Page 4 of Ruin Me Knot
I don’t care who they are or what their essences do to me. They’re Alphas, and I want nothing to do with them. Every Alpha I’ve ever known has brought me nothing but misery and suffering. I’m done with the bullshit.
Puberty stole everything from me. Before that I was the cherished daughter of loving parents, who thought Haven was sanctuary for Omegas. They followed the law because they trusted it, but they had no idea what being Omega really meant. If I could carve this cursed biology out of myself, I would. Gladly.
They visited on every day the facility allowed, which was never enough, until the day they died in a car accident. I was barely twenty when the basement became my world. When Hugo and Lars began their twisted ‘lessons’ and my life turned to concrete walls and endless misery.
Mira and Emma helped stave off the darkness, or I would have gone insane long ago. We planned to escape, but time was running out. We knew what they were going to do to us. It was only a matter of time before they sold us to the highest bidder for our first heats. When the opportunity came to escape, we took it.
I wasn’t free for long.
We ran as fast as we could through the forest. We split up when they sent hunting dogs after us, but I didn’t make it far. I didn’t see the ravine I fell into. The fall snapped my leg, the pain so sharp I puked over my dress. The dogs found me first. Hugo and Lars weren’t kind when they picked me off those rocks. They didn’t drag me back to the Basement; Hardwick had plans. She had me thrown in the back of a car and delivered, like cargo, to the Facility. There's no watchdog down there.
That’s when I met Ethan Wallace for the first time. The lead Alpha-turned-scientist who is fond of syringes and data sheets. He forced me into heat after heat, pumping me full of chemicals that tore my body apart from the inside in the name of science. No comfort. No nest. Just agony that gnawed at my insides, fevers so high I thought I’d die, skin crawling, soul set on fire until even screaming hurt too much. So much pain it chewed through endless time. Senator Evelyn Hardwick is obsessed, chasing her vaccine for the Mortalis Strain, and I’m her star guinea pig. The only guinea pig who lasted.
I don’t know why or how.
Other Omegas have come and gone. Some died in their first trial. Some just faded, their eyes empty, their scents gone thin and strange before their bodies gave out. I don’t thank the gods I’m still here. The end will be a kindness.
Absolute darkness presses against the car windows, broken only when moonlight catches the razor wire crowning the tall fence. We glide through empty streets into a deserted compound, gates clanging shut behind us like a steel trap.Ahead squats a cinderblock building surrounded by an empty parking lot. Leaves scatter in our headlights, and loose stones ping against the under carriage as we roll to the building’s deepest shadows.
I’ve never seen the outside before, but I recognize the cinder block. It’s the same on the outside as the walls I’ve stared at for years. It’s been my world of pain. Nothing can hide the stink of suffering that bleeds from the inside and out of those walls.
I spit out words that will hurt because why the fuck not. "You keep playing God, but control is the only thing keeping your pack tied to you. Kylie and Sean are too afraid to run and without your bark, Skylar would chew her own arm off just to escape you. What’s it like, having a pack who only stay because you break them harder than anyone else ever could?"
She flashes her teeth and lunges at me, but before she can make contact the car eases to a stop. She forces herself to calm, lip turning up in a sneer. "Keep going like this, Omega and I’ll let my guards ‘ease your heat’ before they put you out of your misery." Dread coils in my gut as she exits the car. She doesn’t even turn around as she barks her next order. "Bring her."
Her heels strike against the tarmac as the juiced-up Alphas drag me from the car and into the frigid night. I gulp one last breath of clean air before they haul me toward a steel side door. Hardwick punches in a code on the security pad, and then I’m shoved after her.
The familiar tang of antiseptic and despair hits my nose, so thick I taste it. The guards frog-march me along the glossy white linoleum. Other Omegas pass in a ragged line. Some stagger. Others slump in wheelchairs, pushed by nurses who don’t meet my eyes.
Then I see an Omega I know and,oh Gods…Espie is here too?
Haven’s basement had hollowed her out the same as all of us, but now? Grease mats her long, raven hair. Her pale skin is filthy with dirt, blood and bruises. Her head hangs low, but not low enough to miss the way her eyes flare when she sees me. I didn’t know her for long. She was a couple of years younger than me when she was thrown into the hellhole with us, but we’re swept apart before I can react.It wouldn’t matter if I did. We both know we’re never going to see each other again.
The halls are clear by the time we reach Room One.
My stomach knots so hard it hurts.
Ethan Wallace is waiting inside, hands tucked into the pockets of his white coat. His hair is slicked neat, face sharp, eyes cold and bottomless, mouth set in that calm, distracted line that never changes whether he’s taking notes or twisting pain out of me. He’s handsome with that fresh boy-next-door look, but on the inside he’s all man-from-hell monster.
His gaze flicks over me and nothing can disguise the hunger in those blue depths. Not because he desires me, not that my Omega designation has ever saved me from anything, but because Hardwick has given him the green flag to do his worst. Terror surges through me when his eyes flick to the tray of tools on the metal table he’s already prepared and the giant syringe on the top.
I have nothing left to lose; I throw everything I have at the guards pinning me between them. Elbows and knees, teeth bared, I claw and kick and twist, trying to wrench free even though my muscles are jelly, my strength wrung out long ago. They shove me down on the metal gurney without breaking a sweat and strap my wrists and ankles into the bindings even as I continue to thrash as hard as I can.
Hardwick rounds the gurney and stands at my side, arms crossed tight over her chest, breathing in the fear coming off me like it’s a luxury.
"You’re certain about this, Senator?" Wallace looks over my body like he's sizing up cuts of meat. "After all these years, the investment… her blood is valuable."
Hardwick flicks hard eyes at the doctor. "She’s compromised. I want this done as soon as possible. Her scent-matches recognized her."
Wallace’s brows flick up. "Really? You know, if we had them they could provide valuable information—"
"Just get it done, Doctor. That’s an order," Hardwick says.
"As you wish." Wallace nods, moving to the tray.
Tears burn down my face, raw and shocking. I’m not afraid of dying, but I can’t, I justcan’t, go through another heat. "No, please. Not again. I can’t, please…my last one, you just…"
I’m not recovered from the last heat they forced on me, my body much too weak to handle another. An Omega should have a natural heat every three months, but I’ve endured a monthly heat since I was brought here, every one of them wearing me down to ash.
