"Wait," Isme cut him off. "I'm an alpha. Maybe I can help you."

The omega paused at that, a beat too long in which Isme almost said something to break up the pause. "I don't believe you," hissed Matthias. "No alpha would work a job like that. With humans."

He hung up again. Isme cursed. He knew he should dial again but all of his alpha instincts were screaming at him to do the stupid, reckless thing. The instincts that before, he'd just thought were borne from experience, from being good at his job, good in the field. His partner stared at him, judgment flashing in her eyes.

"Don't do it, Isme. Follow protocol."

"Sorry, I just can't this time. Sorry, Carmen."

"Isme. This isn't the way we do things."

He ignored her and walked quickly toward the front entrance. Police milled around Carmen and his radio buzzed with alarmed questions. Pushing open the door, a bell announcing his entrance startled him. He drew his gun. An omega spun toward him, carrying only a long hunting knife. His yellow eyes glittered, not unlike Jonah's, but with more ochre in them. There were three dead bodies at his feet, blood everywhere. His breath was ragged. His gaze tore into Isme's face. "You weren't lying." He choked back the words. "But you're different, somehow."

He raised the bloody knife and Isme pointed his gun straight for his skull. But he was only raising his arms in supplication. He sniffed the air, his nostrils quivering.

"You smell weird," he said. "Why did they send an unmated alpha to me?"

"They? What do you mean by they?"

"The Council," said the omega. "They're coming, aren't they?" The man faltered. His hair was long, tied in a ponytail. His frame was bony and slender. He wore a plaid shirt and drawstring pants that wore him. He reeked of something awful. Nothing like Jonah's ocean breeze-cinnamon-home smell. Something putrid. Like something had died.

"Why would they be coming?" asked Isme, still with his hands on the gun, his elbows straight.

"I killed my mate," sniffed the omega, but he didn't seem sad about it. He raised his chin. "Fucker had it coming. He had his fucking knot in me for ten hours straight. Got some kind of sick perversion out of torturing me. Now that fucker can't hurt anyone else."

"I'm sorry that happened to you," said Isme. "It's not right how omegas are treated. What did these people do to you?" He nodded to indicate the corpses on the ground.

"They got in the way," said the omega. "They were just there. I was trying to make it stop."

Isme didn't ask what he was talking about, this time. He felt they understood each other about what "it" was. "I cut myself sometimes," he said, his voice quiet, knowing he could be heard over the radios. "I want to make it stop, too."

"You won't make it stop until you make him your mate," the omega said, his voice small too. "Maybe your omega is a nice one."

Isme snorted at that. "I don't think the bond is very nice," he said. Red and blue lights pulsed reflections in the window behind him. "It's not love if it's forced."

"The bond doesn't force anyone to do anything they don't want to do," said the omega, still holding the knife, his shoulders shaking. Isme spotted an Asian woman with cropped hair and a dress with a sweetheart neckline looking at them from between shelves of canned peas. "People force themselves on each other. It's people who are corrupt, not the bond."

"Why don't you put the knife down, Matthias?" he said. "And we can talk Council ethics in a better place. A quiet place. Where we don't have to hurt anyone else."

Obsidian HeatOnde histórias criam vida. Descubra agora