Chapter 3 The Rear Exit

Ryder's POV

The sound of the key turning in the lock makes my wolf roar inside my chest.

Every instinct I have tells me to tear Garrett apart right here. For twenty long years, I have searched for the source of Moonveil, the illegal poison used to murder my entire family.

Now I find it on the skin of the woman pressed against my chest... my fated mate... an Omega who has been kept in a drug-filled daze inside an enemy pack.

The smell of her heat is sweet and hot, filling my lungs until my teeth ache to bite her. But if Garrett opens this door and sees her like this, he will realize what she is to me.

And he will try to kill her just to rip out my heart.

"Stay behind me," I whisper, my voice heavy with Alpha power.

Rosa clings to my vest, her small hands shaking against the leather. Her heat is burning through her clothes, her body soft and wet against my thigh. It takes every bit of my control not to pin her to the wall and finish the mate bond right here.

But survival comes first.

The door swings open with a loud creak. Garrett steps into the narrow doorway, a gun in his hand, his eyes red with anger. Two of his Steel Venom men stand right behind him in the hall.

"Hand her over, Kane," Garrett demands, pointing the barrel of his gun at my chest. "She belongs to Steel Venom. You do not get to walk out of my sit-down with my property."

My wolf snaps. The gold in my eyes flares bright and hot.

"She is not your property, Reyes," I growl, taking a step forward so my broad shoulders block Rosa completely from his view. "She is not property. And if you point that gun at me for one more second, I will make you eat it."

Garrett hesitates. He can smell the strong Alpha power coming off me, but he can also smell the sweet heat leaking around the edges of my body.

His eyes narrow in suspicion.

"What did you do to her?" Garrett asks, his voice tight and angry. "Why does the hallway smell like an Omega in heat?"

He does not know. The fool has been drugging her with Moonveil so long that he did not even realize her body was hiding its own heat cycle. The moment my wolf entered the room, her body woke up.

She broke through his poison because her wolf recognized mine.

"She is going into heat because she found her mate," I tell him, keeping my voice dead cold.

Garrett's face goes completely pale. "What?"

"You heard me," I say, my voice carrying the full weight of my Alpha authority. "Pack law is clear, Reyes. A fated mate bond overrides any debt, any contract, and any territory line. Touch her, and every pack on the coast will come to tear Steel Venom apart."

Garrett's fingers tighten on his gun. He knows I am right, but he is too desperate to care. He has kept her hidden in his pack, waiting for her heat to start so he could claim her for himself. Seeing her body wake up for his deadliest enemy is driving him mad.

"Kill him!" Garrett orders his men. "Shoot them both!"

But before his enforcers can raise their weapons, I strike.

I grab Garrett by the throat with my left hand, slamming him hard into the wooden doorframe. His gun goes off, the loud bang echoing through the hall as the bullet hits the floor near my boot. I shove him back into his two men, sending all three of them crashing down the narrow hallway in a mess of boots and leather cuts.

I turn fast, scoop Rosa up into my arms before she can hit the floor, and run for the back exit of the storage hallway.

She cries out against my neck, her hot breath burning my skin. Her fingers dig into my shoulders, her sweet scent coating my clothes, my hands, my hair. My wolf is screaming at me to stop, to lay her down on the floor and claim her, but I force my legs to keep moving toward the exit.

I hit the heavy metal bar of the rear exit with my shoulder. The door flies open, letting in the cool night air of Valen Ridge.

Rain is falling outside, making the gravel of the dark alley behind the roadhouse slick. My heavy motorcycle is parked fifty feet away under the shadows of the pine trees, its dark metal frame wet with rain.

I run down the metal steps, holding Rosa tight against my chest. Her fever is rising higher by the second. She rubs her face into my neck, her lips brushing my pulse point, making my whole body go stiff with desperate need.

"Ryder..." she whispers, her voice breaking.

It is the first time she has said my name. Hearing it come from her mouth almost breaks twenty years of my strict control.

"I have you," I tell her, setting her onto the leather seat of my bike and climbing on in front of her. "Hold onto my waist. Do not let go."

She wraps her arms around my middle, burying her face into my back. Her slick is soaking through her pants, her heat pheromones turning the cold rain air into pure poison for any male within a mile.

I kick the starter. The heavy engine roars to life, vibrating through the metal frame beneath us.

Shouts break out from the alley behind us. Garrett and four of his men rush through the rear exit, guns raised, their faces twisted with rage.

"Shoot the tires!" Garrett screams.

I slam my foot into gear and twist the throttle. The back tire spins on the wet gravel, throwing mud as the bike shoots forward into the dark woods. Bullets tear through the pine trees above our heads, but I do not slow down.

We hit the main road, the cold wind whipping past us as I push the bike faster down the dark highway.

Rosa grips my waist tight, her whole body shaking against my back. But then she stiffens, and her fingers dig into my sides so hard I feel her nails through my leather vest.

"They are waiting," she gasps into my ear, her voice strange and hollow, like she is speaking in her sleep. "Not Garrett... the man with the silver ring. He is waiting at the river bridge."

I freeze, my hands tightening on the handlebars as we speed down the dark highway.

I have never told a living soul about the man with the silver ring. He is the unknown killer who led the massacre of my family twenty years ago.

"What did you say?" I demand, my voice shaking with sudden shock.

"The silver ring," she whispers, her head dropping heavily against my spine as the fever takes her completely. "He has a gun... and his ring has a skull on it..."