Taming the Broken Playboy Alpha

Clamping my palms to my ears failed to still the din that “Camila Duarte!” The piercing voice slit the air. A tornado of razor-sharp shards sandblasted my cheek, laying my flesh open to a blazing white-hot pain. The instant I began to inhale, something launched itself at me. A heavy ceramic vase—large and spinning—barrelled toward my head. I ducked. The blow collapsing against the wall behind me hurled a shower of dazzling splinters, as needle-sharp as glass. Jerking to a standing My elder sister issued the command that I remember. If she so much as heard a hushed whimper, she’d only smile. Every lung-searing intake of breath rattled across her chest. A scent so savage slipped into my nostrils. As I spun about, the iron I’d set on her favourite blouse lay there, blackening a ghastly hole neatly through the fabric. Smoke. I yanked the plug from the socket and whirled about. Of course she had gone wild. Her golden-brown eyes—magnifying my own—flared with a blaze hotter than the iron. Still her gaze was unwavering, unsympathetic, and unremitting. I barrelled into the dining room. My sister. I sprang aside, squeezing through her hold by the slimmest of margins. She lunged. With every footfall that echoed across the tiles, a scalding slap echoed. She bellowed, “Mamá!” and the reverberation coursed the length of the hallway. Still trailing only halfway across the room, I elbowed my way into the dining space, where I cringed on alighting upon the spread—four cereal bowls lined up next to one another, three set beside my brothers. The moment I passed, she grew ready to fling her bowls to the floor. Assuredly keep those eyes under unremitting watch, you loathsome mongrel. That choking disgrace rested at my shoulder. I said nothing. I ran only. I couldn’t. I glided by the table, glided between the hallway’s walls, slid through the creaky old wooden door, then slid further down the steep staircase. As soon as my first foot touched the floor, it drove my chest still deeper, and before I knew it, I was standing within the cellar. Today—right this very day—Camila, you are dead! I paused for only a breath. Her cry rolled down the stairs, slamming me with far more force than any of her thundering footsteps ever could. I was nowhere near safe. They lumped me into the lowest category of scum. Not here. Not anywhere. They would never be able to press me again to their heel. Not while I was an Omega. The beat of my heart beat more frantically. Mistake. Burden. The frail one in a haughty Beta household. I once scanned the cellar, and my eyes stopped when they met the antique dryer crammed into the corner. Not today. I watched the wasteland of seconds creep past, inch by inch. I hurled my body forward, snapped it from its base, and laid bare the narrow vent cloaked there beneath. The lone corridor to my liberty. Twisting my limbs into the gap, I glided my kneecaps along the rough stone floor. Even so, many years earlier I had shoved my way through that very passage. The forest “draped” me in glistening cool. Pressing my shoulder against the boulder barring the tunnel’s exit, a stream of light rushed in. Vengeance hammered my Omega into being, and this very day it will no longer k****e their hatred. Fresh air. I tumbled into the open world. A faint shudder coursed from my lungs, and beside me Alma stirred, rising prepared to surge. The softest of smiles caressed my cheek with the gentlest of breezes. Today. Now is the time for me to put away my cowering. Boundaries be gone. Today I would reforge myself into an Alpha. The wizard had promised. Since the very first morning, every day of my life has unfurled. Perching along the forest canopy and letting the leaves slip by, I slid forward, my soles brushing the soil scarcely above a breath’s breath. Every leap landed me that much nearer to the instant the world would change. Soon I stood within the clearing on the hill. I cast my eyes to the ground, and, rising ever higher before me, the academy—Laguna Blanca Academy—made its ascent. Gardens that unspooled into tales threaded their way through the pack. Tall gates. Proud towers. It was reserved exclusively for Alphas and the progeny of power. A domain I had no claim to even dream of. Still I dreamed. Framed by a shadow lingering in the wake of my footsteps, am I moving through life single-mindedly? From behind came a rustling. My muscles locked. An overpowering surge of long-dormant anticipation ricocheted through my voice. Within moments, the leaves brushed past, and I inhaled, uncoiling as the old man materialised before me. Behind him, scarcely audible, a soft “You’re here” slipped into the air, while he kept his hands clinging to his back. I would never let this pass me by for any reason. “Of course. He seemed to have been hurled forth into the present from an era long past. The ragged robes that had never left his shoulders still drifted down his back. I had never met a being whose stare, whatever charge it had upon me, was so deep and penetrating. Do you draw close? Mysterious. Strange. Dangerous. A timid, unselfconscious grin slipping into a serene tone of serenity itself drifted across his lips. A squeeze of anxiety clamped my throat in a vise. That oath you uttered to yourself. He slipped his hand beneath his robe and came forth with a small glass vial. Inside the vial, a rainbow blaze surged—red, gold, green, and blue—as though a captured sun blazed behind the water. I lurch toward it only to have him yank it away. One spark after another leapt into being beneath the weight of his menacing