“Is that… a problem?” I asked.
“No…” Her lip wobbled as her arms locked around my waist, drawing me closer, which caused her neck to angle further backwards so she could keep gawking at me. “Oh… my… I have an…omegascent match?” she asked. I watched as she mouthed the wordomegaagain, as if she couldn’t process it, which was the cutest thing I’d ever seen.
“Oh…” She glanced at Karma, then back at me, her cheeks burning red. “I didn’t…” She looked panicked, and it took me a second to work out why—until I clocked that she was naked, beneath the blankets with… well, withmyalpha.
“I’m sure Karma is grateful for cuddles,” I said. “He doesn’t get them from me.”
Okay. Nottotallytrue. Sometimes he sleepwalked, and I’d wake crushed in his arms and far too hot.
Still, I was a shit omega, though explaining that was complicated. The heat drugs we’d just pulled from the drawer—the last ones we had—were there because I skipped every heat, as unhealthy as it was for my body.
My pack meant everything to me, but I wasn’t with them romantically—and it was more than I could ask that none of them made me feel like I owed them.
Banging other omegas in cages for favours? That was easy, I didn’t care about them. But Karma, Phantom, and Vandle were different.
“I’m not…” I trailed off, not sure how to explain it.
“Sin’s not with us,” Phantom supplied, like it was no big deal.
I shot him a grateful look.
“Oh.” Crescent nodded as if that made sense, though we all knew it didn’t.
I’d been forced down here to be treated like a possession, thrown from one owner to the next—until I’d met my pack.
I hadn’t healed from that. I didn’t know if I ever would, but I knew one thing for sure: I’d never find out while we were still down here.
It was hard not to think about how very naked she was under the blankets.
“Yup,” I said, trying to straighten out my thoughts. The fever pitch her scent had hit with the waves of heat was dying down, though not fast enough.
Through the bond I felt Phantom’s struggle to keep a hold of himself—and he was the most stable of us. He’d been tossed in here because he was feral, same as all the alphas, but his instability had an easy fix. We were lucky, and the pack bond fixed his Echo Rut Syndrome—which wasn’t always a guarantee, but with an omega it was a good bet.
But if he was struggling, it was no surprise Karma had gone and cracked. He’d had more time in here than the rest of us, but he’d started out as mad as Vandle. None of it was her fault, though I don’t think she realized that.
I’d taken a measure of Karma’s stability before I left, I just hadn’t accounted for a fucking scent match.
Poor bastard.
But he’d be fine by the morning.
His aura would settle down as the decadent velvet rose and cocoa scent calmed, its edge of heated desperation waning.
And Crescent seemed happy to stay curled up with him until he was better—though we should probably get her into some clothes sooner rather than later, or risk this happening all over again. She was still clutching the blankets to her chest.
“I got you some clothes.” I handed her the bag.
Phantom straightened where he sat, eyes suddenly wide as he looked at me.
Ah shit.
The deal with Dominic Redgrave.
The biting deal—that had to be off the table now. There was no way in hell I was taking her into a cage. She was way too fragile.
And a literal fucking virgin.
The problem was, that meant no bites. Not until I managed to undo the deal—which was a bit of a task, since it hadn’t really felt like a deal at all. More like Dominic was putting me into a headlock and telling me what was going to happen.