1. Lianna

"So, what do you think?"

"Uh…" I blinked at the trio of tan, smug Synn alphas, then cleared my throat as today's tension headache scratched behind my eyes. "It's… a lot… to take in."

Seriously, what the hell did they expect me to say? Dewey, Chad, and Thad, heirs to the powerful Pack Synn, social media darlings and tech giants, had just told me dragons were real. The three dumb meatheads courting me, the only alphas who had shown interest since I put my name in the local pool six months ago, had just shattered my whole worldview, and there they were, smirking, waiting for me to, what, drop to my knees and blow them?

Fuck's sake.

Okay.

Dragons… existed.

Vampires too. Witches. Warlocks. Werewolves. Demons. Fairies. The whole nine yards were real, living alongside us ordinary folks in secret.

A secret I was now sworn to, apparently. Only a few mere mortals were brought into the fold. Something about the delicate balance, the fate of the world, whatever—it depended on mankind believing monsters lived in stories, fables, and myth.

Most monsters kept the secret too, and those that didn't were, uh, executed? Exiled?

These idiots had sucked at explaining the rules, babbling, barking over each other like they always did. Their pack rhythm was a chaotic nightmare, but, like every other conversation we had in the last two months, I'd managed to flag the important bits and string them together in a way that made the most logical sense.

Kind of.

Dragons were real. The supernatural existed. I wasn't allowed to tell anyone. I'd only been graced with this knowledge because these lugs assumed I was a sure thing, ever so desperate to accept their invitation to become their bonded omega. In a way, I was. But I was desperate for any alpha pack at this point, and these idiots were my only option.

Idiots who, apparently, had a dragon locked in the dingy, sketchy-as-fuck warehouse looming over us on the dusty outskirts of Cedar Cove.

On Monday, Dewey had told me to wear something extra fancy for our standing Friday date, to prepare for a night I would never forget. The trio even sent a luxury car service to fetch me from the apartment—but when the driver veered away from downtown, off the beaten track to the industrial parks, boxy buildings backlit by the setting sun, I briefly entertained the idea that this had all been some elaborate scheme to kill the spinster omega that the local alphas deemed beneath them.

You know, that maybe this was a long con, a secret hit, and the promise of paying my family's medical debts, moving Louis to a better care facility, and finding Dad the treatment he deserved was a ruse to make me drop my guard.

I mean, it had happened to plenty of omegas before. We were supposedly precious treasure, the rarest designation, the most delicate, blah, blah, blah—unless we broke the rules in front of the growing population of traditionalists in this fucking country. Step out of line and it was all re-education academies and she got what she deserved rhetoric.

And I had stuck a toe over that line more often than not after the ol' prefrontal cortex fully developed.

But then there they were, three Synn boys, waiting in front of a ramshackle warehouse covered in shitty graffiti, wearing their best suits.

It all went downhill from there.

Well, not downhill, per se. Just… a lot. I was no stranger to fantasy media. I designed paranormal, fantasy, and sci-fi romance book covers on the regular; they paid the bills, and I had two whole bookshelves full of my published artwork. As a teenager, before I awakened at eighteen, I too thought those TV and movie vampires were hot as hell.

But fuck me. Realizing all the monsters were out there, just, you know, vibing? Waiting in line behind me at the grocery store?

A lot. Trust these Synn douchebags to drop it on me with the grace and delicacy of three dumb bulls in a china shop.

"Do you want to see him?"

"Uh…" I wasn't usually all stutters and blinks and stunned silence, but, you know—monsters. "Is that safe?"

"Vidar has been an associate of Pack Synn since, I dunno, the early twentieth century?" Dewey swept a hand over his slicked platinum blond hair, oozing old Hollywood from top to bottom. "He was hit by hunters, like, fifteen years ago? The injury he got from the attack keeps him pretty chill, honestly."

Pretty. Chill?

What the hell did pretty chill mean for a dragon?

"Vidar?"

Thad snorted to my left. "Yeah, some old-ass Viking name."

The trio erupted in a symphony of alpha rumbles and chuckles, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes and insist that, well, not everyone could be named some variation of Chad.

"You should see what you're getting into as the future Synn omega," Dewey mused when the guffawing died down. "Our world is a shitload bigger than everyone else's."

