Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There was dust in the air despite the straw over the ring's floor and the stacked scents of nearly a hundred Alphas crowded into the underground space were enough to make any Omega vomit. Not these Omegas, though. No. They were savages. They were animals. They were strong and they were masculine and they constantly lived to surprise her. It had taken her over a year to get this one up to snuff and now that he was, she was crammed up against the wooden side of the ring with her hands gripping the rail so hard that her knuckles were white and she was screaming at him with her Alpha tone and this time, finally, she knew he was going to listen to her.

“Throw him down, Ozzie, take him to the wall!”

He did what she told him to do, ducking a cross and pushing the other Omega hard into the side of the ring in a practiced and lethal move. He planted one foot down beside his opponent's and used the wall behind him to snag in him place so he could deal an incredibly close hook that disoriented him enough that the arm around his neck was as easy as one, two—

The other boxer was out, limp in Ozzie's grip and dropped to the straw while Ozzie danced away, blood running over the side of his face from a cut near his hairline and his chest heaving while his body shined with his sweet sweat. His victory made his scent strong and bold, cutting through the mess of Alpha while cheers and jeers were thrown.

Hawk beat her palms on the side of the ring in triumph while she laughed. It hadn't been a perfect win. They were on the tenth round and it was a fight until one was down. Ozzie had taken a tremendous beating and when he looked back toward Hawk, he swayed a bit on his feet. She leaped over the rail and steadied him while the other manager collected his fighter from the floor.

“You alright, Oz?”

“Yeah,” he panted. “S'long as you weren't kiddin' about givin' me a go with Miss Molly's...”

She chuckled and hoped that he could hear her over the din. “No, I wasn't kiddin' buddy. You'll have your little Thom if that's what you wanna waste your money on.”

“S'not a waste...” he breathed, his arm around her waist for support while she led him to the side door. “You've...you've never seen 'im.”

“You're damned right I've never seen him and I don't have to see him to know he's a waste of money.”

Miss Molly was the rather formidable Alpha who ran the most prominent brothel this side of the city. Despite that Alphas were not allowed upon the premises, she did an incredible amount of business otherwise, admitting only Betas and Omegas into the beds of her gorgeous and high-brow prostitutes. As a Madam, she was shrewd, calculating, and savvy. As an Alpha, Hawk knew her to be compassionate, sensitive, and surprisingly fierce. From every run-in she'd had with the woman, Miss Molly Mitchell was not a woman she wanted to go toe-to-toe against. It was one of the reasons why Hawk was overtly annoyed by every single boxer's near predisposition to be besotted by her damned Omegas. Ozzie, when he'd finally discovered the fucking brothel by word of mouth, was no exception.

“Give me a lift there,” Ozzie said, fumbling over his words. “Thom will treat me...treat me good.”

“You've hardly enough energy to stand, much less fuck. Suck his little cock tomorrow and get a good night's rest tonight. We'll have a proper doctor take a look at you and make sure you haven't cracked your head too hard.”

Ozzie frowned while Hawk helped him into his shirt and pulled a knitted wool sweater over his head. “N-No! You said I could see him!”

“Yes. And you will. But you've got a cut on your head and you can barely walk by yourself.”

Ozzie's scent soured considerably and a few of the other boxers who were milling about moved to flock around him. “I want to see him.”

“Oh for the love of Christ...” she mumbled, all-to-familiar with the tempers after a fight. She'd had the worst of it from that little arse, Hugh, she didn't need more of it from the one she'd raised up from the gutter. “I'll take you to Thom but you're going to see the doctor. Tonight.”

“P-Piss off...” he told her, wrenching his arm free from her grip and storming through the crowd of Omegas, all of whom stared at her with challenge in their eyes.

“Why don't you all just go right to hell, hmm?” she asked them, turning about and making her way up the stairs to get out the side entrance, the steps leading out to the alley finely dusted with the snow that fell in lethargic patterns through the dark. There, she took a few swoops of bracing winter air into her lungs and closed her eyes while the pricks of those small flakes soothed her. Ozzie had done wonders for her temper. Having him from the very first moment of his boxing career, through every up and down and nights spent with him emotional over his losses and elated over his wins—she had learned him and grown with him. It was nothing like it had been with Hugh, already confident and proud and resistant to any change or direction. Ozzie trusted her and she trusted him. His fire directed toward her was uncommon but post-fight, it was to be expected. Once the flame was lit in the ring, it was difficult for them to temper it even after they'd won. Especially if they'd won.

She sighed and felt the steam of her breath on the tip of her nose, moist and warm in the cold. New York was ugly in the winter though she couldn't help but think it might have been even worse in the summer. At least in the winter, for a few moments after the snow fell, she could find it to be white and pure and pretty again. The carriages mashed the snow into a dirty mush and splashed it over the white, creating ruts and slushy, jarring bits of ice that made everything horrible once again...and of course with the backdrop of white, it was difficult not to notice the grime.

She put her hands in her pockets and opened her eyes, casting a hard eye at her father's boxer, Niall standing off to the side smoking in his coat. “When he comes out, tell him I'll meet him in the coach.”

“Yes, Miss Hawk.”

She nodded and crunched over the snow, climbing in across from Dr. Nowiki.

“He took quite a hit to his head,” the doctor noted, scribbling in his pad. He was her father's pick for a physician and had been the one to treat all of Ozzie's injuries. He'd attended every fight he was able to with Hawk's insistence and he didn't mind it, being paid what he was. “I'll take a good look at him but from where I sit, you'll want to rest him for a few days before you let him give or take any hard hits. I don't want him over-stressing himself. Some poor little bloke near Port Morris stressed himself enough in training to have a bleed in the brain. They don't think he'll make it and if he does, he'll be unresponsive his whole life. If they can't find a way to feed him, he'll no doubt starve to death.”

The idea of Ozzie having to lay in a bed and waste away after something preventable was something she could not risk. As much as she had thought that the Omegas could never mean anything to her, especially after Hugh had damaged her against them so badly, Ozzie had completely changed her mind. She couldn't risk him and he knew it.

She and the doctor chatted for a few more minutes until the door to the coach opened and a grumpy little Ozzie pulled himself in.

He sat next to her without looking at her, glowering instead at the doctor.

“Are you ready to be examined, little one?” Nowiki asked lightly.

“I suppose,” he mumbled.

“Alright.” The Beta ran his fingers over the sides of the boxer's head, prodding in sensitive places and taking note of where and how he winced. He pressed on his temples, pressed over the sides of his neck and the back, taking stock of how his scent changed and his reactions to the touch. It was important that his reflexes and reactions occur on par with expectations and it seemed that Ozzie was at least passing this test despite how cranky he seemed. “How does your side feel?” He reached down and lifted the heavy knit sweater, pressing a thumb over the spot where Ozzie had been hit with a few hard rips. “You're tender here.”

“Yeah...” Ozzie replied, some of his fire gone as he acknowledged his injury. It was here that Hawk noted the true difference between this little boxer and her former charge. Whereas Hugh would never have come to the coach, Ozzie would come and would allow an examination. It softened her, even now and her scent was free of her previous anger, the spice of it meant only to calm him. He noticed and gave her an apologetic expression before he hung his head and whimpered. “Can I go to Miss Molly's now?”

Hawk moved her hand to the back of his neck, squeezing softly. “Yes, Oz. You can go to Miss Molly's now.”

The one thing she could say for Thom was that he was a very clean Omega and every day after Ozzie went to the brothel, he was practically sparkling and smelled so wonderfully sweet that she was certain they must have bathed him thrice to get him that way. With how contented the boxer looked as he was getting out of the carriage, Hawk couldn't help but smile at him while he trudged hopefully through the snow to the big wooden door. There was something to be said for the whores, she thought, if they could make a man so desperate that he was begging to go.

She had the driver swing by the doctor's residence and then take her back to the gym. She had a room over the top of it and she was ready to get right into her bed. Unfortunately for her, the light was on downstairs, meaning her father wanted to discuss that night's set of rounds with her before she drifted off into oblivion and she would be kept from sleep for as long as the man wished to instruct her.

Her father, Vincent Hawk, was a gruff Alpha and he suffered no fools—his daughter the least. His voice was deep and gravel-lined.

“A rough night.”

“You don't have to tell me that. He could have had him down in the fifth if he'd been braver. Hugh would have had him down the minute he'd side-stepped instead of taken the cross he was set-up for.” She picked up the half of a ham sandwich he'd left for her and took a hefty bite out of it, chewing while her father weighed in.

“It takes years for them to get to be like Hugh. Ozzie's been fighting what? A year at most? He's good for how long it's been. He's a boy with more skill than talent and that is a very, very good thing for a woman like you.”

“Yeah, yeah...” she said around her sandwich.

“He's humble,” he told her. It was the same thing he'd reminded her of fifty times before and the same thing he'd keep saying for the rest of his life, she thought. “He's got drive and he's got heart. In a few years, he could be giving those bookies trouble.”

She growled. “I'll give those bookies some trouble.”

“That's the spirit,” he told her. “I think you'll have to work on his courage a bit. You're right about the fifth round. If he'd moved forward during that sidestep, he could have had it then. There was another moment in the eighth that he missed a step forward.”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “When they both danced back and circled. If he'd read him better, he would have known that's what he was thinking of doing and he could have chased him. If he'd been quick enough, he could have gotten a good hit to his throat while his guard was down.”

Her father chuckled a bit with surprise. “Sometimes I wonder just how vicious you could be in a real row, girl.”

“You've seen me in a real row.”

He scoffed. “I was drunk, remember? I don't recall anything but Niall telling me you'd nearly bitten a man's finger off.”

“If he was going to put it in my face, he should have expected it to be bitten off.”

They shared a bit of laughter and after she'd polished off the ham sandwich it was nearly one in the morning, her mind wilting and her eyes feeling a bit like someone had thrown sand in them. Her father noticed and sent her off to bed, taking care of the lights while she climbed the stairs and stripped down to nothing, pulling the sheets and heavy quilts around her until she was fully encased within them. In the dark and the quiet with just the barest hint of Omega scent still present in her sheets from a good fuck a few days prior, she drifted off into blissful peace.

It wouldn't last. Only two hours later and she was being shaken awake by a frantic and bedraggled Niall. He stank like gin and his eyes were wild in the dark.

“Hawk!” he cried, shaking her still even as she fought him off and tried to sit up. “Hawk you've got to help! You've got to go get 'im Hawk!”

“Get-Get what? Help wh-who!?” She grabbed him and with her considerable strength she held him back from her, his hands drunkenly flailing. “Niall! What's going on?!”

“Ozzie!” he shrieked. “You've gotta help Ozzie!”

Chapter Text

It had been a boring night. It was like that sometimes in the winter season before the holidays had rushed everyone into the city and the hotels especially. Most of the excitement came from counting the stock and bulking up the orders and getting the place glitzed and glittered with all the small decorations for Christmas. It took an army to clean the whole damned place and to get everything in order so that the seasonal guests could enjoy it for the general splendor of red ribbons and mistletoe. For all the employees who cleaned and scrubbed the tables, chairs, and floor, it took a little magic out of one of the most glamorous and well-to-do restaurants in New York during the holidays. Knowing too much about anything would take the magic out of it.

Even though the kitchen had closed hours earlier, the bar was open absurdly late and normally Tilly wasn't up long enough to see it close. That was, unless something had gone wrong. With Tilly managing both the restaurant and the bar nowadays, it wasn't often that something went wrong. She'd been asleep for a few hours on the cot she kept in her office. She was supposed to get up early the next morning to go over a bunch of orders and it wasn't all that uncommon for her to end up sleeping here rather than going home. The true misfortune about having not gone home was that when something did go wrong, she was there for the barkeeps to prod her about it. Usually they had enough sense not to but when it came to this night, she was almost glad they did.

“Tilly?” whispered the Beta bartender. “Tilly? I've got a bit of a problem.”

“Mmmf,” she groaned back, rolling over to face him while she rubbed at her eyes with her thumb and forefinger. “What kind of blasted problem could you have that couldn't wait until I've got my beauty rest?”

“The constable, ma'am. He'd like a word.”

“The constable?”

It was still dark and it was warm in the room, a product of the way her body radiated heat while she slept. Groggy and in no mood to be entertaining any constables, she pulled on trousers and a sweater and considered for a moment wandering out without her shoes on. She decided against that idea and pulled them on, the addition of that particular piece of her sloppy ensemble the true end to her perceived hope for more sleep soon. When she shuffled out of her office, she followed the nervous barkeep through the dark dining room of the restaurant and into the dimly lit bar, her brain suddenly snapping awake at the sight of the wet floor glittering with tiny glass shards.

“Whuh—” she started before she noted at least two or three hard wood bar stools that had been tossed across the room hard enough to have their legs cracked against the wall and tables. Through it all, the scents of blood and angry Omega mingled and drew her into alertness. Her immediate stare was upon a set of three sheepish-looking Alphas who were huddled together with their hands in their pockets but the constables—there were three of them—were holding a small and struggling little Omega. “What in the blazes...” she mumbled, looking between all the faces and trying to decide where to place the blame.

“Miss Caird, is it?” the lead constable asked. She nodded to him sharply. “Your man here called us for a bit of a row. We'll take the little one with us but we've got to know if you'll be pressing charges. We can hold him for a little while but if we're going to hold him for long, he's got to have a charge.”

She tilted her head, staring down at the growling and drunken little creature before she looked back at all the damage he'd supposedly caused. She was used to Omegas with tempers and this one looked to have a hell of one. “What exactly happened here?” she asked cautiously, rounding upon the Alphas.

The middle one spoke first. “He was a bit wore down and 'e was at the bar and so we was just trying to cheer 'im up is all. Nothin' untoward. He just started throwin' glasses and cussin' us up and down. Tossed the stools at us, screamin' and drunk and carryin' on.”

The other two Alphas nodded in agreement, their brows raised imploringly.

Tilly had been lied to too many times to swallow this one. She was aware of what packs of Alphas said to lone drunk Omegas at bars and taverns and the Muir was no exception to the rule. She looked at the poor thing while he continued to struggle, giving the constables that held him a bit of a time holding on. “Let him go,” she said. When they balked at her request, she stated it again, harder this time. “Let him go.”

He nearly fell when they released him, panting and and staring up at her with a trembling lip and glazed, unfocused eyes.

“What happened, Omega?” she asked, taking stock of him. He was small but he was fierce. It wasn't uncommon for her to see the boxers come in and out of the hotel, comforted by the idea that this was a place that was welcoming to them. The two men who held this empire in the palms of their hands were no strangers to the boxers and the younger of the two of them was no stranger to the ring itself. This one was wilted, his scent angered and heartbroken. It teased her nose and drew her to comfort him, the impulse to hold him and press her fingers to the back of his neck nearly overwhelming. His short blonde hair and his watery pale gray eyes could have made him into quite the beauty had he not been a fighter, his lower lip and chin marred with a scar down one side and the remnants of blood and dirt smeared over his skin.

Unsurprisingly, the tap-hackled little thing shouted at her with every bit of his rage.

“Nothing happened! I've been heckled! I've been groped! I've been treated like a common street whore! What's that to you Alphas?! Nothing! Nothing happened!” By the end of his tirade, tears were streaming in rivulets down his dirty face and he probably couldn't see through the pile of them in his eyes. He was giving out soft breathy sobs and delicate sniffs that didn't seem to have any effect at all on the constable. Tilly, however, was less equipped to deal with matters like this and she knew it.

The constable spoke to him, his tone rough and hard for a Beta, “You call this nothin', boy? You call wreckin' the place nothin'?! Wealthy, grand folk come here and all they want is a little bit of peace at the end of the day and here you come stinkin' of liquor and you toss about their crystal and you call it nothin'!” He waved a finger in the blonde's face. “I know you types and I know how much trouble you cause. Sneakin' about in the back alleys and pickin' peoples' pockets! People who work hard for their money!” The constable grabbed the back of the Omega's sweater and shook him, reaching down and pulling a few paper dollars and crumpling them up in front of his nose. “Who's is this, huh?! Where did you get this amount of money?! There's no way for an Omega like you to make 'is own money like this, who'd you steal this from?!”

Tilly took a step forward, crunching over some glass shards and grateful that she'd put on her shoes. She wanted to argue that the poor boy is obviously strong enough to be a laborer or even a factory worker but she knew him to be a boxer. If not for the scars on his face, for the money in his pocket. No Omega made that kind of money save the fighters.

The little one tottered on his feet while he was shaken by the constable and when he was able to regain his footing, he promptly spit in the man's face.

“Fuck off!”

“That's it,” the Beta growled, wiping the boy's spittle from his face. “Who's your Alpha, you little pisser? I'll make sure he puts the fear o' God in you, so help me. If he don't use a rod on you now, he will when I'm done with 'im.”

“Constable,” Tilly interrupted with a finger up to pause him. “If you'll allow me?”

He did but not without a reluctant and petulant expression that belied his contempt of an Alpha intervening with what he saw as his duty. Duty or not, Tilly wasn't going to let a boxer get his marbles knocked around by some power-frenzied Beta.

She came to him, catching him about the back of the neck before he could duck away from her. One squeeze was all it took before the Omega was soft, warm, and sifting through her hands like flour. “You're a fighter, Omega.”

He was half limp, his knees trembling before she caught him and held him up while she kept a hand on the back of his neck. Omegas were normally susceptible to this sort of thing but drunk ones were doubly so. He was absolutely pissed with gin and whiskey and she was surprised by the smell of him that he was even still standing. He slurred, drool falling into a long string to the floor between his knees. “Whaassit to ya.”

“You've got to be a strong one to crack my bar stools how they are.”

“Piss...piss off.”

“Calm yourself, Omega. Do you have a manager?” She wanted to ask him a thousand questions but with him in such a state, it would be impossible for him to answer more than one simple one at a time. Yes or no was possibly all she could get out of him.

