Faith & the Dead End Devils (Sweet Omegaverse, #8)(102)

They had my alpha. Black shadowy figures reached for me, familiar silhouettes down the hall. There wasn't enough gas or fire or smoke to keep me from reaching Bear and King.

"Don't fire!" a male voice shouted. "Honey, come here, we got y—"

A long arm stretched toward me and I snarled, grabbing and twisting it, relishing in the bark of surprised pain.

"Faith! Faith, stop!" a familiar voice called.

"Don't shoot!"

"Let her go!"

The voices and shouts layered until every noise was a threat, every figure an enemy.

"Bear!" I screamed, voice already hoarse, the world watery and red, hot fire streaming down my cheeks.

Another body, bigger than the first, grabbed me around my waist, lifting me off the ground. Iron arms were banded around my own, but my legs were free to kick, and I bit blindly at the arm to my right. My heel connected between the man's legs, and I was released with a surprise grunt. I reached for the black mask covering his face, ripped it away, and fell backward with my own force.

"Fuck, she's feral."

"Faith! Faith, get back."

"Bear! King!"

I ducked as another black-clad figure dove for me, landing hard on my knees, and crawling through the smoke.

"Eve, I swear to god, don't shoot!"

"Enough!"

My arms and legs gave out beneath me, dropping me to the hall floor like a pancake. The bark was incredible, an inarguable order to cease. Even some of my anger and fight fled me with that single word.

"Someone open a door," the woman continued, and I whined, getting ready to turn and obey when all I wanted was to reach the end of the hall.

"Faith?"

I blinked and my eyes ran with the tears from the gas.

"Faith, it's me. Adam."

Adam.

"Bear," I whined.

"Eve, quit pointing your guns at them."

Oh my god. Adam.

I sat up, flinching at the blurry figure in front of me, dressed in black like the others.

"Here," he said, reaching forward. "I've got water."

"Put the knives away," the woman ordered.

"Don't fucking bark at him," Ghost growled from near the stairs.

"Faith, it's me," Adam whispered.

"Adam." I reached for him then, and the shape of his shoulders was familiar in my hands, his voice weak and muffled.

The air was clearing, and I held still as he tipped my head back and poured water in my eyes from a bottle. It rushed over my cheeks, down my throat, cool and surprisingly calming.

"Omikron found you," I breathed.

"No. Well, yeah, a couple times. But no," Adam said, taking away the water.

He pushed the mask off his face and there he was, blurry but startlingly clear too. I knew the cut of those cheekbones because I had them too, that same dark and unruly hair. He smelled like warm vanilla and sugar.

"Oh my god. It's you." My eyes were watering again, but this time the tears were earnest, the sting harsh but welcome.

"Found you," Adam said, a wobble in the words.

Found you, kiddo. As if we'd been playing a months-long game of hide-and-seek.

I sobbed and Adam gasped, crashing into me, his arms circling my shoulders. Cookie warmth and sweetness hung in the air, his embrace strong enough to squeeze heartache out of my chest.

"You're safe now," he whispered. "I'm here, you're safe."

I wept, clinging to Adam, because it had been months and I'd lost hope of seeing him again. But the truth sat uncomfortably in my chest. I was safe. I had been safe. And I wasn't sure what Adam being here would mean for the future.





I kept checking the door of King's office. Adam was on the couch at my side, four alphas lined up in front of us.

"It's okay. You're safe," Adam whispered, his arm around my shoulder, squeezing.

I licked my lips and nodded. Bear was pacing in the bond, trying to hide his own anxiety under reassuring waves sent in my direction. They didn't work.

"I am safe—that's what I've been telling you," I said, but my voice was faint.

Eve, the slender and gorgeous female alpha standing at the center of the pack, glared down at me with her arms crossed over her chest, smelling like the air after an explosion. She was terrifying. She was the one who'd barked and made my limbs betray me.

"Is there a bond mark?" Eve asked me.

I nodded, and Adam's breath hitched at my side. "Bear's. He's the one who pulled me out of the van, took care of me, got me to see a doctor after…everything," I said to Adam, because he was easier to look at than that row of unfamiliar alphas.

"Bear?" Eve echoed, dry as the desert.

"His legal name is Courtney, and he is my alpha," I said, a bright flare of temper giving me the bravery to turn and face her again. "And I want to see him and the others."

Two of the other men looked at Eve, both wearing slight smiles. The third, a huge man with a permanent scowl and a white stripe on his short beard, glanced toward the door.

"She doesn't seem coerced and captive to me," Garrett said. Adam had introduced me to the alpha as one of his bondmates. Garrett was handsome, with bright green eyes and long hair. He was also surprisingly calm about the fact that Chance had managed to cut his arm with one of his knives, although Eve took the injury as personally as if it had happened to her.