Page 59 of Unbonded (Pack’s Companion #3)

Heat rolls through me, a prickling rash that slices across my raw nerve endings like a blunt scythe.

It’s the third wave I’ve had to suffer through since they brought me up to the auction floor, and the thin gown they dressed me in is plastered to my overheated body.

I brace against the agonizing rush of hot needles through my limbs, trying to fight the urge to writhe through the pain.

My hands are still cuffed, and they rattle on my wrists as I dig my nails into the wooden floorboards.

I don’t want to give the assholes the satisfaction of seeing me react to their pheromones, but I’m fighting a losing battle.

The drug had already kicked in when one of Brennan’s minions dragged me into this room.

The first wave of my forced heat was already surging through my body, but my heart still sank as I took in my surroundings.

Little effort has been made to pretend this is anything but a meat market, with clusters of mismatched chairs gathered around a small stage.

It’s painted a garish red, like it was plucked from a low-rent strip club, and a harsh spotlight is rigged to the roof.

The rest of the room is lined with shelving units for storage and boxes of stolen goods with their big brand stickers still on the side.

No back door that I can see, but large windows taped over with black plastic.

It could be any dusty, grimy warehouse in the city, only this one attracts the kind of alphas who buy and sell omega flesh.

There are six groups of buyers, although I don’t think they’re all here to bid.

A lot of them are muscle, watching the other alphas more than the omegas.

They have bulges under their sports jackets, while their bosses lounge on the worn furniture with matching bulges in their pants.

Lust and paranoia hover over them like an oily mist. I try not to let it touch me, but every omega in the room is infected by their pheromones, and I’m the worst of all.

As I rattle and sweat my way through the third wave, I can taste blood in my mouth from where I’ve chewed my lip.

Anything to hold in the moans that draw the alphas like moths to a flame.

At first, I snarled at them when they came close, but then I discovered it was more effective just to give into my nausea and puke on them.

I catch the eye of the muscle who had to wipe my vomit off his boss’ shoes.

There’s so much violence in his black gaze, I feel it like a hand squeezing my throat.

But instead of making me cower in the corner like the other omegas, it sends a prickle of rage across my skin, and I bare my teeth in a bloody smile.

If he wants to hurt me, he has to come closer, and he will only be able to do that if his boss wins the bid.

Hopefully puking on him put him off buying me, but even if it hasn’t, I won’t go down without a fight.

Something the alpha next to him worked out the hard way.

Before the puking incident, the asshole tried to grab my breast, and I stabbed him in the wrist with the hair pin I had hidden between my cuffed wrists.

Not enough to do real damage, but he’d backed off with a string of curses, and I can still see the blot of blood staining his white shirt cuff.

His own custom-made Valentine design…

I just wish the thin fabric of the gown they put me in didn’t feel like molten wax against my skin.

Every brush of the cheap lace against my nipples sends a bolt of arousal straight between my thighs.

The urge to tear it off is almost overpowering, but I won’t help this process along in any way.

To resist temptation, I roll until my hands are trapped between me and the floor.

The cuffs bite into my ribs, but better that small pinch of pain than a pair of alpha fangs in my throat.

Not that any of these men plan to bond me. Their murmured conversations have been the ugly backdrop to my tormented heat, and I’ve mostly heard them talk about quotas, return on investment, and resale value. Just another business transaction in an omega trafficking ring.

But there are a couple who enjoy circling the omegas, whispering all the horrific things they plan to do to them when they win them in the auction.

They tried the same shit with me, but it was easy to block them out.

All I had to do was cocoon myself in my pack, rearranging their names in my head like my favorite song lyrics.

Lachlan. Dash. Corbus. Bram.

Dash. Lachlan. Bram. Corbus.

Corbus. Bram. Lachlan. Dash.

Bram. Corbus. Dash. Lachlan.

My pack.

My mates.

They’re coming for me, and when they do, I hope Bram shows them that I’m a really bad fucking investment.

Fighting words, but when a groan spills past my bruised lips, I pant my pain into the floorboards.

It’s not the pretty breathless cries of the other omegas, and I hear one of the alphas click his fingers to summon King.

