Shepherd had hurt her in his fervor, in his need to see her mated while the bond reformed… to ensure that she could not escape it. There was a little blood between her legs, as she had been dry and aggressively resistant when he first thrust. Even her mouth was swollen from his unwelcome kisses; new bruises were forming around her wrists and between her thighs.
Shepherd relished each one of the stinging scratches marring his own flesh, his reminder that she was his again—each wound a trophy, and testament to what was between them.
His little one had put up a good fight, but Claire had quieted over the hours, though not calmed completely. The thread in her chest was frazzled; it pained her; so Shepherd held her tight and kept the heat of his palm where her nails tried to scratch through her skin. The tears had ended and instead, she was in a trance, fighting sleep, yet clearly exhausted.
The purr never ceased, and though she gave him her back, Shepherd stroked and soothed, allowing her little defiance. She needed nutrition and hydration, yet he withheld his immense dissatisfaction at the state of her body to allow her some respite after her struggle—to let her think she might rest on her terms for a moment.
Unwilling to leave her, he sent out an order for medical supplies, and covered Claire from sight. Holding her in a grip of iron, he allowed Jules to set what was required on the small table beside the bed. When the door was locked, he found her still refusing to look at him. It didn’t matter.
Shepherd had seen her reaction to food, was certain that she would hold nothing down as upset as she was, and took her arm. When the needle pierced a vein, she remained unresisting. Intravenous fluids were administered. While the IV emptied, he bathed her with soft towels, each wound treated and bandaged, the stitches grunted at, and her feet, a thing that made the beast openly angry, were wrapped in soft strips of cloth.
When the process was finished he gathered her again in his arms.
‘I will build you a new world, little one—a kingdom worthy of you and our son.’ He whispered his distorted ideals, raking his fingers through her tangles. On and on Shepherd elocuted, articulating all he would accomplish, how he would be a legend, how he would do this for her.
In Claire’s hazy understanding, Shepherd had never spoken so much and said so little.
On her belly, with her back to him, she found herself listening to the pipedreams of a madman until she could not stand it another instant. Rolling over, interrupting his game with her hair, she argued with that same passionate defiance, that same misplaced goodness that had yet to vanish no matter what had happened to the rest of her. ‘Do not use me as an excuse for the horrible things you do. I will have no part of it!’
He grinned, smiling darkly at her hoarse complaints. Hand molded to the shape of her belly, Shepherd patted where their child grew. ‘The very fact that I have you back proves the Gods side with me.’
Claire had cried herself dry, her chest was rotten mush. ‘You have me because I would rather save the lives of forty-three people than kill myself.’
‘Shhh.’ His hush was brushed over her chest. He kissed where their bond thrived. ‘Everything is mending and your sadness will fade in time.’
It was not mending, it was scarring.
There was a gleam in his eyes, confidence. ‘We will begin again.’
Lip curling, Claire laid out his sins. ‘You forced a pair-bond, drugged and impregnated me, fucked your crazy Alpha beloved in my nest…’ She did not finish. Instead her pain surged again and Claire found her eyes could indeed leak more tears. ‘I recognize, Shepherd, that I am only here to be your toy. I’m a slave, a kept thing. I sold myself for them.’
It was predictable, the storm of fury in his eyes. What was surprising was the small dash of regret. Where he had been rubbing her chest, his hand moved to a breast and began to roll and pinch the nipple until the soft pink darkened and the bud elongated under his fingers.
Of course he would fuck her again no matter how unappealing Claire found the idea. That was always his recourse for her mouth. That was his answer every time she was resistant or unhappy.
Lying still, too tired after hours of struggling to put up a fuss, she remained limp… ready to get it over with.
The other nipple received the same treatment; all the while Shepherd watched her with that calculating gaze. A thumb traced over her lips and dipped just a bit between them to play against the flat of her tongue. The growl was made, the aroma of her slick scented the air, and his free hand began to play with her pussy.
Shepherd pressed his chest to hers, growled low and deep once more, watching so very carefully.
She closed her eyes and chose to ignore him.
