Chapter 3

Ari

For a couple days after the meeting with Samson, my body buzzed like I was about to go into heat early, without the Heat Lightning pills. I tried to tell myself it was the thrill of the dark and dirty thing I was about to do. Just the idea that I was going to live out my darkest fantasy had my adrenaline pumping and my libido running riot.

There was something more to it, though. Samson was absolutely the perfect alpha to play out a scenario like this with. He was exactly what the sicker part of my imagination would have ordered, tall and beefy and every bit the primitive alpha. My body had been in a constant state of latent arousal the entire time I'd been in the man's presence, and my imagination brought him into my dreams for the next few nights as it spun images of everything we were about to do.

But it was more than that. Aside from being physically intimidating and hot as Hades, Samson also brough me a paradoxical sense of security and groundedness. It would be easy to chalk that up to him mentioning he'd been a cop—although he'd left a lot of questions hanging about why he wasn't a cop anymore and why he'd moved all the way across the country into the middle of nowhere—but there was more to it than that.

I trusted Samson. I shouldn't have. I didn't know him at all. I had basically given him permission to hurt and humiliate me. That didn't seem to matter, though. Something as deep as the substance that made up the cells of my body was pulled to him, and because of whatever force that was, it felt like second nature to trust him.

Which was weird, because trust wasn't something that came naturally to me at all.

"Oh, you look lovely, Ari," my mom said as I stepped out of the changing room in yet another of the designer suits she'd arranged for me to try on.

I was utterly unimpressed with the pale pink, lacy suit, but I walked down the small, narrow runway in the bridal boutique and stood on the dais at the end so she could get a better look. I was certain plenty of brides and omegas loved the catwalk feeling of the bridal store, but to me, it was just humiliating.

"The cut is so flattering," my mom said, clapping her hands together and holding them over her heart. "It really accentuates your figure. Don't you think it accentuates Ari's figure, Clyve?"

"Hmm?" Clyve sat in one of the plush chairs as the end of the catwalk, staring at his cell phone, a flute of complimentary champagne in his free hand. He was as uninterested in the wedding preparations my mom and his papa had dragged us out for that afternoon as I was.

"I think this one is a little too slutty," the omega Mr. Ingraham said, squinting hard at me, then making a sour face. "The trousers are too tight. I don't want every alpha in high society lusting after my son-in-law."

More likely the omega Mr. Ingraham didn't want his alpha mate lusting after me. I'd caught the alpha Mr. Ingraham ogling me a few too many times, like he would volunteer to knock me up if Clyve somehow proved incapable of the job.

"Show us something with looser-fitting trousers," Mr. Ingraham ordered the shop attendant, as if it was the young omega's fault I looked too good in the suit.

"Yes, sir," the harried young woman said. "Right away, sir. I know just the thing."

"Go on, dear," my mom said, sending Mr. Ingraham an anxious side look.

It was pretty hard to tell with Mom, but I didn't think she liked the Ingrahams any more than I did. She liked the connections they would bring her and the status me marrying their son provided, but I could tell she didn't trust them as far as she could see them.

And there was that word again. Trust.

I headed back to the dressing room and shimmied out of the pink suit and into the baggy white suit with palazzo trousers that the attendant brought. How was it that I trusted a complete stranger with a kinky-as-fuck cabin on his remote, wooded property more than a family I'd known since I was a kid? I'd always thought the Ingrahams were shady as fuck, despite their high profile and vast wealth. Actually, most of the wealthy people I knew were shady as fuck. My father was the shadiest of them all.

At least Samson displayed his kinks openly, like there was nothing to be ashamed of. For all I knew, my father liked to be whipped and fucked by skinny betas in leather harnesses while dressed like a schoolgirl. If he was into anything like that, he would probably rather die than let anyone know.

Something about Samson said he didn't care who knew things about his darker side. He exuded calm and confidence. He was the kind of person I would want to come after me to save me if I ever actually was kidnapped by mafia sex offenders, or whatever fantasy it was that got Hayden off.

"Could you hurry it up in there?" Clyve shouted from the main part of the bridal store. "I've got better things to do than sitting around this dump all afternoon."