"Right." I gulped, eyeing the decrepit warehouse with its dusty gray walls and shattered barred windows. "O-okay."

Grinning, Dewey went for the main double doors and punched in a code on the padlock. It snapped open a beat later, and he took his time unwinding the bulky chains from the handles. After lobbing them aside, he shoved both doors open and ushered me in with a sweeping bow.

Dewey was the only Synn here by blood. Twenty-one, he'd been ice blond since birth, which he always wore short and slicked back. Bright grayish-blue eyes and a chiseled jaw paired with a sculpted body that wouldn't quit—and was constantly flaunted on his social media. He was the heir to the empire. Everything was in his name, even if he had pack bonds sealed in bites and blood.

Meanwhile, Thad and Chad looked like twins but weren't related. All three met in middle school, and the two brunets struck me as stage-five clingers who openly enjoyed Synn money, power, and prestige. While Dewey occasionally traveled for family business, these two stuck close to the West Coast, showboating the privilege their bond to Dewey offered. They even ditched their own familial pack names, as many alphas did when there was a social power imbalance in the dynamic, to adopt the Synn moniker.

Stuck in the middle of this trio made me feel especially small tonight. I had kept my distance on our past date nights, not wanting to feel like this, like a caged rabbit surrounded by dumb, drooling wolves. Heels weren't my thing, but I wore them each and every time to cut down on the insane height difference between them and me. While I was tall for an omega, these three were hot-blooded, all-American alpha. Thad was nearly six-nine, and he liked to use it to make a point. Especially with waitstaff, valets, bartenders—other alphas just trying to enjoy their night out.

Here, in the gaping expanse of an empty warehouse, I felt even smaller than usual. Two inches tall compared to these six-foot-eight and beyond alphas who were more muscle than brain.

Except, maybe, Dewey. He played the himbo well, but the more I watched the Synn ringleader, the more I suspected it was all a fa?ade to make people underestimate him.

Flashing a sharp smile over his shoulder, he led us across concrete floors, my heels and their smart dress shoes a symphony of crisp clicks. While these three rocked upscale, black-tie tuxedos, I had done my best to dress the part in a full-length strapless gown, deep purple to match the streaks in my hair.

Thad had told me the other day that boxed dye was so toxic it could impact my fertility, then followed that little pearl of wisdom with a guilt trip about the future of the pack, and maybe, just maybe, I shouldn't use it anymore.

Never mind that I had been dying my hair since I was sixteen—somehow my heat came, right on schedule, every three months, and, according to the specialist I had to see before I could join the local courtship registry, my fertility was, like all omegas, off-the-charts great.

Fucking idiot.

Then there was Chad, always insisting I swap the snack bowl of dried fruit and nuts that lived on my desk for raw liver. "For better gains, Lee. Think about it."

Seriously, combined, these three had a massive digital following, and they spouted this same shit regularly to the sycophants who followed them. Their only education to back up their claims was that it worked for me, so it should work for thee.

Never mind that alphas were genetically gifted, destined to be large, muscular, and, most of the time, annoyingly gorgeous—peakmasculinity. They were the apex predators of our society.

Being born hot, alpha, and rich, however, did not an expert make.

We all squished into a rickety elevator, and my palms spritzed a cold sweat on the slow grind underground. There was barely enough room for two bulky alphas, never mind three plus me. I tucked my elbows into my sides, breathing their combined citrus and myrtle musk through my mouth. It didn't do it for me, the bitter orange and the sharp lemon, the hints of lime and sea breeze. Worst of all, their scents clashed with the base notes of my omega perfume, and, if I ever actually misted in their presence, their stomachs would probably turn too.

But this was for Dad.

For Louis.

For the survival of our family.

My heart leaped into my throat when the lift bounced to a stop and the door finally creaked open, revealing a corridor of raw stone and dirt, the air thick with the scent of summer bonfire smoke and?—

I sucked in a quick breath as I tiptoed out of the elevator. It should be all mineral and rock down here, but what stuck out to me alongside the bonfire smoke was—amber.

Cypress.

Maybe a hint of allspice?

Yum.

