Alice had often spoken to us about his son. Truthfully, the omega had talked about little else. The little bunny was his entire reason for existing. Alice lived for him—for the day he would find him again. I had lost count of how many people had been tasked with leading the little bunny to the upper level. Everything had been arranged, one way or another, to ensure he could climb. The only problem was that Alice wasn’t the only one who wanted to see that little bunny rise. Outside, things were still calm. I expected them to remain that way until next month, until our dear Jill returned.

That pissed me off. Things would be less simple once he came back, and if the viewers started craving footage of Jill and the little bunny… that had to be avoided at all costs. Until next month, he had to see only us, live only through us. Ideally, he would develop genuine affection for us—for me, Ravenne, Malik, or anyone else, so long as something bound him to our hideout, to the Greys.

Luckily, the little bunny belonged to the Fourth wave. He had been born to achieve genetic perfection, to draw attention, to captivate. The cameras were probably already trained on him from the moment he arrived. He and everyone around him would inevitably gain visibility. He had everything needed to please, and anyone could tell that he knew how to use both his physical and mental assets. There was plenty about him the audience would love.

He took after Alice in many ways. They both had beautiful, harmonious features, and yes, that was one of the defining traits of omegas, but I didn’t find the same thing in Malik. With Alice and the little bunny, it was magnified. An enchanting aura followed them wherever they went. It was in the way they fluttered their eyelids; the way they lifted those captivating eyes beneath long white lashes; the way they moved their bodies with a sensuality entirely their own.

But he was different too. Alice had always been gentle, naturally maternal. That was why he had built this hideout in the first place, so the Greys would have somewhere safe after he left. The little bunny had none of that. I sensed nothing of an omega’s maternal nature in him, the way I did in Malik. With him, it was something else. There was that imbalance, that ease with which he left corpses behind and inspired danger and caution in anyone dealing with him.

It was intoxicating.

I wanted to believe the reason for that difference was simple: he had grown up in a hostile environment and had never known anything else. His sensations, his emotions, even his nature itself had all been suppressed by the constant danger of prison. That rat hole treated prisoners like animals. Plenty of them deserved it, and I wasn’t claiming otherwise, but some—like the little bunny—had never been given a choice. Because of all that, he didn’t even know himself. Yesterday, he had truly encountered himself for the first time. After nearly twenty-one years of being repressed without his consent, his nature had come charging back.

Prison… wasn’t so different from the laboratory where the others and I had grown up. I knew my anger came from that resemblance. Nothing more, nothing less.

“Fuck… did someone trample me to death or something?”

The little bunny stretched in bed and, his body sensually draped beneath the sheet, searched for someone nearby. His mauve gaze caught mine, and his lips revealed his beautifully sharpened teeth in a smile.

“It feels like the entire prison walked all over me—literally—until I turned into a pancake beneath their feet. My whole body hurts like hell.”

“It’s the aftermath. That was your first time. Your body will gradually adapt. If you allow yourself moments of solitary pleasure or intimacy with alphas you trust, your system will get used to it.”

His hand slipped beneath the sheets, and I raised an eyebrow when I understood where that curious little thing was headed. I covered my lips with my fingers, holding back an amused laugh while his devious eyes never left mine. He knew exactly what he was doing, and it seemed our little carnal exchange yesterday had set fire to both his instincts and his loins. I leaned toward him as his foot emerged from beneath the covers and worked its way between my thighs.

I placed my hand over it and stroked him. His skin was as white as marble. He bruised divinely well. His throat and nape were proof of that.

“I’m still nice and tight down there,” he observed. “You didn’t take advantage.”

“You say that as though taking advantage of your condition was ever an option.”

He sat up, withdrawing the wandering hand from his backside. His smile faded, making the moment a little more serious.

“You never really know what the person in front of you is capable of. It’s always better to be careful, but… I didn’t feel like being wary when we were together.”

It felt as though I were facing a child who had only just discovered what his body and instincts were capable of. And in truth, that was exactly what he was.

“It won’t always be like that. Even during your heat, your body will only accept an alpha it trusts. That’s instinct, and instinct won’t offer its throat if it senses danger. Prey doesn’t willingly surrender itself.”

“I felt that too—that I wanted it. I don’t know if I’d call it trust, but it was close. I think it’s more the way you and Ravenne behave toward the others that makes me feel that way,” he explained.

It was flattering, but it also had a tendency to irritate me.

“You’ll quickly learn how to manage all of this, even your pheromones. Eventually, it becomes as natural as breathing, and—”

His bedroom door opened, but I didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. I had felt his pheromones teasing mine for a while already. Ravenne approached and leaned down to whisper something into my ear that the little bunny couldn’t hear, despite the way his curious ears practically strained toward us. The news Ravenne brought me couldn’t have been less welcome.

I removed Dante’s foot from between my thighs and set it back on the bed with a gentle pat. It might not have been the ideal moment to leave the little bunny, but something more urgent was calling us away.

