Her Broken Alpha - Isoellen Page 0,42

looked down on drones because they didn't have the same abilities. The man was such an arrogant beast; he thought everyone beneath him.

He took her to a lower floor which was a rougher version than the one above it. Guards at the stairs watched over the defeated-looking people they'd taken from Tenbel's home.

All the alphas wore breathers over noses and mouths. The uncomfortable masks protected the wearers from pollutants, but as a side-benefit, they also dampened the effect of breed pheromones.

They weren't foolproof, though; skin also absorbed the mood, health, cycle, and dynamic chemicals emitted from breeds. But if the alphas kept their distance, drone fear or female ovulation cycles wouldn't affect them.

There were a lot of drones, many more than Naya's upper-class household employed. Thin, poorly dressed, unwashed, scarred, and disfigured, they were the most abused lot she had ever seen.

The cruelty of it went beyond her understanding. More than half of them were women, and a couple of these were noticeably pregnant, holding heavy bellies. If the fathers were breed, those women would need medical care. Breed to drone pairings resulted in twins and triplets. While intercourse was painful for the drone, conception was common, as were the serious complications that came with the delivery.

In her sector, if any breed impregnated a drone, he would be shunned. It was the lowest of the low kind of cruelty.

It smelled like there were more pregnant women than she could see. All of them were terrified. Some were crying.

Naya wanted to cry with them. What these women had suffered was horrible. They expected nothing good to come out of this meeting, and Monster had warned her not to promise anything.

Promises to help were the first words that rose to her lips. Monster gave a warning growl as a reminder and she clawed at his arm in frustration.

"Can you put me down, please?" she asked.

"No."

Holding her in his arms the entire time, Darre had her ask several questions, each of them designed to find out what the drones knew about the black-robed men's activities, and what, if anything, they knew about Naya's kidnapping.

He wasn't interested in anything Naya wanted to ask.

Their suffering rolled over her stronger than their smell, but Monster didn't seem to notice it at all.

She thought she recognized faces. She felt like she should know them, like she had experienced something with them, but it was hard to pinpoint what or how. Now that her head was clear, her ordeal with the false priest had become a collection of vague memories: getting out of a box, mushrooms growing on a wall, being scrubbed raw in a shower.

The questioning went nowhere. There were too many of them and they were too afraid.

"Do you like any of them?" he asked after he finished their questioning. "Pick two or three to serve you."

Naya started to protest—she didn't need anyone to serve her—but Monster beat her to it. "I run a household of males. You need someone to bring you food, go shopping for your needs, and be a companion, if you wish. You said you wanted clothing, undergarments, goop for your hair, pretty bedding, and better food. You want me to send Mac to look for female support wear?"

The question surprised her. He'd been paying attention to everything she said and was willing to do something about it.

For her.

But he was offering nothing for them.

She picked out the four women who felt familiar. "What about the rest of them?” she asked. “They need medical care, food, help. How could this happen to them?"

Monster ground his teeth and his arms flexed. Turmoil emanated from their bond.

"I'm not running a rehabilitation center or hospital. This is fuckin' Sector 2, Naya. This is what real breed, free from the veneer of hypocritical laws, do. This is the outcome of our actions. Might makes right and weakness suffers. This is our nature."

"It is the nature of males without self-control."

"And who judges what is and is not self-control? The Administration? Don't you think they pick and choose what is good for themselves? What is easy and comfortable for themselves?"

She tipped her head back to meet his black eyes. "Who will help them if not the strongest alpha?"

An irritated growl vibrated through his chest. Naya slipped her hand into the collar of his shirt to feel him, tucking her head under his to offer a calming purr.

He held her tighter, breathing deeply of her scent as he wrestled with something she couldn't see.

After a moment he kissed her