Heat gathered at the nape of my neck, and I shuddered as hot, fiery hands curled unseen around my throat like a collar.

"The… The dragon," I stammered, mouth suddenly dry as Dewey beckoned me to follow him toward what looked like the opening of a cavernous but well-lit chamber. "Does he… have a designation?"

Chad snorted. "Obviously."

"Most supes are alphas or omegas," Thad added for context, both still behind me, unable to see the way my face flamed—not only because of that scent, but because that was the same tone you used when a toddler asked why the sun disappeared in the evening and returned at dawn. Like I was stupid. "Not a lot of betas in that mix."

"Oh."

About ten feet from the gaping mouth drenched in a warm yellow glow, Dewey rounded on me so suddenly that I stumbled to a halt, wobbling in these five-inch stilettos. He towered over me, handsome face cast in shadows, his eyes intense as he growled, "There's no going back after this, Lianna. This is Synn legacy."

At the sound of a thinly veiled threat, my body eked out the teeniest spritz of omega perfume. Dewey's nostrils flared. His pupils widened. The edges of his mouth kicked into something sinister.

I hadn't taken these morons seriously as alphas until right now. While there was zero attraction here, either on an emotional or biological level, I accepted their courtship for the greater good of those I actually loved. They had always seemed harmless. Dumb workout influencers who skated by on their good looks and the hard work of Synn alphas who came before them.

But here, now, I felt the literal pressure of Dewey's presence, real as if he were touching me. The influence of an alpha asserting his dominance hit like a stack of bricks falling all at once, a weight on my shoulders, on my chest, behind my knees, threatening to take me down with them. He might have been seven years younger than me, but as I peered up at him, fisting my dress so none of them could see my hands tremble, I was acutely aware that he—they—could make me do anything down here with a well-timed alpha bark.

And it triggered my omega instincts to fawn the threat until it went away. I wasn't a fawn. I had never been a fawn, but my body, sensing the risk, decided that this was the exact tactic needed to survive.

"D'you understand, Lianna?"

Thad and Chad rumbled gruffly behind me, their voices an octave deeper, and I forced a placating smile as I nodded. "Y-yes. Of course."

Dewey's white brows shot up, and he softened just enough for the alarm bells to stop shrieking inside my skull. Running a big hand over his lapels, he ducked down and wrinkled his nose like I was the most adorable little fawn in all the land.

"Good girl."

Ugh. Gone was the fawn, replaced by the tired, grown-ass omega who had no time or patience for alpha bullshit—and a twist in my stomach so brutal bile rocketed up my throat. I swallowed with a grimace.

He had no right to say that to me. It was too intimate, too manipulative. Omegas intrinsically thrived on alpha praise. Our stupid biology craved it—that sense of belonging, protection, and love from someone so big and burly, someone who could defend our nests when we were vulnerable and lift us up, literally and figuratively, when life knocked us down.

A true partner. Omegas melted for alphas, packs and lone wolf types alike. Alphas who complemented us, who fit just right like the last puzzle piece in the box.

Dewey wasn't my puzzle piece, and I'd just realized that praise, intimacy, from the wrong alpha felt like heartburn on steroids. Awesome.

He seemed not to notice, thankfully. If anyone knew how to put on a convincing brave face, it was an omega with a history of heartbreak. After another deep, grumbly inhale, like whatever sour crumbs of my perfume lingering between us pleased him, Dewey set off down the corridor, and, after a brief hesitation, I followed on shaky legs.

Thad and Chad were right on my heels, their presence palpable, the warmth of their alpha frames annoyingly constant. They fell away, however, as soon as I joined Dewey at the mouth of a cave—and uttered a gasp that came straight from my soul.

Given the light and the smell, I had expected a chamber, but this was like a small moon cut into the earth. It was round and vast, with a domed ceiling and gravel that sloped down to the bottom, starting a few feet out from where we stood now. Soft light spilled from the ceiling, like sunshine breaching an oppressive overcast, like moonlight slanting through a thick canopy?—

Like two dozen spotlights on a sleeping dragon.

He was pure gold, a jewel in a dingy gray sea. Gold all over, tip to spiked tail, which wrapped around him as he dozed, curled in a tight ball like a cat snoozing in a sunbeam. Enormous. Dragons were just so… big.

