Born to Be Bound (12 page)

"No wounds of consequence. Three will be hanged."

Horrified, Claire whispered, "For what reason?"

Shepherd hardened his expression, flexing the arm that chained her to his lap. "They attacked my mate and tried to sell you to me... thought to barter a life I already own to ensure their comfort. Do not imagine they had any regard for the others either; those women had no intention of returning to share the spoils."

Claire clutched at the hand he held to her face, pleading. "Please don't kill them. Lilian and the others were starving, afraid, and desperate."

"So were you," his narrowed eyes flared, "more afraid than they were. And you were, and are still, trying to be their champion."

Looking down, full of sadness, Claire muttered, "I am a piss-poor champion."

"You did fairly well considering the odds," he acknowledged quietly. "Your flaw was assuming there is good in Thólos, when there is not. That is why you lost."

"I know you're wrong. Some of those women are my friends. They
are
good people. Those who attacked me... I don't know them well, but I would rather show mercy than condemn desperate, starving women tempted by the lie of food you broadcasted on your leaflet."

"And that is why you are weak," it seemed almost a compliment, "and why I am strong."

"You are stronger than me," Claire acknowledged, studying the Da'rin markings on Shepherd's shoulder, unsure how many dead were represented in that patch of skin. "You're faster, have power, but you lack something great. And you will never find it in the life you live."

"Do I?" It was as if he knew what she was going to say, found her opinion juvenile and cute. "Do you speak of love?"

She shook her head, black tangled hair waving around her shoulders. "Not love. Anyone can love."

"Then what, little sage?"

"Humanity... the source of joy. You may have had it once, but whatever life you lived has eaten it away."

He hummed at her, unconcerned with her judgment. "I understand humanity at its basest level, and have far more experience in the world than you do, little one. The way the citizens are behaving—such as those women I am going to hang no matter how much you may beg or cry—proves the point that they were never good, even before starvation. Suffering merely draws out the true nature of each life festering under the Dome."

"The way you speak; you make it sound as if you believe you are offering enlightenment by knowingly crafting misery," Claire scoffed, shaking her head, surprised he had not just started fucking her to shut her mouth.

It was the same stormy fury that rolled through his eyes when her words displeased him. Claire was still afraid—afraid of the monster that could so easily crush her, afraid of the effects of the bond—but Shepherd seemed tranquil and almost willing to let her speak.

"The books you keep," she breathed softly, looking to the shelving across the room. "You have such a strange collection... a veritable training manual on how to be a dictator. But then there are soft things: poetry, writings by great spiritual leaders and virtuous human beings. Do you read them to try to seek what you are missing?"

He stated with pride, "I am the Shepherd. I lead the flock."

She whispered the words, mesmerized by the exchange, "Through terrorism?"

"Your naiveté is like that of a child. Under this Dome injustice runs rampant; Thólos is a cesspool filled with corruption, greed, apathy, and vice—a breeding ground of lies. Weakness must be purged, deceptions exposed, and punishment suffered."

Her thickly lashed green eyes went wide. "This is some kind of trial?"

"You have grown wiser, Miss O'Donnell."

The fact he had used her surname was chilling. Her end of the thread began to hum out of tune, the connection to such a creature unwanted and abhorrent. "You don't want power at all... you want the city to wallow in what your breach has inspired. You want to watch us squirm."

A conceited smirk, an evil thing, distorted scarred lips. "Continue, little one."

Slight understanding of the man and his reasoning came together. "You think you are some kind of champion... like Premier Callas, or—"

Snapping in anger, Shepherd cut her off, "Your precious Premier is no more. I ripped him apart with my bare hands, and caution you against speaking his name in my presence."

To be Premier was to be the ultimate servant of Thólos; a hereditary position held by the family that had erected the Dome, and served until death. They were immaculate, lived wisely, and led by example. Yet Shepherd's hate was personal... unexplainable. Claire had to know. Heart racing, she tempted fate and whispered, "Why?"

