Page 12 of Your Wild Omega (The Feral Actress #2)

Chapter nine

Rickon

At the far end of the lounge room, Red clicks her fingers. “Come, Zack.” She steps forward, gently tugging the leash clipped to the collar around his neck. The alpha walks obediently beside her through the kitchen and right around the room.

I heave my ass up onto the countertop to watch them. In just two days, the big alpha has settled so much. Although he still monitors our resident OCB agents, he twitches less, and Red can move a few feet away without him freaking out.

Maybe he just needed his omega, like Red keeps saying.

“Good job!” she praises, feeding him a bit of vanilla cake. She catches my eye over Zack’s shoulder and holds up a tiny square of the dessert. “Still his favorite.”

I flush. When she gave Zack his choice of treats, he went straight to the vanilla cake, and then swung to me and checked my scent.

I didn’t think I smelled like vanilla, but Red says I absolutely do, and it appears Zack feels the same way.

He’ll eat anything Red or I offer him, but his eyes always light up at the sight of vanilla cake.

Red ruffles Zack’s hair and unclips the leash. “Your turn, Rickon.”

“Zack, come,” I call, beckoning with both hands.

He takes one step eagerly but then realizes Red’s not moving with him. Her cheeks hollow, and her body stills as she waits to see what he’ll do. We’ve played this game, but she walked with him before now.

Zack takes another few steps toward me, looking over his shoulder to check Red hasn’t moved away.

“Come on,” I encourage. “She isn’t going anywhere.”

Zack strides toward me, as if to get it over quickly, and stands beside my dangling legs, waiting for his treat. I keep my amusement inside as I offer him cake and stroke his arm. “Thank you, Zack. Well done.”

He opens his mouth expectantly, and I pop the piece on his tongue. A faint murmur showing his enjoyment hums in his throat as he chews. I play my fingers over his shoulder muscles as he stands almost between my knees, twisting slightly to keep one eye on Red.

With Josef and Pearce’s help, we’ve developed a schedule of formal reinforcement sessions with Zack on the leash, and informal learning experiences based around meals and showers. We take breaks in between, with Red and me reading as many rehabilitation articles as we can get our eyeballs on.

They all recommend stability, a safe home environment, consistency, and positive reinforcement.

Every day we practice walking Zack on a leash around the apartment and asking him to stay and come for fifteen minutes at a time. Today we started him on kids’ educational cartoons. All we can do is try.

My gaze drops to the box on the edge of the dining table. There’s a gag and proper restraining handcuffs inside. We haven’t discussed it yet, but I’m pretty sure those are Red’s backup plan.

Zack swallows and then braces his hands either side of me to lean in. His sweet grain scent fills my nose.

“Want me to stroke your hair?” I ask, threading both hands through his hair. The strands feel rough, like he’s never produced keratin to make it smooth. Probably his body was too occupied in survival mode for such luxuries.

Zack stares at me, eyes roving over my face, and I wish I could tell what he was thinking.

He’s processing, trying to understand everything.

Our newest pack mate always seems puzzled about me, and I assume it’s because I’m an unthreatening alpha.

His DNA draws him to Red instinctively, but I’m an anomaly in his world, held here because Red wants me.

If it wasn’t for her, I’m sure he’d kill me in a flash.

But even knowing the truth doesn’t really scare me. That’s just how powerful love is.

“What’s going on in here?” I whisper, rubbing my fingers more firmly into Zack’s scalp.

He shifts, checking Red is still in place, and then lifts one hand toward my hair. I tilt my head down so he can access my platinum locks. He seems fascinated by the color.

“It looks funny white, doesn’t it?” I’m overdue to the salon, so the dark roots show now. Maybe it looks the same as cake icing to him.

His thick fingers slide down the back of my neck, and he pinches.

Goosebumps race down my arms as I realize I’ve put myself in a submissive pose.

Well, it’s not as if I have a lot of choice.