Two folded wings, with thinner membranes like bats, the scaleless skin there a lighter, sunnier gold than the sharp talons capping each tip. Four claws at the end of thick, strong legs. A long, girthy neck. Golden scales big as my head at least. Spikes up his tail and along his spine, around his face and head like a crown.

The invisible hands at my throat suddenly delved lower, a lover caressing my breasts and pressing possessively over the trembling valley of my belly. I exhaled shakily, shocked, hot, at a loss for words. My heart hammered like a drumline, and I wilted when I perfumed again—a lot this time.

Omegas emitted a concentrated blast of our natural scent—aka our perfume, so delicate compared to alpha musk—to express interest, excitement, desire, or fear.

Currently, I was a mess of all four, and I had no idea why.

"Do you want to get closer?" Dewey murmured, his breath an unwelcome intrusion at my ear. "He's asleep."

My legs answered for me, lurching forward, heels instantly getting stuck in the gravel. Dewey grabbed my wrist, steadying me, then inched us down the slope at such a glacial pace that I almost growled.

"Our guys bring him a dead cow once a week," Chad announced, he and Thad stomping down after us. "Could probably eat a whole herd, though."

"I always forget how big the fucker is," Thad chimed in.

Amber and cypress looped around my legs with the dragon's next powerful exhale. His scent came with an afterburn of allspice and power, and my gut gave a short, pleasant, squirmy clench, then cramped.

Viciously. Like preheat cramps at the end of a long week, the brutal ones right before the big bang. I gritted my teeth and bit back a whine. No. No, no, no, no.

At no point did I want any of these Synn alphas thinking I was perfuming for them.

"What happened to him?" I asked in a strained whisper. My heart rebelled at the thought of hearing his story, like she wasn't ready for more tragedy, still raw from everything else, but I needed the distraction.

"Hunters want dragon treasure." Dewey shrugged when I peeked up at him, his grip on my wrist starting to throb. "We're not the only humans who know, remember? There's, like, secret societies who are super pro-supe, or super against them. Vampire hunters— Dad even poached shapeshifters in Brazil once. You should hear his stories. Totally wild."

He met my look of horror with a smirk.

"Anyway, dragons collect stuff. Gold, jewels, books, weird art shit—that's their big vice, and they hoard it all away like misers. In the grand scheme of supes, they're also super OP." I rolled my eyes at the slang: OP, overpowered. "But there's a weakness riiiight over their hearts." He made a cross on his chest, just below his black bowtie. "From what Dad says, if you can wedge something between two specific scales, you can hit 'em in the heart but they don't die. They just shut down enough for you to rob them. Kinda like putting a shark on its back and they just float there. Tonic immobility, I think, is what Dad called it?—"

"That's super shitty." I stuttered to a full stop, awash with a fury that came out of nowhere. Dewey gripped my wrist tighter as I glowered up at him. "What the hell?"

One of the other meatheads tsked behind us, the second chiming in with a tut and a rumble. While these Synn boys weren't exactly strict traditionalists, I'd gleaned their opinions on ‘good omega' behavior over the last two months, and I barely fit the bill. They were all over social media, half naked, fully naked, blasting their stupid thoughts and faux facts far and wide. But their omega, it seemed, had to be sweet and demure. Someone who minded her Ps and Qs, especially in public.

Swearing, no matter how mild, always made them grimace.

As did my blue highlights last month, then the deep, luxe violet ones this month.

Oh, and the large-scale leg tattoos they hadn't seen yet? Yeah, that would go over swimmingly.

We weren't a fit, but I needed them, and they seemed to relish the thought of an older omega desperate for a pack—so desperate that she might bend and snap to their every whim once the bond was in place.

Something to deal with later, once I knew Louis and Dad were in good hands.

"Dad and his pack went from allies to caretakers when it all went down," Dewey told me, casting a dismissive glance toward the giant mythical being dozing below. "Kind of annoying, but, y'know, it is what it is. He used to be really involved with Summer Solstice."

