Chapter 11

Chapter Eleven

JASPER

" T iny has claws," I mutter as I hear her still screaming. "Are you sure she'll be okay in there?"

"Yeah, it's a temper tantrum," Tommy grunts, though his steps hesitate. "She'll be happier when she has clothes, and some underwear."

Snorting, I shake my head as I jog down the stairs and see the frying pans. "I think she was planning to bludgeon us into submission."

"It's sexy as hell is what it is," Tommy murmurs. "I want to get her some arnica for her bruising and pain she may have. Marie left things here, but there has to be more I can be doing to help. Let's get cleaned up, change, and then go out to get her some clothes and shit. Omegas like pretty things, right?"

"I think that omega wants a specific thing," I grunt, my mood souring. "I told her we were her scent matches, and she just wanted her precious Auggie."

"It's obvious she's been through some shit," he says. "I'm a brute and I own up to being a Neanderthal. I have no issues taking what I want, even if it means leaving her handcuffed to my fucking bed. Augustine is her match too. Do we tell him we have her? What's the right move here?"

"Keeping her forever," I say seriously, waiting for the eye roll he graces me with. "He's had her for six years, man. I want to get to know her. If I need to use Stockholm syndrome as my leg up against him, I'll do it."

"Fuck, you're such an asshole," Tommy says with an approving smirk. "You're right, but we have to figure out what that'll mean. We aren't exactly flowers and dinner date kind of people."

"I think the first step is to not be covered in Arthur's blood," I tease him.

Snorting, he jerks his head toward the bathroom for me to wash up, while he backtracks upstairs to shower. I wonder if he's going to go back to his room to shower.

Frowning, I decide I'm actually a moron because my one last clean pair of clothes is up in the room I'm staying in.

Turning, I run upstairs, noticing that the screams aren't coming from the room anymore. Instead, I hear soft crying, which makes me sigh. Touching my fingers to the closed door, I promise, "One day you'll realize you need us too. Give us a chance."

Moving away, I pull my clothes off as soon as I get to my room, walking into the bathroom to shower. What the fuck do omegas even want? I haven't spent much time around them, not even my little sister, who I just reconnected with.

Omegas like blankets and shit right?

Tommy is right, I decide as I rinse off my body underneath the water. We have absolutely no idea what she wants, but she was struggling not to flash her pretty pink pussy at me, and failed a couple of times as she attempted to fight with us.

And God, does she smell like apple pie and mine. I feel as if I still have her scent deep in my nose, a part of my soul screaming at me to claim, mate, bite her. I don't know how Tommy has been so calm, but watching him as he handcuffed her to his damn bed, I have to say that even he has to be rock hard and feeling the way I do.

Blowing out a breath, I wash my face and arms once more to make sure all traces of blood are gone. We were both in such a rush to come back, this slipped our minds. Turning off the water once I'm rinsed, I grab the towel to dry off.

"Idiot," I murmur as I step out of the shower stall to stride into the bedroom. Tommy's men are taking care of anyone that Arthur was working with, but I could see the memories in Cerenity's eyes when she thought about them.

When I saw her in her club she was so self-assured and proud, but now she's off her footing, and I can tell it's bothering her. The little omega is vulnerable, but is still willing to fuck me up with a frying pan. Damn, it's sexy, and makes me realize I'm damn lucky she didn't find any of the cast iron skillets.

Chuckling under my breath, I pull on a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved blue shirt, knowing I'll need to go to my apartment to pack more clothes. I'll do laundry here later. I live in a three bedroom apartment that I own, but my youngest brother just turned eighteen, and is going to college in the spring. I'm going to find myself alone, because my entire focus has been finding my sister.

She's found now, packed up, and happy, so maybe I should start thinking about myself.

It's funny, because anyone who doesn't know me would say I'm a cold-blooded asshole, but that's not the truth. Not entirely. I'm introspective, hard working, and determined. I care about my fighters, even though I have a really fucked up way of showing it.

