Shivering, I sit up and look around. The room they shoved me in last night is half the size of the one I had back home—which wouldn’t be a problem if it had anything in it besides a twin-sized mattress.. It’s not a proper nest. I was informed that I have to “earn” it.
I have to earn my fucking nest. Not even my parents deprived me of anest.
My eyes catch on the alarm clock next to the bed. Fuck. It’s six seventeen.
I should have been in Starbrook City by now. With Teddy. Instead, I’m scrambling off the mattress in last night’s dress, wishing I could forget my memories from the last twelve hours.
“As our omega, we expect you to make us breakfast every morning,” Kellan says, his hands tight on the steering wheel as he drives me away from one jail to another. The car is flooded with a mix of their scents, harsh, oppressive, and suffocating. A smell like cigarette smoke, a metallic tang, and something else that makes my eyes water. “We’ll be at work during lunch hours, so you’re on your own for that, but we have a chef come cook usdinner.”
Swallowing, I nod. “I understand.”
Jasper smirks, his hand tightening on my knee. I have a brief flash in my mind of slapping it away, but just as quickly it dissipates, and I give a weak smile that doesn’t reach my eyes.
“That means six-thirty sharp,” he adds. “Victor has insisted we give you the night to yourself, but starting tomorrow, one of us will be sleeping in the bed with you each night.”
At least one of them seems to care how hard this is for me.
But…they’ll be sleeping with me? They have to know that I’m a virgin. In fact, despite the way it makes my stomach turn, I have no choice but to acknowledge that it was probably a huge selling point.
Grateful that I have another twenty-four hours to try to convince them that maybe I just don’t have a vagina, I glance at Victor, who won’t meet my eyes. “Thank you.”
Victor snorts. “Don’t thank me, Freckles.” The nickname isn’t affectionate. Just condescending. “I just don’t want to sleep on a bare mattress tonight.”
My heart sinks even further. “A…a bare mattress?”
“Right,” Kellan sighs, raking a hand through his hair, “we’ve heard you’ve been rather troublesome, and we thought we’d try a new…training technique.”
I’ve apparently become a parrot. “Training?”
Jasper’s grip becomes painful, his fingers digging into the flesh of my skin. I choke down my yelp. “For every task you do correctly, you’ll get to pick one nesting item from what you brought with you. For every screw up, you’ll get one taken away. I think that sounds fair, don’t you?”
No. No it doesn’t sound fair. It sounds mean, and cruel, and against every “how to care for your omega” book alphas can buy, but when I look up and see the hard glint in Kellan’s eyes through the rearview mirror, I bite my tongue.
I can do this. I survived twenty-one years in a home with bullies, I can manage a little longer before I find a way to escape.
“The house needs to be cleaned too,” Victor adds, still staring out the window. “I prefer to have my laundry done daily, and there’s a very specific way my bed needs to be made.”
“I understand,” I say quietly.
“I think we can have a good relationship, Wren.” Kellan’s tone is all business. “As long as you follow the rules, everything will run smoothly.”
I hope I don’t catch hell for being in last night’s dress and not dressed properly. My fingers smooth through my hair in an attempt to look presentable as I run down the stairs.
When I had asked for my suitcase, I was told that I would get it back once they’d gone through it.
Once they’d removed any clothing they deemed offensive.
I spent half the night crying myself to sleep because my pajamas, the only vaguely comfortable clothes my mother would let me buy, were thrown away.
“Our omega sleeps nude,” Jasper had said, a cruel glint in his eye.
I slide into the kitchen, fuzzy socks on my feet, and rush to throw something together. Thank fuck Freida taught me how to make a few basic staples when I was younger. Mother never taught me anything—I’m not suresheeven knows how.
The pan sizzles as I crack six eggs, adding cheese to make a scramble. Toast is in the toaster, and bacon is crackling on the stove.
By the time Kellan, Jasper, and Victor come downstairs, I’m pretty proud of my little feast laid out on the table, complete with silverware laid out nice and tidy.
I stand, my hands clasped in front of me while they pull out their chairs and sit down at the table.
