“What was that?” The omega wrenched her hand from his, black eyes dilated with shock.
The image vanished from his mind and the air in front of him.
He found his voice. “I guess your gift exists after all.”
Enhanced sight of the past and the ability to project it so others could see it, too. The omega girl had a powerful gift.
They stared at one another.
Raw, blistering shock vibrated between them.
His fury came next. He didn’t like feeling exposed. He hated anyone knowing his doubts and fears, her most of all.
“I have never done anything like that before.” Her body swayed as if she might fall. “I have no idea why it happened now.”
He did.
He glanced down at his wrist. Faint golden lines that hadn’t been there before were beginning to circle his wrist like a band. If he turned the omega’s hand over, he’d find the same thing.
He’d only heard of this happening once in his entire planet’s history, but there it was. Proof.
No wonder he felt such a connection to the girl.
If they remained together, the bands forming on her wrists would darken and become full cuffs. A band would appear around her throat like a collar as well. If she did not remain in his presence, the marks would disappear. The same went for the bands at his wrist.
“I-I am sorry for what my father did to yours, Nikolai Skolov.”
Thanks to her gift, she knew his name and so many secrets he hadn’t wanted anyone to learn. The brush of her sympathy was like sandpaper against his skin. “You’ll make it up to me.”
Her winged eyebrows shot upward. “How?”
“That gift of yours is going to be useful in all sorts of ways.”
She seemed shocked, then offended, and then scared. “You’re like them . . . Oh gods, once they know . . .” She looked terrified. “There will be no chance of escape.”
He couldn’t give her false hope. Nor did he want to. “You cannot run from what you are.”
Defiance flared once more. “I can try. I am more than a vessel to be used. I don’t want to become like my mother, or yours.”
He growled low. “Accept. Submit. That is the omega way.”
“Not this omega.”
“Dahlia Lundin. Your behavior has been reported.” The beta was back, her stare glittering with smug pleasure. “You will both pay now.”
His omega’s anger turned to fear for him. “You should run.”
“I do not run.”
Her gaze shifted from the door to him and back again. “You will not survive another beating.”
“You’d be surprised what I can endure.”
But her worry for him only grew. She really was too nice for her own good.
“Here.” She pulled something from over her neck and pressed it into his palm. “Take this. Hide it somewhere safe.”
A rope of gems glittered in his palm.
“No.” He pushed it back toward her. He had no interest in more of her pity.
“Please.” She backed up a step, her body trembling, and he knew she was using all her strength to fight the compulsion to obey without question. “Please, Alpha.” The title soothed him, as he suspected she knew it would. “The necklace will be of no use to me where I am going, but for you . . . . You can use it to help with the care of your siblings.” She blushed, knowing full well she only knew that information because of her gift. “And, maybe, if I haven’t escaped on my own by then, you could use it to keep your promise and find me.”
Count on it, omega.
“Fire!”
Olan stumbled into the front hall, his panicked prime omega clinging to him. Both were coughing and covered in ash. The prime omega’s usually perfect hair was tilted to the side while Olan’s shirt was torn, his skin smeared with soot and strange blackish-red streaks across his chest and arm. “The back of the building is in flames.”
Nikolai’s gaze snapped down the hall.
It couldn’t be. Fires were rare on the ice planet, but when they happened, it was bad.
The non-native timber used for building was not meant for this climate. Its brittle, dry state was akin to kindling, and the brutal winds only made matters worse.
The stench of smoke singed Nikolai’s nostrils.
“It’s moving fast,” roared the Lundin head. “Everyone out!”
Why the fuck did Olan have blood on his skin? Even through the smoke and soot, Nikolai could scent it.
And identify it as familiar.
His chest went tight.
“It’s going to blow.” Olan stumbled toward the front door, shoving past them, a coward revealed.
Right behind him was a panicked crowd of Alpha soldiers and beta servants. A stampede.
Nikolai grabbed his omega and flattened them against the wall.
More servants and soldiers followed.
But not his mother.
Not the twins, either.
“We have to get out of here.” The terror in the girl’s voice decided him.
“Go!” He pushed her toward the exit, but instead of following, he darted in the opposite direction, down the hallway toward the family’s private wing and the omega quarters. He ran past a few beta servants who were coughing as they hurried by.
Thick smoke made it hard to see.
He slammed into something and then heard the shriek as a body hit the wall and then toppled downward. Even at his young age, Nikolai was still already more solid than any beta.
With a curse, he reached out a hand, but the male beta servant was already bounding up, his face covered in soot, his eyes full of panic. “They’re dead! It’s too late for them. Save yourself!”
The servant darted by.
No! There was still time.
From outside, so faint he could barely hear it over the roar of the flames, he caught the sound of the omega girl screaming his name. The panic in her voice pulled at him, but he fought it. He had another priority now.
Determination growing, Nikolai sprinted deeper into the smoke and ash, rushing down the hall toward the sleeping quarters, choking and gagging until he saw it . . . the wall of flames at Naytalia’s door.
His stomach heaved.
Holding up his forearms to his face, he peered past the flickering orange, purple, and red, searching for movement, listening for cries of help.
Nothing.
All too soon it was clear why.
Through the thick smoke and flames, he could see Naytalia’s sightless eyes, her burning body less than three arms’ lengths from a door she never reached. Flames devoured her hair, clothes, and skin, erasing who she’d once been, but not yet enough to hide the gaping blaster hole in the middle of her belly. Just behind her was the crime boss Ghal Kuril. Two blasts in his chest and stomach burned just as fast as he lay half on his belly, half on his side, as if he’d been trying to turn over when he died.
It wasn’t fire that had killed them, but a laser.
No wonder that servant had said they were beyond help.
Angry flames at the far end of the room licked their way up the sides of the cradle where Naytalia had put the twins to sleep, the bedding and the wood ablaze.
Nothing could survive that.
Pain crippled Nikolai, slamming him to his knees, making it impossible to breathe.
The twins were dead.
Killed by the same bastard who’d murdered Naytalia and Kuril and attempted to cover up the evidence with fire.