I'm ruthless, and the little omega in the next room is getting a first-hand experience of that. I don't want her to hate me, so I need to figure out how the fuck to ride the edge between bending her to agree to spend time with me and breaking her. I have no interest in breaking her, when I love her fire.

Huh, love, that's interesting. I didn't think I was capable of feeling that for anyone I wasn't biologically related to. It's true when they say that scent matches just snap together when they meet. As I begin walking toward the bedroom door to leave, I stop so quickly I almost stumble on air.

"You're an idiot," I mutter. Tiny kept asking us not to take her choices, and this is what she meant. It's almost impossible to fight biology once the scent matches meet. It makes sense why she uses her alpha pheromone spray.

Fuck me. I need to figure out a way to get her to understand this is a new beginning, and not a trap. This explains why Augustine never told his best friend they were scent matches.

What the hell has her running scared like this?

Yanking the door open, I stride down the hallway to check on Cerenity, a million questions rolling through my head that I'm not in the right frame of mind to ask at the moment. Sliding my fingers through my still wet hair, I find myself pulling on it, the sting of pain helping me to think.

I don't think Arthur made her this scared of alphas, fate, and biology, because she's been using these blockers for years. She told us this herself. Why does she want to be alone forever?

Touching the door knob of Tommy's room, I gently push it to peek in on Cerenity. The omega is sleeping, tears sliding down her cheeks still. She must have just fallen asleep, which makes me sigh heavily.

"Hey, she'll be fine. We have to go though. Shaw and his pack just texted me to tell me he wants to chat. He said something about a violation of our districts," Tommy murmurs behind me.

Eyes widening, I turn to find him dressed in a dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up, dark jeans, and shiny combat boots. He could either take a meeting or kill someone.

"He's coming from Minnesota?" I ask, surprised. At Tommy's nod, I sigh as I close the door to the bedroom. "Fine, but I need to get more shit from my apartment and Tiny needs clothes. It's one thing to keep her calm long enough not to chuck a frying pan at our heads, but another to leave her to rot in your bed."

"That's not what I was doing," Tommy groans as he walks with me. "She was fucking wild, and needed a time out. I'll uncuff her when we get back so we can talk."

"Is she fucking five-years-old?" I ask, snickering.

God, we are so not ready for this omega. Here's to a hope, a prayer, and a match to burn it all down.

CERENITY

My eyes close, exhausted from fighting, my arms over my head in these stupid handcuffs. I'm uncomfortable, my tear ducts feel as if they'll never shut off, and not over the truth bombs these alphas dropped on me today.

I blame that for being pulled into a nightmare that is more a memory I try hard never to remember during my waking hours.

"Cere, hurry," my mother hisses as she makes my eight-year-old legs run next to her. We don't have much because Mama won't let me keep much outside of a teddy bear and a favorite small blanket that'll fit in a tiny bag.

We move every time Mama gets a "feeling". Sometimes I'll get months of normalcy, but others we'll move every two weeks. It doesn't make sense to find an apartment anymore, so instead we stay in hotels. It scares me because I think there's something wrong with her.

"Mama, what's wrong?" I ask, hurrying to follow her. My mother is wispy and tall, which makes me wonder if I really am her kid with my short legs. "Please wait for me!"

Mama crosses the street, but even this late at night, there are a lot of cars and I can't follow her. Gasping, my eyes widen as she continues to walk, disappearing into the subway in Chicago.

"Mama!" I scream, my heart slamming in my chest as I somehow race across the street by myself. Horns blow as I cross, making my body shake even more. I know that if I saw my reflection in one of the windows in these darkened store fronts, that my face would be pale and terrified.

My mother isn't supposed to leave me behind too. She ran from my fathers to protect me and herself, she's always told me, but why does she keep moving so fast that I can't follow? My heart chooses her, I choose her, so why can't she wait for me?

"Mama!" I yell again as I look down the dark stairway leading down into the subway. She wouldn't have jumped on a train without me, would she?

This is one of the bigger stations, and Mama said we'd take a bus after this. We've zig-zagged across the city most of the night. God, I'm so tired.