“Lemmego.”

“Would you like to spend the night in jail?” she asked him, letting the hard edge of her tone tear through the fog in his brain. He knew what could happen to a lone Omega in jail. They would keep him separate...if they cared to. It was only too common to find that a willful and Alpha-less Omega had been left to fend for himself in a cell with Alphas only too willing to take whatever it was that they wanted.

“Mmmmmrrrrrrgh!” he growled, finally giving a bit of a struggle, only to be held tightly by Tilly's strong arms.

“I'm not going to hurt you, little one. I'd like for you to tell me what happened here. Did you break my stools?”

“Mmmrrrryes!”

“Why?”

The constable crossed his arms, glaring at the both of them while the Omega pouted and Tilly patiently stared at him, her emotions level and her scent betraying nothing. She wasn't angry, after all. She was curious.

She cooed at him. “Was it these Alphas? Did they touch you? Did they say something to you?”

His scent was sour and walled off but he was quiet for a few moments, his glower now focused entirely upon the three sheepish-looking Alphas. It was likely that they were wary of her more for her size than much else. She was a huge Alpha and she well knew it, intimidating most other Alphas merely by her height and the breadth of her shoulders. When he spoke, it was softer and more direct. “They was around me...they was gonna...take me upsssstairs.”

“And you didn't want to be taken upstairs.”

“Nah.”

Tilly raised her head, striking a sharp eye over the three Alphas, addressing them with a cool, collected tone. “Do you three have rooms here? If you do, I suggest you go to them. Now. Before this little fighter here tells me the rest of the story.”

They didn't reply, quickly gathering their things and rushing from the room, their shoes crunching over the glass as they left, careful to hurry out before Tilly could gather enough anger to rip them limb from sorry limb.

She addressed the constables next. “It's alright. I'll have him to rights by morning.”

“I'm sorry, Alpha, but he's assaulted a constable—”

“What is his fine?”

He stopped short, staring at her. “What?”

“What is his fine, Beta? I'll pay you now and get it done, then. He's not to go anywhere. His crimes are against me and it's to me he owes the largest debt.”

He cleared his throat, looking back at his comrades before he adjusted his belt and turned back to her with his shoulders squared. “I suppose I can overlook it this time if you think you've got him under control. He ought to have an Alpha comin' to look for 'im. If he don't, then he should.”

“Have a good night, constable,” she told him brusquely, moving to pick up the little Omega who promptly began to struggle. “Alright, alright. I won't lift ya. Tell me. Where do you live, little one?”

“Rivington...”

“Oh...” her brows came downward and she gave a sharp sigh. It was no wonder the boy could toss bar stools about like they were nothing. It was no wonder he could throw a punch. It was no wonder he'd become a boxer. It was likely that he'd been fucked six ways to Sunday during his short youth after presenting while living in those squalid, grime-filled tenements with all sorts of festering creatures. If he didn't want to be taken advantage of, he would have gotten tough and he would have done it quickly. There was no way in hell Tilly was going to be taking this little one back to the Lower East Side. Not in the middle of the night—not ever, to be frank. Taking a drunken Omega to the tenements was like dropping a struggling songbird into a box of cats. She gathered him, careful not to pick him up while she led him slowly and carefully to the bar where she sat him down on the one stool he hadn't thrown.

“Karl,” she asked the barkeep, “Water?”

“Yes, mum.”

“And a cool cloth, would you? For his face.”

“Yes, mum.”

It was fetched and she made the boxer face her, his eyes glazed and seeking desperately to avoid contact with hers. She ran the cloth over his dirty face, slowly cleaning away the dirt and dust and traces of blood leftover from what must have been a hell of a fight. Before, in the dim light, she hadn't been able to see the extent of his injuries but from what she could tell, he was still swelling up from them, the bumps and bruises fresh from tonight. She spoke softly, crooning to him to quell his nervous, vibrating energy.

“Did you win, little one?”

“Yeah.”

“Good, good.” She rubbed at his nose. “Does anything hurt?”

“No...”

“Good. That's good. Can you tell me your name?”

“It's...it's Ozzie.” He squirmed on the stool when she moved the cloth to his throat, taking care to wipe away the sticky pheromones that had coated him from proximity.

“Do you have an Alpha, Ozzie?”

“...no.”

“No manager?” Her brows inched upward.

“I-I have a...a manager. She's not my...my Alpha.” His cheeks were ruddy and she recognized the scent he emitted readily. It was a twisted kind of embarrassment and it came from a hidden shame. He was saying something that he knew was wrong. It was a scent that some Omegas just couldn't hide when they thought they were lying or saying something that someone else wouldn't like. For this, Tilly guessed that it was the manager in question who wouldn't have liked to hear something of this nature.

“Does she hurt you?” Tilly asked, a flame sparking in her gut. Boxing managers were the scum of the earth just below the crime lords and the bookies who took the very lives of the boxers and gave them nothing but broken bones and broken dreams in their wake. That anyone could be so heartless toward these soulful and weary life-givers was something she could never understand.

“No. No. No.” He murmured, hiding his face in his hands. “No...she would never.”

“Alright,” Tilly breathed, gently massaging him still. “You understand you're not going home tonight. I'm going to put you to bed in my office for the night. We can talk about you cleaning up your mess tomorrow morning before the boss walks in and sees it.”

He sniffled, his eyes once again filling with tears that he tried his best to hide. “Are you going to...make me? Alpha?”

“Make y—” What he meant suddenly rolled into her mind and the lance of sharp, emotional anguish struck her as if he had stabbed her in the heart himself. “No. No!” She wanted to scream. She wanted to cry. She wanted to toss a fucking bar stool. With her hands on either of his shoulders—brawny for an Omega—she softly shook him, drawing his wet eyes to hers. “No, Omega. I will never make you. And if you should so tell me to, I'd swear to it that no Alpha on God's green Earth would ever make you again.”

Glassy-eyed and satisfied, he relaxed a little bit more, content that her scent was not masked and that her affront at the suggestion that she take by force what she wanted from him was genuine. He trusted her. At least to this point. He reached out to her, his dirty fingers clutching at her sweater as he swayed a bit on the stool.

Tilly reached for him, this time picking him up with no struggle from his end, settling his weight on her hip like a child while his arms came around her neck and his nose was buried in her throat.

Before she could get far, however, the sound of voices reached her and the strong burning scent of an Alpha's potent alarm reached her and in some small distant manner, the scent rang a small bell of warning in Tilly's brain. She recognized that scent. But from where?

She didn't have to wonder long. That seething rage that had emerged from the thought of rape suddenly frothed to the very top of her emotions as soon as that reddish-brown mane of hair and wild, manic black-brown eyes appeared in the doorway. Every hard bit of her past grudge she held against that low-down cunt of an Alpha boxing manager was sent, bloated, to the top of her emotions and she felt her muscles stiffen in response while Hawk's jaw dropped just slightly at the sight of her.

“You...” Tilly rumbled with venom.

Hawk glanced upward for a moment to the mistletoe hung over her head, her first words to Tilly breathy and laced with a wry humor. “I uh...I don't suppose you'll be kissing me, will you?”

Chapter Text

Tilly would not be kissing her. In fact, Tilly was nearly red-eyed with fury to even see her stepping into the hotel and that was a wholly predictable sort of issue. She'd known from the start that the Alpha would have to have been present, as the arrival of a constable would certainly require her there but there was always that slim chance that she could have been otherwise engaged. Hawk, of course, was never that lucky.

“If you'll allow me, Alpha—” she tried before Tilly's thundering voice halted her.

“Absolutely not.”

Her face was frozen into an expression of mild surprise and she shut her mouth into a tight smile. She had almost thought that the Alpha was going to be too angry to make sound, seeing as the last time Hawk had stepped into the Muir she had been threatened with a rather gruesome form of beheading. Tilly's foremost reason to dislike her had stemmed, of course, from that little ornery Irishman who used to manage the bar—the one who'd skipped off to England to chase some debutante's skirt. The woman's first mistake was to fall in love with some devil-may-care boxer who'd been fucking other Omegas possibly longer than he'd been presented. Her second was thinking that a boxer's manager could leave him the hell alone when he was playing hookie and there was real money on the line for his next win. It was no surprise that she had been jealous, oh no, she had every right. It was more than that.

Hawk cleared her throat into the still, silent air that was filling still with the harsh scent of Tilly's ire. “Legally, Alpha...he is mine.”

“Like Hell.” Her eyes took on a shine that Hawk easily recognized as dangerous.

“Alright. How about I just help you clean—”

“Get out.”

Hawk hardened, drawing up to her full height—paltry next to the towering Tilly Caird. “I'm not leaving without him. He's my charge and he's my responsibility. I'll pay for his damages. I'll clean the damned place up myself if that's what you want me to do, but I'll not leave him. That's not what a Hawk does.”

“I know exactly what a Hawk does,” Tilly growled. “You take them, you work them to the bone. You throw them into the ring with each other and watch them pull each other apart like dogs. After they've done all the work and taken all the beating, you walk away with your winnings and brag about them like they're your prized pets.” She spat the last word with such vitriol that Hawk winced at it.

“I've not done nothing.”

“Then tell me. Tell me what you've done for him. He lives in the slums. In the tenements. He comes in here drunk and dirty and heartbroken and you've done exactly what for him?”

She shot back, “I gave him what he wanted. Do you see my mark on him? I'm not his wife. I'm his manager. I don't keep them with my boot on their neck, Alpha! If he wanted a better place to live, he could save up all the money he wastes on whores and liquor. He wanted to have a better life and I found him in the gutter and gave him the chance—if he thinks that what's better is a warm body and a blurry head, he might not be wrong.” She let her gaze wander over the glimmering shards of glass over the floor. “He's not perfect and neither am I. This is what I have to give, and he chose it. He chooses everything and I'm the one who makes that possible. If you think you could do a better job, then why don't you try it? Obviously you think it's easy enough. Now do you want me to clean this up?”

Tilly was still seething but her anger had died a small bit. It was no picnic to take in one of those boxers and there was no doubt from the look on her face that she knew first-hand how stubborn and impossible they could be.

Of course she knows.

“Broom's around the bar,” Tilly muttered. “He'll be in my office for now.” She disappeared with him through a doorway and left Hawk to find the supplies.

Not only did she find the broom, she found the mop and bucket as well. She was near-finished with sweeping up all the shards of broken tumblers and bottles when Tilly came back and saw that she'd also taken out the mop. The huge Alpha took the metal bucket and filled it with soapy water, hauling it out onto the floor.

“Hey, he made it a little easier to do this,” Hawk supplied with a grin.

“How's that?” Tilly grumbled back.

“He got all the stools out of the way.”

Despite herself, the large Alpha cracked a smile.

The rest of the chore was done in silence and when the last of it was finished, Tilly emptied the liquor and water mess down the mop drain and came back to Hawk who was examining the damage to the stools. There was only one of them that was entirely broken, two of the legs snapped in half but another was cracked and not likely to hold much weight before it broke. She moved to the wall and put her fingers down where the paper had ripped. Fortunately, the hotel was made of some sturdy stuff and the wall itself seemed undamaged despite the hard wood of the stool having collided with it.

“Send me the bill,” she muttered, thumbing the paper where it had torn. “I'll take care of it.”

“And what happens to him?” Tilly asked darkly. Most Alphas would consider it unnecessary to inquire and most certainly none of their business. What an Alpha did with their Omega behind closed doors as punishment was between the Alpha and the Omega.

Hawk raised a brow. “He's a boxer. He gets what boxers get. A headache and an extra set of work-outs.”

The woman clearly did not believe her and it was understandable at the very least, Hawk thought. There were plenty of managers that punished their boxers much more severely for such indiscretions but for Hawk, she'd found that boxers didn't work harder when they were afraid. They worked harder when they trusted. If they couldn't have a temper tantrum now and then, their emotions got in the way of the fight and when emotions got in the way—they were useless.

“Listen,” Hawk tried. “He wasn't supposed to be here. That he was here means something went wrong. He had a fight, he was supposed to get that stress out at Miss Molly's—”

Tilly sighed and rolled her eyes.

“Ah. Good, we have the same opinion on that at least.” She cleared her throat. “I dropped him off there myself and that he's here should be a good indication that something set out to ruin his night and did a hell of a job of it. Now all I'd like to do is collect my boxer, go back to my loft, and let us both sleep this horrid night off.”

“No.”

Something sagged inside her and she let out a breath of something almost akin to grief. The night was already a waste and it was likely that she was going to get no sleep whatsoever but at the very least, she could have something go right. This, it seemed, wasn't going to be it. Tilly was too steadfast. As massive as a bull and just as stubborn, she crossed her arms while she stood by the bar and wordlessly challenged Hawk to take Ozzie by force. It was not going to happen. Hawk groaned. “Cleaning all this up and paying for the damage isn't enough? He's my boxer.”

“And he's in my bar,” Tilly shot back. As you said before, he's got no mark on his neck. He's too drunk to make his own decisions and there isn't a damn thing you can argue for the law to take him back.”

“I've got a contract with him,” Hawk argued. “It gives me every right to take him back.”

“And I suppose you just carry it around with you so you can just call the constable back and get them to force me,” Tilly mocked.

Damn this Alpha.

Hawk sighed, frustrated. “I'm not leaving without him.”

“Then you're not leaving.”

She put her arms out. “Where am I to sleep?”

“You can always rent a room. This is a hotel.”

“This is the Grand Muir, it's not some shoddy little inn at the side of the road and it certainly isn't a boarding house, how do you think I'm to afford a room here?! Not to mention that I would like my boxer with me.” She could have stomped her foot, she was so mad. “If you're so intent on this, why don't yah just come to the gym? I've at least got a bed and a few mats for us!”

Tilly seemed to think for a few moments about the offer and Hawk capitalized on it.

“I've even got breakfast, if you're keen for it. I've got a kitchen and hell, I've got a punching bag you can hit. If you think you can hit me, I'll go ahead and let you get in the ring.”

This lit up Tilly's eyes with concentrated curiosity and interest. The prospect of having a go at Hawk seemingly the thing that might win her over. Her scent fluffed a bit with that sentiment and her body language loosened. “You'll let me fight you?”

“If it'll get my boxer back to my gym, I will. But I don't promise you'll get a hit in and I definitely don't promise you'll win.”

“If I hit you once, I'll win,” she said in that smug Alpha manner that was common among them.

Hawk let her have a little smugness back. “If you can hit me, maybe.”

The challenge was too much for her to pass up. It was unspoken but an agreement nonetheless and Hawk helped the woman put the bar stools aside before she was led through the restaurant and into a back office where she found Ozzie curled and sleeping under a heavy quilt and still in all his clothes. Tilly picked him up, his tiny form in her arms like that of a snoozing puppy while Hawk collected his shoes and his scarf, following the woman out so that they could put him in the coach.

It was cramped with Tilly's bulk taking up most of the inside of the coach though she didn't seem to mind holding the little Ozzie on her lap and crunching her form down in order to not hit her head on the top of the carriage. The size difference between the two of them was no more pronounced than it was here and Hawk didn't mind taking a moment to gawk at her.

“What?” Tilly mumbled, noting the Alpha's staring.

“You're just...massive. That's all.”

Tilly shrugged. “Comes from my da's side. A Scot.”

“Is that how they make them in the highlands?”

The woman allowed for a soft chuckle through her nose. “I suppose, yes. Huge. It was no surprise to have been an Alpha, that's for certain.” She raked Hawk with an appraising glance. “Was it a surprise for you? You're fairly tall, I suppose.”

Hawk straightened up. “I'm a normal sized Alpha, thank you. No shock here.”

The carriage wobbled a bit as it ran over some snow and Ozzie murmured in his sleep, soothed by Tilly's soft whispers to him as he cuddled further against her.

Hawk leaned back. “You're a natural with them.”

She only grunted her response and said nothing more. When they were finally at the gym, Hawk led her to the door and they knocked their boots off on the rug just inside, slipping out of them and wandering into the chilly dark room in their coats and wool socks. Hawk moved to the stove and started to pile logs into it while she motioned to the steps that led up to her room, the loft above that held most of the heat that lingered near the ceiling at night. The Omega would be tucked under a pile of quilts and the warmth from the stove would accumulate enough for him to be comfortable even as he awoke in the morning.

Hawk was awake now and from the effort she'd already expended, she didn't miss sleep. As the fire was begun, she closed the hatch of the stove and held her fingers near the grate before she stood to find Tilly back from settling the Omega in to sleep, shuffling into the wide training room and examining their equipment and the ring. She touched the hanging bags and cast discerning glances toward the various weights and the rolls of tape sitting upon the padded benches.

“How many Omegas?” Tilly asked, her voice low.

“Currently?” She bit her bottom lip in thought. “My father has about five. I have one. Ozzie. I should probably have more than just the one but he's got enough potential that I want to focus on him.”

Tilly nodded slowly, her scent hard to read but not in any way complimentary.

“What?” Hawk asked, frowning slightly.

Tilly wasn't looking at her. She was staring up at the loft where Ozzie was likely deep in his drunken slumber, as close to oblivion as a man could get. Her voice was soft and melancholy. “Like mice in the mews. They don't have a chance.”

She felt her chest burn. “This is their choice.”

The Alpha gave a doleful snicker. “Yes. Because they had so many more decent choices than this...”

“The lesser of two evils is better than an equal,” she muttered, turning back around toward the stove to shove another log into it even though it didn't need one.

“The lesser of two evils is still evil,” Tilly told her flatly.

“They have agency. They have options. Do you think Hugh could have found his way to the Muir had he not been a boxer? Of course not. A little Irish Omega fresh off the boat? He was half eaten alive before he was found by my father and it was lucky that he was. He would have been dead within the year and now look at him. Off in the English countryside doing god-knows-what but at least he's doing what he wants.”

