now why the other omega had said to dress with flair. This had to be him. Vesper. The Curator.

The man was beautiful. He was beautiful in the same way that sleek black panthers were beautiful.

He looked exotic and dangerous. He was made to sit atop a throne.

Ridley gawked as he took in inky black hair, thick brows, and eyes so golden they appeared to glow even in the dimly lit room, an effect only deepened by black liner and a fringe of thick dark lashes.

Vesper had high cheekbones and a chiseled jaw partially hidden by a five o’clock shadow and his skin glowed from the iridescent powder he’d dusted over his full face of makeup. He appeared otherworldly. Like some kind of fae creature from a fairy tale, come to life.

He dressed like one, too—like some elven king who had somehow gotten stuck in their mortal world.

He wore tight black leather pants, a silky black shirt, and a black morning coat encrusted with shiny silver stones that glittered in the ambient lighting.

It was flashy even for the elites. His hands were hidden by black gloves and his feet were encased in knee-high leather boots.

Ridley fought the giggle bubbling in his throat.

This was the man they were all afraid of?

The man currently twirling a black cane with a golden flamingo head like the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland ?

The man who looked like the ringmaster of his own gothic circus?

The man currently glaring at them like they were the ants coming to ruin his picnic?

“That’s close enough, alphas,” he said, his voice warm and rich, almost hypnotic. To Titus, he said, “It took you long enough.”

“We arrived as soon as we received your…request,” Titus said through gritted teeth, clearly agitated by the man’s arrogance.

“I shouldn’t have had to summon you. You should have come to me voluntarily.”

Why was that? Why did Titus answer to Vesper? Titus didn’t respond so Ridley filed the question away for later.

“Get out of the way,” Vesper said, waving a hand at the alphas. “Let me see them.” Ridley sucked in a sharp breath as his alphas parted without a fight, leaving Ridley and Rain bare to the strange man’s gaze.