The attendant helping me dress made a strangled sound, as if Clyve's words had hurt her.

"Don't worry," I told her with a sad smile. "I'm the one who has to spend the rest of my life with that asshole, not you. And I'll make sure you get a huge commission for this, even if it has to come out of my account."

"Thanks," the young woman said with a watery smile. "I'm sorry you have to deal with him."

I shrugged, then brushed my hands over the floppy suit before stepping up onto the catwalk again and striding out to show off to three people who didn't really care.

"Oh," my mom said as soon as she saw me looking like I'd swathed myself in one of her formal tablecloths. "It…it's certainly made of expensive fabric."

"That's how an omega should dress," Mr. Ingraham said. "Conservative and modest."

And definitely too covered up to give his husband an erection during the reception.

"It's comfortable," I said, trying to help the process along. Mostly, I just wanted to get it over with so I could get ready for tonight.

Tonight was the night I would head into the woods to begin my fantasy. Tonight was the night I would see Samson again.

"Clyve, what do you think?" my mom asked the lump on the plush chair beside hers.

Clyve was staring at his phone with a tight, serious frown. He was reading something, probably a text, judging by the way he typed some sort of fast, furious reply. Whatever it was, he was really into it.

"Clyve?" Mr. Ingraham snapped.

"Hold on. This is important," Clyve grumbled.

I rolled my eyes and tried not to sigh. This was what my life would be all about. Me waiting impatiently while Clyve played video games, or whatever it was that he considered important. I was definitely going to have to get myself a hobby. Maybe charity work. Mom did a lot of charity work, and I suddenly understood why. Maybe I could get involved in one of her things. It might even bring us closer together.

"Clyve!" Mr. Ingraham shouted, loud enough to make me and everyone else in the shop jump.

"Alright!" Clyve shouted back. "I told you this was important." The way he shouted at his papa was yet another preview of the sort of treatment I could expect for the rest of my life.

Clyve finished whatever he was doing and stood abruptly, tucking his cell phone into his jacket pocket. If I didn't know any better, I would have said he was anxious about something. He was red-faced and sweating a little, and he had a restlessness about him that was the complete antithesis of Samson's calm and cool.

Fuck, I needed to get out of this gilded nightmare and into the forest so I could have my fun with Samson, and I needed to do it now.

"What do you think of this one, Clyve, dear?" my mom asked him, gesturing to me.

"It's fine, yeah," Clyve said, then almost without pause, went into, "Listen, I have to go. I have a meeting at four that I can't miss."

"We have cake sampling at four," Mr. Ingraham said, teeth clenched.

"Well, I can't make it," Clyve said with attitude. "And I'll be out of touch this weekend, too," he went on.

Mr. Ingraham's eyes and nostrils flared with frustration. "You've got an appointment with a honeymoon planner tomorrow," he said.

"I can't make that either," I said, knowing what the reaction would be.

Both Mr. Ingraham and Clyve stared at me like I was trying to start a mutiny.

"What do you have that's so important you have to miss crucial wedding business?" Clyve asked.

As much as I wanted to ask him the same question, I needed all my powers of concentration not to look as guilty as sin as I said, "I have that pre-wedding meditation retreat."

"Pre-wedding meditation retreat?" my mom asked.

It took more effort not to blush in front of my mom. "Yeah. Remember? The one they wrote an entire article about for Sophisticate magazine? It's all about recharging your romantic battery and preparing to enter a new phase of life. All the celebrities are doing it these days."

"Oh, well, if all the celebrities are doing it," Mom said. I knew that argument would win her.

"Where is this retreat?" Clyve demanded, taking a possessive step toward me. "Who's going to be there? What company runs this retreat? Will there be any other alphas there? I don't want you going near other alphas right now. Not so close to the wedding, and not this close to your heat. You're mine, and I won't let any other alpha look at you, let alone touch you."

Mr. Ingraham smirked and nodded, as if he agreed with the possessive sentiment.

"It's an all-omega company called Oasis," I said with a long-suffering sigh, as if I'd told Clyve all about it before and he'd just forgotten. "The only people allowed into the facility are omegas. Not even betas are permitted. They've got a pop-up location over in Dennison Valley, way out there, away from the hustle and bustle of the city. Feel free to check my location on your phone for the next couple of days if you're worried about me."