"Your Enforcers are dead, your Premier rots in pieces, and soon every Senator will swing outside the Citadel so that all Thólos might breathe the true stink of their corruption." Shepherd placed his lips to her neck and pulled in her scent, flexing his hips to press his growing erection between the soft legs wrapped around him. "So you see, there is no one to save you. You have only me."

At those words panic surged, her mind racing past the point of dread. If Shepherd hadn't started purring at that very instant, she might have begun to scream.

Large hands went to his belt. He felt her tremble and resist as he withdrew his member, restraining his weakened mate on his lap easily. Feeling the feminine curves nurtured by the food he'd provided, he gave a hungry growl. The instant she was remotely wet enough, he lowered her down on his straining erection.

The pace was almost languid. Her head buried against his shoulder as he lifted and lowered her, Claire's panic broken apart by distracting debauchery.

There would be no escape, all her fighting had been for nothing—these things he whispered in her ear.

She would not show her face, or her silent tears—her only view the sight of his thick cock, shiny with slick, infiltrating her body, just as his taunts penetrated her mind.

Shepherd stroked a hand up to grip her neck, pulled her closer until her breasts were flush to his chest, the location of their bond in contact. He held her so wet, green eyes were compelled to meet his. "Kiss me."

Claire felt it begin all over again. "No."

It was his show, it was
always
his show. Her life was his, her body too; but her lips were her own.

Her defiance only excited Shepherd more. With a low, animal growl, what had been unhurried became an all-out carnal attack. He turned them about, bouncing her on the mattress to pound the scented, pretty hole that sheathed him so perfectly. She screamed, filled the air with sobbed moans of his name. Shepherd held her by the nape, felt the strength of her climax lock on to his cock as he swelled and secured her to him. And though his hips were trapped by the knot, it did not stop the pad of his thumb from grinding against Claire's swollen clit.

He was merciless, pushed her past pleasure and to a point of overburdened sensation.

She tried to writhe away from his finger, the friction too strong, but could do nothing, pinned as she was. Begging in breathless catches of sound, Claire panted, "Shepherd, please stop."

Watching her lips form the words, dissecting the tortured desire and uncontrolled pleasure, he rubbed even faster. Snarling like a beast, still painting her womb with spurts of cream, he demanded, "Who do you belong to?"

There were tears leaking from eyes squeezed shut as she jerked and twitched from his abuse of her clit and the cramping orgasm, prolonged too far. "Pleeease, please stop... I can't..."

"WHO DO YOU BELONG TO?"

She was going to die, it was too much, the sensation so great it was agony. Everything went white, as if the world was made of nothing but blinding, horrid light that stripped her bare. Back arching, she sucked in air, like the first gasping breath of a newborn, and felt another wave of devastating contractions in her core. With a face full of pained pleasure, Claire gasped, "I belong to you!"

"That's right, little one," came a voice as if leagues away. The pinch on her nerves abated and she sobbed when the over-strong, extended climax began to abate. More waves of hot semen burned her from the inside when Shepherd purred, "You belong only to me."

The punishment had been brutal and it took him almost an hour to soothe her trembling muscles and ragged breath. Eyes shut tight, Claire burrowed into him, pressing hard, worried that should the contact vanish she might cease to exist.

With a stroke down her hip and back up again, the monster explained in a low, soft rumble. "If I ever smell another man's scent saturating you again, I will hunt down the male and rip off his limbs while you watch... then I will fuck you in the pool of his blood."

Her fingers simply clawed where she clung, digging in deep. "When you speak that way it frightens me."

Strangely, he hushed her as if comforting a child, gathering her tighter in his embrace.

Chapter 8

He just couldn't believe it. Shaking his head, hurting for her, Corday fought boiling anger. Rumors had spread like wildfire, varying stories of how an enclave of Omegas had been rescued.

That was the term Dome Broadcast used to describe it.
Rescued
.

And Claire was gone. Deep in his gut, Corday felt responsible—that he should have known the Omega would do what she felt was best—and hated himself for not seeing the signs.