“He got where he was because of—”

“Because of what?!” Hawk snapped. “The benevolence of someone else! No Omega that I've ever known has made anything for himself. They can't! There are too many things in the way to let them and that's no fault of theirs. I know that.” She glared up at Tilly. “I help them as I can and they work hard and they try their best. That's the whole damned point, isn't it?”

“I thought it was to make money.”

Hawk scoffed. “Yes. I suppose. Though if you really want to see why they fight...” She turned around and threw a pointed glance at the ring. “I'll wrap your hands...”

Tilly's mouth twitched up at the side with the ghost of a smile before she moved to one of the benches and picked up the tape. “I've never boxed before.”

“Well,” Hawk said, strutting over and taking the tape to begin wrapping. “I guess I'll just have to show you a thing or two. Might be that you'll learn something from me, God forbid.”

By the distinctly unamused expression on Tilly Caird's face, it was enough to say. God forbid. There was a dangerous glint in her eyes and as Hawk peeled the first bit of tape back from the roll, she had to tamp down the faintest tickling of emotion that had threatened her peace and control. It could only be one of two things and neither of them were welcome.

Fear...or exhilaration.

Chapter Text

Tilly examined the wraps on her hands, fisting her fingers to gauge the difference in movement. Hawk wrapped her own hands after she was done with Tilly's and cut the wrappings with her teeth, finishing herself off as easily as if she were spreading butter on a biscuit. She did it every damned day, so of course she would be good at it. The thought gave her pause.

If Tilly could manage to get one good swing into this fight, it would be over. She had enough weight on this Alpha that she could probably take her out even without the use of any Alpha strength and that was likely with just about any Alpha she came across. She'd never met a man or woman who could match her in strength but there was also the matter of experience. Tilly had never boxed before. Hawk was likely to practice and teach these techniques every single day. But one hit was one hit. Tilly could likely get in at least one good swing before the woman could do any lasting damage. She'd never been one to shy away from a punch and she had been in enough brawls to know how to handle a hit. There was no way that Hawk could give her anything she hadn't already seen in rough nights at the bar.

She stood on the floor of the ring and peered around at it. It was nothing like the underground rings where the Omegas actually fought. She'd seen those before, graced not with ropes around them but with hard wooden boards that kept the Alphas out of the fight. This ring was clean and raised, the type of ring that professional Alpha fights used—not dirty pits filled with dust and straw. It must have been nice, she thought, for the Omegas to have such a manager who thought they should train in something better than refuse. It must have seemed glamorous when they first saw it.

“Ready Alpha?” Hawk asked, pulling her shirt over her head and tying her reddish brown tresses up in a tight bun. Her eyes were hard and serious but her face was not where Tilly was looking. Embarrassingly enough, she couldn't help herself from giving a few loaded glances to the way Hawk's muscles rippled under her pale flesh, marked by a dusting of freckles over her shoulders. As she had just woken not too long ago from sleep, she had no bindings over her breasts but the marks of the day were still imprinted into her skin, lining where the cloth had lay.

Tilly shed her own shirt and made certain that her hair was up and all the ends tucked in. She hadn't bothered to unbind herself the few hours before and so she left it on, conscious suddenly of the way Hawk stared at her, wondering if the woman appreciated her in the same manner.

It shouldn't be strange. She's pretty for an Alpha and the boxers were pretty despite being boxers...

There was something about that hidden strength and the hard determination that Hawk held in her gaze, pinpointing in a fashion that made Tilly somehow believe that she could see even into her very being. That she could see weakness somewhere.

“I'm ready,” she growled, trying hard to dispel the notion that she'd somehow forgotten how angry she was. She tried to conjure it, bringing back the burn of that vengeful fire. After all, she had hurt so many boxers. She had hurt Hugh.

Tilly almost wasn't ready for the first throws that Hawk put out. She managed to block them but realized in the first few seconds of this fight that her movements, compared to the smaller Alpha, were sloppy and unrefined. It was to be expected. Hawk was measuring her and it was only too obvious with the quick and sturdy hits—quicker than Tilly had expected. Drunks didn't do things like this. They swung wildly and barreled forth in rage. This was cold, hard, and steely and Hawk was much faster than she was.

The only hits that the woman managed to land were some to her ribs and they were not particularly hard, so Tilly side-stepped to avoid her, catching her hands and pushing her back when she went for the face. Hawk whirled back and lowered her hands, not even bothering to dance when she moved around the edge of the ring, inspecting Tilly's stance.

“You've got your hands up but you're not in a good position,” Hawk told her. “Keep your hands open like this.” She showed her, holding her hands up. “This type of boxing isn't about what's fair. It's about what you can do to get your opponent on the ground. They don't have to be unconscious but they have to be on the ground and unwilling to get back up. So if you can get them in a hold, that's perfectly fine. It might not be legal in some rings, but in the ones where we make money, they're fine. You can't have your hand entirely open but you want to have that option in case you get the chance to pull them in.”

“To choke you.”

“Yeah.”

Tilly scoffed out her nose. “That's barbaric.”

Hawk put out her arms in a shrug. “That's a fight. Now keep your knees from locking. You don't want to get caught off balance. I'm going to tip you anyway but you might as well have a chance.”

She popped her brows up. “You're going to tip me? You think you can put me on my back.”

“I know I can.”

Tilly narrowed her eyes and came forward, taking a good swing at the woman who ducked off to the side and swung herself under Tilly's arm, whirling back to give her a rip to the side of her. This time it hurt so she turned about and rubbed at the spot, her brows knitting deeply in the center and that familiar fire blazing in her heart. All those measuring hits had spoiled her, it seemed, and now Hawk was starting to mean business. The smug sound in her voice when she'd claimed that she could tip her—that she would tip her, was grating and dissonant with everything she knew about herself. Tilly Caird was a solid pillar of muscle. It was what she knew about herself. She'd never in her life been removed from her feet and here was this smaller Alpha claiming that it would happen tonight. In this fight, even.

“Take stock of any injury after the fight,” Hawk told her. “You could be bleeding from your eyes, nose, mouth, and ass at the same time and you shouldn't think a thing of it until you've just about killed your opponent for having done it to you.” She moved cautiously along the edge of the ring away from Tilly. “If you think about any injury, you'll lose focus and you'll lose your match.”

They were wise words and Tilly hung back, waiting for Hawk to come for her. She was too quick to go after, as that hard hit had proven and it was likely that in order to get her into a good distance, she was going to have to put herself there. The moment came when Hawk darted in and Tilly moved to catch her, surprised at the way the Alpha avoided her swooping arms. The surprise was replaced with frustration when she was dealt two hard hits to her other side and one good shot right to her jaw which snapped her head off to the side before Hawk deftly whirled away and regarded her with a deeply smug smirk.

Tilly growled. “You think that's funny, girl?”

“I do.” She leaned almost lazily against the ropes. “You're big and you're slow which makes your hits powerful but you have a lead that's too easy to notice. My father's trained a lot of different types of boxers and they fall into certain categories and each of them has a style. The benefit I have in a match against you is that I can choose what I want to do that will benefit me most.”

“Which is?” Tilly asked, intrigued rather than annoyed by Hawk's explanations.

“Most of the smaller Omegas, like Hugh, were the type to dance about the edges. They wear out their opponents or get them angry and make them loose stamina over time. Then they can come in and deliver hard, punishing hits. If they get cornered, they use their opponent's weight against them.”

“How is that?” Tilly asked and immediately wished she hadn't. Hawk took her by surprise, ducking in and forcing her to block quickly, whipping herself away faster than Tilly could think to grab her and then coming in again from another angle. She tried to throw a few punches but swung through nothing but air, the sting of missing mounting until she followed Hawk in a few steps and made to grab her on a pass. Her stomach flipped when she managed to slide her forearm around Hawk's shoulders, pulling her warm body back as the smaller Alpha struggled. She let out a pleased grunt. “What are you to do now, Alpha?”

Hawk's scent was blank. Devoid of any emotion. There should have been something. There should have been fear or disappointment or even, Tilly had hoped, appreciation. There was nothing. Confusingly, the woman let out a small growling chuckle and with no small amount of strength, took a step forward, dragging Tilly a step before she bent and her body lined with tension.

“Oh no, no, no!” Tilly shouted, shocked to find herself lifted by Hawk's hips, the rigid hold of her own arm over Hawk's shoulder bracing and assisting the woman's efforts. For a moment, she was weightless and suddenly careening forward as Hawk pulled and lifted with her back and her knees, bodily throwing Tilly over her shoulder. Her thought train was gone when she hit the floor of the ring, staring up at the ceiling and at Hawk's placid, inverted expression. She wanted say something. She wanted to curse, really, but any words she might have said were completely gone—lost with her very breath.

“I told you I was going to tip you,” Hawk told her, wiping a bit of sweat off her brow. “You've never had anyone knock the breath out of you, have you? I'd venture that no one's ever knocked you off your feet either.”

No...

Tilly lay there, pulling in short sips of air while she waited impatiently for her lung capacity to deepen. It was infuriating. That she should be rendered so damned helpless and reduced to staring up at the wooden beams above her all because she managed to get that damned Alpha in her grasp. She should have just hit her somehow. She should have just put her out with one good swing...somehow. She glowered, glaring at Hawk as she stood straight up and wandered off to the side of the ring.

“I'll get us some water, Alpha. Whenever you're ready for it.”

I'm not done with you, yet! The festering bit of frustration welled up and boiled over, sizzling in her emotions until her breath had fully come back and she was able to sit up. Hawk was setting a glass of water down on a small table next to the stove and with one hand, she pulled the short black ribbon out of her hair, letting the waves of that coppery brown tumble over her freckled shoulders as she was still nude from the waist up. That frothing anger melted and simmered at the sight of that long, shining hair, even when Hawk pulled it back again in a looser, less controlled up-do.

Tillly gathered herself and then cleared her throat, testing her breath. “Do you...do you ever fight your Omegas?”

“I'll get in the ring with them, but it's only as training. When Ozzie started winning more often, he started getting a bit too cock-sure and yeah, I let him challenge me. It doesn't go far and I don't hit him. If that's what you're asking.”

“And do they ever see you with your hair down?”

She smiled an enigmatic little smile. “I've never slept with Ozzie. But the others...sometimes.”

“Hmm.”

“Another reason to despise me, Alpha?” she asked, straightening and cocking a brow. “Think I'm taking advantage of a boxer by letting him stay in my bed with me? I well know where they usually sleep and if they'd like something warmer or less dangerous—”

“Less dangerous?” Tilly interrupted incredulously while she got up, ducking the ropes to climb down the short stairs and approach the table. She picked up the water and sipped it, grateful for the warmth from the stove as she neared.

“They're not about to get raped here,” Hawk told her, boldly jutting out her chin. “They know what it costs to sleep in my bed and they pay it just fine. That, again, is a choice. Some of them chose to cuddle up to Hugh and take their chances with him for a night at the Muir...it's the same cost.”

“Their dignity?”

Hawk's stare was bemused, at least. “I don't ever remember them complaining about it. Maybe they just don't let me hear it if they do.”

“What would you do if they refused?”

“Listen,” she replied, her voice cutting, “I'm not the one pursuing them. If they want to stay here, they ask me. I don't ask them. That's not the way this works, alright? They get nothing out of sleeping with me other than a warm Alpha and a stress relief. Miss Molly's is fine for them but sometimes, they want an Alpha and here I am.” She opened her arms and gave another shrug, her scent spiced in defense. “The difference is that they don't have to pay for me. I'll suck their little cocks for free.”

Tilly's own member twitched at the mention of Hawk's mouth and she frowned at herself. It was the thought of her spreading open an Omegas's thighs that really did it and Tilly made the attempt to quash the image.

“Besides,” Hawk grumbled, “I can't imagine you've done much better for Omegas in the past, considering you've got no mate either.”

Tilly drew up, her cheeks suddenly boiling. “I-I beg pardon! I am a fine and decent Alpha, thank you.”

“Oh yeah?”

“I don't...I don't take advantage of Omegas.”

Hawk rolled her eyes. “Great. So you only fuck Betas.”

Her cheeks were blazing hot and she felt the redness creep down her neck.

“Oh no.” The Alpha was snickering. “You've never fucked an Omega.”

“If any had ever shown interest...I would be a fine Alpha for them.” She swallowed. “As it is, there have been some...some girls. They were very kind to show me attention and I've been grateful to them.”

“Hmm,” Hawk hummed before she gave a sniff. “Well if there's one thing I'd like straightened out right now, it's that I don't make any Omega do anything they don't want to do. Unless it's train for fights. That's what they're here to do and if they don't want to do it, they can find another manager who'll let them slack off and be lazy little shits. They want the thrill of the fight but sometimes they forget the work that goes into getting the win.”

Tilly frowned, considering how easy it was for Hawk to best her. It tugged at her.

“What is it, Alpha? What've I said?”

“It's nothing.”

“It's that I've tipped you, isn't it?” She sighed through her nose. “Given you just one more reason to hate me and really, what's one more?” She started pulling the tape from her hands. “I fuck Omegas when they want a warm place to sleep, I give them the option of training to be boxers, I make my money by setting them against each other—like dogs, you say—and I've shown you just how damned easy it is to get your lumbering weight ass over tea-kettle.”

“That is rather infuriating,” Tilly admitted, watching Hawk work on the tape and even more so admiring her glowing skin in the dim light. When the Alpha wasn't looking at her with such a stone face, she seemed almost soft and that was another infuriating issue. Tilly had slept with a few Beta girls and none of them could have been considered small though they were nowhere near as tall as Hawk...but Hawk was pretty. It was certainly not a word that the woman would use for herself but Tilly couldn't help it. Not only was she pretty, she was nearly perfectly formed and proportional, her collarbones deceptively delicate-looking and her shoulders swooping into well-muscled biceps. She was lean and roguish-looking and suddenly Tilly had another flash of imagination, thinking again about the way Hawk might have looked if she were in the midst of pleasuring a little Omega. How powerful her body might look when she plowed forward and—

Tilly cleared her throat and grabbed at her shirt, pulling it on and drinking the rest of the water while Hawk turned around and put another log in the stove. She had stayed to assure herself that nothing untoward was to happen to the little Omega in the loft, but now she was beginning to regret the decision.

Hawk was unperturbed while she casually sipped from her glass. “I hadn't ever considered how my work might look to those outside of it...” She sniffed. “Those with a tender spot for rough little boxers, that is. You know, there aren't many in this city who wouldn't rather see plenty of the little bastards drowned like rats—Hugh being one of them.”

“Any who think that can go drown themselves,” Tilly grumbled, pulling the twine from her hair and re-tying it loosely. “Those poor souls from the Isle don't deserve to starve any more than anyone else does. If they come looking for a dream then let them chase it.”

Hawk paused for a moment and gave Tilly a solemn stare. “Exactly...”

Tilly pursed her lips, suddenly realizing that she'd made the damned woman's point for her. “Damn your eyes...” she grumbled, frowning.

Hawk grinned. “If you'd like to fight about it, I'd be ready for another go. Maybe you'll learn something else from me...”

“I'd rather not,” Tilly replied hotly, working to get the tape off her own hands.

“Afraid I'll tip you again, Alpha?” she taunted.

Tilly glared back, her dignity sore. “No.”

“Hmph. Well if you want to get some rest, I'll get us some blankets. I've no doubt we'll be sorry in the morning...no more sorry than Ozzie will be, though.” Finally, Hawk picked up her shirt and pulled it on, shuffling over to wherever she'd left her sweater and putting that on too, obscuring any and all of Tilly's view of her form. “If you want to sleep close to the stove, the mats are along the wall. You can drag a couple out.”

She did just that, making sure to put them at an angle to each other so that she didn't, by accident, end up somehow too close to the smaller Alpha.

Blankets were distributed, lamps were extinguished, and the two of them settled down, quietly together in the dim orange glow emitted from the grate on the stove. Hawk murmured through the dark. “Coffee in the morning? Or tea?”

“Coffee.”

“How early do you have to be at work?”

“They'll live without me for a little while.”

“Ah. Bacon, then?”

“Alright.”

“Alright.”

There was a soft shifting as Hawk turned over away from Tilly's mat and settled in to sleep, the gym suddenly too empty and too quiet.

Chapter Text

It was no surprise how long it took for Ozzie to wake up the next morning, his stumbling steps thudding down the stairs from the loft about the time she and Tilly were halfway through their mugs of coffee and were beginning to munch on the bacon. His eyes were bloodshot, his tiny body leaning heavily on the doorframe of the small kitchen, and his gaze ravenously searching for the carafe of coffee.

“I think you should have some tea,” Hawk said, lifting one brow.

“Piss off,” he snapped back at her with more venom than she'd expected. He poured himself a cup and held it protectively to his chest while he glared at her, even his little upper lip curling as if he were to growl at her or even bite her.

“Calm yourself, Omega. You've put a dent in my pocketbook pulling that stunt you did last night.”

“Pulling what stunt?” he snarled. “Anything I did was far less than what you did. Spare me! How else should I have reacted?!”

Tilly was staring at him with great interest, her head even tilting at the vitriol he spewed. Her low feminine Alpha tone drew his attention and his glare softened but only by a little. “You were accosted, I'll give you that, little one. But not by Hawk—what is she to have done to you?”

Tilly coming to her defense? A rare day indeed, she thought pleasantly.

Ozzie's scowl returned in full force. “She knows what she did! Thom! She took Thom from me! She's never liked that I go to Miss Molly's and she's known that I always see Thom! Why else should he have told me in the parlor that he can't see me no more?! How else could he have been bought off like this?!” He turned his accusatory stare upon her directly. “How could you?! How could you?! He's the only one I want!” His voice was gaining in pitch as he continued, errant tears shining in his eyes while the latent bits of his Slavic heritage glowed in his voice. “You're a mean Alpha! You're a terrible manager! See if I ever win another fight for you again!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” she cooed, lifting her hands in front of her. “Let's take a moment.” She took a step toward him and he skittered backwards.

