The doctor who conducted my exam was brisk and impersonal. She noted my weight loss, the dark circles under my eyes, the slight tremor in my hands that I couldn't quite control. She asked if I wanted to speak with a counselor. I said no. She wrote something on her tablet and moved on.
Finally, they brought me to the registration desk. A stack of forms waited, dense with legal language I couldn't begin to parse. Waivers of liability. Acknowledgment of risk. Consent to claiming.
The woman behind the desk watched me read. "Take your time. This is a significant decision."
I picked up the pen. Signed my name on every line they'd marked. Didn't hesitate, didn't pause, didn't let myself think about what I was agreeing to.
"Emergency contact?" she asked.
I looked at the blank line on the form. Thought about Rosa, about Eli, about the careful distance I'd maintained tokeep them safe. If something happened to me in The Chase, I couldn't risk Vernon tracing that call back to them.
"None," I said.
She raised an eyebrow but didn't push. Just typed something into her system and handed me a key card.
"Dormitory C, room 14. Dinner is served until ten. Orientation at nine." A pause. "Good luck, Mr. Grace."
I took the key card and walked away without responding.
My room was small but clean. Two beds, two desks, two narrow windows looking out at the mountains. My roommate hadn't arrived yet, which suited me fine. I set my bag on the bed closest to the door and took stock of the space with an artist's eye. Cream walls, pine furniture, industrial carpet in a shade of gray that swallowed all personality. A blank canvas designed to hold nothing but bodies in transit. The sheets smelled of industrial detergent, stiff and impersonal. The mattress creaked when I sat, cheap springs protesting even my diminished frame.
The bathroom was barely large enough to turn around in, but it had a lock on the door. That mattered more than square footage. The tile was cold under my bare feet when I tested it, the mirror above the sink actually reflective, unlike the warped metal at the bus station. I avoided meeting my own eyes.
I sat on the bed and let myself breathe for the first time in two days. Outside, voices drifted up from the courtyard. Other omegas comparing notes, making friends, pretending this was summer camp instead of an auction block with better marketing.
A couple more days until The Chase began. Seventy-two hours after that, and I would belong to someone new.
The bond mark on my neck throbbed. Vernon's claim, faded but not gone. It wouldn't disappear until a new alpha bit over it, until foreign hormones flooded my system and rewrote the chemical signature that tied me to a monster. Until then, I could still feel him sometimes. A distant pressure at the edgeof my consciousness, oily and cold. He was looking for me. He would never stop looking.
I pulled my knees up to my chest and wrapped my arms around them. Made myself small, the way Vernon had trained me to be. The way I'd sworn I would never let myself become again.
This was survival. Not sacrifice. I was choosing the lesser evil, picking my poison, playing the only card I had left.
I almost believed it.
***
Chapter 2
Min-ho
The iron had reached temperature. I could tell without checking the gauge, the same way I could tell when rain was coming or when a client was about to lowball me. Twelve years at the forge had calibrated my senses to heat and metal until they spoke to me in a language more reliable than words.
I pulled the steel from the coals and laid it against the anvil. The hammer came down in steady strokes, each impact precise, each angle calculated. A commission piece for a restaurant in Asheville. Decorative railings. Simple work, but simple work paid the bills while I waited for the projects that actually mattered.
My phone buzzed on the workbench.
I ignored it. The metal wouldn't wait for notifications. Another thirty seconds of shaping, then into the slack tub. Steam hissed and billowed around my hands as I quenched the piece. Only then did I strip off my gloves and check the screen.
A news alert. Senator Vernon Ashby's name in the headline.
My blood went cold.
I opened the article and read it twice to make sure I understood. The senator had given a statement that morning, his expression carefully calibrated for the cameras. His estranged omega, missing for over a year, had been located. Thefamily was working to facilitate a reunion. He thanked the public for their concern during this difficult time.
The words were smooth, polished, rehearsed. The words of a man who had practice making threats sound like reassurances.
I set the phone down and braced both hands against the workbench. The wood grain pressed into my palms, rough and real, an anchor against the rage building in my chest.
