CHAPTER 2: THE MONSTER'S SCENT
1071 Words
The rain felt like needles against my face, but the cold was the only
thing keeping me conscious.
I leaned my head back against the rusted iron gate, listening to the
echoing splash of her boots as she fled down the alleyway. She ran
like a deer—fast, terrified, and desperate. But she was entirely
clumsy in her panic. She tripped over a discarded crate, recovered her
balance with a sharp gasp, and vanished around the corner of the brick
building.
Even after her footsteps faded into the ambient hum of the city, her
scent remained.
It hung in the damp midnight air, heavy and intoxicating. It cut
cleanly through the bitter stench of the garbage dumps, the metallic
tang of my own blood, and the ozone of the thunderstorm. Sweet citrus
and fresh rain. It was a scent that shouldn't exist in a place as
filthy and forgotten as the docks. It was a scent that belonged to a
myth.
An Omega. A real, biological Omega. Hiding right under my nose,
disguised as a common, dirt-poor Beta courier.
A low, involuntary growl rattled deep within my chest. My inner Alpha
slammed against its cage, demanding that I get up, chase her down, and
sink my teeth into her neck before any other male smelled what I had
just smelled. But my body betrayed me. The silver-tipped bullets the
Ivanov syndicate had pumped into my torso were laced with wolfsbane
suppressants. The poison was doing its job, turning my muscles to lead
and making my vision blur at the edges.
"f*****g cowards," I spat, my voice a ragged whisper.
The ambush had been clean. Too clean. The Ivanov’s knew exactly which
route I was taking back from the docks. They knew I only had three
bodyguards with me. Someone inside my own pack had sold me out. They
thought three bullets to the chest would be enough to end the Volkov
lineage.
They were wrong. I was too angry to die. And now, I had a reason to
live that transcended mafia politics.
Headlights cut through the darkness of the main street, splashing
yellow beams across the wet brick walls. Tires screeched against the
asphalt as two black armoured SUVs swerved into the mouth of the
alley. The doors flew open, and six men scrambled out, their heavy
tactical boots splashing loudly in the puddles.
"Pakman!"
It was Ilya, my second-in-command. His face was pale, his usual calm
demeanour completely shattered as he sprinted toward me, a heavy
submachine gun gripped tightly in his hands. He dropped to his knees
in the mud beside me, his eyes sweeping over the massive pool of blood
collecting around my thighs.
"Sir, we got delayed by a secondary blockade on Fourth Street. We came
as fast as we could," Ilya said, his voice tight with panic. He
reached out to lift me, but I grabbed his jacket collar with whatever
strength I had left, hauling him down until his face was inches from
mine.
"The perimeter," I rasped, coughing up a mouthful of copper-tasting
blood. "Did you lock it down?"
"The entire grid is sealed, boss. No one gets in or out of the dock
district without my men checking their IDs. We're hunting the Ivanov
shooters right now."
"Forget the shooters," I growled, my fingers tightening in his lapels
until the fabric groaned. "There was a girl. Five minutes ago. She ran
south, toward the old warehouses."
Ilya blinked, completely thrown off. "A girl, sir? Was she with the
ambush team?"
"No," I barked, a sharp pain flaring in my lungs as I forced myself to
sit up straighter. "She patched me up. She’s a courier from The Red
Velvet. Small. Brown eyes. Heavy dark coat. She’s using high-grade,
black-market chemical suppressants to mask her biology. She smells
like a Beta to the untrained eye, but she isn't."
Ilya’s brow furrowed. He leaned in, his nose twitching slightly as he
caught the residual air around my coat. The moment the faint trace of
citrus hit his senses, his eyes went wide with realization. As a Beta
himself, he couldn't feel the primal pull of a mate, but he knew the
political value of what I was describing. An unclaimed Omega in our
territory was a nuclear weapon. If a rival syndicate captured her,
they could breed an entire generation of pure-blood Alphas to
challenge my throne.
"An Omega... here?" Ilya whispered, his voice hushed with awe. "Are
you certain, Pakman?"
"My wolf doesn't lie, Ilya," I snarled, releasing his collar and
pushing him away. "She triggered my claiming response through three
layers of wolfsbane. I marked her scent. I will know it until the day
I die. Find her. I want her name, her address, her family
history—everything. Do not harm her. If a single one of your men puts
a rough hand on her, I will skin them alive in the courtyard. Do you
understand me?"
"Crystal clear, sir," Ilya said, turning to the soldiers behind him.
"Get the medical kit from the truck! Prepare the trauma bay at the
compound! Move, you useless bastards!"
Two soldiers hoisted me up by my arms. The pain was blinding, a
white-hot spike that nearly made me black out, but I kept my eyes
open, staring down the dark corridor where she had disappeared.
She had hit my wound to escape me. The little thing had fire in her.
She thought she could hide in a city of three million people, but she
didn't realize how the mafia operated. Every security camera, every
street vendor, every drug dealer, and every crooked cop on the payroll
belonged to me. I owned the air she breathed.
As they loaded me into the back of the armoured SUV, the leather seats
cold against my bleeding back, I closed my eyes and let her scent fill
my mind.
Eva.
I didn't know her name yet, but I knew her soul. She had saved my
life, and in our world, a blood debt could only be repaid with total
surrender. She was running from a monster, but she was going to learn
very quickly that the monster was the only thing standing between her
and a world that wanted to tear her apart.
"Run all you want, little bird," I whispered into the dark interior of
the car as the engine roared to life. "You're already mine."
- Writer