With his fingers coated in her slippery fluid, he began to speak. ‘In the Undercroft, I had my mother for so short a time, I hardly can remember her face. She died from the harsh use of many men.’ A slippery finger slid to her puckered anus and Claire started. Shepherd slowly added pressure against her rectum, her breath catching at the uncomfortable cramp of that place being stretched. Wide eyes showed her distress; Claire reached down to grip the wrist of the offending limb, her complaint lost around the thumb still teasing her tongue.
When she had stilled, realizing he was not moving, not penetrating further, Claire watched him with absolute attention.
‘As women never lasted long, prisoners took their pleasure from men in this way.’ The probing finger slipped past Claire’s clenched ring. ‘Or by using the mouth of another. The beasts in that hole would howl in the dark as they gratified their bodies on the small and weak. The sounds of screams, of tortured begging—even the moans of those who took pleasure in such things—that’s the lullaby that lulled me to sleep every single night.’
The sensation he was creating was unpleasant, the tip of his finger wriggling. Claire tried to squirm but his weight was on her, and Shepherd growled again until more slick dripped down to coat what penetrated her rectum.
She whimpered.
‘I was smaller than you are now the first time I was cornered. My back was to the wall, a man with sores on his face pulled out his member and reached for my throat. What he didn’t know, what nobody knew, was that my mother had whored herself for a knife. I shanked my attacker. During the struggle I earned the scar across my lips that you in your estrous called beautiful.’
Had she?
There was a purr, a short offer of soothing as he pressed his digit further up her ass, knowing the stretch was unwelcome, but using it to make sure she listened to every damn word he said.
‘I left his corpse strung outside my cell, his cock hanging from his mouth as warning to others. He was only the first, and I was surrounded by dark-hearted monsters. As I grew bigger, grew stronger, the small and feeble would come to me; offering their mouths or their bodies for protection from those same men who hounded them. I found them repugnant; weak, and beneath me. I killed several just to make my feelings on the topic clear.’
The thumb in Claire’s mouth stroked her tongue in little circles as he spoke. ‘One day, something from the light found me in the dark, a young woman with a knife of her own. It was already bloody.’
Svana.
‘She’d heard of me, had crawled into hell to seek me out. She gave me the means to rule and asked for nothing. Her visits were often, her affection splendid. Like me, her mother had been killed before her. Like me, her future had been stripped away.
‘Her mind, the things she knew, were beyond anything I had been taught. She offered to share such wisdom, brought me books, found worth in the monster whom inmates feared. The angel even brought me the file with my mother’s name on top.’ Shepherd nuzzled her cheek. ‘In that missing person’s dossier was a photograph. My Beta mother, before the Undercroft rotted her teeth, had been very beautiful, like you. I hated hearing her screams.’
Claire put her hand to his flank, she felt his pain break against her.
The Alpha continued. ‘I could not save her, and to this day could not tell you which one of the demons underground was my father.’
Claire did not want to let his history touch her, but it was so pathetic she could not help but feel pity.
‘I was not the only man trapped in that dark by corruption above. Like my mother, more than half of the men forced below were innocent enough, but inconvenient to the powers that be. I learned secrets from them, things you cannot imagine… if you only knew the infection creeping through the hearts of this city, little one, if you could read the stories scraped into the rocks below us.’
Why was he telling her this? She began to struggle, and flinched when his finger inside her surged deeper, stretching her until she stilled.
‘Open your eyes, little one.’ The growl was menacing, guttural. ‘You will look at me when I say this.’
She did not want to look at him, felt invaded by that single, oversized finger, and the way he still teased at her tongue with his thumb. Jerking from the penetration, she met his gaze.
‘These men, this rotten society—in your goodness, you fail to see the flaws. I could tell you things that would keep you awake at night. Everyone, man and woman, hanged outside the Citadel participated in, or knowingly ignored, atrocities. Like the imprisonment of my mother.
‘And yes, years ago Svana became my lover and I thought she was also, equivalently, my mate. I learned I was wrong. She is a driven woman, powerful, but you are the mate the Gods designed for me. Had you been dropped into the Undercroft, had I smelled you once, I would have killed every man who tried to touch you. I would have claimed you and dragged you to my cell, bent you over my cot, and fucked you where every convict might see through the bars… so that they all knew you belonged to me. Do you understand?’
There was no answer for such a barbaric statement.