Hayden and I had already talked about how to manage Clyve. Hayden would take my cell phone to a diner in Dennison Valley called Oasis so that if Clyve did try to check in on me, which he inevitably would, it would appear that I was exactly where I said I'd be.

"Fine," Clyve snapped, letting it go far quicker than I thought he would. "I've got to get going."

With that, and without even saying goodbye to his papa, he turned to leave.

I was able to finish up with Mom and Mr. Ingraham without too much more fuss. I bought the baggy wedding suit, mostly because I didn't care and I didn't want to keep trying on clothes. That was a first for me, really. Usually I loved a little fashion therapy.

Mr. Ingraham was done with us as soon as we were done with the bridal store, but it took me a little longer to send my mom on her way.

"Tell me more about this retreat," she said as we sipped high-end coffee that cost as much as an entire meal for some people at a café half a block away from the bridal store. "It sounds like a lot of fun, like the ashram Vinny and Pat and I visited two years ago."

"It's more like a spa than an ashram," I explained as casually as I could, pretending I was just fine with turning into the kind of omega my mom was friends with. "It'll be three days of meditation, mud baths, yoga, healthy eating, and crystal therapy, all designed to help me say goodbye to my single life and embrace life as a married omega."

Well, my fantasy with Samson would accomplish part of that.

"It sounds divine," Mom said with a sigh.

I wished I could arrange for Mom to go away on a retreat like the one I invented for her. I wished there was some Light Fantasy Club to match the darker one I'd found. Mom wasn't really happy with her shallow, captive life, even though she'd long ago resigned herself to it. I wished there were a way I could free her from the mental and emotional prison of her life the same way I was trying to escape the fate I was about to be trapped in.

I wasn't sure Mom would want to leave, even if she could, though. I didn't think my omega sister, Harmony, or my alpha or beta brothers would choose to leave the lifestyle we'd been born into either. I was the only black sheep who didn't think money, status, and privilege were enough. Yet another reason for me to wonder if I'd been adopted at birth, despite DNA showing I definitely came from Mom and Father.

Those thoughts weighed on me once I finally took Mom home, then packed a small overnight bag with a few things I thought I might need for my fantasy. I'd never been content as a spoiled rich kid. I'd gone to the parties, enjoyed the expensive clothes and toys, and even sampled the drugs that seemed to flow like alcohol in the fancy crowd. I'd hated how drugs made me feel and only tripped that one time, but drugs of every kind were a big deal with my peers.

Yet another reason I didn't feel like I fit with them, I guess. I was lucky I'd met Hayden at Barrington University. His family had money, but not on the scale that mine did. Which had been perfect, because I'd still been allowed to make friends with him, but he'd also allowed me an avenue of escape from the stifling life of the super-rich now and then.

And, of course, now Hayden had introduced me to the Dark Fantasies Club.

"You've got the iTag I gave you?" Hayden asked as I made my first stop at his house before heading up to Glass Top Mountain.

"Yep," I said as I handed over my phone. "It's in my bag."

"You should keep it on your body in case you get separated from your things," Hayden said. "That way, I'll be able to track you."

"Yeah, but you won't need to track me, right?" I said, my heart beating faster as I got closer to the moment when my fantasy would turn into a reality. "You trust the whole Dark Fantasies Club process, right? This alpha is safe and his second is reliable?"

"I absolutely trust them," Hayden said, clapping a hand on my shoulder. "I had a long talk with Jay this morning, actually. He's a good guy and a good second. He vouches for Samson, and I trust that."

"But you'll track me anyhow?"

Hayden laughed. "You know it." He squeezed my arm, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a small pill jar. "Here's your Heat Lightning pills."

In addition to Hayden taking my phone to the Oasis diner, we'd arranged for him to get the Heat Lightning pills for me so there would be no trace of me having any sort of financial interaction with Bangers Mash. I was fairly certain Clyve was monitoring my spending, and he would have flipped if he'd seen I paid anything to BM.

"Okay, I'm off," I told Hayden with a nervous smile. "Wish me luck."