“Don't touch me!” He glanced at Tilly with wide and searching, frightened eyes. “Don't let her touch me! Don't let her take me!”

“What?” Hawk felt her brows come together in a frown and she glanced at Tilly, wondering just how far this was going to go. “Let's get some things straight here.” Her voice was suddenly laced with a hardness she rarely used with him outside the ring. “I didn't do anything to Thom.”

“You bribed him! Or threatened him!” His expression was manic, his scent buzzing with distress and fear. “He told me zhat he couldn't see me anymore! It was you! You've never liked him!”

She blinked, a small spark of anger beginning a blaze in her chest. “That is not true.”

Ozzie sputtered, obviously thrown by the genuine shock and ire in her scent.

Tilly took a sip of her coffee, looking between the two of them with clear interest.

Hawk spoke clearly and with purpose. “If you think that I could have gotten my ass close enough to one of Miss Molly's prostitutes to bribe them, you're delusional. Not to mention if I was caught trying to threaten one of them—you'd never see me again. At least not in once piece. So. If you're going to come down from that loft just to fling about accusations, I suggest you take that coffee and you go back up there and you think long and hard about what really happened last night. I spent plenty of time with Miss Caird cleaning up your little tantrum you threw last night and I've no intention of being yelled at by an ungrateful little tramp who slept far longer than I did.”

He set down his mug, turning to Tilly with purpose. “You have to help me.”

“Excuse me?” she asked, calmer than she ought to have been.

“You're an Alpha. You can help me.”

Hawk put one hand on her hip. “You have a contract with me, Oz.”

“Big deal,” he spat before he rounded on Tilly again. “You've got to help me. You know she did zhis to me. You know it as well as I know it. She's taken the one zhing that makes me happy and she's ruined it.”

Tilly munched a piece of bacon, frowning. “Let her at least clear her name, Omega. It's obvious that she's got no idea what you're talking about.”

“Zhat is what she wants you to think!” he practically shouted. “How do you think we learn how to mask our emotions in the ring?! You think it just comes with the territory? No! We are taught. We are taught by our managers! Mój Boże!” He continued on in a litany of broken Polish, yelling and carrying on even as he snatched a few pieces of bacon and ate them ravenously. His chatter only stopped when Tilly leaned forward and interrupted him.

“Alright! Alright. I get it.” She looked over at Hawk. “I've made this my problem by being here.”

She felt a knot twist in her stomach. “It doesn't have to have anything to do with you, Alpha.”

Tilly sighed through her nose. “I'm here now and I say it does. What do you know about this?”

“Nothing. I dropped him off at Molly's myself. If I'd known anything about it, I would have stayed right outside in the carriage to pick him up and take him back. I wouldn't have left him to walk himself anywhere in this cold. Not that I feel the need to explain anything to you.”

“You have to help me!” Ozzie shrilled.

Tilly tossed him a glare. “Calm yourself, Omega. I'll help you.”

“Then let's go,” he replied, latching himself onto her muscular upper arm and huddling next to her as if she were his only hope for protection against Hawk. The sight made her roll her eyes with how much it almost seemed as though he wished only to make her jealous. Had he been her Omega, it could have worked. She was peeved for an entirely separate reason.

“I'm not finished here, Omega. Sit down,” Tilly told him and he regarded her flatly before he huffed and sat, obviously ill at ease with either of his options.

“Well,” Hawk breathed, her lips tight. “I invited you to take care of a boxer last night and to tell me how well it went for you. Perhaps you'll get a taste of that. And you,” she eyed Ozzie and his petulant glare, “may come back whenever you please. I also expect a full apology whenever you do find out who's tampered with your whore.”

Tilly looked at him. “Why don't you fetch us a coach?”

He was off, shuffling and grumbling even as he went to get his coat.

“God,” the larger Alpha mumbled. “At least it'll give us some time.” She put her forehead in her hand. “This is all your fault.”

“I believe I just told you that it wasn't anything to do with me. Now he'd better get his head on straight by the end of the week or I'll have a hell of a time explaining that he's going to be falling out of the matches coming up. Those are some important match-ups and he's slated to do very, very well in them.” The level of peevishness that plagued her was inching higher by the second and it did her no better to recall the last time Ozzie had pulled a stunt similar to this. He'd been gone for three days before his money ran out and he'd had to come crawling back to her with his tail tucked between his legs and his hat twisted up in his grimy little hands. With Tilly behind him, it was likely that he could stay away for much longer before his pride broke and sent him back to her. “I'll give him six days before I hand his contract to the constable and have him dragged back by force,” she told the larger woman before she took a long sip of her coffee.

“I understand,” Tilly grunted. “I won't wait that long.”

“He doesn't sound appealing to you? You don't want to protect him from me anymore?”

Tilly shrugged one shoulder. “I still think you're scum, if that's what you're asking. But I've no place for some drifting Omega. He'll have to sleep in my office.”

“You won't take him to bed?” Hawk teased, smirking at the frown she gained from it. “You've never been with an Omega before. I'm sure he'd show you just how sweet they can be.”

“If I were you, I'd start the work of clearing my name...not to mention figuring out who's trying to fuck around with your fighter. Obviously someone thinks they can get to him—and they have.”

Hawk blew a sharp sigh. Tilly was right. As racehorses had their goats, fighters had their whores and somebody had gotten Ozzie's goat. The question was really, who might have had something to prove by doing it? Was it revenge or was it a preemptive strike? Was it someone he was going to fight or someone he already had? There were any number of Alpha managers or even Omegas who might have had a reason to take Ozzie's peace of mind and the one place that Hawk would wish to start looking, she couldn't.

If Miss Molly saw me anywhere near her whores, she'd flay me alive.

One could, theoretically, if one were not Sasha Hawk, speak to Miss Molly about the issues plaguing them but the managers—none of them—were on positive terms with the woman and thus the more direct approaches to appeasing the little boxer were off limits merely due to circumstance.

She would have to go the more round-about way of figuring it out and it was really just a matter of time before it all fell out anyway. Unfortunately, she only had so long before she would anger him further by having the constables drag him back to the gym. For all intents and purposes, she was his ruling Alpha and there was nothing he could do to alter that save to break his contract with her—the penalty for which was a fine too steep for him to manage without having won any recent matches. She must have been glowering rather hard for Tilly tilted her head at her, attracting her attention.

“I suppose you've already got a plan.”

“Something like one. There must be someone who knows something. Miss Molly hates my guts like every respectable person should, so chatting about it with her is useless. I suppose I'll have to start with the most obvious of sources—they hear everything, they're practically invisible when they want to be, and they've got plenty of reasons to want to tell me what I'm asking for.”

“The boxers?” Tilly asked, draining her coffee.

“Indeed.”

As if summoned like the devil by just the mention of them, two of her father's fighters made their way into the kitchen having arrived only minutes before. Niall's ears and nose were pink and there was snow in Sam's hair.

“Niall,” she barked, “Thom broke it off with Oz last night, you know anything about that?”

There was a short pause as the information broke into the two boxers' brains and Niall's mouth opened in his stupor. “No...well that's a damned shame, ain't it?”

“You know why?”

“Can't say that I do. Had he said something odd to the boy? Confessed his love? Not that somemat like that would do it, they like it when you're in love.” He chuckled a little and glanced at Sam who wouldn't meet his eyes, still pretending to be surprised at Ozzie's break. “Mayhap he did somethin' embarrassin'.”

“Hmmph,” she grunted back.

Niall looked at Tilly, his cheeks reddening a little while he took in the brutal size of the unfamiliar Alpha. “Mornin' ma'am.”

“Mornin',” Tilly replied, standing up and increasing the redness on Niall's cheeks. She turned to Hawk and nodded her head as if in goodbye. “I'll do my best to keep him for you...though I do sort of hope that you might not get him back.”

She felt her lip curl while she shooed the two boxers out of the kitchen after they'd snagged some of the bread from the larder. “I'd trade him.”

Tilly's expression was that of mild shock. “Trade him? Is he worth so little? What could I have that would release him from a contract?”

Hawk didn't have to even think about it before she said it. “Another contract. With you. Have you ever thought about boxing, Alpha?”

Her frown was more pronounced and she regarded Hawk from the side, examining her solidly for any hint of facetiousness. “You're joking.”

“I'm not. If you're so concerned about the Omegas, then maybe I shouldn't manage the Omegas. Maybe I should manage an Alpha instead. There are plenty of Alpha rings and Alpha fights underground. We could have you ring-worthy in a few months. You could actually land a hit on someone one day. Maybe even me.”

There was a long, pregnant silence in which Tilly merely stared at her, mildly irked.

“You think about that,” she murmured, moving to brush past her. “You take Oz and nurse his wounds and keep him tucked away for a little while and you think about what it would be worth to you. Maybe he'd have something to say about it...who knows?” She lifted a shoulder in the doorway and glanced at Tilly over it before she left, intent on finding out exactly who had dared hurt her little Ozzie.

Chapter Text

Whatever Hawk's doing to try to get this little hellion back, she'd better start doing it quicker.

She'd known the boxer would be a handful—she hadn't banked upon him being several handfuls. Already she'd had to chase him from the bar for begging the barkeeps for booze—hair of the dog, he said—hoping that her rather generous rations of roasted duck and creamy goat milk would have been enough. Ozzie, for whatever reason, didn't seem to be satisfied with anything. Every time Tilly left him to go about her chores, he was at the door to the office with his nose peeking through it, peering out at everything and everyone as if he were a puppy trapped behind a fence, his tail wagging each time she came near. After she had left him for a considerable spell, she had sent one of her Betas to her office to fetch an order copy with the request that they not let the little rapscallion out—the news returned to her that he was upon her cot sleeping...and he was entirely nude.

With the arrival of that little tidbit, Tilly covered her eyes with her palm and resolved not to go back into her office at least for the next hour or so. It was all she could do. He was going to drive her completely up the wall. That or he was going to wander out right in front of Bazaretti and force her to explain to the Hotel Manager why in there was a poorly dressed little Omega monster running about in his hotel seemingly without supervision. At least Hugh had the blessing of Cyril Muir—Ozzie had nothing and sometimes it seemed that Tilly had even less.

“I know what you're thinking,” she told Cambry, the Beta. “He's nothing to do with me. He's the little one who got into a row here the other night and he needed...” She sighed. “Someone.”

Cambry was giving her a sympathetic expression. “All due respect Miss Caird, but they don't need someone. Or anyone. They do just as good all on their own.”

“Yeah,” she grumbled. Even a rat needed a bath every so often, she thought sourly, recalling that Hawk was going to be reveling in her struggle with the obstinate little fighter if she ever found out about it.

An hour later and she found him curled like some tiny sweet roll under the quilts on her cot, every stitch of his clothing still laying all over the floor as if he owned the damned place.

“Don't you have any kind of decency?” she asked with her Alpha tone to the fore, the sharp edge waking him and tumbling him into a high alert nearly immediately.

He had whipped about, his eyes wild and unfocused while he came awake and the blankets piling around his hips while he sat up. His blonde hair was mussed and with at least his upper body revealed, she could see the bruises that clouded his skin where he'd been hit—purples and blacks and greens that marred him and fogged over scars of cuts and knicks. His scent was alarmed but sweet underneath and filled the small office with a distinct and light perfume she could at least appreciate for its individual merit.

Despite this, she bent over and picked up all of his clothes, ignoring their attractive fragrance, and tossed them at him as he groggily stared up at her. “I've taken you in, the least you could do is try to have some semblance of etiquette while you're here. If my boss were to see you the way you are, he'd read me the riot. Put on your clothes, you little pisser.”

“You know,” Ozzie breathed, finally relaxing and melting back down under both the quilt and his pile of clothes she'd thrown at him, “I wouldn't complain if you were to...you know.”

“What is it that I'm supposed to know?” she asked him, moving around to her desk and sitting there to purposefully ignore him while she filled out her paperwork.

She heard him rustling behind her and knew he wasn't putting on his clothes like she'd told him to. She felt him at her back, his tiny hands coming to her shoulders and pressing into her muscles. She could feel his bare chest behind her and she thought he had to be standing on the cot for him to be so tall. Yep, she thought as his lips came down to the top of her ear, standing on the cot. His voice was dulcet and sweet, combining with his now nearly-overpowering scent.

“If you were to touch me,” he told her. “I'm not like some of the other boxers. I'll take an Alpha every so often...”

“And what in the world makes you think I'd take you?”

That had stung him and she could smell it in his scent. There was a pause before he spoke again. “You don't have a mate...I can't smell one on you. You've got to be lonely.”

“How's that?” she asked, reaching for a pair of reading spectacles and perching them at the end of her nose so she could discern some of Bazaretti's notes at the side of one of the sheets in front of her. Although viciously pretending not to be paying any attention to him, Tilly was in no way oblivious to his nudity, his scent, or how and where his body touched her. A thrumming had started up within her and she cursed it with every portion of her willpower. Omegas. They were simultaneously everywhere and nowhere. Required and yet unattainable—beautiful, willful, and pure. It wasn't that Ozzie wasn't attractive and she recognized why she resisted him—it was a madness, really. The concept of an Omega who was at once pure and broken—untouchable in that she could not defile him and that he had already been deflowered. She could, surely, touch him, kiss him, take her own pleasure with his body, but how it should make her feel after she had done it was something she wasn't willing to discover. She already felt terrible thinking about it now—how should she feel after?

Ozzie kissed the inside of her ear. “Don't you think I'm pretty? I know you want me, Alpha. You wouldn't get flustered about me here if you didn't think I was some kind of sweet you'd like to put right in your mouth.”

“You'll be going nowhere near my mouth, thank you. You look like you might taste like the bottom of my boot, dirty as you are. Does Miss Hawk fuck you?”

There came a tiny disgruntled growl from the little one behind her. “No. She doesn't.”

“Does she think you'd taste like a boot too?”

“I don't taste like a boot!” He was gone from her and she heard him rustling about again and this time she knew he was roughly pulling on his trousers.

She didn't turn back around, marking some of her pages and scribbling down a few things. “And what did that little prostitute think of you?”

He grumbled, obviously distraught still. “Thom thought I was very sweet...”

“And did he give a reason for not wanting you?” At the very least, she might have been able to glean a little bit more information out of him that might help with Hawk taking him back. He was a right little bastard and Tilly was just starting to understand how in the world Hugh could have driven Hawk to have such a sour mood.

“He said there were plenty of reasons and he didn't name any of them. I was...I was angry so I...I stormed out.”

“You didn't demand an answer?”

“I did...he told me he'd thought about it long and hard and decided against seeing me again. That there were many reasons not to continue. He never said what!” Impatient and frustrated hands came back to Tilly's shoulders and she felt him slide his palms forward until he was draped over her, the side of his head heavily resting against her ear. “He didn't think I tasted like a boot...” His scent wilted. “At least...he never told me he did...” His nose was against her neck and he was taking in huffing breaths of her scent without any care to propriety.

She shouldn't think he would have ever paid attention to propriety, she thought wryly as he continued to take in long sniffs of her. She spoke to him calmly, recognizing the distress in his scent. “Am I calming for you, Omega?”

He didn't bother to respond verbally, merely nodding against her neck.

“That's fine then. You should gather yourself. It was a mistake to fall in love with a prostitute anyway—what did you think would happen? That he would one day fall in love with you too?”

“I don't know...” was his muffled response.

“He has an Alpha and he lives in luxury. You live in tenement housing.”

“You don't have to say it like that.”

“Like what?”

He pressed his forehead against the slope of her neck. “Like I'm...less than.”

Tilly sighed. “I apologize then, for my tone. Hawk must have known that this would be your reaction if she had bribed or threatened Thom. Would that not have stopped her from doing it? She can't truly think that it would be a good idea to anger you before you're to go up against some important boxers.” She softened her voice as far as she could manage. “She cares about you, Omega. I can tell that she does. She came for you last night when you were drunk and about to be arrested by the constable. She's going to pay for what you did to my bar stools and she has the patience of a saint with you. I don't believe for a moment that she would have turned Thom against you.”

“You don't have to believe it,” he growled. “You don't know her.”

“I know what I need to know.”

“She hates Miss Molly's.”

Tilly pinched the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger and then looked up when there was a soft knock upon the door. “Yes?”

Bazaretti entered, popping a brow at the sight of his restaurant manager sitting at her desk with an Omega draped over her shoulders. If it bothered him further than the brow, he didn't show it and the Beta ignored Ozzie while he spoke softly with his mild Italian inflection.

“I've approved your requests for repairs from last night's incident. I trust that you've settled the matter with the constable.”

“You'll not hear from him,” she explained.

“Ah. Good. Did you need assistance with anything else, Miss Caird?”

“Not at this time, thank you Bazaretti.” She looked up at him with a stare that she knew was very put-upon and the Italian managed an amused little smile that seemed to commiserate with her—even if he couldn't. Not really. The part about the man that Tilly liked the most was that he trusted her. They had worked as partners for a decently long time, with she in the restaurant and he as the bar manager and thus now he did have a better understanding than most...especially for a Beta. When he was gone, she reached up and hesitated only a moment before she touched the boy's hand, bruised and rough from his fighting and yet still feeling almost fragile under her fingers merely from the small size of it. “I can't leave you in the hotel overnight.”

Ozzie sighed heavily against her.

“Are you at all...averse to cats?”

He perked, lifting his head. “Cats?”

“Two. Two cats.”

“N-No.”

“Alright.” She nodded mostly to herself. “I'll get us some supper tonight and you can meet them. But you'll not be in my bed, you understand? And no matter where you'll be, you'll have a bath before you get anywhere near my quilts.”