Shepherd sniffed her, growled. With his finger still submerged in her ass, he worked his cock deep inside where she was wet and ready. She gave a little scream, muffled by his thumb as he began to rut. There was nothing tender, it was pure aggression, but it satisfied in a strange way. The overfull feeling, the way he left no place untouched as that uninvited digit squirmed around. She climaxed so quickly it was startling, felt his knot press against her quivering passage as he removed his finger from her rectum.
Claire screamed when her orgasm twisted into a tuneless vibration that wracked her bones.
When he shot his load against her womb, each spurt was matched with a roar. Head buried at her shoulder, lips at her neck, Shepherd pressed his chest to hers, to the place where they were tied. The cord sang, burned, ached, pleased, and consumed.
His thumb left her mouth, Shepherd pleased when he ground his knot inside her and his little one came again.
Crushed under him, his Omega moaned, lowered her lashes, and found sleep in the clinging arms of what may, had circumstances been different, been a good man.
‘What do you mean she’s not here?’ Corday demanded.
‘I mean, Enforcer Corday,’ Nona offered a tired sigh, ‘that she isn’t here. Claire slipped away days ago and has not returned.’
Behind narrowed eyes, Corday’s mind raced a mile a minute. The worry was making his stomach churn, and by the look in Nona’s eyes it was clear she was just as upset, only concealing it better.
As if trying to offer the young man an explanation, Nona said, ‘I think she simply decided to go home.’
‘To Shepherd?’ he snapped, anger written all over his face. ‘Claire would never do that.’
‘She had been low on spirits, Enforcer. What I am trying to tell you is that she most likely went home.’
‘You are wrong,’ Corday spat the words. He had spoken to Claire only three days prior. The Omega had given him her ring… she’d made a vow. ‘Did those women run her off?’
‘No, but they would have in a matter of days. She knew that.’
The agitated Beta looked at the old woman as if she was stupid. ‘So she went somewhere else for shelter.’
‘Perhaps,’ Nona admitted, debating if it would be best for the young man to have something to hold on to.
‘When did she leave, precisely?’
‘The morning of your last visit.’
Corday threw up his hands, growling at the ceiling. ‘Goddamn it, Claire!’
Nona took his shoulder again, squeezed his coat, and pulled him away from the gathering Omega crowd. ‘Sit!’ The Beta male obeyed out of decorum, Nona glaring. ‘Claire did not want me to tell you who I really am. But I am going to anyway, because you are a Beta and I know you care for her, but you do not understand.’
Nona made him be still, composing herself beside him. ‘When I was sixteen, I was abducted from my home, kept under lock and key for days until I was sold like cattle—bought by a man named David Aller, and forced into a pair-bond at my next estrous by a stranger twice my age.
‘Once bonded, he revealed me to the public again, and my family accepted what could not be changed, even though I begged them to help me. I had no advocate; I was just a bonded Omega with no rights. When I ran the first time, I made it less than two weeks before I began to lose touch with reality. I was found wandering, confused, through the streets. The Enforcer that picked me up took me back to David as if I were a stray pet.
He beat me; a common practice for correcting renegade Omegas. The beatings grew worse, and I ran again a few months later. It was always the same, that unwavering pair-bond to a man I hated persisted and controlled me. I tried everything, every hinted course, but it was the same nightmare. It was ten years before I poisoned him and acquired a new identity. I still dream of him, sometimes I think I hear him… and David has been dead almost forty years.’
Jaw loose, Corday looked at the gentle, old woman and knew she spoke the truth.
‘There is no way out of a pair-bond, no recourse for Claire. One of them has to die for her to be even marginally free. Killing Shepherd might have saved her, but her time was running out and she knew it. She just did not want to worry you… because she knew you had affection for her.’
‘Claire is stronger than you.’
Nona agreed. ‘That is absolutely true.’
‘She told me herself that the bond was damaged. Why do none of you listen when she speaks? Why do you all assume?’
‘Corday.’ Nona took the boy’s hand and spun the ring on his finger. ‘Claire is gone. She gave you her ring so you would not forget her, because she had affection for you, too.’
The man argued vehemently. ‘She swore to me that she would survive. I choose to believe she had a plan, we have all seen just what she is capable of. I have faith in Claire.’
‘I love Claire as if she were my daughter. I knew what she was suffering, what she had sacrificed for us, and I hope you are right. But if you are, the only way that would have happened is if she purposefully went back to Shepherd.’
