Page 3 of Ruin Me Knot
The phone rings once and the voice on the end stirs the wasps in my stomach into a swarming and stinging frenzy. Hardwick’s stare doesn’t waver off me. "Evacuate the lab rats, Wallace. Everything has gone to shit. You have an hour. But keep Room One operational. I have one last experiment to conduct. You can help me start, but I’ll tie off the loose ends myself."
My heart flat-lines because Room One stars in my worst nightmares.
She’s never done this before. Evacuating the whole lab? One last experiment?
Ethan Wallace, the sycophantic bastard, accepts the order without hesitation no matter how outrageous it is. No questions, no disbelief at the scale of it. Just complete obedience and the quick click of the call ending. Of course he’ll do it. He always does whatever Hardwick asks. It serves him to play loyal, to crawl after her like the sniveling monster he is. He’s as twisted as she is, and she’s his green light to do whatever he wants, no questions asked, no pesky legal or moral repercussions.
Hardwick lowers the phone, exhaling a humorless little huff. "Well, you’ve compromised us, Omega. That makes you worthless. Apart from the one last test you can be of use for." Her mouth twists up, baring her teeth into something that wishes it were a smile. "It’s always easier to get rid of a dead body than to keep one alive and hidden."
Ice blooms behind my ribs. Whatever she plans, I know I won’t walk away. I’m a problem to be erased, evidence to be destroyed, and there’s nothing and no one to stop her.
Chapter Two
Leah
There’s no surviving this.
She’s going to run the experiment Wallace warned her against. The one she pushed for while he scowled and scribbled in his files. He held her back out of grim practicality, not mercy. Keeping me alive was just a matter of convenience for him.
Vulnerable, orphaned Omegas aren’t easy to find. We don’t just slip through cracks, least of all into hell. But I’ve been seen now. My protection is gone.
Hardwick spears me with sharp eyes. Somehow, she makes this my fault too. I see it in her look, hear the accusation in her voice, as if the world has spun wrong just to spite her because of me.
She’s not just evil.
She’s fucking insane.
That unstoppable kind of crazy that chews through anything softer than steel. The kind with power and connections.
The kind that wins.
Spittle sprays across my bare legs. My rag-dress is so short it leaves me exposed to every drop of her contempt. "Of all the damn Alphas in the country, it had to be your scent-matched pack storming in…"
That stops me. For a second, I can't think past her words—scent-matched pack.
Normally, I shut down when she’s mid-rant. Questions get punished. Curiosity costs blood. But something in me breaks. The small, acidic snap cuts through the last layer of obedience holding my tongue still. Maybe it’s the certainty I won’t walk out of the lab alive. There’s literally nothing left she can take from me.
"What the hell is a scent-match?" The question stutters in my chest but defiance tastes better than begging. "If I’m going to die, at least I deserve some damn answers."
Hardwick chokes on a laugh, then falls silent, regarding me. "Of course you wouldn’t know. No sense wasting breath on trash."
A dark light flickers in her eyes, but then they widen, like she’s just discovered a new way to torment me. "But I suppose there’s no harm in telling you now, is there? Not like hope will keep you alive." She draws out the words, savoring each one. "A scent-match is rare. Perfect. Like stranding magnets. The instincts, the very essence draws fated mates together to share souls and bond for life. It’s biology. Feral. Unbreakable. They’ll fuck you senseless, knot you for days and then they’ll ravage your neck with their bites to claim you. Use their venom to flood your bloodstream and bond you. You won’t even need to be in heat for them do to that to you. Your souls will be cemented together forever thenthey’ll systematically destroy you. You will always belong to them and they’ll do whatever they want to your body and you’ll beg them to do it. Still knowing this, Alphas go mad for their scent-matches. Omegas, too. And now, you’ll never know what being bonded would be like. It’s finished before it even begins."
For a second, wounded bitterness flickers in the depths of her eyes before they harden and narrow to cold slits.She knows what this feels like, and she hates that I see it in her.
Recklessness sparked by rage loosens my tongue. She wants to hurt me? Then I’ll hurt her back with the only weapon I have. "You sound like you know a lot about scent-matches. Someone reject you, Senator? Can’t say I blame them. I’d want to end things pretty damn quick if I had you as a mate."
Hardwick’s hand cracks across my cheek, the slap so sharp my ears ring. My head whips sideways, vision blurring with white stars. Pain bursts along my jaw as the world tilts, stomach swooping. For a heartbeat, everything goes dark.
Her voice filters in, cold and amused. "Even after all this time, you still haven’t learned to be quiet. Stupid Omega."
I keep my head tilted and my eyes shut as I wait for the throbbing in my skull to subside.Scent-matching. In the end, it’s another prison. Just more control, another leash stitched into my bones and a trap I’d never escape.
The idea of being powerless makes my skin crawl. The way those Alphas looked at me, the way their roars boomed down the hall. None of it promises safety.
Never comfort.
Not ever.
