Make The Alpha Pay

The scream that tears from my throat doesn't sound human. It's something primal, raw, the sound of a world ending in real time.

"Asher!"

I'm running before my mind catches up, my bare feet slapping against the wet asphalt. The summer storm that had been threatening all evening finally broke just as I heard the screech of tires, the sickening crunch of metal meeting flesh. Now the rain mixes with something darker on the road.

My mate lies twisted on the pavement like a broken doll, his carpenter's hands—hands that built our daughter's treehouse, that traced my face in the morning light—now still and wrong.

Blood pools beneath his head, reflecting the streetlight in a way that makes my stomach lurch.

"No, no, no." The words tumble out as I drop to my knees beside him, my hands hovering over his body, afraid to touch, afraid not to. His chest rises and falls in shallow, ragged breaths.

Alive. He's alive.

The acrid smell of burnt rubber and engine coolant fills the air, mixed with the metallic tang of blood and something else—expensive cologne.

My head snaps up toward the sleek black sports car that sits like a predator twenty feet away, its front end crumpled, headlight shattered.

Alpha Grayson Cross sits behind the wheel, and my heart stops for an entirely different reason.

He's not getting out. He's not running to help. He's sitting there, perfectly composed, his phone pressed to his ear as if this is nothing more than a minor inconvenience.

"Get my lawyer," his voice cuts through the rain and my panic, sharp and commanding. "There's been a... complication."

Complication.

My mate is dying on the asphalt, and he calls it a complication.

I can see him clearly through the spider-webbed windshield. His dark hair is perfectly styled despite the crash, his expensive suit unmarked. There's no blood on him, no sign of distress. Just cold calculation as he speaks into his phone.

"I don't care what time it is, Marcus. Get down here now. And call Judge Elsworth—tell him I need a favor."

Judge Elsworth. Even through my terror, the name registers. The same judge who dismissed the Hendricks family's case against the Alpha last year when their son was beaten by Grayson's security team.

Asher's breathing grows more labored, and I finally touch him, my hands shaking as I stroke his face.

"Stay with me," I whisper. "Please, Asher, stay with me. June needs you. I need you."

His eyelids flutter, and for one desperate moment, I think he's going to open his eyes, going to speak. Instead, his body goes completely limp.

"No!" I press my ear to his chest, relief flooding through me as I hear the faint, irregular beat of his heart. "Help!" I scream into the night. "Someone help us!"

The Alpha's voice drifts over again, still maddeningly calm. "The Delta was jaywalking. Came out of nowhere. You know how these lower ranks are—no sense of traffic safety."

Jaywalking.

I whip