Waking up on that lumpy couch, a crick in his neck from the odd angle, he'd realized at once what she'd done. Leaping to his feet, cursing up a storm, Corday had run out the door.

There had been no need to search, his hours racing through the city wasted. Had he simply turned on his COMscreen, a distorted version of the story—including footage of emaciated women accepting food—would have played on repeat. There had been no shot of Claire, or even Shepherd for that matter. But a short Beta known to be Shepherd's second-in-command was featured, offering blankets to the Omegas and directing Followers to see them to safety.

A lie.

Corday didn't know how Shepherd had found them, but after seeing the flyer and the outrageous bounty, he suspected that one of Claire's friends had betrayed her.

The thought broke his heart.

The Enforcer knew Thólos, understood what she was up against. Innocent Claire was too idealistic, too sweet, and no matter how willful she was, still Omega. She saw the world through the eyes of a caretaker, a nurturer—not a warrior.

From the look of the icy grounds surrounding the capture, from the steam of starving women's exhaled breath, it was the freezing Lower Reaches that had sheltered Claire's group—a dangerous place where more than just the subzero weather could kill you.

Corday had made his way into the mist to see for himself, disguised as a looter to pick through the warren, blending in with the rest of the vultures already poaching the meager goods left behind.

Claire's smell lingered in the air, heady with anxiety, powerful from the sweat she must have worked up when she ran to her friends. Corday followed it, ignoring the deserted personal items scattered around the rooms, the garbage. The trail ended at a closet, where—once the door was pushed open—he found trapped air that reeked of sex. Shepherd had fucked her the moment he'd found her; that was clear not only from the smell, but the sight of the discarded sweater and pants Claire had been wearing. His clothes—the ones Corday had specially prepared for her earlier that day.

Crouching down, he lifted the fabric and brought it to his nose, pulling in a breath of the Omega, bowing his head, feeling like a failure.

It could not end this way.

He may have failed Claire, but her information about the pills had brought to light other Omegas in need, and the Enforcers—led by Brigadier Dane—were already preparing to strike. Corday would help them like he'd promised. After all, what was the point of resistance if one didn't actually fight back?

#

Corday had a difficult time finding respect for a woman like Brigadier Dane. Dane's arrogance and short-sighted need to constantly remind him about his father's crimes and subsequent incarceration had set them at odds from the first moment he'd met his commanding officer. But something had changed in Dane during the months since the city fell. It was clear that the Alpha female harbored the massive weight of survivor's guilt. Dane tried much harder, spoke much less, and seemed as grimly determined as Corday to right at least one wrong if she could.

The weather was nasty; even at midday it was almost dark, the swollen sky over-dome just as unwelcoming as the guards outside the chem pusher's den. When Corday arrived to join Dane's tactical assault, he could smell drugs cooking, the bitter, chemical tinge tainting the air. More so, he could hear the drugged, needy calls of the women, begging for release from wherever the saggy faced dealer had them locked away.

There were about twelve men on the premises; half were armed with Enforcer-grade artillery they should not have had access to. Guns slung over their shoulders, faces devoid of emotion, the thugs were habituated to the vileness surrounding them. From Dane's intel, the Enforcers now knew which sleaze ran the show; an older, stocky Alpha named Otto. The Brigadier's orders were to keep him alive for questioning.

They needed to know who had supplied those men with those guns. Were they affiliated with Shepherd's Followers? Were there other cartels with artillery that could be confiscated?

Customers were already shuffling in with offerings to trade, twitching with the need to knot a heated Omega. It seemed something as simple as a fresh piece of fruit or a bag of rice could get an Alpha or Beta laid. There were stockpiles of food, crates stacked in a guarded corner that could be put to better use once impounded.

Taking down these men might potentially fund the beginnings of a true rebellion.

Led by Brigadier Dane, with Corday at her back, the team of twelve armored Enforcers breached the concrete compound in tactical formation. All targets were eliminated without question, the infiltration choreographed to a precision even Shepherd would have admired.