The cats were less impressed of him than he was of them though they did warm up to him a small amount when they watched him crawling about on his hands and knees to look at them where they had hidden under her sofa. He picked up their small mouse-shaped toys and examined them, shaking them near his ears to hear the gentle chime of the tiny bells inside. He also curiously picked up the small springs she had taken out of a few broken childrens' toys as there was something very interesting for cats about springs as they rolled and bounced out of paws. Millsworth and Daffodil, the two Calico brothers, inched out of their hiding spot to peer out at the Omega and they were eventually rewarded when Ozzie subtly began to slip small pieces of his supper under the table for them to snack upon, undaunted by Tilly's reproachful glances.

When they were finished, she heated up some water and put it in a basin with some hard soap and a cloth, instructing him to bathe every inch of himself before he was to touch any of the bedclothes. With that, she shrugged on her coat and at his inquiry to her destination, replied only that she would be back in a few hours.

It was cold and it had begun to snow again in sparse amounts of fat white flakes that slowly coated the ground as she walked to her destination several blocks away. The gas lamps gave on an eerie and greenish sort of glow through the cold air and over the dirty, slushy streets of the city while she passed between buildings, her huge presence enough to deter anyone from bothering her on her way through the cramped alleyways. It was better to come at her destination from the back rather than the front, as it was not somewhere that Alphas were admitted and it would have been easier to attract the attention of her friend without the added requirement of having to finagle the two Alpha bouncers.

She stood beside the back door and knocked upon it, waiting until it was opened by a scrawny Omega dishwasher before she caught the edge of it in her hand to prevent him from closing it. “Tilly Caird,” she said to him. “Get Orville for me.”

He silently gave her a glare before he left presumably to do as she'd asked and she held the door open a few inches while she waited until the barkeep himself arrived with his bar rag draped over his shoulder and a cigarette dangling from his mouth. Tiny as he was, his hard stare was enough to make any Alpha, even she, wary of him.

“Evenin' Tilly,” he greeted. “What can I do ya for?”

“I hope you know I appreciate your seeing me. You didn't have to.”

He shook his head. “I'll see you when you need seein', Tilly. Now what'samatter?”

“Hawk's boy. Ozzie. You know him.”

Orville's expression flattened and he crossed his arms. “I know him.”

“Someone's trying to stop him from winning his matches and they've done a damned good job of turning him into a mess of an Omega. I'd like to know what the hell is going on and who's responsible.” She stared at him expectantly.

“Alpha, what are ya doin' with Ozzie?”

“Nothing.” She blinked. “Well...it's difficult to explain. You see his...lover...”

“Oh Alpha,” Orville sighed. “Come inside. Just in the kitchen here. I can't have ya standin' outside in the cold freezin' with the door hangin' open.” He pulled her by the sleeve of her coat until she was standing just inside the door, having to duck just slightly from the slant of the roof. “If you mean little Thomas at Miss Molly's, then I'll have to tell ya, the boy's known to be fickle. Not only that, if Ozzie owed him money at all, he's bound to have his access revoked until further notice. It's sweet of you to call Thomas his 'lover' but you and I both know exactly what he is.”

“Whore or not,” she explained, “he's convinced that Hawk's to blame.”

“Could be,” he replied simply. “I've met her before and I wouldn't put it past her though she does humor him more often than she doesn't.”

“Orville, this isn't helping me.”

He sighed and glanced at the Omegas who moved around them nervously, giving Tilly a wide berth as they prepared simple tavern fare and washed up dishes. “I'll do a little asking around, see if anyone knows anything about it.”

“Do any of them see Thom? Do you?”

He met her eyes, his brows ticking downward. “I have a mate, if you don't recall.”

“My apologies, he doesn't ever leave Miss Molly's?”

“And come to the Rabbit?” he asked, incredulously.

“Forgive me,” she blinked, “I wasn't aware that your establishment was in such poor condition as to—”

“Tilly Caird,” he fumed, his tiny body gaining tension while he once again crossed his arms, “this is not the place for prostitutes of any caliber and I am not so delusional as to believe that a young Omega who is used to a severe amount of pampering should like to be surrounded by the likes of dozens of rough and tumble boxers. Having one alone in a bedroom is one thing, I'm sure. Now if you're asking me if I would somehow be able to get someone to needle little Thomas for information, that might be possible, but at the moment I am not feeling so inclined.”

“Ten dollars.”

He stared at her.

“Twenty.”

“Save your money, Alpha. You might need it later. Tell you what. You slip me a case of Gordon's under the Italian's nose and I'll make certain you get a good answer.”

“Done.”

“Alright. Thank god it's cold out, your Alpha stink might not have made it far out of my kitchen. You'd best get along before the whole place gets nervous thinking one of you's snuck in and is after them.”

“Thank you, Orville.”

“Bah.” He waved a hand at her. “I'll be certain to come to yah with a problem sometime in the future so you don't feel like you owe me somemat.”

“Alright,” she agreed, opening the door and cursing the cold wind that greeted her when she did. She nodded to him as she left and then made her way through the streets, her feet crunching over the fresh fallen snow as she huddled against that chilly night breeze to Hawk's gym. When she arrived, she stomped the slush off her boots and shuffled her way into where the musky scent of Omega exertion filtered through the dry air around the training ring.

An older male Alpha approached her while two little boxers grappled with each other, making soft grunting sounds as they struggled in their mock fight. He held out his hand while she shook off the cold and introduced himself when she moved to grasp it.

“Vincent Hawk.”

“Ah, you must be Miss Hawk's father,” she said and he nodded. “I suppose she's told you...”

He gave a little shrug. “It's not the first time he's run off and it won't be the last.” He grated over her with his eyes, taking in every detail of her and assessing her as if he were going to make some kind of purchase. “I was under the impression that you and Sasha were not on the kindest of terms. Have yah come to tell her to take the little prick back? No shame in it, they're all like miniature dogs, the lot. They yap and they nip if yah forget to take a heavy hand at the first.”

“I...I beg pardon?”

“That's not to say to hit them,” he clarified with his hand up placatingly. “But rules and boundaries. That's what they're wanting, you see. You'll find out. That's if you're not here to dump the damned boy off here right now.”

“No. But I did want to talk to—”

“Sasha!” he bellowed without letting her finish. “Alpha to see yah.”

Hawk almost immediately turned the corner from the kitchen with a tall glass of milk in her hand and the faintest bit of it still clinging to her upper lip.

Oh no, Tilly thought, staring at that soft strip of white and unable to look away even as the tip of Hawk's pink tongue darted out and licked it clear away.

“Tilly. Hadn't expected you so soon. How's Oz? Givin' you some grief, I guess?” she was grinning with all of her teeth bared, clearly tickled to the bone to see her back so soon. She was comfortable-looking in just a shirt that gaped open at the neck far enough that it was possible to just barely catch a glimpse of her bindings, the gentle swoop of her collarbones enough to form an odd sensation in Tilly's throat that prevented her from a reply.

What the devil is wrong with me?

Hawk looked down at her milk in her hand and then back up at Tilly. Misinterpreting her glances, she asked blankly, “Would you like some milk?”

“Uhm...”

“Come into the kitchen so you don't have to watch Sam get his fool ass beat by Niall again. It's embarrassing.”

“Well alright...” she managed, giving one glance back to the fussing little Omegas in the ring before she followed Hawk into the kitchen and settled her coat upon one of the chairs, snow still slowly melting off the shoulders of the garment. “I...I wanted to let you know that...” she gathered herself. “That I asked about this evening. About Thom. I've got a few sources about the city that might be able to tell us something, at least where Thom is concerned.”

“Nice of yah,” Hawk told her, pulling out the little glass of milk and pouring her some into a tumbler. “I suppose you won't find anything out right away but if it can get you anything at all, that would be a good start. As it is, I've about as much luck as you have. None of the boxers here know anything at all about it and even if they did, they might not rat for the fear of getting themselves thrown into the East River with a sack of rocks tied about their ankles.” She laughed but it was a grim sort of thing.

Tilly sipped her milk to prevent herself from replying.

Hawk continued. “Anyhow, there are a few managers around here who get chuffed a bit by me and likely for good reason, as you know. Hugh didn't do well for my reputation and now that I've Oz, it's easier for them to try ruffle him to get to me. It's not the first time they've tried but it's certainly the first time they've succeeded. There was once they'd gotten some scrap to come and try to get Oz to lose a drinking competition. Obviously they've not met Oz before then—you have to drown him in liquor to get him to the state he was in when you found him and the little scamp who'd challenged him for the Alpha lookin' to sour 'im ended up flat on his back with his lips near blue.”

Tilly grimaced.

“Ah yep,” Hawk replied, her eyebrows up. “The course had been to take him out of the fight the next night but the kid walked upright into the ring and swung his way right into a win. Not the prettiest fight, for certain.” She chuckled and looked up at Tilly with a warm and unfiltered grin. “You up for a fight, Alpha? I'm sure Niall and Sam could use a good laugh.”

She glowered back and took another sip of her milk.

“No? Well alright, but I hope you're thinking still about what I said to yah.”

“About...fighting?”

“You're huge, Tilly,” she told her. “With the right stance, you could take a hundred hits. With the right swing, you could fell any man. You could be immovable. You could be unstoppable. You could likely take a single step in a fight and still win...not that we'd ever have yah do it, but it could be possible at least.”

“And what about Ozzie?”

“What about Ozzie? You take care of Ozzie...” her voice grew softer and she swallowed a bit before she seemed to force out her next words. “And I'll take care of you.”

She finished her milk, setting the glass down on the wood of the tabletop near her and picked up her coat again, swinging it on without any words. Hawk didn't seem able to conjure any either as the suggestion floated between them in that long, awkward silence that stretched and stretched into something unbearable. There was something less innocuous about the suggestion and Tilly knew exactly what it was. Tension. She wanted to feel what it was like to hold down an Alpha and somehow Hawk could sense that. There was a challenge there and its roots were mighty, strong, and overtly sexual.

Why is everything such a goddamned ordeal? It's always about sex, isn't it?

She was annoyed at herself, wondering if she might be able somehow to catch some tail on the way home despite that most of the Beta girls who wandered about selling their wares didn't spend much time out of doors and Tilly was most certainly not going to go out of her way to find one among her fellow rabble in the taverns about New York's seedier neighborhoods. They were hardly a challenge anyway, and as she moved toward the door and pushed it open to the cold wind, flaked with sporadic bits of snow, she cursed under her breath.

Blast that Alpha. The devil tempts me and I'll take the blame for it. She's as beautiful as she is dangerous and I hate her. I hate her, she tried to remind herself. I hate her, I hate her, I hate her. But God, do I want to fuck her.

Chapter Text

“What in the Devil's name do you think you're doing?” Vega Kowalczyk asked while Hawk stared at him over her crossed ankles. She had her feet up on his desk and there was not a single doubt in her mind that the sight of her in his usually-locked office came as quite the shock. “How did you get in here?”

“Trade secret,” she shrugged. “Don't bother changing the locks, we're all practiced at the best of them.”

His dangerously arched brows gained an even more striking pitch and his eyes glinted with a hard viciousness that was difficult to ignore. “How many times have you been in my office?”

“How many times have you nearly killed a boxer?”

“Nearly?” The twitch of his upper lip betrayed his pleasure at the task and it was all Hawk could do to hide her disgust.

“Any clue who's gotten to Miss Mitchell's Thom? Maybe you're giving me shit for something or another? Am I allowed to know what it is?”

“I don't think I like what you're implying here,” he sniffed, approaching his desk and staring down at her with those cold glassy eyes, his burning Alpha scent strong around her and even stronger now that she'd pissed him off. “You're suggesting that I should know something and I assure you, Miss Hawk, I don't have anything to do with Miss Mitchell's whores.”

“Ah,” Hawk smiled, relishing that the sight of it was enough to make him even angrier. Anything to make this son of a bitch angry was enough to be worth the effort in picking his locks. “You're afraid of her too, aren't you? Had any run-ins with her recently? She's a firecracker, ain't she? I bet you'd really like to have her between the sheets, wouldn't 'cha?”

His jaw was tight and his scent shifted suddenly when she gave out a harsh cackle. If there was anything Hawk was good at, it was coming to know exactly where Vega Kowalczyk's weaknesses were. She didn't use them to exploit him—oh no. She couldn't do that. The man didn't take to blackmail well. But she could use them to pick at him and pick at him until there was nothing left of him to be fearful of. The man was no mystery. He was no enigma. She had thought so before, when she was new and the bookies seemed terrifying and strange and nearly all-powerful. She had thought so right up until she'd found out that Vega had a particular taste for powerful women.

“I should like to sit in my chair, Miss Hawk,” he ground out.

“Would yah?” she asked, a grin spread far across her face. “You might have to take me out of it first.”

When he moved around the desk, she pushed off from the chair and stood straight and tall on top of his desk, heedless of the papers beneath her boots. She turned and looked down upon him while she spread her feet to ground herself and put her fists on her hips. He stared up her with the side of his nose pinched.

“Miss Hawk,” he began quietly.

“Tell me who's dabbling in my affairs,” she demanded.

He drew in a long breath and looked around at his office for a moment then back up at her, having collected himself enough to reply. “This is not the time nor the place.”

He doesn't know.

“If you wish for that information, I'm certain that the two of us could strike some kind of deal, but for now, I'm in no mood to be gossiping like some kind of schoolchild.”

She let her brows drop and she stared at him for a moment until she casually took a step off the far end of his desk and threw him a glance over her shoulder. “I'm not going to be making any kind of deal with you, Vega. I know what you want.” She drew her eyes over him from head to foot and then back to his face while he looked back at her icily, comprehending exactly what she was suggesting and unable to refute it. “If you knew something, perhaps that would be another story.”

“Who said I didn't?” he tried.

“You don't.” She was almost to the door when she sensed him coming behind her and when she turned about, he caught her wrist in his hard grip.

“Hawk...”

She pulled against him, testing the tension in his arm before she hissed through her teeth. “Get your disgusting hands off of me, you snake.”

Surprisingly enough he released her though his scent hardened still and he breathed sharply out of his nose to collect himself and his wits. Vega was no stranger to those who would speak aggressively against him but it was only too obvious that he was reluctant to harm her—for the most odious of reasons. “I could find out for you,” he told her. “I could help you.”

“Pull yourself together, you sack of shit. I'll ask who I'll ask and if I ever find out, God help them. If you do end up knowing who's done it, you'd best tell them to keep it quiet because I'll be putting them down once I find them.”

He drew up and straightened his waistcoat, glaring at her insult. “I don't think it wise for you to treat me thusly, Miss Hawk. It wasn't I who was giving you shit, as you so eloquently put it, but I could certainly make life difficult for you in the future.”

She took a step and a half closer to him, enough so that she was nearly nose-to-nose with him, a challenge in her grin. “You going to give me trouble, Vega? I'll give you some trouble.”

He puffed out a small laugh. “She, who couldn't even manage the little paddy.”

That was about it. She was going to spend forever and day trying to live down what Hugh had put her through and this was something she was never, ever going to let slide. It was the last straw in any encounter and she was one day going to make certain that no one, not a soul, would dare speak to her about Hugh or the way he treated her or spoke to her ever again. Especially not the bookies. Especially not this absolute pisser. She grabbed him by his cravat and jerked him back and then forth again, knocking him out of his steady stance easily and bringing his balance under her control. When that was finished, she brought him close enough so that the tip of her nose just barely brushed his and she could scent just the faintest stirrings of fear and arousal that he emitted from just that simple act. Her voice was dangerously low in her growl.

“I suggest you think about what you say to me, Vega. From what I've seen, you've never been in a real fight. You've never gone toe-to-toe with an Alpha like me before—just little Omegas and never alone. Just try to put your black bag over my head one of these days, Alpha. I'll have your guts out by the night's end and don't you ever doubt it, you pathetic scumwhore.”

He was practically panting when she let him go with a small shove and there was desire clear in his predatory gaze. He bounced back quickly and put his hand up as if to touch her, seeming to think better of it at the last moment when he paused. “Hawk, I can help you.”

“Oh piss off,” she dismissed, disappearing out the door too quickly for him to retort. When she was back in the coach, she gave another address and was off again, still fuming from the way he'd dared to touch her. He'd always been like that as far as she'd known him and it was disturbing when he managed to get his paws on her even if it was only for a moment.

The man was a murderer. It was black and white as far as Hawk was concerned even if the constables did nothing about it and there was little to no evidence to even bring him for questioning. None of the witnesses were brave enough to step forward and very few remained living after having been identified. The man killed Omegas and, as far as Hawk could imagine, he enjoyed doing it. That such a man could wear a suit and a cravat and wander about acting as though he were normal or even civilized at all was unfathomable to her. That there was a creature out there who could hold the distinction of Alpha and yet go out of his way to humiliate and destroy the very beings that Alphas were normally instinctually bound to protect—it was inconceivable. How many Alphas were capable of this? How many Betas? How many humans could look other humans in the eyes and give out only the barest hints of their depravity? Had she not known previously, was it possible that she could have missed the small mannerisms that betrayed him as something...less human?

She crunched through the snow and this time didn't pick any locks to get where she needed to be. Walking purposefully through the tavern that was filled to bursting with raucous, thirsty Alphas, she made her way through a narrow back passage past the kitchen and didn't bother to knock when she saw the faint sparkle of light through the crack under the door. She swung it wide and slipped inside, closing it behind her while Carmon, another of the bookies, glanced upward.

“Hawk,” he said in welcome. “Have a drink. Sit down. What brings you to my neighborhood?”

“My boxer,” she stated bluntly while she sat, forgoing the drink. “Someone's trying to get into a mess with me.”

He nodded sagely. “That will happen from time to time. What's gone wrong?”

Hawk explained to the man what occurred and he listened with steepled fingers gently touched against his lips. The more she thought about it, the less it all made sense and and for the few moments it took for the Alpha to process what she'd said, she was certain that it all sounded like the ravings of a lunatic. That her Omega boxer had somehow been poisoned against her by some nefarious plot—what if the toffer was simply tired of the boy? What if little Thom was merely overbooked? What if he had found a more stable and wealthy client?

