Chapter Seventeen

Kara rubbed her eyes. While living with three alphas had its perks, two being the delicious soreness between her legs and the way her pseudo-heat hormones hadn’t made a peep, she needed to get to bed earlier.

The night before, she’d taken one after the other, tasting and enjoying each alpha in their own way. She’d ridden Damon on the bed, his large hands gripping her waist, his surrender sweet. She’d sucked Reese until he’d come, his hand wrapped in her hair. Cullen had gone last, since he’d seemed to enjoy the show. He’d put her on all fours, shoving her chest to the bed and fucking her with wild and untamed thrusts.

She’d savored every touch, every caress the three offered. How could something feel so good? So right? How could she so quickly lose herself to it all?

In fact, at one point, she’d realized her eyes had opened. She’d met Reese’s gaze as he’d pressed his cock deep into her mouth. The moment had terrified her, the risk of a connection there, yet she hadn’t broken it. She’d stared into his hazel eyes with a dangerous openness, as though he could see deep into her.

Just sex. She’d repeated it to herself like a mantra, but when she’d curled up against the alphas, when their scents and heat had surrounded her, she’d questioned if it was true at all.

She was a good liar, after all. Was she just fooling herself?

All three slept soundly, with only Cullen rousing when she’d left the bed. She’d given him a sweet kiss and whispered that she was going for a run. A frown had said he didn’t like the idea, but maybe he knew that the more he tried to push her, the more she’d push back.

That was how it worked. If he said no, she’d damn well do it.

Smart or not, it was her.

So when he’d lain back down, Kara had pulled on a workout outfit and headed downstairs.

She didn’t really plan on running. Instead, the familiar sounds of the city lulled her to comfort. The whir of traffic down the street, the bustle of people as they went to their jobs, as they dropped their kids off, as they did all those normal things, helped her become just another one of them.

She wasn’t broken or different or confused. Just another nobody heading out for their day.

Just what she wanted. Maybe that was part of what the alphas offered her, a feeling of being…normal. When they touched her, it wasn’t as a broken thing. It wasn’t as a thief who couldn’t fill the roles she was born to fill. Instead, they touched her like she was a woman they desired. That alone was intoxicating in an entirely too dangerous way.

She’d lost so much before. Could she lose them? Could she walk away now that she knew how it felt to be wanted?

She mused as she walked street after street. Even when her feet ached, she pushed as though some great epiphany would come to her if only she went a little farther.

She even allowed herself, as time drifted on, to imagine where things could go in some fantasy where it could work. Not that she got a clear idea. She wouldn’t stop her job, and they didn’t seem likely to let her continue. Let me? Like they could stop me. Yet, in the space between those clear obstacles, she saw Damon chuckling at her jokes, that almost shy way he smiled as he pushed up his glasses. She saw Reese’s laugh and his mischievous grin. She saw Cullen’s heated gaze, the way he wanted her with a primal need.

If only the world could stop on those moments in between, when the rest of the shit didn’t seem so insurmountable.

Kara fell so deep into the safety of her anonymity that she ignored everything around her. A hood pulled up over her head should hide her identity in the event people were looking for her—though she was walking random streets, not going anywhere she might be recognized.

The city was large, easy to get lost in if a person wanted to, and she really wanted to.

She crossed the street, staying in the crosswalk as the little symbol signaled her turn. The soft pockets of her sweater kept her hands warm against the early morning chill.

Her body went tense. It took a moment longer than it should have for her to identify the threat she’d seen but hadn’t recognized.

At the other side of the crosswalk stood three men, and the one at the front was the one she focused on. The man from her apartment, the one who had escaped the trap at the safehouse. Persistent, isn’t he?

He opened his coat slightly, the threat obvious with the holster there.

Would he really consider opening fire on a crowded street?

Kara doubted it, but doubt wasn’t certainty.

She swallowed hard as she ran through her options. There were only three of them there, so where were the rest of their buddies? Behind her, probably, given how her days had gone lately.

Getting within grabbing distance would be a very bad choice. Kara had experienced once already how apt that man was at close quarters, and she doubted her luck would hold out.

Between forward or backward, backward seemed the obvious choice. Kara bolted back without looking, wanting to cross as much distance as possible and use her speed as an asset.

It proved a mistake, however, when she went back fast enough to put her in front of a car making a right who hadn’t expected her to move. The bumper of the large truck hit her, and she rolled onto the hood. She’d love to say it was a graceful and purposeful move, but that would be too big a lie even for her.

Instead, pain exploded on the side the car struck and after a quick roll on the hood—where at least the driver had the decency to hit his brakes—Kara went off the truck and slammed into the ground. When her head hit, the crunch it made was sickening even to her.

Everything was blurry as she lifted her head to see the man across the street. He took a step toward her before people swamped her, hands checking her, voices telling her not to move.

The man’s lips pressed together in a furious line. She saw him move away a moment before everything faded to blackness.