Page 81 of Shades of Scars

“You.” I snarl, making to lunge for her, but the two assholes that have me held upright tighten their grips on me. Then, I feel cold, hard metal press against the back of my skull. Raven flicks a glance at whoever it is over my shoulder, and her lips tighten. She doesn’t look happy.

“He is not part of the deal. You are here for your omega. If she’s not on the main level, she has to be up on the rooftop. There’s a pool.” My entire body freezes at her words, my brain making quick work of the entire scope of the situation.

I know then who must be at my back.

I try to jerk around, but the muzzle of the gun only presses harder into my skin. “Show me where my pet is.”

“Fuck you,” the sound that rips free from me is anything but human. Over my dead fucking body will I lead this sadistic asshole to my omega. He’ll have to put a goddamned bullet through the back of my skull. “She doesn’t belong to you. Never has, never will.”

A dark chuckle whispers over my ears a moment before I feel his hot breath tickle my skin. “That’s where you’re wrong. For it’smymark she bears on her skin. Not yours.”

Before I can rage out, a fist catches me in the gut and makes me double over. Then I am being dragged forward behind Raven as she leads the way to my omega.Fuck, fuck, fuck!I try to jerk again, but the crack of a gunshot rings out milliseconds beforewhite hot pain lances through my right calf, and I slump with an ungodly roar of fury.

The two assholes are prepared, though. They take my weight as if it’s nothing to them, and they continue to drag my ass towards Wren’s office. “The elevator is down since we cut the main power lines, but we’ll be able to slip up the staircase.” That walking dead bitch calls over her shoulder as she pushes inside the office. She better hope Wren gets to her before I do, because I’m going to make her fucking beg for death when I’m through with her.

I can feel blood pouring free from the wound in my calf. My lungs burn, and my head and face feel like I went ten rounds in the ring with the world’s heavyweight champion. “Put him on his knees.” I hear the snake that had shot me say at my back. “Open the door to the staircase. We will wait for my pet to come to me.” He orders Raven, who practically fucking skips to the door.

I curse out as I watch her punch in the code we never should’ve given her, and then she steps out of my line of sight while we wait for Scarlett to come down. It only takes another minute before the door is swinging open, revealing Kate supporting my omega around her waist.

All color leaches from Scarlett’s face when her eyes collide with the monster at my back, and he finally comes into my line of sight. He keeps the gun he’d already used to shoot my calf trained on me, but his eyes and creepy ass smile are all for her. I’m going to rip those goddamned lips offafterI pluck out his eyes for looking at her like that.

“Hello, pet. Someone has broken the rules, I see. It’s time you return home for a few refresher courses.”

Undiluted rage courses through me as he speaks to her, but I can’t fucking do anything when I am down a leg, I have a gun trained on me, and others have their weapons trained on the twoomegas.God fucking dammit!“I will fucking kill you, Erossi. Do you hear me? If you touch her-”

Harlan Erossi finally looks at me, and he peels his lips back in a sneer as he looks me up and down like I’m nothing more than garbage that needs to be taken care of. “You’ll what, Reaves? If you move one muscle to stop me from taking what belongs to me, she’ll get a bullet between those pretty eyes.” He turns back to Scarlett, and his lips twist into a smirk. “And she knows if she fights, the same goes for you, don’t you,pet?”

My omega fucking trembles. The seconds tick by, and she locks eyes with me for several heartbeats. I see it then. Her resolve hardens her gaze as she looks at me. “Scar, no-”

I start to protest, but she tears her eyes off of me and returns them to that asshole. “I’ll go willingly. Just leave him be. He’s… he’s nothing to me.” Her words normally would have cut right through me if I didn’t know her better than I did.

My omega loves me. She hasn’t said the words to me yet, but I know she does. Just as she loves that tiny babe growing in her womb. I know she’ll say or do anything to protect that secret. There are only three of us in this room that know, and she’ll do anything to keep it that way.

“That’s right,pet. You know who owns you. Come,” He twists away, signaling towards some of his men. “Bring them both. I can catch a pretty penny for the other slut.”

Just at the thought of him leaving with the omegas, adrenaline surges through me. The guys holding my arms are caught off guard when I jerk upright on my good leg and stumble towards Erossi, ready to rip him to shreds. Another gunshot rings out, followed by a scream, and then I feel a bolt of lightning pierce my chest.

I see the look on my omega’s face when I crash to my knees. I hear her screaming as she’s pulled out of Wren’s office kickingand screaming, along with a weeping Kate. I don’t feel it when I slam face first into the rough hardwood floor.

I don’t feel a damn thing when the darkness steals away my vision and my life.

53

Wren

If it wasn’t for Caito’s contact clearing a path for us to the penthouse, we never would have gotten through the police barricade that had already been erected around the scene by the time we got there. I don’t know what kind of sway the alpha has, and I really don’t care.

Lark meets us in the lobby, his panic stricken face like a fucking punch to the gut. It adds another thousand or so pounds of weight on my shoulders that I already bear. A hideous reminder that I’ve failed.

Because without even stepping foot inside the penthouse, I already know I’ve done just that.

The crushing weight just keeps piling on my shoulders as we make quick work of the fourteen flights of steps that will take us up to our floor. I know Caito and Lark are behind me. So are Fraser and Sutton. I know a small team of first responders are also present with us. I’d bet that had to be Sutton’s or Lark’s doing.

I’m numb when I punch in the code and let myself into our penthouse. I don’t register that the place looks like a hurricane has been through it. I follow my senses to my office. The coppery tang of blood is thick in the air, even before pushing the door all the way in where it had been partially cracked.

I expect to find carnage. I’d already hardened myself to come face to face with my omega’s lifeless body before I’d even walked through the front door. Fraser had already been through here before we arrived, but he hadn’t uttered a word to Caito about what he’d possibly seen.

What I find is an empty office.

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