Carmon took in a breath through his nose and frowned. “That is puzzling.”

She breathed out a small sigh of relief. “It's not mad?”

“No, no. Of course not. Have you told your father?”

“Not entirely...” she admitted. The man already thought her completely inept. There was no reason to give him another doubt in her. Let him think it was the fickleness of the boxers rather than the work of someone seeking to destroy her.

“Well, it's not likely that he could do much about it anyway,” he told her. “And what do you plan to do?”

“I can't tell you that,” she grumbled and then looked at him sourly while he raised his brows. “What if you're the one who's done it?”

“I've nothing against you, Hawk. Why should I have done it?”

“You're a bookie. You're just like the rest of them.”

He tapped a finger over his spectacles and then perched them atop his head to look at her, the amused shine in his brown eyes enough to melt away at least the outer layers of her defenses. A few gray strands in his hair silvered in the flickering light of the fire and in a second, the Alpha seemed inordinately kind. “Hawk,” he mused, “You know better than to group us all in together. I'm a man who spins bets and collects debts. That's all I am and as long as that's how you think of me, there should be no mystery in my actions. You owe me no debts and you've no say in how I spin the bets. I should have no reason to harm you or your boxers.”

She leaned back in her seat and stared at him, wondering how he and Vega could possibly work the same job with such different outlooks upon it. “You've hurt people in the past.”

His expression darkened. “People who've made me look like a fool, I've hurt.”

“I must seem weak to you then.”

Carmon gave her a sympathetic expression. “You don't seem weak to me, Hawk. Actually, the opposite. I've wondered for a long time how you managed to have such patience.”

“Oh yes,” she supplied wanly, feeling tired. “Patience.”

“You're hard on yourself like we all are when we're young. You can afford to be. One day you might be sitting in my seat and spinning the bets instead of playing the game and you'll realize just how valuable your skills in patience can be. You're a strong woman, Hawk. As much as you hate to admit it, that little one your father gave you did much to develop your skin the way it is.” He smiled at her. “And you know, I'm going to tell you something and it's not my place to tell it to you but I doubt your father ever has.”

She narrowed her eyes at him.

“I'm proud of you.”

She took in a small breath and sighed with it. He was right. Her father hadn't really said those exact words. It was difficult, she knew, for a man like Vincent Hawk to work around the idea that his Alpha daughter—hapless as she was—needed to hear something so simple. though, why did she work so hard if not for that fleeting bit of approval? He was a man of action. Should she expect him to know something that was so obvious to a man like Carmon?

“If you want my advice,” he continued, “you should see if one of those boxers your father has might get in with whatever Omega has spurned your little one. Have them wheedle a little information out of him. That or you could catch the offending prostitute when he's out and about.”

“I don't know what he looks like,” she grumbled. “I've never seen him and I'm not prone to kidnapping like the rest of you are.”

He put up a finger. “I'm only prone to kidnapping when it comes to men who owe me debts. Don't cast me in the same lot with Kowalczyk, I don't take pleasure having to find them and I certainly don't take pleasure in having to make examples out of them. Aside from that, eventually you'll have to go and find that little Omega of yours and put the fear of God in him if he doesn't come back on his own, won't you?”

“You know as well as I do that the fear of God doesn't stop them from stomping all over my toes. He might come back to me but he'll be tossing fights left and right until I can prove to him that it wasn't me who spoiled it all for him.”

The corners of Carmon's eyes crinkled a bit with his amusement. “They're such randy little creatures, are they not? Have you tried...you know?”

“It's not good practice.”

“Ah. This is why I've never managed them. I wouldn't know. I prefer them a bit less rugged, anyway.”

There was a small moment of silence between them in which Hawk pretended to examine her nails. When it had gone on long enough, she broke it by clearing her throat.

“How is the Alpha syndicate doing? I never do hear about it anymore.”

“Well your fine little arse went rogue on us so it's really no wonder. You haven't seen a fight for a few years. I suppose you wanted to save that pretty face of yours,” he teased. “If you're itching for a go, I'm sure I could drum up some Alpha dumb enough to get into the ring with you downstairs. We've no fights tonight though a few of the brutes have been keen to set their dogs loose tonight to spite me.”

“I wasn't thinking for me. There's an Alpha that's caught my eye and...” she trailed off, shrugging a bit. She was uncertain exactly what she wanted to say. Tilly hadn't given her any hints one way or the other and it was fairly obvious that the woman still mostly disliked her—how she was going to convince the woman that she would make a fantastic boxer, she didn't know.

“Well if you'd like to break into the market for Alphas, I'll certainly lend you a hand in it. Though not too much of a hand, else those managers start thinking I'm playing favorites. You know how they hate that.”

“Oh yes,” she grinned. “I know how they hate that. Well. Thank you for your input, Carmon, but I've got to see about this business, such as it is. I feel like I've gotten absolutely nowhere with it and I've got less than a week before I have to start thinking about dragging him back and forcing him to fight.”

“If I were you, I'd swallow my pride and plow him until he's forgotten the name of whatever wastrel's been doing it before.”

Hawk stood up, chuckling. “And if he'd rather be the one plowing?”

Carmon blinked. “That's...well...I think I'd have to decline on that count.”

“And therein lies the true conundrum,” she grinned. “Goodnight, Carmon.”

“Goodnight, Hawk.”

Still nowhere in this mystery and it wasn't even the only thing that was on her mind. She could live if she lost Ozzie. She had plenty of savings from all the fights he'd won and all the deals she made and considering the fact that she never wasted it the way other managers did on gambling and whores, she had a decent egg. She could live but she didn't want to have to. She wanted her boxer back. Not only that, she wanted to have Tilly tell her that she would fight. She wanted it all.

It's not probable. And it's foolish to boot.

Still. Still she wanted to know what it might be like to face Tilly in the ring again. To slip and dodge those heavy blows that threatened her very life if they landed in a sensitive spot. The thrill of having such a huge and formidable opponent sharing a ring with her was probably the best thing that had come about from this mess and eventually, she hoped, the woman would come to hold a better opinion of her—as strange as that sounded. Why she should have any care at all as to whether or not Tilly Caird liked her or not...she didn't know. There was something about the Alpha that appealed to Hawk's particular tastes and it was nearly impossible for her to place her finger on exactly what it was.

She closed her eyes in the coach and tried to doze on her way back to the dark gym. When she got inside, kicked off her boots, and climbed the stairs into the loft, she found the lamp upon the side table burning low, casting a dim glow over a lump in her bed. She sighed while she shed her clothes and got under the covers and out of the chilly air, the sheets warm from the sweet Omega who occupied them.

“What are you doing here, Niall?” she whispered while she came behind him, pulling his small but strong body back against her.

He mumbled. “Waiting for you.”

“What do you want?”

“A bed.”

Hawk ran her hand from his knee over the soft naked flesh of his thigh, surprised at herself that she held no inclination to touch him further. “Alright, little one. You may have a bed.” Even as she put her arms around him and held him as she had dozens of times before, his scent didn't soothe her. His presence didn't calm her. She felt no desire.

What is wrong with me?

As her mind slipped off toward the weighty mire of sleep, the snippets of memory that morphed into dreams teased her with fragments of glittering realities. Shimmering broken glass and the scent of bothered Alpha. Moments lost to silence in the orange glow of the gym's stove with an Alpha's heat close by. That puckered brow. Those pouting lips. That power and yet that grace. Before she slid entirely beneath the surface of her dreams, she could capture only one more fleeting thought.

One day, I'll really put her on her back.

Chapter Text

She had to slap his little hands away from fiddling with the shirt about five times before she told him she might just tie them behind his blasted back until she was finished.

“Well why do I have to wear the damned thing? Nobody's going to see me!”

“And that's why you don't have to wear anything 'round your neck. I'll let you get away without any of that, but if you're going to work in my kitchen, you're going to look like you belong there.” She buttoned up the trim black waistcoat that used to be Hugh's, nearly completing the look until she pulled out a long white apron and looped it about his neck to let it hang and then tied it snug about his waist. With the collar of the shirt folded neatly to hide the apron loop and the rest of him clean and presentable, she turned him about and set him in front of the sink.

He frowned at the pile of dishes and then frowned at her.

“It'll make your day go faster and I'll pay you an honest day's wages for the work.”

Ozzie looked down at his rolled up sleeves, down at the apron, and then back up at her. Without saying anything else, he turned toward the sink and began scrubbing. When she was satisfied and he was in a decent pace, she felt better about the whole situation and left him to it, going about her duties in the restaurant as normal.

It wouldn't hurt him to have something to do with himself while he wasn't training and was, at current, on the out-and-outs with Hawk. A man had to have something to occupying his time, after all, and if there was nothing else for him to do then he could certainly wash a few dishes. Aside, it was a good job for a young Omega and it would keep him off the streets and earn him a little cash. The kitchen staff mostly left him alone, avoiding him and his surly-looking expressions much like they had left Hugh alone at first when he'd first started working the bar. It took them a while to warm up to new-comers and especially to any newcomer who seemed like they would rather be socking someone in the face than doing just about anything else.

She ran through a few orders, helped to unload an order of groceries, stocked the back room with all of the fresh ingredients that came in on the lorry, and checked on the men who'd come to replace the broken bar stools. With the invoice in her hand, she was wandering back to her office when her current barkeep pulled her aside to tell her that she had a rather small visitor asking for her. She stuffed the bill in her pocket and wandered out to the dim bar room to find Orville standing awkwardly beside the bar.

“Hasn't come in yet,” she told him, referencing her promise to supply him.

“You'll owe me,” he replied. “This is a nice place. I don't think I've ever been further than the lobby before and even then I felt like a bum walkin' in. Look at all of these rich sods...” He grumbled a bit and pulled a rolled cigarette out of his pocket and stuck it behind his ear. “Anyway, I got a guy who goes to Molly's who's a regular with Thom. He said that the kid seemed skittish the other night and that was unusual—he's normally very composed. He said he's never seen anything like it, like the kid kept going to the window and looking out like he was waiting for someone to be there.”

“At the window?”

Orville nodded. “Of course, this guy I talked to, he was real drunk and maybe he was misremembering something but he insisted that it was weird and that the kid was acting really strange. His scent was all messed up like he might have been scared.”

Tilly felt her brows pinch in the middle. “Maybe he was threatened.”

“It's a brave Alpha who'll threaten one of Molly Mitchell's Omegas, that's for certain,” Orville mumbled, impressed.

“Maybe it wasn't him. Maybe it was someone he cares about.”

“Then why all the bit with the window?”

She pursed her lips, tapping the side of her finger against her cheek while the gears turned in her head. Why all the bit with the window? Was it for show? That didn't make much sense, did it? She tried thinking out loud, her voice soft as to not attract any attention from the other patrons. “If there was someone after him...an Alpha, say, then what would it matter? He would have protection where he was and he wasn't going to leave that night...”

Orville shook his head. “Fanciful and flighty little things they can be...”

“You know that includes you, you little goat,” she chuckled.

He scowled up at her and put his hands in the pockets of his honestly tiny-looking greatcoat. “Don't you be tellin' me about my business now, Alpha.”

“I wouldn't dream of it,” she chuffed back, teasingly. With her thumb and her forefinger to her chin, she puzzled again. “A strange mystery this is...”

“And Ozzie?”

“In the back, washing dishes.”

The man balked, staring at her as if she had suddenly grown a second head out the side of her neck. “Ozzie? Doing dishes?”

Tilly raised a brow. “He's not useless and I won't let him pretend that he is. He should work for his living just like every other little scrub alive. I've made him wash himself up, get enough rest, and he can make an honest living. If he doesn't want to box for Hawk, then he can do the wash for me.”

Orville gave out a small, shocked laugh. “He'll make a lot more boxing for Hawk.”

“Then maybe he'll be more inclined to go back to work for her.” She could only hope. She had woken up that morning to find that he'd moved from her small sofa into her bed and he was in naught but his underthings when she opened her eyes and caught him cuddling her with his face buried against her throat. That she hadn't even woken when he'd made the switch was the most unnerving part of the ordeal and that she hadn't quite wanted to leave once she'd found him there was another. He had been soft and warm and so easily molded against her that it was difficult not to acknowledge that perhaps the traditionalists were right when they screeched that Omegas and Alphas were simply made for each other. He had smelled so sweet that it had been quite the chore to pry herself out of her bed and having his supple body leave hers was such a dramatic loss that she couldn't imagine how any bonded Alpha could bring themselves to get out of bed while their mate still slept. If she had such a difficult time with Ozzie then it seemed near impossible for the poor souls who were meant to be together.

“Well if it really was Hawk who's done it,” Orville looked at her seriously, “which it could have been, then I don't know if he'll ever go back to 'er. He might abandon you for another manager, though. That is, if yah haven't fallen in love with him.” He winked.

She frowned at him. “You know that's not going to happen.”

“You and your Beta girls,” he sniffed. “You're a strange Alpha.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've heard it before. If you don't have anything else for me then you can get the hell out and I'll pay you whenever the order comes.”

“I'll count on it,” he told her. “And if I come across anything else, I'll be sure to let you know. But you know, Alpha...you might be able to talk to Miss Molly 'erself.”

“It's well-known you don't walk into Miss Molly's as an Alpha,” she reminded him, recalling the tales of the men who'd done so chatting at her bar about their nightmarish interactions with the protective madam.

“Show up with your hat in your hand and just tell her you're not interested in any of her Omegas. You don't have to talk to Thom, you really only have to talk to her.”

“I'll think about it.”

“You do that. I'll see you 'round, Alpha.” He left with one parting glance at the snobbish-looking clientele, shaking his head and putting his cigarette into his mouth as he went.

The rest of the day went as well as could be expected, though she hadn't known that when she was wiping up the bar close to the end of her shift that she would look up to see Hawk sitting herself down. Tilly leaned on the bar in front of her, meeting her eyes and staring at her calmly. It wasn't natural for two Alphas to hold eye contact, the action often being considered a challenge and often ending in some kind of a fight but Hawk continued to hold her gaze, the side of her mouth tipping upward with her unabashed amusement.

Seconds passed. Maybe a minute, even. Hawk's eyes were such a deep, dark brown that it was difficult to determine where her pupils began and her irises ended. Staring into something so dark and unfathomable had Tilly tingling somehow and somewhere deep inside herself, a gentle buzzing that confused her and titillated her simply for curiosity's sake alone.

“You alright, Alpha?” came an unfamiliar tone to her left. She broke contact with Hawk, suddenly feeling cold when she turned to look at another patron who was giving her and the manager strange glances. His scent was wary and she realized with slight embarrassment that he had been expecting a brawl to ensue.

She cleared her throat. “Yeah...yeah...everything's fine.” She flashed a glance at Hawk and then turned around, grabbing a few glasses to wash to cut through the fog in her mind. They hadn't even said anything to each other and she was getting flustered. Was it from the rock-steady strength in her gaze? Was it from being interrupted or caught somehow by some outside party? It wasn't any of their business, really, though from wherever he'd been standing, it must have looked like a fight was about to break out. Nobody wanted to be around in a bar when a fight was about to start between two Alphas. She chuckled to herself until she heard his voice again.

“You got a problem with her, Alpha?”

Tilly turned around to find the man addressing Hawk who wasn't even looking at him, calmly ignoring him while she munched on some peanuts that sat in a glass bowl on the bar top.

“Hey, maybe you should leave.” He went to reach for her.

“Whoa,” Tilly told him, holding out her hand before he could touch her. “Steady, Alpha. She's tougher than she looks. She can stay.”

His dark brows moved downward. “Are you...are you sure?”

“Just a game we play. No need for alarm.”

“Tougher than I look, huh?” Hawk asked, raising her head and jutting out her chin playfully. She picked up another peanut and popped it into her mouth.

Tilly gave her a cavalier nod. “It's not any Alpha can put me on my back.”

It was this statement that made the gentleman take a guarded stance toward the seated woman and looked between the two of them with a silent awe. It must have been shocking for anyone to know that it was possible to put Tilly Caird on her back, big and solid as she was. He removed himself quickly with a soft “excuse me” and retreated back to his table where he sat and presumably minded his own business.

She tapped the bar in front of Hawk. “What's your poison?”

“Whiskey.”

“And somehow you didn't get along with Hugh, huh?”

The Alpha didn't respond, her reluctance to discuss him coming with a tightening to the side of her mouth that signaled her displeasure at being reminded of him.

She set up the glass and poured three fingers of the best, pushing it toward her and watching her take a sip of the smooth amber, gold in the light.

“It's good. How much?”

“Nothing. I'll give you the bill for the damage fixed and you can have the drink as a gift.”

“I can't take it and not pay you.”

Tilly flicked her gaze down to Hawk's soft-looking pink lips and then flicked them up again just as fast, catching her eyes and wondering if the other Alpha was thinking something along the same lines. That was ridiculous, of course. Hawk wouldn't think something like that.

Hawk would never think of repaying me with...

“How about a little boxing lesson? How would that do? A few more drinks and you can get a few more minutes in the ring with me.”

Her mouth moved before she could stop and think about it. “I'm off tomorrow...”

“Tomorrow then. I'll count on it.”

Good grief, it wasn't enough that she was taking care of that damned little minx they called a boxer and now she was indulging herself in strange and wild thoughts about this infuriating and inexplicably attractive Alpha. That she could possibly keep thinking of her in such a manner was more than Tilly could stand though she had already made the deal...she couldn't demand payment now. The best she could do was hope that somehow she could lay a hit tomorrow. Somehow, she could finally take revenge for all the nights she turned around to find Hugh counting inventory with an eye swollen shut or a lip split and scabbed over. Her fury had much abated over the last few days but found fresh footing with the memory even as she looked at the surprisingly comely Alpha at her bar.

Hawk sensed the shift in her fragrance and commented upon it. “Something wrong, Alpha?”

“No.”

