Pack Darling, Part One by Lola Rock

Twelve

FINN

Our loaner omegamakes the sexiest sounds. I keep leaning into her, trying to catch a sniff, but all she smells like is Hunter’s smoke.

She might not be awakened, but when she moans, my cock fucking is. He perks up every time she licks those rosebud lips.

Lilah.

She gives me a high I haven’t felt since I raced my first Ducati or discovered wingsuits. Feeding her, sneaking brushes at her mouth, I can’t even sense the void.

She’s starlight, soft and bright.

Plus Hunter’s fucking face.

He never says shit, but I can read the asshole’s inner workings. Stop touching her, Finn. Don’t get so close. She’s not ours.

I know all this.

But I said from moment one that I wanted to play with her, and that’s what I’m going to fucking do.

If she’d showed up flirting, shaking her tail and trying to pry us away from Orion, then I would’ve just fucked with her.

Lilah’s innocent.

Which—who knew—is even more fun.

She’s hesitant, almost afraid, but why do I love it when she leans into my touch? When she relaxes, accepting the food from my hand with those sweet, sparkling eyes.

“Have another shot.” I push her the glass I didn’t down. I’m still banned from drinking. The pack claims I start too many fights.

Like I won’t start shit sober?

Lilah knocks back the mezcal with an adorable shudder, wrinkling her nose and everything.

“Slow down.” Hunter takes away the empty glass, shooting me the back off glare.

So much fun.

I offer her another wing, but she finally shakes her head. “Too full.”

“Want to dance it off?” Hunter and I were supposed to be cruising for a beta to share, but I’m not letting go of Lilah for some quick bathroom fuck.

“Dance?” Her eyes light like glittering grey stars. “Where?”

“Upstairs. Come on.” I grab her hand, but Hunter grabs my wrist.

“Feet,” he says like a fucking mama duck.

He’s so much more fun when he’s playing with me instead of against me. Tonight, I’m team Lilah.

I scoop her into a princess hold and carry her to the coatroom while Hunter mutters and settles our tab.

“Hey,” I call to the coatroom beta. “You have any lost shoes in a size...”

“Five?” Lilah asks hopefully.

“Just a sec.” She disappears under the counter, then quickly reappears with a tiny pair of silver heels. “Princess shoes for the princess.”

Lilah makes an adorable snort, eyeing the heels so hard it deepens the wrinkles in her nose.

“Let me.” I set her on the counter and step between her legs.

Her pupils dilate and her pulse speeds up. Any second, she’ll wrap her arms around my neck and her thighs around my waist, pressing her tight little body all up against mine…

Only she doesn’t.

Weird.

The girl’s not awakened, but she’s also not dead.

Women can’t love me because there’s nothing in my burned-out soul worth caring about, but I mastered the bad boy asshole thing by fifteen.

They line up to fuck.

I ease Lilah’s bandaged foot into the shoe and carefully tighten the buckles. Her toes are adorable. Like little round pearls. I tweak the smallest one.

“Finn!”she gasps my name.

Fuuuuck, that’s good.

I want to carry her everywhere, but I set her down to let her test the shoe situation. “Okay?”

“Good.” She shifts her weight back and forth. “There’s a club?”

“This way.” I tug her away before Hunter can follow.

Then I carry her upstairs. I’m no gentleman. I just want to grab her hips and feel her body pressed against mine. Lilah’s so goddamned small. I can’t help leaning in to smell her hair.

All I get is lake water and sweat. I know that’s not right.

There should be more. Maybe after she awakens?

For the first time, it’s something to look forward to.

The upstairs bouncer leaps the fuck out of my way without carding. Smart man. Lilah doesn’t notice. Now she’s the one tugging me toward the writhing dancefloor.

She dives straight into the chaos.

My kind of girl.

But when she starts to move, I lose words.

She’s boneless. She moves like the beat is in her blood, like she was born to feel herself. Sexy as fuck, even swimming in Hunter’s too-big hoodie. The hem of her borrowed dress creeps higher and higher, baring the kind of pale, silky thighs you need to spend way more than one night between.

I watch her without blinking, and I’m not the only alpha tracking this sweet piece of prey.

Darkness leeches out my vision.

When an asshole steps too close, like he deserves to touch her skin, breathe her air, I let my dominance bleed. He flinches so hard he sloshes his beer when he flees.

Every single alpha who can’t meet my gaze fucks right off, leaving Lilah alone to shake and wind.

I’m so fucking hard for her.

When the beat slows, turning raunchier, I slip behind her.

She sinks against me, so sweet, so submissively showing me the long, smooth column of her neck.

We move together, her ass grinding against me, her arms slipping down my thighs. I’m turned on as fuck, so I shouldn’t give a shit that her dance has nothing to do with me.

I never give a shit about anything.

But I need Lilah’s attention.

I grip her soft throat and tilt her chin back with my thumb. When her head bumps my chest, and she stares up at me, seeing only me, Lilah wears a smile like moonbeams. My heart gives the one full-on thump it usually saves for jumping off bridges.

Fucking weird.

“Can we dance up there?” Lilah nods toward the cage, never once fighting my grip on her throat.

“Fuck yeah we can.” A rumble rocks my chest, and I tug her into my arms, steering her to the cages and protecting her from the eyes and crowds. Everywhere Lilah’s skin touches mine is electric, alive and bright instead of the dull, nothing numbness that drives me to drink and fuck and stir shit up.

I don’t want to let her go.

Keeping her close, I cut to the front. The club girl running the line spots Lilah’s hoodie and scowls. “You can’t—”

“We can.” I dead-eye her.

She yelps, scrambling back and opening the cage door wide. “My mistake.”

