Page 16 of The Sterling Acquisition (Manufactured Mates #1)

Chapter ten

Strategic Adjustments

Dante

Orion had run. And stole his spare blanket.

Well. That was to be expected.

The smart, tactical choice would have been to follow, to press his advantage while Orion was still reeling from what happened between them. Instead, he allowed him to leave, though he’d be lying to himself if he hadn’t hoped Orion would join him in the shower.

Or maybe you knew he needed to process. Maybe you knew he needed to go back to his cage and spend the night thinking about what competent hands feel like.

Either way, the result was the same. Orion was back under Leo’s supervision, lying awake on that narrow mattress and reliving every moment of being pinned against the wall. Probably fighting the urge to touch himself while remembering the promises Dante whispered in his ear.

Good. Let him think about it. Let him remember the difference between Leo’s fumbling brutality and someone who knows what they’re doing.

Dante moved through his morning routine with mechanical precision, though his reflection in the bathroom mirror showed evidence of their encounter.

The bite mark on his arm was an angry red crescent, the imprint of Orion’s teeth still visible against his pale skin.

He traced the edges with his fingertips, feeling the slight swelling and smiling to himself.

Most Omegas would have gone limp with gratitude after an orgasm like that. This one wanted to leave evidence of resistance even in surrender.

It was a perfect response. He’d given Dante what he wanted and then immediately reminded him that it didn’t make him owned. Yet .

The SVI phone Leo gave him for “emergency corporate exchange communications” buzzed against the nightstand—three short pulses that meant Leo was having another crisis and needed his Gensyn expertise to solve it.

Dante almost ignored it on principle, but maintaining his cover required a certain level of availability.

And finding out what new disaster Leo had created for himself might be entertaining.

The message was typically Leo—rambling, panicked, heavy on corporate buzzwords:

Leo James

Need urgent consultation at facility. Dr. Morrison is accelerating timeline on vaccine oversight. Situation becoming critical. Your expertise invaluable. Please advise soonest .

Situation becoming critical. How wonderfully vague. Critical for whom?

But the timeline acceleration was concerning. Dante had been counting on weeks to extract both the technology and Orion. If Morrison was rushing the Project Tether trials, that window was collapsing rapidly.

Which means decisions need to be made. Soon .

Dante mentally mapped out his options, weighing risks against benefits with the precision that made him Gensyn’s top corporate espionage specialist. Duckie Chang could provide access to sublevel three, but Dante would need to move before fully understanding the security systems. Extracting the technology alone would be challenging enough; adding Orion to the equation multiplied the complexities exponentially.

An Omega in pre-heat could normally be hidden with suppressants, but even now Dante could still smell him through the thin walls.

Apparently, an orgasm and suppressants couldn’t tamp down the chaotic pheromones of a 26-year-old unclaimed virgin.

Then again, he highly doubted any commercial suppressant had been formulated with someone like Orion in mind.

Their escape route would need to avoid all biological scanning checkpoints. Transportation would require isolation chambers or experimental suppressants. And that assumed Orion would cooperate rather than fight every step of the way.

Logically, the mission should take priority. Extract the technology, destroy SVI’s research, and return to Gensyn with the prize they sent him to acquire.

But logic was becoming increasingly irrelevant where Orion was concerned .

He composed a reply that struck the right balance of professional concern and corporate cooperation:

Available for consultation this afternoon. Will require detailed briefing on timeline changes and resource allocation adjustments.

“Resource allocation adjustments.” Leo could interpret that as him needing to spend more time at the facility. What it actually meant was that Dante could find himself with more time alone with Orion, so he could convince the most interesting person he had ever met to come with him when he left.

Keep telling yourself this is about intellectual fascination instead of the fact that you want to own something that magnificent.

The truth was becoming harder to ignore.

Yes, Orion was valuable for intelligence purposes—he knew SVI’s internal operations, understood the territory layout, and could probably even provide insights into corporate security protocols.

But those were justifications for a decision Dante had already made on a much more primitive level.