There was a pause and Tilly knew that it was Hawk's moment of indecision. She was attempting to pick apart the tone and the word and the implications of the matter with the knowledge that it was a bold-faced lie. When she didn't say anything back, Tilly turned around again and moved to wash more glasses, the simple act enough to again soothe her and drift her mind away from the sting of those not-so-distant memories that clung like soot and ash to her skin and her mind. It wasn't something an Alpha soon forgot, their Omega bloodied and battered...

He was never yours. He never could have been yours and you know it. You're too much a coward to have an Omega as your mate, Tilly Caird, and especially one of those damned boxers.

The sensation of Ozzie melted into her flesh as she awoke that morning came back to her and she felt her cheeks warm at the recollection. He was as far away from her as Hugh had always been, though the boy was most certainly up for more...she couldn't take advantage of him in such a way. To besmirch him that way, it was beyond her. Still. Still. Could he have an Alpha mate? Could it be her? She rolled her eyes at herself and glanced over her shoulder at Hawk who was tipping the rest of that liquid gold into her mouth. She stood up and raised her stare and her brow to Tilly.

“Tomorrow then?”

Tilly sighed. “Tomorrow.”

“Good.”

After Hawk was gone and the glass was clean, she walked back into the kitchen, ready to pluck the little Omega from his station to take him home. Before she did so, however, she watched him from a short distance, the little one having engaged the imagination of one of her younger and smaller Beta dishwashers on the staff. As Ozzie chatted and washed and the Beta, named Eugene, listened and dried, Tilly watched them work and get along well, the Beta taking a great shine to the rough and rowdy Omega.

“How much pressure?” Eugene asked, his curiosity bubbling and brewing.

“Oh, I don't know. Enough, I guess. But once they're limp, you have to let go. You can let them just drop to the ground, though. If you've done your job right, you've done more damage than the floor can do to 'em anyway!”

Eugene chittered out a laugh while he swiped his drying towel over one of the large crystal platters. “It sounds wonderfully exciting to me. I've often wondered about Mr. Muir... There are some who mumble all sorts of things about him, but if he's anything like you, then I suppose he wouldn't be so terrifying.”

“Cyril Muir?” Ozzie asked. “Oh god, I'm nothing like Cyril Muir.”

“No?” Eugene asked, seeming almost deflated.

“Oh no. Never fought him but I've heard about him. He'd put you right in the ground if you weren't careful. They talk about him in my circles too and it's always with those stares all shifty-like, like they think 'e's lurkin' about in the dark corners.” Ozzie laughed. “He's a bit of a myth, I think. All those rich snobs are.”

“You don't think he's worth all the whispers?”

“Maybe he is, but I ain't seen nothin' to make me think so.” Ozzie shrugged, handing the Beta another wet dish.

Eugene's shoulders drooped. “I suppose we'll never know now. He's gone off to England and traveling the world and we're...”

“Poor!” Ozzie exclaimed. “It's one thing when you box as a hobby, it's another when you box for your life!” He splashed his hand in the soapy water. “Damned spoiled...” he trailed off with a hard grumble.

Tilly stepped forward then, tilting her head to show she was not about to reprimand them when Eugene shrank from her. “Are you ready to go home, Omega?”

Ozzie turned about, his back against the edge of the bay of the sink and he gulped. “Home?”

“Yes. Home.”

“...M-My home?”

She leaned over and straightened his apron, letting the backs of her fingers slide over the warmth of him through his shirt and the waistcoat she'd made him wear. “If there is anything you'd wish to fetch from the tenements, I would be willing to make a stop, but no. You'll be staying with me.”

He appeared relieved. “N-No...I have nothing.”

“Nothing?”

Ozzie swallowed. “Perhaps before...I should have had something. But...not anymore.”

“Before what?”

He shook his head, unwilling to say, and she let him have his privacy. He reached behind himself, nervously untying his apron strings and when he unlooped it from over his head, she took it from him, throwing it in the bin to be washed. “The clothes, Alpha?”

“Keep them on. I've a few more sets for you that are already clean and pressed. Used to be the other boxer's who worked here before you.”

Eugene rinsed another dish and set to drying it, smiling broadly. “Oh yes, Hugh. You would have liked Hugh, I think.”

Ozzie made a strange face and his upper lip curled with distaste, his scent ironed and laced with venom.

Tilly smirked with her amusement to his reaction. It was funny that he should display such loyalty to his manager while still having abandoned her. It could only be natural, though, couldn't it? He was, in the end, going to go back to her whether he wanted to at the end of the week or not. It was likely that such loyalty was a good sign as it displayed his ability to overcome such petty emotions and get back to what would do him best in the end. Washing dishes was a job, but it wasn't what put a fire in the boy's blood and it certainly wouldn't put fistwads of cash into the garters of Miss Molly's whores.

“Alright,” she murmured softly, putting her hand out to usher him out. “Good night, Eugene.”

“G-Goodnight, Miss Caird.”

Tilly bundled him up in his coat to take him home and when they were through the door, she had him feed the cats and watch him rub them, taking care to scratch them behind their ears even though they were too preoccupied with eating to appreciate it fully. He truly did like the cats and, in turn, the two of them did seem to tolerate him and his loving caresses. While he was focused on them, still bundled in his coat even while he was crouched without his boots on and in his socks, Tilly spoke.

“Gene was quite taken with you.”

“You call him Gene?”

“It was better than 'you.'”

Ozzie looked up at her with a reluctant smirk for her pun before he stood up and shed his outer layers, beginning to work on the buttons for his waistcoat and then his shirt, intent on getting back into his more comfortable and familiar clothes.

“I've taken your clothes to be washed. They should be back tomorrow.”

“What?” There was tension in his body as he tried to process his options. “What am I going to wear?”

She walked into her room for a moment and came back out with a few sets of more comfortable and casual clothes she'd taken from Hugh's suite after he'd written to her to take whatever she needed. She'd taken the clothes without even thinking, relishing the fact that they had smelled so sweetly of his beautiful and rugged scent. He'd always smelled so sweet to her that it wasn't any surprise that she might have taken them. Even now, they still smelled faintly of him and she had struggled with the idea of letting Ozzie borrow them for the loss of that treasured fragrance.

He sniffed them curiously. “These are someone else's.”

“They used to be.”

Ozzie's expression was somewhat pained for a moment when he asked softly, “Your Omega?”

“No.” Though I sometimes think of him so... “Just Hugh.”

He pulled back from the fabric and frowned before he pulled it to his little nose once more and smelled it again in his curiosity. “He...smells good.”

“Yes. He did. It was difficult for me to see him hurt. That she could be complicit in hurting all of you...that is also difficult for me.”

He didn't look at her. “Hugh hurt her too.” Tilly didn't speak and Ozzie continued. “He treated her like she was nothin' and I guess she was compared to him, but he didn't have to do it like he did. He could have worked with her. He could have made her at least like Omegas. She was weary of us long before she met me and to this day, I'm shocked she gave me a chance. She could have given it all up and where would I be? Nobody else would have let me in the way she did. I was nice to her...at least, I tried to be. Even when she was hard to work with, I tried my best not to make her mad. Sometimes if I lost my head and I mouthed off to her, she would get this look in her eye like she was so hurt and...and her scent would be so...wounded. I can't do that to her.”

“And yet you accused her of tampering with your Thom and you abandoned her. If you're so loyal to her, how could you do that to her? Don't you worry that she's off licking her wounds somewhere and you've done the same to her that Hugh has?”

Fire came back into his eyes and there were pools of shining liquid tears that brimmed up from his bottom lids. His voice was filled with a hard emotion that vibrated at the edges in a crumble of depression. “She deserved it. She ruined everything!”

“I don't think she did, Omega.”

He shook, unable to control his fury. “She made him shake me loose. She never liked him. She never liked any of them!”

Tilly sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, unaccustomed to the scent of an angered and frustrated Omega, the tang of it too much for her. She reached for him and roughly scruffed him, holding the back of his neck in a somewhat tight grip while he struggled with soft “eeping” sounds while she led him to the bedroom.

“Alpha!?” he asked as his eyes laid on the bed, the question in his panicked voice putting a pang straight into her soul.

“No, Omega. You're going to end up here anyhow, might as well get you dressed for bed. Or undressed, as it were. I'll not have you stinking my place up with those nasty scents of yours and if I can calm yah, I will.”

He relaxed, letting her knead the back of her neck with a softer grip as he quickly stripped off his clothes. When he was in his underthings, she tucked him in under the covers and prudently wore her own underthings as she fully intended on giving him a good bit of attention. She pulled him to her and massaged him gently, letting him tuck his nose under her ear and take big sips of her scent, his tiny hands gripping onto her bindings while he clung to her and pressed his tiny, soft body into her as tight as he could manage.

Like jelly in her arms, he mumbled softly, “You can't just get it done, Alpha?”

Knowing his meaning, she rumbled with a bit of laughter. “No, little one. You're not mine.” For no real discernible reason that she could deduce, her mind didn't spiral into a memory of Hugh making quips and lighting up with his frequent tales. It didn't show her the Omega that she had often thought of as hers. What her brain was intent upon that night was not an Omega at all. It was Hawk—and Tilly wasn't surprised at all.

Chapter Text

When the huge Tilly Caird showed up at her father's gym the next day, Hawk thought she was seeing things. Tiny next to the gigantic form of the Alpha, Ozzie was moping and glowering about and it was a sight that Hawk hadn't thought she was going to see until the week was up. That the boy had come on his own accord was something mighty big and the look on Tilly's face seemed to confirm that she had been the one to convince him to come.

“Well, well, well,” Hawk mused.

“Don't get it in your head that I'm here for any reason havin' to do with you.”

Tilly put a heavy hand on his head and passed a wry smile to Hawk. “He's here because I won't let him into the hotel's kitchen without me. He won't be any trouble to you, I promise.”

“The only trouble I'm looking for is from you when you look to put me out in the ring,” Hawk replied, leading her into the gym's open training area where Niall was practicing on the bag and Sam was lifting some weights. “As for Oz, since I'll be taking him back whether he likes it or not at the end of the week, he can train now if he doesn't want double-shifts of it when he comes back.”

“I'm not coming back,” he snapped.

“Yeah, yeah,” Hawk dismissed him.

Tilly moved to one of the benches next to the open ring and tossed her greatcoat over the end of it, her eyes catching Niall while he made some hard, well-formed rips to the bag, his sweat dripping down from his hair and his scent sweetly overpowering in the chilly air, yet to be fully warmed by the stove. She kept her voice low and calm, easily sensing how far the sound would travel in the open and quiet space. “I had a visitor last night, actually, who gave me some information on the little Omega, Thom.”

Ozzie squeaked, “What? You didn't tell me?”

Tilly blinked. “It wasn't meant for you.”

“And?” Hawk asked.

“There was a customer who described him as being overly nervous, checking the window as if he were in danger or looking for someone to be there. I've no idea what kind of threat he could be considering if he were to go to the window every so often and why in the world he wouldn't simply tell Miss Mitchell if he was in any kind of trouble.”

“Unless,” Hawk provided, “the kind of trouble he was in would get him in hot water with Miss Mitchell.”

Tilly nodded with her eyes wide. “I hadn't considered that.”

She tapped her head with one finger. “And there are a thousand other things that I haven't considered either. Nothing's a perfect science. I've got a plan though and if you don't want to get completely pummeled or stabbed by a woman's parasol, you'll let me go through with it alone.”

The woman gave her a worried look and kept at it even while Hawk stripped to her bindings and trousers, taking the time to wrap hers and Tilly's hands.

When Tilly's face was still marred by the emotion, she sighed. “Miss Molly is going to a play tonight with one of her girls. Got that from a good source. Since Alphas can't step foot on her turf, I'm going to be catching her while she'd outside. Even if she doesn't want to speak to me, it's enough to raise the question in her mind that there's something going on with Thom.”

Ozzie tugged on Tilly's arm. “Go with her! Please! Make her do what she says she's gonna do.”

Tilly frowned. “Well of course she'll do it.”

“Not if she's the one that's done it!”

The big Alpha rolled her eyes hard and shook him off her arm so she could take off her shirt for a round. She looked fairly determined this time around and it was apparent that she'd had a good night's rest.

Hawk grinned as they both climbed up into the ring. “Alright. Before you start trying to swing at me, I'm gonna give you a few tips.”

Tilly nodded and appeared almost eager to hear what she had to say.

“You're a brawler. You can take hits. What you want to do is keep your center of gravity where it is and lock yourself down. Here. Put your feet like this.” She first showed Tilly a stance and then helped her move her feet in the appropriate spots. “Great. Now, there are only a few ways that someone can push you from this position and I can count on one hand how many boxers have actually managed it that I've seen. Your center is low and you're a brawler. Now take a step forward.”

She did. “Am I meant to be mobile?”

“Not you, no. When your opponent starts out with you, there are going to be a lot of them who are built like me. They're built to run. What you want to do is wait for them to get close and let them have the first hit. The first hit is the most important hit and you have to let them have it. You can block it if you want to but your best bet is to let them make contact.”

Tilly was frowning. “Why? Doesn't that seem counter-intuitive?”

“A boxer is never more vulnerable than when he is hitting you.” Hawk held up her finger to emphasize her point, “You are a lot stronger than most of them. They can't hit you like you can hit them. If you wait for that first measuring jab and you hit them with a mirrored three jabs, you could end that fight in the first round.”

The woman was nodding, her thoughts tumbling over the information while she chewed her bottom lip. “Are there Omegas who box like this?”

“Yeah, there are some. Most of them are the sort that fly around the ring and eventually come together and try to catch each other. It makes for a boring fight to have two outsiders try to fight because they barely ever hit.” She shrugged one shoulder. “See, you're the type of fighter who shouldn't care about getting a punch or ten. You can handle it. You have to think about yourself like a horse fighting for territory. Hit them with anything and it doesn't have to be your hand. It can be your shoulder, your elbow, whatever. As long as it's not your foot, you're within the rules.”

“That's rather barbaric.”

“Life is barbaric. This is boxing.” She took her stance, lifting up her fists and watching Tilly do the same. “You've got a good handle on where your hands should be. Now, if you take a swing, you shouldn't waste it. It's easy to throw out powerful haymakers, but that rule about when your opponent is vulnerable also applies to you. You don't want to waste a punch.”

Hawk worked with her for another hour without any punches being thrown, the Alpha soaking in every single bit of advice like a dry sponge finally encountering water. The types of punches, how to execute them and when to do so were things that most Alphas never had to learn, coming upon their personal victories through sheer luck alone. It was more often the rich and snooty families that paid for sport boxing to be taught to their precious Alpha sons and that was a whole different animal. That wouldn't save you in a ring match—this would.

Ozzie, bored of watching, had gone to spar with Niall on the mats and their little fighting game had seen them rolling around more wrestling than boxing and Tilly watched them every so often, curious as to their antics.

“Omegas are very much like Alphas when they fight,” Hawk explained. “If there's no one to guide them and no rules, it turns into a mess. Some Alphas are going to fight dirty. They'll bite you, pull your hair, try to gouge out your eyes...”

Tilly blinked and came back to focus on Hawk. “Isn't that against the rules?”

“If someone takes out your eye, they're gonna get tossed out of their ranked matches and likely won't see the ring again but that doesn't mean that some won't at least try.”

“And you claim that boxing isn't barbaric.”

“I told you that life is barbaric.”

“Alright,” Tilly said, dropping into her stance and picking up her fists. “Enough chatter. Hit me.”

Hawk did exactly as she asked, laying in a good measuring jab and then ducking quickly to avoid the whooshing jab that was coming in return. “You're slow,” she told her, dancing back, “you know their first attack is going to be a jab. It's how you measure your opponent. They have to know that they can make contact and that jab lets them know that. When you can see their face change and you can read the tells for what they're going to throw at you, that's when you make your move. You can throw the exact same punch at the exact same time. If they're leading with this foot, they throw with this arm. Got it?”

“I got it.” Her scent was mildly irritated but smoothed readily and that was another thing Hawk made a mental note to work with. It took months to get a fighter ready for an actual fight and with Tilly, she seemed no exception. Her scent would give her away as easily as her face would. Hopefully none of this was a huge waste of time.

Hawk went in for another but this time she couldn't even make contact. Tilly moved quicker, slapping her arm as she threw it inward and taking her balance with it. With one step forward and a decisive shove, Hawk found herself crashing into the mat like a thrown doll. Pain throbbed from her shoulder while she rolled up to her feet, recovering quickly enough to find Tilly standing upright and completely bewildered.

“What?” Hawk asked, rubbing her shoulder.

“I hit you.”

She chuckled, unable to suppress her grin. “Are you going to apologize? That's what I've been trying to get you to do this whole time. It was a great move and it came at the right time. You got me when I was moving forward and you did exactly what you need to do to pull me out of my balance. That's the kind of thing that's going to really take a man off-guard.”

She looked at her hands. “I didn't even have to punch you.”

“Thank god you didn't. I might be out on that mat for the day if you do.” She was smiling now, proud of herself and ultimately, proud of Tilly. “Feel good about that, Alpha? You should.”

“When do you teach me how to pick you up and throw you?”

“If you wanted to pick up a fighter and throw them, you don't have to do it the way I did it. In fact, you might not be able to since you're so damned tall. You can just grab them by the scruff and toss them.” She laughed, warming at the way Tilly was looking at her.

Has she been looking at me like that? Like she wants to eat me? Like she wants to lick me up and down until I dissolve like a sweet in her mouth? Hawk felt her smile fade. Is this my imagination? Tilly Caird hates me...

The bigger Alpha cleared her throat and broke eye-contact, her eyes awkwardly sweeping over the floor of the ring while she approached the edge and slipped herself down under the ropes. She picked up one of the towels that sat on the bench and wiped her face with it, her scent tinged with a strange embarrassment that Hawk was not going to engage.