Fucking right.

We climb in alone, and I shouldn’t be able to hear anything over the pounding music, but I catch Lilah’s breathy gasp when the cage lifts. Once we’re up, dangling from the ceiling just high enough to make you feel alive, she laughs, clear and bright.

Gripping the bars like it’s not her first time in a cage, Lilah drops low, arching her back and flashing that sweetly curved ass.

I want her holding onto me instead of those bars, but she doesn’t even try to move closer, just feeling the music, throwing herself into the beat like she’s begging for salvation, like the beat’s the only light in her darkness

I fucking feel you, girl.

I move behind her, caging her in, and Lilah rolls with it, rubbing up on me so good as she shakes her ass.

The bass drowns out my satisfied purr.

Where the fuck did that come from?

The sound steals my attention long enough that I spot Hunter. He’s waving off beta bitches, pacing back and forth, looking everywhere for us.

Kinda makes me cackle. I grind on my babydoll until his gaze snaps up.

What a sweet, sweet scowl.

Hunter points down and mouths something.

I cup my ear. Can’t hear you, motherfucker!

We dance a few more songs, and I’m alive, heart pumping, adrenaline roaring in my veins, heat and color, and everything until I realize Lilah isn’t moving.

She grips the bars, shaking.

“Babydoll?” I pry her hands away from the metal.

“Tired,” she murmurs, head lolling against my chest. My heartbeat levels off and I let out a breath. I was worried—

Holy fuck.

I was worried?

Me?

I haven’t worried about shit since I notched my first kill at seven years old. I wasn’t supposed to start assassination work that young, but what are you gonna do when you get kidnapped and tortured?

It was kill or be killed.

I won, and nothing seems important since.

Only a few things make me feel alive.

Bikes. Stunts. Saunas.

Killing. Clubbing. Fucking.

And Lilah motherfucking Darling.

I wave to lower our cage. As soon as the door opens, Hunter tears Lilah from my arms. “What did you do?”

“Nothing. Maybe she drank too much?” Are two shots too much? She is super tiny.

“Let’s get her home.”

I follow him to the truck.

He settles her into the back seat but yanks my collar when I start to climb in with her. “You stay.”

“Why? I want to sit with her.” She’s adorable, curling into herself, hugging Hunter’s hoodie tight. Lilah’s all the fun of vodka shots and drag racing without the hangover and jail time.

“That’s why. Since when do you get so attached so fast?”

“Since Lilah. Don’t you feel it?”

“What? The guilt?”

“No.” Guilt isn’t even a thing. “She’s special.”

“Don’t say that shit in front of Orion.”

“Fine, but she’s still special. He’ll see.” And the way Hunter keeps glancing at her through his rearview, he’s only fucking fooling himself.

Why not have fun with our new pet?

“Don’t get obsessed,” Hunter warns. “She’s temporary.”

Maybe. But she’s not vanishing.

When Lilah ends up in rotation, I’ll be first in fucking line for her heat. “It’s not like Orion doesn’t let us play.”

“With betas,” Hunter insists. “Not with omegas. And not the omega he thinks is replacing him.”

“No one’s replacing Orion.” He’s our boy and our sunshine. The whole mate, crazy heat sex thing is a fringe benefit.

When we finally pull up at the house, Atlas waits on the front porch.

I grab Lilah before Hunter can steal her again. The way she nuzzles me like a soft baby kitten keeps me from slipping into the void.

“You took her out?” Atlas growls.

“Shh.” I cup my babydoll’s ear. “You’ll wake her.”

“So fucking help me, Finn.” Atlas glances up at the sky.

Let him be a cranky shit while I take care of the pretty omega.

“We didn’t take her out. We found her on the roadside wearing next to nothing with bloody feet. She hadn’t even eaten. Didn’t Craig have the basement stocked for her?”

“She hasn’t been in the house,” Atlas says. “Just put her downstairs.”

Pack leader’s orders, I climb the front steps.

“No,” Lilah whines, all pitiful, clutching my shirt. “Back door.”

“I’d love to take your back d—”

“Dude!” Hunter elbows me in the gut.

“Fine, fine.” I stomp into the grass, taking her around back where her sad duffel bag sits alone in the dew.

I liked the idea of banishing her when she was supposed to be some slutty viper spy, but now the backyard seems too dark. The stairs are too steep if she falls. There’s not even a lock.

It’s not safe.

I climb down and find the light switch.

The downstairs is more bunker than basement, and it’s shabbier than I remember. The sheets on the nest bed are dingy grey, though fuck if I remember the last time I even looked at a sheet.

When I set Lilah down, she makes a breathy noise against my throat that gives me a 3D vision of her teeth raking my Adam’s apple. Claiming me.

My cock stands to attention, and I catch a sweet whiff of something impossible.

Caramel?

I sniff her scalp, coming up with nothing but dust and basement mold.

I unbuckle her shoes and tuck a thin blanket over her shoulders, stalling like I’m nursing the bottom of a glass.

The second I leave, I’ll crash from the temporary high Lilah injected into my veins.

I always come back down.

Hunter sets her bag at the foot of the bed, then tugs me away. “Enough.”

“I want to kiss her good night.” I’m praying a taste of her lips is enough to keep away the darkness.

“She’s not a toy.”

Isn’t she though?

I let Hunter drag me into the gym, and reality snaps back like a rubber fucking band.

The empty, yawning nothing.

I can feel the smile bleeding off my face. The color and electricity. All gone.

“Spar or sauna?” Hunter hauls me onto the mats, knowing how close I am to the edge.

Anyone else I’d kill.

The bond humming between us is the only thing that reminds me I’m not already dead.

Though fuck knows, I will be soon.