Gritting his teeth and glaring at her, Corday growled, ‘She would not have gone back to Shepherd.’
‘I agree.’
Beyond frustration, Corday turned and left, furious with the old woman.
The warmth of a large hand softly stroked back loose hair from her face, waking Claire from a dead sleep. The purr was light, enticing her to stir, and from the way the mattress dipped she could tell Shepherd was sitting on the edge of the bed.
It was the smell that made her comply, the aroma of roasted coffee beans and something sweet. Blinking salt crusted lashes, she looked straight at the bedside table. Sitting in a white cup atop a saucer was a steaming cappuccino made by someone who possessed the skill to create the little pictures in the foam.
It did not take a genius to figure out he had been watching her in the processing plant. Shepherd had heard her conversation with Nona, and he had done this in response.
‘Please don’t tell me you kidnapped a barista,’ Claire groaned, sleepy, stretching forward to sniff.
‘The chef I kidnapped months ago to prepare your meals needed company.’
Claire could not tell if Shepherd was trying to make a joke. Scowling, she glanced up at the man still petting her elongated back and pursed her lips. From the look in his eyes it was clear the brute was absolutely serious.
He picked up the saucer to hand to her, using his other hand to lift and turn her to sit back against the pillows. Situated with the drink in her hand, she sipped and sighed, unsurprised when Shepherd moved the curtain of her hair over her shoulder to reveal her breasts for his gaze.
‘Are you enjoying your coffee?’
Shepherd had never woken her unless it was for sex, and certainly not with coffee in bed. Claire did not trust him for a moment. ‘I am not going to thank you.’ But she did take another sip and melted… hating to admit that the drink was really fucking good.
Though his expression did not change, Claire was certain he was satisfied with her reaction to his offering.
Elbow on his knee, Shepherd watched her savor her drink. ‘Maryanne Cauley is in the Citadel as we speak.’
Cup rattled against saucer, and the moment of coffee-induced comfort was gone. ‘You promised me you would not hurt her.’
‘And I have not.’ Shepherd’s eyebrow arched. ‘But I will if she is here in some attempt to steal you from me.’
‘Considering how you collected me, I doubt anyone even knows I am here.’ Claire turned belligerent. ‘I came with you willingly to respect my end of the bargain, and I will not attempt to leave so long as you respect yours.’
The purr came and so did a pet down her hair. ‘That is all I wanted to hear.’
Claire looked to one side, debating. ‘Could I speak with her?’
Of course Shepherd was going to deny the request, he knew she knew that. With a deep sigh he took her empty cup and saucer away. ‘I do not wish to argue with you.’
‘Then you may as well go back to torturing Thólos and I will sit here like a good captive and stare at the walls.’
He shifted, leaned closer while Claire pressed herself further into the pillows. His lips brushed hers as he asked, ‘What is your connection to Miss Cauley?’
So close, Claire felt… torn. ‘Maryanne was my best friend when we were children.’
He stroked her arm as if rewarding good behavior. ‘I find that difficult to believe. The woman is a thief and a prostitute.’
‘Like you,’ Claire frowned, ‘she too was once innocent… Though, unlike you, I think she is trying to be good now. She is just not very confident in the pursuit.’
‘You are the one to hold all the goodness and I will hold all the power,’ Shepherd purred, leaving a lingering, and ignored, kiss on her slack lips.
‘As you say,’ Claire responded, her voice flat once he disengaged.
‘Are you sore,’ his fingers dipped under the covers to brush over her mound, ‘here?’
Any second he would make the growl and she would be spread under his rutting body. ‘Does it matter?’
The hand left her. Shepherd brushed the pout on her lips. ‘You will rest today. Food will be sent. If I find out you have not eaten, one of your forty-three will pay for it.’
‘You do not need to threaten them.’ Claire did not want to play such games. ‘I gave you my word.’
‘That pleases me, little one.’ Shepherd was so damn confident as he shifted from the bed.
He gave her a long look while she slipped back under the covers for more rest, then left silently, turning off the light.
