She darted down a random causeway, winding in and out of alleys, climbing to higher terraces, her body steaming in the chilled lower region's weather. She came to a crossroads, heaved, and spat bile on the ground. Before her sat a broken bridge between two quarters, a massive, unscalable gap separating her from the nearest escape. The temptation to jump and end it all was so tempting. No more Thólos, no more Shepherd, no more falling into rapturous pieces when he fucked her, then hating herself afterwards.
But there were still the other Omegas... and she had let them down. They needed to know about the little blue pills, needed to know that Shepherd would not help them. It was that feeling alone that moved her feet again.
Claire ran for miles, ran in a crazy pattern that would make no sense to any who could smell her, ran until she vomited and fell in a pile against iron girders. Then she saw him, and he might have just been the most beautiful thing her eyes had ever beheld. A Beta, a stranger, was reaching down to help her... leading her sobbing body away from all the cold and pain.
He told her his name was Corday.Chapter 4Claire woke on an unfamiliar couch with actual sun on her face. Head aching, she sat up and looked around. The Beta's one room accommodation was small, sparse like hers, with little more than necessities and only a single, wilted, air-scrubber plant.
Corday himself was standing in the kitchen; frying eggs from the smell of it.
"Do you like coffee, Miss?"
God, she had not had access to coffee in months. Already salivating, she nodded, her green eyes so wide it made him chuckle. The young man walked over with a lopsided grin, handing her a plate and the steaming beverage. "Sorry, I don't have sugar or milk."
She couldn't care less. The mug went to her lips, Claire sipping with a contented sigh. "Thank you."
"Just eat up. When you're finished, you can shower and—not to make this awkward—but you might want to put on some of my dirty clothes to mask your scent."
After all the running, all the sweat, she reeked of Omega. His offer was extraordinarily kind, assuming he was not just cornering her like the last man had.
Reading the troubled look on the woman's face, Corday added, "I'm not going to hurt you."
Suspicious, she asked, "Why are you helping me?"
"I'm an Enforcer."
She shook her head. "All the Enforcers are dead. I saw the Interdome Broadcast; the security footage at the gates of Judicial Sector. Shepherd's contagion killed them."
There was little Dome-humans feared more than the disease that had reduced billions down to a few million in one generation. That had forced skirmishes for supplies. The Red Consumption had destroyed global culture and left life safe only under the careful management of the Domes. Knowing Thólossens had seen his brothers and sisters-in-arms die coughing up blood, knowing that a pile of unconsecrated corpses waited in a section under lockdown, knowing potential Judicial Sector survivors would have been burned alive once quarantine procedure began, drained his smile away. Corday grew sad, his face suddenly seeming so very young. "Not all of us, Miss. Some were on patrol outside the Judicial Sector before quarantine lockdown."
Her lower lip started to tremble. "My name is Claire."
"Are you okay, Claire?" Corday asked carefully, looking at a woman who showed all the reactive signs of abuse.
God, it was so nice to hear someone say her name. Whispering, she shook her head, "I'm not okay."
Skirting the couch, he sat as far from the shaken woman as the sofa would allow. With his hands on his knees and brown eyes soft, he suggested, "Tell me what happened to you."
She knew that the second she said the name Shepherd, Corday would kick her ass out on the street. She hated to lie, but she needed a shower and warm clothing to survive in the Lower Reaches.
But maybe she didn't have to lie. Maybe all she needed to do was start at the beginning. "The chem pushers are selling counterfeit heat-suppressants. They look just like the little blue pills... but they are not heat-suppressants. They're fertility drugs. They cause us to go into estrous unexpectedly, where we are unprepared and exposed."
"And this happened to you?" Corday asked, gently urging her to continue.
Claire didn't say yes or no, she didn't have to; the huge tears dripping down her cheeks were answer enough.
Realizing she was close to falling to pieces, Corday nodded and promised, "I'll look into it. Now finish your lunch." His boyish grin returned and he backed off to return to his stove, teasing, "I had to fight six Alpha females to get those eggs."
She forced a laugh at the joke, the coffee going back to her lips. But it was hard to enjoy. The unshakable paranoia that Shepherd would burst through the door at any moment made her stomach churn. Or worse yet, Corday could be lying, waiting for an Alpha he could sell her to.