Total pages in book: 63
Estimated words: 58365 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 292(@200wpm)___ 233(@250wpm)___ 195(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58365 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 292(@200wpm)___ 233(@250wpm)___ 195(@300wpm)
It did not lessen the hardness of him, not in the slightest.
On the verge of bawling, Morgaine begged, “Please…”
At her entreaty, the stranger began to produce the most beautiful music.
Never had air rumbled with such perfect warmth. From under the vivid armor across his chest, deep reverberations made the world new. The resonating noise held the power to loosen her locked muscles—Morgaine suddenly able to suck in greedy gulps of air.
Baffled, she gaped. The Alpha purred in the way the courting men of her settlement purred—the way her fat neighbor’s son, Cassius, had purred when he’d offered her flowers... but deeper... the sound so profound her body felt as if it were weightless in a vast body of water.
“Keep your eyes open, renegade.” Inundated with rich vibration, a voice rough around the edges grew remarkably smooth. As did his touch when his thumb wiped her cheeks clean of tears. “I wish to hear your name from your own lips.”
Anything, she would do anything to see her mother set free. Even the unspeakable thing her neighbor Hanna had accused her of moments before. Thick-tongued, she whispered, “Morgaine.”
The Alpha’s attention may have been centered on her, the soldier turning her chin left to right as he looked her over, but his words were for her mother. “You are very lucky, old woman, that this one is exceptionally beautiful.”
Desperate to reach her child, her mother fought the second soldier who still held her by the throat. “Leave her be. You can’t have her!”
The wild effort produced no change in the situation. The male batted her mother’s hands away as if swatting a fly and spoke to his comrade. “The girl is many years past the age she should have been collected. The Omega is most likely damaged.”
“No.” The back of the purring Alpha’s fingers tripped down Morgaine’s neck, tracing the line of flesh exposed above the open bodice of her filthy dress. He pulled her shift aside until the pink tip of her nipple came into his sight. And then he touched her there, circling secret flesh with the pad of his finger. “This one is perfect.”
Toes curling, a strange croak caught in Morgaine’s throat. She lost sight of her mother’s struggles in the corner. She forgot that she should have been pleading for mercy. She forgot her name.
When the Alpha groaned in approval and palmed the full weight of her breast, Morgaine felt the world slip away. “I... I’m dying.”
Those sad words moved her purring tormentor to reach out and catch her listing body before it hit the ground. In one sweep he hoisted her to his chest and purred all the louder. Voice unbelievably gentle, the stranger put his lips to her ear. “Come, Omega, I know what will make you feel better.”
Chapter 3
A lovely sensation of floating in cream… of safety and warmth, enveloped her body. Morgaine was wrapped in velvet reassurance—the impression so rich, so perfectly contenting, that when lashes fluttered open, she was certain she had passed into the spirit world.
Or so she thought. Lingering soreness in her shoulder began to throb with the smallest movement. Next came awareness of the dry sting of abraded palms. And her knees, her knees were stiff with scabs, joints and muscles aching.
The dead were not supposed to know pain.
A soft whimper escaped parted lips.
Blinking twice, she found her eyes were unable to see even a hand before her face.
She had gone to the dark place of suffering instead.
Fear chased away the last remnants of her false sense of security.
Engulfed in stygian darkness, cocooned in something softer than rabbit fur, Morgaine began to hyperventilate. It was more than her inability to see, it was the scent: spice, musk, salt, sweat... all decidedly male and not a single one familiar.
Alphas.
She was surrounded, locked in pitch black, and she had no idea which way to run.
The room seemed to answer the growing thump of her heart, and soft light emanated from an unknown source.
The glow grew, and the wide-eyed girl found that though the scent of many males filled the room, she was, in fact, alone.
Alone and sprawled within a cushioned pit.
Covering her body were fragments of white fur, scattered like fallen flower petals over her while she’d slept. From each pelt emanated the aroma of a different Alpha. A hundred of them, maybe more.
The fragrance was disturbingly pleasant, as was the fur’s texture, but the uncertainty of why such a thing had been done encouraged only a raw feeling of disgust. Worse still, under the soft pile, her dress and undergarments had been removed. Those scented scraps were the only thing covering her nakedness.
Should she stand, not a single piece would be large enough to cover more than one breast at a time.
That frightened her the most. Whoever put her in that cushioned hollow wanted her naked, with no recourse to indulge her modesty once she woke.