Zack could fold me in half as easily as if I were paper.

I thought he called me “Mine” that first morning we woke up together, but maybe he was just talking about Red because he hasn’t done it again.

Still, he doesn’t growl at me like he did in the car park.

Instead of trying to free myself, I tilt to the side and kiss his inner arm, my lips brushing over an old scar.

Zack snatches his arm back, eyes widening.

“I hope we’re doing the right thing,” Red muses, coming up behind Zack and wrapping her arms around his waist.

“If not, we can ask his forgiveness once he’s educated.” I slide down from the counter and take the leash from her hands. “I know it’s only been two days, but I think we need to step up the obstacles.” With only six days left until Red’s due on set, we need Zack to be comfortable in a crowd fast.

She nods in agreement. “How?”

“I was thinking the lobby.” I dig into the box and pull the handcuffs out. “Should we try these, just in case?”

She purses her lips but then nods slowly. I know she doesn’t want to restrain him, but the risk of Zack hurting someone and getting taken away is too great to ignore. Red takes the handcuffs and says, “Let’s do it inside a hoodie pocket so no one can see.”

My heart swells with love. Even in these extreme circumstances, she wants to protect her alpha’s dignity.

While she secures Zack’s hands, I tell the OCB agents the plan.

Both decide to come along, even though only Agent Pierce is on duty.

Josef scouts the lobby while Pierce asks me about the environment on set.

It’s a relief to see them taking the role seriously and anticipating problems ahead of time.

Makes me feel more confident in what we’re doing.

“Okay, Zack, we’re going out,” Red declares, holding up the leash. “You gotta have this on to come with us.”

Zack stoops a little so she can reach, allowing Red to snap on the leash clip. His eyes widen expectantly, waiting for instructions.

Pierce clears his throat. “I suggest we get a different attachment for that before we leave the apartment building. The way it is now, he could easily reach up and release the clip.”

Red takes another look at the mechanism and sighs. “Yeah, you’re right. Add it to the list, Rickon.”

I nod and type up a note in my phone.

Nerves trickle through me as Pierce opens the front door and Red leads her feral alpha out into the foyer. She halts in front of the elevator and looks over her shoulder at me, and the pleading in her eyes tells me just how nervous she feels.

“How about we take the stairs this time, for exercise?” I suggest, shutting the door as quietly as I can.

Zack tenses at the faint click, but he’s far more relaxed than the day we brought him home.

Red nods and steps out, heading for the fire stairs, more confident now she has direction. I wonder if she’s thinking of a movie. “Just like in Second Chance in the Romdine ,” I offer.

Red snorts. “Much better than what I was thinking of,” she mutters.

“Which was?”

“ Aliens vs. Alphas .”

I cringe and look down instinctively, imagining tentacled aliens swarming up from the shadowed well. The zigzagging staircase kinda mirrors the movie set. “Shit, that gives me the creeps just thinking about it.” I shiver dramatically to shake off the chills.

“Guys, you’re going to give me nightmares,” Agent Pierce says with a laugh.

Red chuckles. “Lucky we have the fiercest alpha of them all right here. They wouldn’t want to mess with Zack.”

Agent Pierce gasps. “And here I thought you were referring to me,” he says, tone full of mock outrage.

Red and I both laugh. “Would you believe me if I said I was there for the filming?” I ask, following her down the steps.

She smiles, her profile backlit by golden lighting. “I’ll believe anything you tell me, Rickon.”

Hot damn, Cupid just keeps hitting me right in the heart. Can you die from loving someone too much? I blow her a kiss. “It’s true. They had these super weird stand-in rubber aliens that ran on noisy tracks. And half the dialogue had to be dubbed in after.”

Pierce, leading the way down the stairs, pauses to look back at me, brows lifted. “Truly?”

I lift one hand in pledge and grin. “It was Lyra Gray’s first major appearance, and I was her acting manager.”

The agent whistles quietly. “And that was the film that made her big.”