My frown had him smirking again, as though he'd hooked me at the mention of the stupid beach festival Pack Synn hosted every year. "The fire wall? His fire. It looks insane in person. Dad says ol' Vidar would go out in his dragon form at dawn—he's a shapeshifter, mind you—and he'd let out this massive breath of fire. Then he would fly around, bellowing, putting on a show before the general public showed up. We saw it a few times as kids. Nuts."

"Now we light it with torches," Chad told me, sauntering a few paces over the gravel, arms crossed and eyes narrowed as they swept across the golden beast. "Night before the festival?—"

"Tonight," Thad added pointlessly.

"We come down here, get him to blow, and bring the fire to the festival grounds on his behalf."

"You don't need to feed dragonfire, so once it catches, that baby will burn for at least two whole days like it's freshly lit," Dewey finished for them, "and Vidar gets to just lounge in his little den."

I blinked incredulously at the sneering alpha, then refocused on the miracle at the bottom of the hill. It didn't strike me as lounging if he was too injured to move. It sounded like… being stuck. Caged. Trapped in your own body?—

Like Louis.

Clearing my throat, I shook off the grief, the sadness, the loss, and did my best to stay rooted in the situation at hand. Dragons were real. The Summer Solstice Festival was tomorrow, and now that I'd seen Synn legacy with my own eyes, our bond was imminent.

Which no doubt meant I'd be expected to put on a show this weekend.

Summer Solstice Festival had started as a casual beachfront bonfire for locals back when Cedar Cove was in its infancy. Under Pack Synn's management, however, it had slowly blossomed into a two-day rager on the beach. From humble beginnings to an obnoxious music festival, I was in for fire-eaters, food trucks, and a lot of liquor. This was barely the fun family-friendly event promised in the brochure. This was influencer paradise, full of booze, drugs, and rutting alphas hunting for their next hit in the crowd. Tickets cost a fortune. Under the intense June sun, it'd be hot, packed, and hazy.

And Synn alphas were always the stars of the show.

My waking nightmare, honestly.

The fire wall had been a massive attraction since the start. It ran a full mile along the beach and soared a good fifty feet tall—though I had always assumed the numbers were greatly exaggerated.

As was the fun.

As was the source. Pack Synn claimed ownership for everything Summer Solstice, from the musical lineup to the prestigious culinary offerings to the bonds forged in the pit. They boasted about the fire wall. Used it in all their marketing.

But it was because of him.

Vidar.

Heat looped around my waist at the next spicy gust of cypress and amber, thick and palpable. An unseen hand delved lower, cupping me, and it felt so goddamn real that my clit hummed with pleasure. A shiver trickled down my back, followed by a stronger plume of my scent.

"So, he's injured," I forced out, attempting to sound nonchalant in the face of everything. To drive the point home, show them that I wasn't rattled despite being surrounded by three hulking alphas, I looked each in the eye as I said, "Why haven't you guys, I don't know, pulled out whatever the hunters got him with? Did they take his treasure?"

"His hoard's a secret, even to us," Dewey muttered bitterly. "Nothing's local as far as we know, so they got jack shit. I think they maybe stole a scale? Dunno, but he won't let anyone near the injury, and he can't pull whatever it is out himself, so, yeah, it's his own damn fault. Dad says he can sit and spin until he stops being so stubborn."

I sucked in my cheeks and bit down. Alphas didn't exactly have the most tender approach, especially with other alphas. Maybe Vidar just needed a kinder hand. Cocking my head, I scanned his massive frame, noting the way the light danced off all that gold, highlighting the nuances in shade and sheen.

"Maybe he just needs—" I gasped and stumbled back. Just as I was studying his face, the one eye facing us snapped open. It widened, the slitted pupil rounding to an obsidian sun. Suddenly I was falling, drowning in pools of gold and fire, in lust and want, an inferno unlike any other.

"Smell her, boys?" Dewey jerked me toward him as my perfume spiraled into panicked, delighted overdrive. "Told you she got off on danger."

"Is this what you like, baby?" Thad chimed in, closing in on my left.

"Is it because we take such good care of him, just like we would our omega?" Dewey rasped in my ear, ducking down to where I had clipped my hair back on the right, leaving my neck all too exposed. "Or is it because we own a dragon?" I flinched when his teeth scraped my earlobe. "Either way, Synn alphas are always in control."