“Stay here today. Your pheromones are still strong, and to make your solitary pleasures more enjoyable…”

I released my pheromones as lightly as I could while Ravenne did the same. Then, moving in unison, we removed our jackets and laid them over the little bunny. Hit full force by our combined fragrances, he arched with a long moan. His scent wrapped around us, and I inhaled deeply on instinct. He pulled our clothes against himself and buried his face in them. Ravenne placed a hand on my shoulder to draw me away, and we left the room before things became uncontrollable.

But after closing the door, we both needed a moment. One look at Ravenne was enough—the heavy breaths into which he poured every ounce of control, the tremors racing over skin already stretched to its limit, as though anyone touching him in that state might break him, and even his eyes, almost clouded by the fantasies he was trying to bury. His mask concealed none of his feelings. He was dying with desire for that little omega.

And I couldn’t say I felt any differently.

He handed me my mask, and I put it on with a laugh. Fuck, how many years had it been since our self-control had been tested this severely?

“Let’s move before his scent starts teasing us again.”

Ravenne was already several steps ahead of me.

“Delicious lavender,” I called after him with a laugh at his urgency.

He practically flew down the stairs, skipping several steps at a time. All I could do was match his pace, genuinely amused. He had been so reluctant about the little bunny’s arrival, and yes, I had asked him to make an effort, but this went far beyond anything I had ever hoped for from him! On the ground floor, I warned Malik about Dante’s condition as a precaution. He assured me he would take care of him if necessary, and I had no doubt he would. Malik had been born to care for others, in every sense of the word.

Once we left the hideout, Ravenne and I searched for the same person. We found him in the middle of the crowd—and he found us too. Before we had even reached him, he turned around, his smile as arrogant as his handsome face allowed, proudly displayed across his features. He walked toward us. Today, he was alone, but he was still wearing his prison guard uniform.

“What is a Hare doing down here?” I asked with a smile. “I think you’ve lost your way. Aren’t the lower levels beneath number four now?”

“I’d rather you just call me Red, like always. Otherwise, I might start thinking jealousy is choking you, Oren.”

Ah, that pretty face had a gift for irritating me. Red—a Hare, prison guard, number four. He had an unfortunate habit of always getting in our way.

“You see… I’ve been looking for a lost little guy for the past few days. White hair, mauve eyes, a pretty omega.”

“Sounds damn cute. Never heard of him. Ravenne?”

Ravenne gave the faintest hint of a smirk, barely perceptible to anyone who didn’t know him, then shook his head.

“An omega that pretty wouldn’t go unnoticed. Promise, if we see him, we’ll let you know!”

I pretended to leave, but Red stopped me without hesitation. His hand closed around my wrist, apparently determined not to release me. The moment he touched me, however, Ravenne grabbed him in turn, ready to break his wrist if he tried anything.

“Well, isn’t that interesting. You two smell rather good. New shower gel? I didn’t know they allowed that this far down,” Red retorted.

The urge to grab his glowing red hair and pull until it tore free from his scalp was hard to resist. Making him choke on that arrogance of his remained one of my greatest fantasies. Neither of us was fooled. He knew the little bunny was with the Greys, but he also knew he wasn’t allowed anywhere near the hideout, let alone inside it. He must have heard the rumors, and the scent clinging to us wasn’t helping, but none of that changed a damn thing.

“You and I both know you Greys were always joined at the hip with Alice, but other people up there want the kid too, and you know it. Besides, the kid and Jill are friends. If you find him before Jill or we do, who do you think he’ll choose when the time comes?”

Ah… the bastard. He’d struck a nerve.

Ravenne understood from the shift in my pheromones that playtime was over. He tore Red’s hand away from my wrist and forced him back.

“Ah! You meant Alice’s kid? I had no idea he was already here—or that he was friends with our dear Jill! I’ll be sure to invite you both to a lovely dinner so we can celebrate the good news. Now…”

I let my pheromones escape for the briefest moment. It lasted only a second, but in my condition, that was enough. More than enough, really. Red remained impassive, but his body couldn’t lie. The brief tremor in his hand gave him away.

“Get off our level.”

Red raised his hands, keeping his smile in place to save face, then stepped back and waved goodbye. He turned on his heel, but before he could finally stop being a pain in the ass, he lifted one finger.

“One last thing. One of our guys has gone missing. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”

The one who had laid his hands on Malik…

“We would never dream of offending you.”

“If it turns out it was you…”

He wiggled his fingers—a threat in its purest form, aimed directly at ours.

“Well, I don’t need to draw you a picture, Siamese twins. You already know what’s waiting for you.”

At his words, I lowered my gaze to my hands and Ravenne’s: mutilated, severed, crudely pieced back together. In the seconds that followed, as Red disappeared into the crowd, I didn’t know how to react. It was Ravenne’s pheromones that electrified me, sending a small shock through my heart and jolting me back to life. I answered by harmonizing my scent with his.

“The little bunny has to choose us. He could climb with anyone, but just the thought of leaving him with those fucking Hares makes me… Aaaah, I want to make them eat their own fingers.”