He wanted Orion. Not just sexually, though last night confirmed that particular compatibility in spectacular fashion. But there was something about that brilliant, defiant mind that made the idea of leaving him behind unpalatable.

He’s not part of the mission. He’s a complication you can’t afford.

Except that wasn’t true anymore. Because if Morrison was accelerating the timeline on Project Tether, then Orion was about to become either a perfect intelligence asset or a chemically compliant shell of his former self.

And shells don’t bite back when you pin them against walls.

The facility was buzzing with the kind of controlled panic that came from compressed deadlines and executive pressure. Staff moved with purpose rather than their usual corporate shuffle, and Dante noted the increased security presence with professional interest.

Perfect environment for intelligence gathering. Nothing made people sloppy about information security quite like deadline stress.

Leo was waiting in the lobby, his usual desperate optimism had been replaced by something closer to barely contained hysteria.

“Dante, thank God you’re here. We’ve got efficiency problems with the vaccine production scaling, and Morrison’s breathing down my neck about resource allocation.

” Leo’s voice carried the particular strain of someone whose career was hanging by a thread.

“Plus there’s this whole situation with my.

.. domestic arrangements... that’s affecting my productivity. ”

Domestic arrangements. What a delicate way to describe having an Omega who treats his Alpha like a particularly annoying pest.

“That’s unfortunate timing,” Dante observed, letting appropriate concern color his voice. “Are the production issues technical or logistical?”

“Both. The scaling protocols aren’t working the way they’re supposed to, and there’s talk about transferring the whole program to a different department if we can’t show results.” Leo gestured toward the elevator with nervous energy.

As they entered the elevator, Leo’s demeanor shifted subtly. For a moment, the desperate middle manager disappeared. Leo pulled up molecular diagrams with unexpected precision, fingers moving through complex biochemical structures with genuine expertise.

“We’ve improved stability by 47%, but production yield drops exponentially at scale,” he explained, highlighting problem areas with sophisticated analysis that suggested his professional reputation wasn’t undeserved.

Legitimate talent buried beneath layers of personal incompetence.

The elevator made concerning grinding noises as it climbed, and Dante noticed Leo didn’t even flinch at the mechanical distress. Just another day in SVI territory, where equipment failures were treated as background noise rather than problems requiring solutions.

Much like Leo’s approach to everything else, really. Accept the dysfunction and hope it doesn’t get worse.

“Tell me about these resource allocation concerns,” Dante said as they emerged onto the research level.

“Corporate politics. There’s been some interest from other departments about whether our vaccine development is producing measurable results.

” Leo made air quotes around the corporate speak.

“Morrison’s convinced that if we don’t show concrete progress soon, the whole program gets transferred elsewhere. ”

The research level was a maze of laboratories and production areas that managed to be both functional and somehow chaotic. Security cameras were positioned at irregular intervals, with obvious blind spots near emergency exits.

Most concerning from a security perspective: the complete absence of scent-monitoring systems that would be standard in any Gensyn facility.

Here, anyone with a strong enough suppressant could potentially mask their designation, moving through restricted areas without triggering biological authentication protocols .

All useful intelligence about SVI’s operations, though nothing relevant to Project Tether. But every piece of information about their security vulnerabilities was potentially valuable.

“The main production lab is through here,” Leo said, leading him past a series of rooms with standard laboratory setups. “This is where we’re trying to scale the vaccine manufacturing processes you helped us optimize.”

Dante peered through the windows at the equipment and saw several inefficiencies that would make any Gensyn supervisor cringe. The workflow was disorganized, the quality control seemed minimal, and the staff looked like they were making things up as they went along.

No wonder they’re having scaling problems. This looks like a university lab project, not a corporate manufacturing operation.

“I can see some obvious bottlenecks,” he said diplomatically. “Very solvable with proper process optimization.”

“Really? That’s what I was hoping you’d say.” Leo’s relief was palpable. “Morrison’s been pressuring me to show concrete improvements, and if the vaccine program fails, it reflects badly on my overall performance evaluation.”