My scent exploded, frantic and desperate. Two halves of my omega heart fought for control: there was perfume to soothe the circling predators, sweet and calming violet, but then there was the call to an alpha, my alpha, to rescue me. Vanilla. Take me. Cardamom. Call me. Sandalwood. Claim me.

Inside was a war zone, but outside, I was trapped in place, rooted, frozen. A desperate little whine tore loose when a heavy hand clamped down on the back of my neck. My stomach twisted again, disgusted, and my pelvis spasmed with a vicious heat cramp.

While I felt Dewey, Chad, and Thad, scented them, suffered the unrelenting pressure of their interest, all I could see was him. Gold. The dramatic rise and fall of his body with his deeper, sharper breaths. The twitch of his tail and the flutter of his wings.

"L-let go for a second," I choked, only to yelp when someone pinched my hip and nosed at my throat.

"Fuck." Chad's tongue dragged down my neck and across my shoulder.

"She smells so good," Thad rumbled.

"Baby," Chad nipped my arm, "you're like a cloud of violets."

"Good to know she's actually an omega," Dewey grumbled, his hold on my wrist going from tight to punishing. "She hasn't perfumed once."

"But it was worth the wait."

"S-stop," I begged, whining, wilting, as Dewey wrenched my arm around to nose and lick at my inner wrist. "You're h-hurting me."

He was gone. Pupils blown, slacks tented with the same desire grinding against my ass from someone else, Dewey bit hard enough at the veiny underside of my wrist that I wailed. No. I didn't want his bite. I didn't want any of their disgusting mouths on me.

Another merciless cramp rocked my core, followed by a flood of need that had slick drenching my panties. As soon as that heady scent hit the air, the trio pushed in harder, grabbing, groping, ripping my dress up and slobbering all over every bit of exposed skin they could reach.

A fourth set of pheromones entered the fray, smothering the citrus and seashore smog. The rich scent of bonfire wove around me like a serpent, slithering between my legs, coiling around my hips, but when I frantically looked down, there was nothing there. Another pathetic whine slipped past my lips. Another desperate surge of slick painted my inner thighs. What I wouldn't give for the snake to be real, to be hungry—to bite all these rough hands clean off.

"Guys," I whimpered, twisting and bucking, my legs turning to jelly. No matter which way I squirmed, there was an alpha waiting. "Stop."

"You just aren't used to alphas taking care of you, little omega." Dewey bared his teeth, then pressed a long, leisurely open-mouthed kiss along my inner forearm, toward the bite that hadn't broken skin but was already starting to bruise. When I whined and misted them with another whoosh of terrified, too sweet violet perfume, he straightened with a snarl and barked, "Stand still."

My body responded instantly. Alpha barks could stop any omega dead in their tracks. There was no disobeying a bark. It had almost the same effect on betas, despite how dull their biological drives were by comparison, but honestly, a furious, shouting alpha was just plain scary. Out went the fawn, shot in the heart. This time, I froze, every instinct in me determined to obey.

But I was still me. I wasn't gone, even if I couldn't move. Tears streaked my cheeks. Fear howled in my chest. My lips trembled and my teeth chattered, and I let out a strained sob when two hands hitched up my dress, followed by the sounds of zippers whizzing down.

"If you didn't want us," Chad hissed as he bunched my dress in his fist, "you wouldn't be going into a fucking flash heat, omega."

"You're crying with need," Thad insisted. "Didn't you go to an academy?"

"She knows." Dewey chuckled gruffly. "She just gets off on danger. Is this a non-con situation, omega? Because we can play if that's your game. I can write it into the bond contract?—"

"Get off!" My shriek came from the very depths of my soul. Alpha-bark chokehold broken, I slammed my heel onto Thad's foot, and he responded with a snarl and a brutal hand in my hair, yanking my head backward. The trio pressed in, forcing me onto the gravel.

"Put her on her knees," Dewey snapped, fussing with his belt in the corner of my eye as rock and dirt bit into my palms, my shins. "I bet she needs a good rutting at some point in her?—"

Before he could finish, a furious roar exploded from the golden dragon, his wrath crashing over us like a tsunami.

And as six hands shoved me away, the fog of citrus musk suddenly sour with fear, all I felt was relief.