Page 8 of Forbidden Bonds
I take an unsteady step back, my eyes darting to the doors and noticing the red light indicating they are locked.
“You have become bolder of late, Larissa. I was hoping to wait until I awakened so that I might be the one to bond with you. But your heat is imminent, and I cannot wait. I need youbonded to an alpha, to any alpha. Now, I will not ask again. Pick someone, or I will let them all have you. I’ve heard rough fucking will trigger a heat. I’m confident any would oblige.”
I swallow hard. None of them. I want none, and yet I must choose.
My eyes shoot tohim, the behemoth I’ve been trying to ignore, because if I don’t ignore him, I will betray him. He is the only genuine alpha in the room. He is trying to mask his thoughts and focus on things other than his mission. But he could not possibly guess the darkness that invades an Uncorrupted alpha’s mind, and thus he could never emulate that.
Is he here to save me?
For so long, I harbored that hope. As the years passed, I concluded that, despite the Empire once lauding over my specialness, I am not special at all.
I cannot allow that thought to flourish. One more crushed hope would break me as surely as the alpha I must choose to rut me through my heat.
I try desperately to be objective, but what is there to think about? It’s him or one of the Uncorrupted alphas. I swallow thickly, thinking about Jord and the omega he broke. But even putting Jord’s violence aside, I’ve seen the captive omegas with their dead eyes after they’ve been rutted.
I do not remember such a look during my fleeting time as an omega within the Empire.
He is a little piece of that lost life—a tiny hope.
“That one,” I say. As the words tumble out, I recognize my mistake.
He has been hiding a secret, by keeping his focus on other things. Just how successful he’s been horrifies me, as I realize what he has kept hidden.
His head snaps my way, and the sea of bodies between us fades from my view.
“The omega has spoken,” Cohen says. His voice carries over the hushed gathering. “Her heat is imminent, and the honor of being the first to rut her will be yours.”
I fear I might throw up. The Empire alpha’s thoughts assault me, crashing over me like a giant wave that sends me tumbling, drowning in the horror of what I’ve done.
He is bonded, and his precious mate is pregnant.
His nostrils flare, and his eyes turn pitch black. Beside me, the general chuckles. “I shall enjoy watching the show. Join your chosen alpha.”
Besides his impressive size, the alpha is barely recognizable from the images I’ve seen over the years. Blond hair, cropped close to his head, is the usual style among the Uncorrupted, where his natural color is dark brown. Silicone implants to the cheeks, nose, and chin can easily alter facial features.
It was his mate that Jenda experimented on. His mate, whom Jenda lost when he stole her back, and which led to the Uncorrupted doctor’s fall from grace.
As I meet Ethan Black’s eyes, I see naked fury.
As I read his mind, I feel it, tenfold.
The other alphas might well have sought to break me if they’d had me in their hands, but this one will destroy me.
Chapter Four
Larissa
Two weeks later…
Chimera. After ten years as a ‘guest’ of the Uncorrupted, it feels strange to be back home. The glistening city lights, the skyscrapers, the electronic billboards, and the streams of skycars are familiar and yet alien as I observe them from the vantage of the backseat of the expensive SUV.
I hate you. I want to snap your fucking neck.
I barely flinch. Ethan shares the back seat with me, and he stares stoically out his window, his face giving away nothing of the hate that sears me from his mind.
He saved me, if one can call the shell that I am ‘saved’.
I realized Ethan had been working undercover, yet I still expected a representative from the government or the military, maybe both, to be waiting for us when we exited the shuttle. I thought there’d be some sort of official presence rushing to escort us out of sight for debriefing, off to a military base or a secret government facility. Instead, we were collected by ablacked-out SUV, and what appears to be a private security team is whisking us into the heart of the city.