"Oh, I will," Hayden said with a lascivious grin. "You're in for the kinky time of your life, my friend. You won't forget this for the rest of your life."

That was definitely the point, I thought as I drove off, heading for the mountains. The whole point of putting myself into this level of danger and allowing a strange alpha to brutalize me was so that I would have something hot and delicious to remember through the rest of my agonizingly dull and miserable life. I just knew that I wouldn't be disappointed by the experience either.

It took a good few hours to reach the campsite on Glass Top Mountain about a mile from Samson's house. We'd walked out to the site at the end of our meeting the other day, and I could definitely see it was the perfect place to camp. It was off a dirt road, which was off a side road off the main road, and if there was a more secluded place in that part of the forest, I would have been surprised. As I set up my tent, I was confident there was no one for miles around, and I'd be able to live out my fantasy in peace.

As soon as I had the tent set up, I grabbed a bottle of water and took a Heat Lightning pill. From everything I'd read about the medication, it was fast-acting. If it worked, I'd go into heat in less than an hour. Which was perfect timing, since Hayden had said he'd alert Samson that I was heading out after I'd left his house.

The whole thing was arranged and organized perfectly, which was actually a little eerie. As I worked to build a small campfire—something I was actually good at, thanks to my years in the scouts as a kid—and set up a camp chair so I could wait, my entire body buzzed with anxious excitement. It was more than just the Heat Lightning pill, too.

What was I doing? Was this completely crazy? Being chased through the forest and force-fucked was not normal people's idea of a good time. I should just resign myself to my fate of being a high society spouse and forget whatever kinky fantasies I had.

Those thoughts wore themselves out quickly, leaving me jumpier than before as the waiting started to drag. The one thing we'd never clearly established in our pre-game meeting was when Samson would come looking for me. Was I going to have to wait all night? Would he surprise me after I'd gone to sleep?

I wriggled in my chair, my hole starting to feel damp and loose, as the effects of the Heat Lightning pill went from niggling to burning. The pill had been effective, alright. I could feel myself going into heat, which caused a whole different level of panic. What would I do if I entered full-blown heat and Samson had changed his mind? I was miles away from another alpha, and even if I wasn't, what would happen if I got so desperate I'd beg any alpha to fuck me? I'd heard stories of omegas trying to go through heat without an alpha, but they were gruesome.

Time ticked on, and I couldn't sit still. I keened a little as a particularly fierce wave of heat and need washed over me. I felt the seat of my jeans go damp as slick leaked from me. My cock pressed hard against my zipper, adding a twinge of pain to the aching that was starting to consume me.

"Oh, God," I squeaked quietly, gripping my middle.

This was a bad idea. I was in heat, alone in the forest, desperate and vulnerable. I should never have signed on for this. I should have waited until after the wedding and let Clyve take my heat and get me pregnant. That was the life that waited for me, and I should have just?—

A rustling in the bushes off to one side snapped me out of my thoughts with a gasp. I whipped to the side, suddenly conscious that the forest had gone nearly completely black around me. The moon was nearly full above, which gave some light to my campsite, along with the small fire, but other than that, there was nothing but blackness and trees around me.

"Hello?" I called out, foolishly thinking it would be a good idea to let Samson know I was there, waiting.

As it turned out, Samson already knew.

There he was, standing in the shadows just beyond the trees at the edge of my camp. He was perfectly still and silent, and for all I knew, he could have been there for hours, just watching me.

I let out a sound of terror and scrambled to my feet. Because Samson was absolutely fucking terrifying. He'd been big and imposing in the light of day, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, but in the middle of a dark night, wearing only combat trousers, which had a huge bulge, his chest and arms bare and painted with some sort of camouflage, he looked every bit like an alpha beast that had come right out of some nightmare.

But it was his eyes that blazed, bright and round, in the dark that sent a crippling tremor through me, and made my hole gush with slick. His eyes were filled with hot, primal lust. His nostrils were flared, like he was breathing in my scent, and his chest rose and fell with deep breaths that felt almost uncontrolled.

Samson was the absolute picture of an alpha in rut who couldn't control himself. And when he stared right at me and growled, "Run," I turned and did exactly that. I ran like Hell was chasing me, because I really felt like it was.