“Change of plan,” I replied tersely, staring at the freaked-out barman. “Meet me at the zone gate, ASAP.”

“Okay… Is everything all right? Sloane, did he…?”

“I’m fine, just ready to go home. Sex is great and all, but does it really compare to a single origin bean caramel latte from Alphonsino’s?”

It felt like I was putting old Sloane on like a mask, plastering beta competency and decisiveness over…what? What exactly was an omega? A quick kaleidoscope of moaning, whining, biting, slick splattering, knotting sex, hit me like a gut punch, but I just took a long breath in and charged on.

“OMG, Sloane! At least let me keep my illusions. This alpha I met last night, Ryder… Damn!”

“Tell me all about it when you get here, Em,” I replied, much more softly.

“Of course. Five minutes, Okay?”

I ended the call, the phone, the bag, the bar, all of it feeling weird, alien, and ill-fitting, but that would pass, I was sure of it. Hormones had rugby-tackled me for a night, made me say and do things I never would have and never would again. I just needed to get home.

“A fifty if you get me out of the zone gate in one piece within five minutes,” I offered, holding up the crisp note. The barman snatched it out of my hand, but not before he looked up and down the bar.

“Through here,” he said. “We’ll have to go down the alleyway. If any of the alphas catch scent of you… Here, spray yourself with this.”

He handed me a bottle of what looked like Febreze and smelled kinda the same—synthetic and flowery. I doused myself liberally before handing it back to the barman.

“Nah, you keep it, love. That’s the good stuff, and it’s hard to come by outside the zone.”

I shoved it into my bag. He nodded, then took me out the back, through the storeroom, and out into a stinking alley beyond. He clasped my hand, the size and strength stirring something inside me, but I pushed that brutally down. Not here, not yet.

No, not ever again.

Then he hauled me up the alleyway, fishing out a set of keys and holding them at the ready as he approached the fence.

It all felt ridiculously cloak-and-dagger. There was no one around, no one to even watch us pass, let alone wish us harm, but the barman acted like he was some kind of secret agent man, slinking low, eyes everywhere. I was prepared to go along with it, until finally, we reached the gate.

“Oi!”

A harsh voice had me jumping in my heels. A mass of huge men off a way had spotted us and were approaching at speed, the barman swearing under his breath as he worked the lock open, yanking the chain out from where it was wrapped around the gate.

“Go!” the barman said, shoving me through the gap, following hot on my heels, wrapping the chain around the gate twice as the men surged up, slamming into the fence.

Alphas.

This, this was the kind of men I’d seen doing the perp walk to the dock on TV, a poster boy for keeping the zone separate. Meaty fingers pushed through the links of the fence, others grabbing the gate and wrenching it, but the barman clicked the lock shut before stepping back, hands in the air.

“Omega…”

He pushed his way through the mass of men, a picture of deadly elegance, even for his size, the overdone musculature of an alpha somehow looking right for him. He was powerful, lethal even, as he stared at me with pale blue eyes, cold as ice, sweeping a fall of white blond hair out of his face.

“Open the gate, omega,” he said, his voice a perfect purr, rubbing itself allll over me, making my bones and my will soften. “Walk forward and take the keys from the quivering little beta prick and open the gate.”

“Yeah, lure her in, Snake,” a meaty-looking alpha said beside him, fairly slavering at the idea, and for a second, I was treated to a glare of pure unadulterated menace in Snake’s eyes.

“Back the fuck up, Snake,” the beta snarled, which jerked my eyes sideways. The average barman façade seemed to have been slipped off as he produced a gun, holding it upright while he viewed the men at the fence. “I can have Alpha Control down here in seconds.”

“She belongs here,” Snake shot back, then looked at me, dragging his breath theatrically through his nose. “She belongs to us.”

The alphas all started carrying on at that, posturing and shouting abuse as the barman whipped out his phone, making a call.

“You better get out of here and lie low if you don’t want to be under one of these pricks before the sun sets,” he told me as he waited for the call to go through, frowning when I just stood there. “Go!”

The cheery toot of my car horn jerked me out of whatever spell I was under, tensing my muscles, sending me scurrying away, just as the beta said to.

“C’mon, girlfriend!” Jude shouted from the passenger seat window. “Time to do the walk of shame. Work it! You know you want to. Girl, I taught you how to walk way better than that, I know I did.”

I didn’t strut my way back to the car. I walked the swift robotic steps a mouse did under the heavy gaze of an apex predator, not able to fully breathe until I was back in the car, the wheels screeching as we took off.

“So, how was it?” Em asked, clinging to the side of her seat with wide-eyed glee.

“I…”

I had nothing, no words, not a titbit to give her, and as I saw her face fall, I knew she’d chalk it up to me being a stuffy old stick again. God, if only that were true.

Jace

I’d hung on to my temper for Sloane’s sake, but as soon as the door clicked shut on the three of us, I unleashed hell.

“What the fuck was that about? You guys know better than to act like dicks with a new omega.”

Ryder moved toward a seat at the long table, behind which the wide window offered views across the zone. It wasn’t pretty like the fancy beta cities. Here, the buildings were mainly weathered and worn. There were pockets that looked fine, like the main strip. Had to be to get the betas in, but the rest? They were half derelict. Contractors weren’t exactly lining up to enter the zone. Inked was one of the few places that were on the upmarket side.

Ryder lifted both hands in a snarky version of surrender before he slumped down into a seat and leaned back in the chair, eyeballing Dane and me like he was getting ready for a fucking show.

“I was only looking,” Ryder said casually. “Too soft and sweet for me. You know I like a bit of fire.”

“She’s new to her dynamic, arsehole,” I said.

“Well, I want it on the record that not marking her is a bullshit thing to do. Mark the fucking woman,” Dane said. “Or let one of us do it.”

“No!”

“The fuck is wrong with you?” Dane snarled. Unlike Ryder, he made no pretence of being relaxed and stood, feet planted wide as he stared me down. “You’re going to start a fucking riot, and we don’t need this shit coming down on us. You know what Snake is like—one whiff of an unmarked omega, and he’s going to be all over us like a fucking rash. She’ll be a virtual prisoner. Fucking mark her already. We both know it’s what you want.”

Ryder chuckled softly. Yeah, he wasn’t getting involved.

“I can’t fucking mark her, arsehole.”

“You and your fucking bullshit. Have you ever asked Ella if this is what she wants for you? Living like a fucking monk?” Dane asked. Stalking across to the table, he dragged out a chair and slammed his arse down.

As I raked a hand through my hair, my eyes went to the door, and I wondered what the fuck was going on out there. Ma was with her and she would take care of Sloane, but knowing that didn’t stop me from tensing, my beast demanding that I open the damn door and go check that she was all right. All of this was superfluous to him, the stuff that got in the way of what was important.

Mark, breed, claim.

“It’s five fucking minutes,” Ryder said, reading my mind all too easily. “Ma is with her, so chill, for fuck’s sake. We need to know what the plan is if you’re not going to mark her…which I agree with Dane on, by the way.”