Page 6 of The Runaway

They stared at each other in shock, and Gabriel honestly wasn’t sure which of them was more surprised. By now, Gabriel had met all of the staff on the estate, and this was not a face he recognised. Besides which, there was no reason for one of the estate’s residents to be hiding in the stable. Which meant this young man was most likely an escapee. A runaway omega slave.

Noise and fog flooded Gabriel’s mind as unwanted memories crashed over him.The omega sat in the corner, tucked behind a crate of supplies, staring at the group of alphas in terror. “Come out,” one of the alphas ordered. “Don’t make me come in there and get you.” The omega shrank further behind the crate, whimpering in fear. He had a bloody wound on his face, and his clothes were in tatters, despite the cold winter weather. The alpha snarled impatiently. He strode forward and thrust the crate aside, taking hold of the omega by the collar of his shirt and dragging him across the floor. He dropped him on the dirt, then reached for his trousers. “Disobedient little cunt. I’ll teach you to respect your betters…”

Gabriel fought for air, knowing that what he was seeing wasn’t real. The war was over. The war was over. The war was…

Name three things you can see, he instructed himself. The apple crates. The horse’s bucket. The pitchfork leaning against the wall.

Name two things you can hear. The rain on the roof. The snort of one of the horses.

The world settled a little and air once more filled his lungs… but that terrified face behind the crates remained, staring out at him in fear and despair.

A loud creak made Gabriel jump, and he turned to see the stable door opening. Dante came through a moment later, his attention focused on securing the door, then shaking the water off his clothes. Gabriel sagged in relief that someone else had arrived. In his current state, there was no way he could deal with this predicament himself. “Dante?” he called sharply.

Dante tensed and looked up, surprised to see him and cautious of his harsh tone. Gabriel made an effort to lower his voice. “Could you come over here, please? It seems we have a bit of a problem.” He wasn’t entirely sure what he expected Dante to do about it, but if he was right about the young man, then having to face another omega would be far less threatening than having to deal with an alpha. If he actually was a runaway, he was likely terrified of alphas, and with good reason.

Dante came over, walking slowly, looking around for any sign of something amiss. Still working on slowing his racing heart, Gabriel pointed in between the crates, and then stepped aside. “In there…”

Dante peered between the stacks… and then his body went rigid as he spotted the same thing Gabriel had. “Good lord…”

???

As Connor stared out at the tall, muscular alpha staring back at him, he felt his entire body tremble. He was deeply regretting his decision to escape the rain for a few hours. He should have kept running, pouring rain or not. He should have known better than to venture onto a farm, but it had still been dark when he’d spotted the buildings in the early hours of the morning, and after four days on the run, the temptation of a sheltered place to wait out the storm had been too much to resist. And then he’d come inside and found the crates of apples. He was averse to stealing things, not because he had any moral objection to theft, but because there was the potential that anything he touched might leave a trail, which would only make it easier for his masters to find him. And getting as far away as possible from the hellish estate where he lived was his only priority.

Except that his stomach was knotting in pain from not having eaten in days, and the apples had smelled ripe and sweet…

But then he’d stumbled in the dark, cutting himself on that blasted nail. He’d scampered back here to see to the wound. He’d only been meaning to stay a few minutes, just until the bleeding stopped… but then he’d heard footsteps and a voice talking to the horses, and his careful plan had crumbled to dust all around him. The best he could hope to do was hide here until nightfall, then sneak away…

But even that desperate plan was now ruined. The alpha had found him. Terror seized him, and he longed to run away, to shove his way out of the stable and disappear off across the fields. But his body was frozen in terror, a thousand different ideas in his head of all the terrible things that could be done to him.

Connor’s fear only increased as a second man appeared at the end of the stack of crates – also an alpha, from the look of him. “Good lord,” the man muttered. But despite being both taller and more muscular than the first man, this second one was less terrifying. His expression displayed surprise and concern, where as the first man had an intensity about him, a coldness in his eyes that marked him as dangerous. He was lean and tanned, with dark hair cut close to his scalp and rough stubble covering his jaw. And he’d looked at Connor like he wanted to kill something.

The second man had two scars on his face, but his eyes were kinder, and there was a slight hesitancy about the way he moved. He crouched down, a deliberately calm expression on his face. “Hey,” he said, his voice soft and gentle. “It’s okay. No one’s going to hurt you.” Connor wasn’t falling for it. Alphas weren’t kind. They didn’t want to help him. They just wanted to get him to come out so they could rape him, or beat him, or send him back to his master.

He gripped the short knife in his hand. He’d stolen it from the kitchen on his master’s estate before he’d run away. There was little chance he could win a fight with an alpha, but perhaps if he threatened this man, he’d be forced to fight, and then the alpha would kill him. Better to be dead than to be sent back home. He lunged forward, not actually meaning to stab the man, but just to provoke him into fighting. Then Connor would happily lie on the floor while he was beaten to death, relieved to have finally found an escape from his miserable life.

But the first man shoved the second one aside, with a sharp cry of, “Dante, look out!” He knocked the knife out of Connor’s hand, sending it skittering across the cobbled floor. Connor darted back between the crates, his instincts still keen on keeping him alive, even if his mind wished to die. But neither man tried to come after him.

“Sorry,” the first man said, helping the second one up. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” the second man said. His name was Dante, then? “Thank you.” He turned his gaze back to Connor. “Maybe you should go and get Antoine,” he said to the other man. “He’ll want to know about this.”

“I’m not keen on leaving you alone with him,” the first man said. “He might have some other weapon on him.”

The three of them watched each other for a long moment, all of them having trouble deciding what to do next. Then the sound of the stable door being opened broke the silence.

“Gabriel, there you are,” a new voice said loudly. “Antoine was wondering where you’d got to. We couldn’t find you to call you down for breakfast.” The man paused, then continued. “What’s going on?” Connor couldn’t see him yet, but he was definitely a male. Another alpha? Or a beta, maybe? Not everyone on this estate could be alphas, after all.

“Could you do me a favour and go and get Antoine,” the man named Gabriel said. “There’s an omega hiding behind the crates. Probably a runaway.”

“There’s a what? Good heavens.”

An elderly man came hurrying down the aisle, joining the first two as they peered at him. This third man was almost certainly a beta. He was shorter than either of the first two, with grey hair, a weathered face and a wiry build. His eyes widened as he caught sight of Connor. Yep, just a regular circus sideshow here, Connor thought bitterly. “Where on earth did you come from?” the newcomer asked, though it was clear he didn’t expect an answer.

“Cirroc?” Gabriel prompted him. “Could you get Antoine, please?”

Who was this Antoine everyone kept referring to? The master of the estate? It was likely, if he was the one who was going to decide what to do with Connor.

“At once,” Cirroc replied, then hurried away, leaving the other two still staring at him.