The next time she woke, food was waiting on the table. She showered and dressed in one of the feminine dresses Shepherd seemed to think she should wear, and looked at eggs benedict. He had a chef somewhere in the compound just to make her food. She wanted to roll her eyes at the strangeness of the long ignored gesture, but had noticed it almost from the start. Canned veggies and mass-produced meat products had transformed into satisfying cuisine only a week or so after she had first arrived. The confirmation should not have mattered, but it bothered her that he had mentioned it, and now it had to be addressed.
What bothered her more was that the chef was probably safer down there than above ground. Claire even suspected he or she had been taken from the Premier’s mansion. Shepherd was a thorough man; he would only take someone renowned… a celebrity. And he had done it to please her.
Claire ate every bite of that food, though it was too rich and her stomach was bound to rebel. The vitamin followed, and all the milk was drunk. Of course she threw it all up about thirty minutes later, but that could not be helped.
Customary pacing came next, her only form of exercise. Matters needed to be sorted now that her thinking had grown sharper. Shepherd knew of the Omegas, of Corday, and of Maryanne—the Alpha female having been the only one on her list that he was not previously aware of. The real question was how had Shepherd found her, which part of the branch had been first observed? Considering when he had come, it seemed that the answer was Corday. Which meant Shepherd would undermine every move of the resistance.
The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting. – Sun Tzu
Shepherd had infiltrated the Enforcers… but it would have had to have been very recently. Otherwise she would have been collected that very first night.
Claire’s bare feet stopped their limping shuffle and she stood there, worrying her lip. The grate of the deadbolt drew her attention; the door swung in and Jules, bearing a tray, entered.
The blue-eyed Beta did not seem interested in acknowledging her presence, so she spoke instead. ‘Hello, Jules.’
The trays were swapped and he grunted, ‘You did well outside the Undercroft.’
Surprised he was engaging, even if he was not looking at her, she grumbled, ‘Not well enough if I’m back here.’
The male did not respond, simply walked towards the door.
From her lips came a name synonymous with Satan in her mind. ‘Svana. That woman will ruin you all… You know that.’
The man halted and turned his head enough so that she might see his profile. ‘It would be wise for you to choose your topics of conversation with greater restraint.’
Claire scoffed and looked at the suddenly still Beta. ‘You follow a madwoman.’
‘I follow Shepherd.’
Claire actually smiled, a little wicked, and laughed at the man. ‘And he loves her; your point is invalid.’
‘The future is what matters, and your ignorant opinion matters little.’
‘A fact of which I am well aware.’
At the door, he spoke over his shoulder. ‘Do not measure your worth by one minor success, Miss O’Donnell.’
‘I agree. I measure it by my countless failures instead.’
‘You fight for what you believe in, yet when you grew fragile, your answer was to seek out a meaningless death. Mine is to spend what years I have left working for a greater purpose. I will see the world altered, improved. You and I are not that different. I simply chose to be stronger and was willing to pay the price to enact change.’
She had no idea where the words were coming from or why they seemed so important. ‘Your logic is corrupted. I chose to die before I became like you. That makes me stronger than you are.’
The man faced her one last time, those striking eyes unsettling. ‘It does not make you stronger. It makes you a coward.’
Claire felt as if he had struck her, the storm in her words unleashing nothing more than a pointless whispering breeze… because there was an undeniable fragment of truth in his words.
There was nothing else to be said between them, the man dismissing her as if she were nothing. The door closed with a thud. She must have stood there for ages, staring at the metal, half numb. Eventually, she moved towards the food, chewed and swallowed with no idea of what she ate, nor did she notice that she did not get sick.
Thinking of that stupid book, The Art of War, of Sun Tzu and all he seemed to have accomplished, Claire remembered: Thus the expert in battle moves the enemy, and is not moved by him.
Jules had just done that to her.
So, how does one move a mountain? Her words were nothing to Shepherd, arguments ended in sex, but her actions had affected him more than once. On occasion she must have caused distraction in his pursuit. The monster even said he loved her, in his own twisted fashion. That gave her influence of a sort, now she just needed to learn how to wield it.
Her green eyes went to the watercolor of poppies still resting against the wall—a mindless project that had once made her cell a little more bearable. The unwelcome cord in her chest pulsed. She needed a reaction, something small, a place to begin.
Absently, she prepared her paints, her mind full of one image, one hard truth. There was no need for much color, the world was nothing but shades of grey under a bruised sky.