“Yeah.” My voice catches. I’m happy where I am now, but it stings a little, the way she threw me aside like I was nothing. Even if I’m used to people abandoning me, it still hurts.

I said the exercise would be good for us, but sixteen flights of stairs might be overdoing things. Red and I both wheeze by the bottom, and Zack and Agent Pierce puff. Maybe this will be a good way to tire our wildling alpha out somewhat.

We wait at the foot of the stairs until we’ve all caught our breath before stepping out into the foyer. Red tightens her grip on the leash as we enter the open, tiled space. The receptionist watches us curiously, likely already briefed by Agent Josef.

Red leads Zack over to the ground-floor windows facing the street. Cars whizz by under a cloudy blue sky and pedestrians throng the sidewalk, everyone going about their busy lives.

“Look, Zack,” she murmurs, pointing. “One day soon we’ll go out there together.” She reaches up and strokes his neck beside the collar. “That’s why you have to get used to this. I want to take you everywhere with me.”

The alpha vibrates, trying to watch everything at once. The elevator dings behind us, and Zack whirls as the doors slide open.

“Zack, stay,” Red orders firmly, putting a little tension on the leash.

Both agents tense and I hold my breath as a resident walks out, calls a greeting to the receptionist, and then heads into the basement garage elevator. My shoulders droop as the doors slide shut behind her back.

Zack passed the first test.

“Good job,” Red praises, beaming as she offers him a piece of cake out of a small plastic container in her pocket. She walks him a few more times around the room and repeats the process when a cleaner comes through with his loaded trolley. Zack growls but shushes when Red warns him.

The cleaner swings around to locate the growl. His head swivels as he follows the leash trailing from Zack’s neck to Red’s hand, and his eyebrows arch. “Shouldn’t you keep that kind of thing in the bedroom?” he asks, muttering under his breath about shameless young people.

“Is that any of your business?” Red asks stiffly.

“Right, what would I know about public decency?” He throws his hands up, heaves on his trolley, and trundles down the ground-floor hallway. The receptionist jostles nervously, seeming unsure if he should step in or not.

Well, he’s better off thinking it’s some kind of kink than knowing the truth.

But it reminds me that Red might get a reputation for being into kink.

I’d better draft some press releases. And brief Mr Yun in advance.

Or not. It’s easier to get forgiveness than permission, after all.

So long as we can say Zack’s under control.

Today, he appears to be, but that’s only because no one’s done anything that seems like a threat to him. We can’t pinpoint exactly what the kennel bosses conditioned him to react to. I sigh and scrub at my face. We still have a long way to go.

My phone vibrates in my pocket, and I answer it without shifting my gaze away from Red and Zack. “Hello?”

A familiar cultured female voice responds. “You’re a hard man to get a hold of, Rickon Jones. Some might even think you’re ghosting me.”

My heart sinks. “Hello, Hannah.” She’s right. I have been avoiding her. I swallow hard, wrapping one arm across my body. This woman sold me a summer preview gown on the condition Lyra wore it to the gala—but Lyra wore a different dress.

I gather my spiraling thoughts. “I’m very sorry, Hannah. It’s not that I’ve been avoiding you; I just had an omega situation.”

Red meets my gaze across the room, frowning as she watches me. I turn my shoulder away and cup one hand around my mouth over the receiver. She doesn’t need to know about this problem of mine—she has enough to deal with.

“Can I come in and see you to explain things?” I ask quietly.

Hannah scoffs in annoyance. “Thursday, eight am. Don’t be late, and you’d better have a good explanation, darling, or I’ll make sure you can never step foot in a couture showroom in this country again.”

It’s not an empty threat. If Hannah Sorentito blacklists me, I’m done for, and so are my clients. “I’ll be there,” I promise grimly, glancing back at my beautiful actress omega.

I’ll be there, but will Hannah accept my explanation? It’s not as if I have a good one.