"Move, kid!" an alpha snarls, making me squeak as she shoves me roughly aside. Mama has spent every breath she has telling me how dangerous the world is, and how she hopes I'll be a beta.

Betas are safe, because no one wants them. I want to be safe so badly, but do I want to be someone my own mother thinks is useless? Betas aren't special. I guess it doesn't much matter when everyone shoves you aside, because you're so little and you don't have friends.

"Cerenity, where are you!" Mama screams, making my eyes widen as I realize she's still close enough for me to follow.

"Here! Please wait!" I beg, rushing down the stairs behind the alpha who shoved me. My back hurts from where the railing slammed into me. Wincing, I almost trip over my own feet, squeaking in surprise as I slip down four stairs and fall on my butt.

"Why are you sitting down, silly girl?" Mama asks, her hands on her hips. I'm just so happy to see her with our only bag that I jump up and make my way to her quickly.

"You're here," I gasp, wrapping my arms around her.

"Of course I am, Cere. We have to go, though. You can sleep on the bus. Come on, they could be following us and the next train is coming," she says urgently.

Nodding, I slip my hand in hers and resolutely walk with her. My dads aren't good people. They scare Mama, so they also scare me. I hear every day about how they're bad men who will kill me and kidnap my mother, because they don't want a girl.

This can't be how people are supposed to live, but I'll always choose the woman beside me, even if sometimes I worry that she's jumping at shadows.

As we get onto the train and the doors shut behind us, I wonder if we'll get to stay for longer than a few days wherever it is that we end up.

Gasping as my eyes open, I can't even sit up because of my handcuffed hands. Tears slide down my cheeks as I remember the many late nights that we ran from things only my mother could see, and how she explained it all to me the year I turned fourteen.

Probably too young to tell that sordid story to, but I was tired of moving.

Now, I am pretty sure that there was only ever a small chance that my fathers were still looking for me, while the rest was the terror of her mental illness. It kept deteriorating instead of getting better, until she got lost in her memories and psychosis.

The tears turn to sobs as I think about the things she made me promise.

"Never fall in love, because it's a lie, Cere," she told me when I was twelve. Mama made me promise her, and at the time I meant it. Love takes away your choices, your words, and your dreams.

" Alphas are all after one thing if you're an omega. They want to fuck, rut, and keep you for their own devices. Biology will lie to you to make you believe it," Mama snarled when I was fifteen.

She cried when I presented as an omega at sixteen. I was an incredibly late bloomer, and she had high hopes that I would be a beta. Unfortunately, Mama was wrong when my designation appeared, and she spiraled even more until I eventually had to hospitalize her six years ago.

I go see her whenever I can, but sometimes I wonder if it does more harm than good.

Now, I have a series of broken promises in my wake, and my mind is reeling. I never expected to find my scent matches, and I know it won't really be real until the alpha pheromone blocking spray wears off.

Only when I can scent my match will the bond snap into place, even though it won't be official until we make it so.

My breaths get more and more shallow as I think about choices that I never thought possible being taken from me. I figured I'd keep Augustine for as long as possible until he found his match, because there's not an omega alive that would want someone like me around him.

Augustine spoils me, protects me, and is the only person I would be happy about if he was mine. However, he isn't good at keeping secrets, so he'd have told me if we were meant to be together, right?

I never thought that I would come full circle, shackled to a fucking bed the way my mother was. Recognizing the panic descending, I mewl as I tell myself to woman the hell up. I can't help what's happening to me right now, but I can try to get myself out of it. Pulling hard on the cuffs, I hiss as they bite into my wrists.

"I will never understand a handcuff kink," I grunt. They're hard, pinch, and really fucking hurt. My legs are still covered in a blanket, and I snarl, kicking it off my legs.

The damn thing is too scratchy, and I don't plan on staying here for long. Those alphas should sleep with one eye open tonight, because I am not calm or submissive. I'll fucking sing the Star Spangled Banner off key and badly all damn night if they think they're going to leave me chained up here.

I am not an adorable, tiny, omega no matter what my size says. I'll be their worst damn nightmare.