My stalker has been lurking in the shadows like a vulture, and I wonder if it’s dawned on him yet that Brennan doesn’t just plan to sell my heat – he plans to sell me .

Which is going to make it hard for King to claim his battered prize, especially when I’m whisked off to a secondary location.

The guy mutters to King, jabbing an accusing finger in my direction. I’m supposed to go last – the star attraction – but the longer I stab, curse, and puke on the customers, the less convinced they are that I’ll be worth the wait.

“She looks fucking feral,” he gripes. “Who the fuck is gonna want to stick their knot in that?”

“I only have one heat left in me, and this is it!” I hiss, rolling onto my side to glare at the alpha. “One last knot to ride, and if you try to stick it in me, I’ll snap it off with my feral cunt!”

“Jesus Christ,” the alpha mutters, his nose wrinkling and the bulge in his plants deflating. “She smells like a hospital and talks like a fucking sewer.”

Even King looks at me like I’m losing my shine, but my snarl slips as another spike rakes across my flesh. My heat is coming on so fast, I know I only have a few minutes before I’m lost to the haze.

Hold it together, Omega! If this is your last night of freedom, you’re going to make them pay before they stuff you in a cage.

But one alpha doesn’t look too disturbed by my threats. He’s prettier than all of the others, with sandy-blond hair and bright green eyes. Still a smirking asshole, but his gaze doesn’t wander as he crouches at my side, his voice pitched low. “Hold on a little longer, spitfire. Help’s coming.”

I glare up at him, wanting to believe him but knowing it’s a trick. “Don’t try to soften me up. I still bite!”

“Good. These shitheads need a taste of their own medicine.” I have to admit, there’s something musical about his words, and I hold back my next snarl. “My name’s Declan, by the way, and my omega is Grace’s BFF.”

Grace? I blink through the chaos in my head, trying to make sense of the connection. Grace is here?

“No, darlin’,” he replies, like I asked the question aloud. “But you’ll see her very soon. Just get ready to protect yourself when I give the signal.”

I groan and pant into the floor. It’s too much, too hot, too goddamn hard to think through the fog in my brain.

“Stay with me, darlin’.”

I shake my head, because as musical as he sounds, I don’t want him calling me that. The only ones I want to hear it from are… I grit my teeth through another agonizing cramp, tears squeezing from my eyes as I try to focus on his face. “What signal?”

He makes a soft, humming sound. “What's your favorite song?”

I cast a glare at the stage. Brennan is giving his oily smile, his hand gripping the hair of the omega crouched at his feet.

She looks pitifully young in her thin gown, and the circle of alphas are almost salivating as they haggle over her like a prize cow.

“ Murder on the Dancefloor springs to mind,” I mutter.

The alpha follows my gaze and gives a low chuckle.

“You got it, spitfire.” He pats my arm in farewell, and I snap my teeth at his retreating back, before clenching them around a ragged whine.

Damn, but he smelled good. Musky, but not like the old meat of the other alphas, and I try to grind my knees together as slick trickles into my panties.

“No. Knots. Needed.” I roll away from the alphas and chant Dash’s motto into the floorboards, but I know I’m losing the battle.

Pain is chewing through me with hungry teeth, and the only way my body can escape it is by sinking into my heat.

If I was in our nest, there’d be the distraction of kisses and sweet touches, the soothing balm of our bodies finding pleasure together.

But here, so far from my pack, the only respite I get is the friction I can rub from this cold, dirty floor.

And then I hear it. A soulful tenor that rises over the whimpers and haggling. In just a few chords, he’s turned the dancefloor classic into something deeper, more compelling. A threat, but without the happy disco vibes of the original.

Gonna burn this goddamn house right down.

The other alphas are glaring at him, some muttering to shut the fuck up so they can hear the bidding. But the songman – Declan – just tucks his hands behind his head and belts out the next verse. If you think you're getting away, I will prove you wrong.

Someone kicks at his chair, but in the next beat he moves smoothly from lyrics to a sharp, piercing whistle, and all hell breaks loose.