stare and died, and I remained alert for that slender thread of guile. You swore that you would make me an Alpha. Take the vial and your wish will come true. He held it out to me, and in a heartbeat my patience shattered. “I did. You never divulged what you would expect in exchange. The corners of his mouth pulled wider still. The pit of my stomach dropped. A fair bargain stands as a fair bargain. Only one modest favour. That will endure as the single condition I will ever exact from you. Soon you will understand. Crèche-sized vial in hand, my fingers quivering in a clench, I set the vial before the holy reliquary as an homage to its rightful unification. That refined, silvery grace shimmering across his smile sent a soft ripple slithering past me before I could grasp it, coupled with even the faintest hint of deception. He cast the vial in my direction. Bought teetering on the edge of my quivering grasp, the vial—almost no more than a pinch’s worth of the oak-boy’s essence—made my heart beat with sacred reverence as I drew closer to the sacred reliquary, captivated by its perfect unification. For now, drink. Am I strong enough to meet that dread peril face to face? Even so, obey my command,” he hissed, his voice turned to icy shards. A trap. Only one favour. Only certainty. A taut knot twisted itself into my stomach. The Moon Goddess shows no leniency to those who disturb her design.” “Perfect.” The peril squarely falls upon—or within—myself. I held the vial to my palm in a fisted grip. Even so, the reverberation of my sister’s screams exploded inside my head. This is forbidden. I gasped in a sudden breath and raked the clearing—he was gone. I froze. Even so, the grip of my all-consuming desperation tightened so strongly that not an iota of fear could ever slip away. The mocking smirks of my brothers. He appraised me for several seconds, then offered a terse, curt nod. Perhaps, unerringly, I am the fool. The beatings. They spat the word like venom—Omega. I twisted the cap off and gulped the liquid down in a single savage gulp. The fluid was horribly foul, burning and corrosive. I tore the vial from my grasp so savagely that it rocked on the very edge of spillage, and then I gulped down the remainder in a savage swallow. His form dissolved into a blur and was gone. Thus I waited. Weird. An even-keeled, incessant calling pulled me into its path where I stood, utterly without fault. Branches groaned, the grass slipped, and from nearby a voice called to me. A feral blast of wind howled, whirling into the clearing. I burst loose, scooping in not so much as a single breath. I inched ever closer to the gates. Nothing. No pain. No power. Still just me. I crashed down the slope, vaulted across the fields, and with every step my speed surpassed the one that had come before. Advancing into the very marrow of my rib cage, my wolf’s claws dug in, urging me toward the shift—but I held her back. Bare-skinned, with no strategy. I tamped my chin against the iron bars and Toward the academy. Imposing, majestic black iron. Rawing my ribcage, the thunder of my heartbeat roared so loud it reverberated like a drum. I’d never drawn this near before. Everything before me represented every yearning I had held for years. Not now. Gardens throbbing with brilliant colour. A fountain stood, its wolf head spewing water from yawning jaws. I cast aside my stare and leaned into the soothing waste the tree beside me radiated. If anyone should find me scrutinising property that isn’t mine… Borrowed sanity would vanish in an instant, as unforgiving consequences closed in. The pounding cadence of my pulse beat in my ears. He upturned his chin—our eyes met. Hedges trimmed to flawless lines. The footsteps grew still. A boy was there, tall, with his shoulders squared. Footsteps. He lifted his eyes to the wristwatch, and the irritation carved its way into his features. His eyes stripped the truth bare: within them, it forbade sense. Eyes locked. Out of the depths of his gaze, mischief rose in tangible shape. I leaned out. And froze. Keen and icy. I ceased to breathe. At that instant, it passed from my remembrance what my own name actually is. Hair clustered in a tangled knot at his neck, as though he gave it no attention. Grey. As the drumbeat of my steps echoed through my body—taut flesh cracking between shredded bones, each crash of a cardiac beat—even Alma returned that word to my ears. He let out a drawn-out sigh, looked up toward the heavens, and turned his back, answering the summons with a bored voice. I twisted round and ran. Couldn’t move. The spell disintegrated. Branches raked my flesh and roots tightened around my toes; still, I pushed on. Lips that curved as if he knew he was untouchable. Every tendon in my limbs—each bone, every pulse of my heart, even Alma—voiced the same word as I ran. Still, as every step moved me further from him, still another shard of me was wrenched away. Yet with each stride that brought me ever deeper from him, a new sliver of myselfwas lopped away. Even as I kept moving, each muscle filament—each bone, every throb of my heart, even Alma—breathed the same word to me. Each thrust of my foot, every tendon in my limbs—cracked bone and pulsing heartbeat alike—even Alma muttered the same word over and over. Still racing, every fibre of my flesh—each bone, every pulse of my heart, even Alma—likewise murmured that single word. With every footstep, every taut muscle in my limbs—the splinters of every bone, the pulsing of every heartbeat—even Alma—repeated the word in my ear. Go back. Back to the boy with grey eyes.