“So are you going to babysit me tonight?” she asked, leaning on the ropes to peer down at Tilly.

“I suppose I shouldn't but then I'll have to deal with him if I don't.”

She arched a brow. “You're gonna let him call the shots, Alpha?”

“You aren't my manager,” Tilly said, her tone slightly teasing if Hawk was reading it right.

“Yet.”

Alphas normally were warm but Tilly was almost overly so. It was one thing for Hawk to be comfortable sitting in the chilly coach with a foot warmer near her toes but it was another to be almost actively sweating sitting across from a big human fireplace. Not only that, but sitting in a coach with her scent as vexing as it was, was another thing entirely. Never had she thought another Alpha's scent was appealing in this kind of way and in fact, she couldn't remember ever having actively disliked it when she had come across it before. Not even when they had first met at odds over Hugh and it had been overpowered by Tilly's massive and pungent fury. The recollection seemed strange now that she was sheathed in it and warm with it, finding a bizarre comfort in it that she refused to actively acknowledge.

The notion that there was something wrong about the thoughts and feelings that swirled about, tickling the surface as if koi in a pond, was the foremost force keeping them at bay. Still, there was an underlying anxiety from the muddled nature of them, her attempts at introspection like peering into a gloomy, hazy river. For all the world, she knew that if she were to step down into that gritty water, her foot would be trapped in the mire.

How wrong could it be?

She chanced one glance up toward Tilly to see her focus out the coach's small window, waiting for the end of the play and for the moment they should pounce. Seeing the woman so unguarded was a novelty and, in Hawk's own mind, a delicacy that should have been painstakingly preserved. The most prominent issue, of course, was that if Hawk was to intercede in any way, the whole of the endeavor would be for naught. There was no function that Hawk could have that would not immediately destroy the tentative and fleeting wisps of pure candid form Tilly possessed. It was a shame, truly, and there was no place to properly place blame, though she would as soon place it on herself as upon any other more deserving soul.

The heart of the matter was that she didn't want Tilly to hate her. A few short days prior and she couldn't have cared in the least what the Alpha thought of her but now, she felt as though she were distinctly invested in the outcome of...of...something. Whatever this was. Whether Tilly was going to box for her or not, she wanted to reject the facts of the matter—that Tilly Caird didn't hold any fondness for her. Hawk wanted fondness.

She blinked.

Fondness? Affection? Closeness?

There was the scent of her own uncertainly drifting past her nose and she stifled it, taking long deep breaths to rid herself of the anxieties that confronted her with those words that had floated up from the murky, muddy depths of that river. It wasn't like an Alpha to doubt herself and even this she could blame on her father and on Hugh for putting her into those situations where doubt was the only thing that was left that she could feel. A despicable wash of shame came over her and she tried to hold it in but she couldn't, stinking up the inside of the coach with it and drawing Tilly's attention.

“Hawk?”

She didn't speak, peering out the window instead. The play would be over any time and then all those rich snobs would come piling out that door. It shouldn't be difficult to spot Miss Molly but in the darkness and distracted, it could be harder than usual.

“Hey, Hawk.”

She flicked her gaze to Tilly unwillingly, watching her eyes shine in whatever light was coming in from outside, cold and flashing.

“You alright?”

She swallowed. “Yeah.” Fortunate struck and just as Tilly seemed about to say more, the doors to the theater opened and patrons began to stream out onto the cleared walk, chatting and laughing and conversing about specific moments from the play they had just enjoyed. Hawk opened the coach door and hopped out, leaving Tilly to decide if she wished to wait or pursue.

Rich and sweetened scents mingled while Hawk scanned the crowd that slowly dispersed mainly due to the cold. Had it been warmer, the lot would likely have stayed grouped together for longer to discuss particular elements that had entertained them about the production but those pleasantries would have to wait for warmer parlors and many of them walked along to their own rides. It didn't take her long to spot the tall and uniquely feminine Miss Molly dressed in an expensive dark blue Parisian creation that she quickly obscured as she emerged from the theater with a heavy, ermine-lined wool cloak. There were short blunt feathers sticking out of her deep red hair and everything about her screamed finesse and poise and grace. By her side was the absolutely delicious Miss Abigail, a blond who Hawk had encountered only once before and who had again struck her as seeming more like a puppet than an actual girl. Her form was too perfect, her voice too ethereal, and her eyes far too blue.

She waited until they were a distance from the entrance before she jogged before them and turned suddenly, shocking them both into a halt. With a deep bow, she addressed Miss Abigail first. “Miss Abigail, I truly apologize for this interruption but I require an audience with your Alpha.”

The startled Omega at first began to shy away but before she did entirely, she caught herself and took one tiny step forward for a gentle and silent curtsy.

Molly Mitchell was not so forgiving, her eyes sharp in the greenish light from the gas lamp nearby. “What is the meaning of this, Miss Hawk? Should you not have reason to avoid me by now?”

“I did think twice about this endeavor, certainly,” she insisted. “However, you know my boxer, Ozzie, and surely you have knowledge of his love-affair with your Thomas.”

“Where do you think you're headed with this?” she asked, drawing up with her shoulders squared. “I've precious little patience for you, Hawk.”

A few months ago, she might have facetiously asked the woman if she was going to run after her and beat her up while wearing all of her skirts but knowing what Miss Molly could do even while wearing a dress was enough to stay her from making any idiotic sort of comments. Sometimes what the woman could do was not limited to physical aggression. Hawk adhered to her point and spoke quickly instead, prudence outweighing her need to feel in control. She laid out everything for the Alpha who was peering at her with shrewd eyes while Miss Abby surreptitiously eased under one side of her cloak to absorb some of her body heat. When she was finished, Miss Molly was still staring at her, even less of her patience remaining. Suddenly, Hawk didn't think this was such a great idea after all. Maybe Carmon was wrong when he'd told her that it didn't sound like utter madness.

Hawk took in a deep breath and sighed. “I sound like there ought to be no return ticket, don't I? I must be going mad.”

Miss Molly's brow arched impossibly high and her stare was disapproving. “I'd no knowledge of my Omega having dissuaded a client...nor did I have any notion that he should be in any kind of danger. Come to think of it, he's likely been avoiding me...” she gave Hawk an appraising glance from her head to her feet and then back. “I suppose you'll want me to give you information on the subject once I've set the boy to rights...well I won't promise anything. I do dislike you, Miss Hawk. Very much so.”

“I am aware, Miss Mitchell, and I will thank you for anything you might be able to accomplish from your end if you do choose to help me.”

“I will not help you. I will help Oscar. You can go drown for all I care and I rather wish you would.”

“I will...certainly work on that for you, as you know, I have a particular talent for making myself abhorrent.” She grinned, taking a step back to find that she had just stumbled right back into a large Alpha. She was caught about her upper arms and avoided alarm simply by taking a shocked inhale through her nose.

Tilly.

“Miss Mitchell,” Tilly greeted. “Tilly Caird.”

Miss Molly didn't appear impressed. “I've heard of you. From Hugh. You have an interest in the affairs of little Oscar as well? The world truly is quite small, isn't it?”

“He's been a thorn in my side ever since that night,” she replied calmly. “I don't care about his relationships. I care that it sounds like your Omega might be in danger and I care that Oz isn't thinking ahead to the realistic future. If you care for the boxers at all—”

“I care about all the Omegas,” she hissed.

“Then we hold the same goals, you and I,” Tilly told her. “You must know of Orville at the Rabbit.”

She dropped her brow and breathed in a soothing breath, letting it out and regarding Tilly with a more curious expression. “I do.”

“Then if you believe it too dangerous or too intrusive to venture to tell us anything, then I beg you to tell him, at least and the information will make its way to me. There is something nefarious going on, Miss Mitchell. If we want to protect the Omegas, this is one thing we will have to agree upon.”

“Fine,” she snipped. “I'll play your little game of intrigue. You had better not be wasting my time.”

Tilly moved Hawk aside, the warmth of her a treasured artifact that Hawk hadn't known she would miss until she had been unceremoniously cast off. The Alpha gave a polite bow to the prim and feminine woman and then a second one to the smaller of the two. “Thank you, Miss Mitchell. I will remain in your debt.”

“Hmph,” she sniffed, gently guiding Miss Abigail forward. “Then I will see what use you can have.” She and her little Omega tapped away, their shoes on the walk marking their proud exit until they entered their waiting coach without a second glance back.

Tilly turned to her. “I suppose that went as well as we could manage.”

“Yes,” she replied, staring uselessly at Tilly's soft, pink lips in the lamplight.

What if I...

She blinked and took a hard step back. How was it that there were Alpha women out there who looked like Miss Molly, all gussied up and fancy-like and she had to find Tilly Caird attractive? She swallowed and stared at the walk and a pathetically melting fragment of snow laying atop it. Goddamn it all. It was about time she admitted it to herself that there was something insane about her wanting to get into the Alpha boxing syndicates...it wasn't real. It wasn't an honest need or want at all. It was simply a way to keep Tilly close to her. It was raw and unapologetic and as good an excuse for herself as anything else, wasn't it?

Oh my god. I really do think she's...

Handsome? Beautiful? What was the right word? She couldn't even determine that simple part of the puzzle and she still had to get back into the coach with her.

“Hawk? Are you feeling alright? You've been strange all night...”

“It's nothing,” she lied, shaking her head and pushing herself to walk with purpose back to their ride, getting in and hastily tucking herself into the corner, drawing her head to the side so that she might not have to speak with the other Alpha. It was too perilous. There was too much at stake.

What is it? What is at stake?

She tried to push it out of her head but it wouldn't go, sticking like pitch. Black and impossible to get rid of, it stayed and fouled up every last bit of her mood even while Tilly's potent scent made the attempt to assuage her. She knew what was at stake if she slipped and fell into that dark river, mired and trapped by the false muddy bed and pulled down deeper as if a marshland's kelpie had somehow found its way to her ankle.

“You can go drown for all I care and I rather wish you would.”

Unable to keep her eyes away, she flicked them to Tilly again before chastising herself inwardly, cursing under her breath. Damn the Alpha. Damn the Omega. Damn her own selfish heart.

Chapter Text

“Well I think you're terribly brave,” Tilly heard Eugene saying near to the end of the night when she walked back into the kitchen to fetch Ozzie to take him home. “I mean, to strike out on your own like you have and give up your whole family for fame and fortune? That's awful ambitious of you and I think you're doing mighty fine if you've won some matches. Can't have it all right away, can ya? Rome wasn't built in a day!”

“I suppose not...” Ozzie replied thoughtfully. “But I've gone and done it now. I've lost my manager...”

“Well you can get her back, right? I'm sure she'll forgive ya. You've got a winning little grin, don't ya?”

“Nice of you to say so, Beta.”

Tilly quit her small hiding place in the doorway and came upon them, standing near to each other as Ozzie washed and Eugene dried again. She supposed that Ozzie wouldn't want to continue his dishwashing for very much longer but to deprive Eugene, she wasn't sure she had the heart to take him away. The Beta flushed a bit when he spotted Tilly, sheepish for having been laying down compliments over the relatively-oblivious Omega. The poor boy must have thought that she had laid some sort of claim on him and she was eager to prove otherwise for his sake and perhaps even for Ozzie's if he had a mind to entertain the advances of a spry little Beta.

“Not to be eavesdropping,” she mused lightly, “but it is quite nice of Eugene isn't it? You two have become rather fast friends, haven't you? Perhaps a night out for the both of you? Maybe Gene should like to see the inside of the Rabbit?” She eyed Ozzie.

The Omega, for a moment, seemed lost until a sudden realization dawned in his eyes and he stared at her with a strange sense of awe. Truly, the boy would be lost if he was to rely on his own instincts to tell him when a Beta was sweet on him. She stared back at him with not a small amount of pity. He gulped, clearly unsure of what he was supposed to be saying.

Tilly's pity expanded. “I'm sure the Beta would be curious about how all of you boxers take your drinks, wouldn't you be, Gene?”

“Y-yes. Yes indeed.” He nodded emphatically, his mood lightened at the turn of events. “I should be very interested in such places where the bravest Omegas are welcome. It's not something that I could dare miss, given the chance. Everyone always insists that they're to be demure and submissive but...I do think I rather like them dashing and rugged...” his cheeks gained a new round of blush as he looked at Ozzie and smiled timidly. If the boy didn't eventually present as an Omega, he probably should have, Tilly thought.

“I...I guess I could take 'im 'round...” Ozzie finally answered, his own cheeks gaining a bit of pink under his eyes.

“That's the spirit,” Tilly smiled overly wide. “Why don't you boys get changed and we'll drop you both off at the pub? I'll come pick you both up later to take you on home if you like.”

They shared a small and shy glance at each other before they gave a mutual nod and Tilly left them to it. From how smoothly that went, it shouldn't be difficult at all to ease Oz over the hump of getting over his little Omega prostitute...as long as Gene could work up the courage to actually court him. As much as he professed to like the rough and tumble boxers, it was another thing to actually take one to bed and, knowing them, she wasn't certain if the poor boy could handle the role he would be expected to play. It took them only a few minutes to be ready and so she piled them into a rented coach and told the driver where to take them.

Gene's very mild Beta tones were overridden easily in the cramped coach but Tilly could pick them out anyway, teeming with his excitement. His eyes seemed fixed on the small space between his own knee and Ozzie's as they sat next to each other and she recognized that expression though she wasn't exactly sure where she'd seen it before. It was an odd mixture of anxiety and open adoration and it was so familiar but for the life of her, it was a mystery how so.

The coach stopped and the door was opened. Tilly got out first to aide the boys in their descent, Gene looking rather shocked when she held out her hand for him as well. The two of them, wrapped up snug in their respective coats, stood on the walk while they waited for her to chat with the coach driver to tell him to wait for her. Though just as she was finishing up with him, there was a sharp cry that ripped through the still, winter air.

“Alpha!”

She had rarely ever experienced a moment of pure adrenaline, so when she turned about to see Gene fighting madly against a darkly dressed stranger, it was a surprise to her that her reaction should have been so visceral. It was as if time itself slowed to a crawl and as if every one of her senses was suddenly alight with a renewed vigor. The man had dropped a black sack over Ozzie's head and had made the attempt to whisk him away before being caught by Gene's quick hands. The Beta was nothing compared to the stout and sure Alpha and he was quickly dispensed of with a hard shove but Tilly—the man wasn't counting on having been around long enough to face an Alpha's ire.

He took one look at her as she came toward him and dropped the struggling Omega, darting back toward a waiting coach on the street that carried him off into the night. The rife scent of his sudden fear lingered and Tilly couldn't help the smug feeling that tickled her when she pulled the bag off Ozzie's head.

“Alright, Omega?”

“Gorram fuckin' Alphas!” He struggled to his feet, ignoring the hand she held out to him and brushing himself off in a peacock display of toughness that was more amusing than it was intimidating. “Zabiję ich!” He stomped about, anger radiating out of him when he ripped the bag from her hands and threw it to the ground to stomp on it while yelling out odd-sounding words in his mother tongue laced with vitriol.

Tilly and Gene let him get his frustrations laid bare and when his state seemed to resolve itself, she picked the bag up off the ground where it had gotten muddy and wet. “This was not Hawk's doing.”

The ruckus caused had brought one of the Alpha guards to open the door and step out. He addressed Tilly first. “Alright, Alpha?”

“I don't know quite yet,” she replied. “My little friend here has narrowly escaped a kidnapping.”

The Alpha eyed the black bag and his glower was telling. “The work of 'is enemies, likely,” he growled. “It's far too cold for most of us to stand about out here all the time and I should be thankful for you havin' been here with him. Poor bastards seem to disappear weekly from those spats.”

Gene sidled closer to Ozzie and, surprisingly, the Omega let him despite his puffed up demeanor. “Maybe a night for drinks isn't in order... It's not safe...”

Ozzie frowned. “Nonsense. I can do whatever I want.”

Tilly sighed through her nose. “Let me buy us all a bottle and I'll take the both of you home with it. I'm not lookin' to lose you to some half-rate criminal for a grudge against your manager. Let's get settled and give it all a good look-see.” There was plenty to sift through, that was for sure. She thanked the Alpha guard after bartering with him for a bottle of gin and corralled the little ones back into the coach, noting that Gene had closed the space between he and the boxer, their thighs touching as they sat together in the middle of the coach's bench. “Are you not yet convinced this was not a matter between yourself and Hawk?”

He was moody, still, his scent muddled with a lurking terror that was clearly putting Gene on edge. He mumbled in his moping, “She's not the type.”

“And who is? The bookies?”

“They'll have ya bagged before you know what you're about.”

She tilted her head. “And do they have reason to bag you?”

“I've never had a spat with any bookie. Yet. They don't do it unless they're prepared to have the managers come to their throats. Any boy who's snatched is one who...” He quit speaking, his mouth tightening together into a thin line.

“Who?”

“Who never had a manager...or...who doesn't have one...anymore.”

“But whomever tried to take you should have known that Hawk would have been prepared to come for you. I don't think this is about you at all.” She peered out the window of the coach but couldn't see much through the frost on the glass.

Gene's soft tone was meek and weary. “You think he was bait?”

“Yes, I do.”

The Beta's small hand reached out and grasped Ozzie's startling the Omega into staring up at him. “Reckless of them,” Gene said, his voice hardening, “As they'll have to deal with me...and Miss Caird...” He flicked his eyes to her.

“Indeed. I believe tomorrow we'll be taking this matter up with Hawk. If there is anyone who should know who might be after you, it's most likely her.” She watched with warm appreciation as Ozzie didn't pull his hand away from Gene's but instead slowly curled his own fingers around it with a shy acceptance.

I'll be a decent matchmaker yet. She tightened her hold on the bottle of gin and tried to remind herself not to get them so sideways that they couldn't descend into a sloppy bit of roughhousing if it did come to that. She was content to let them roll around with each other as long as, in the end, she would eventually be able to get some shut-eye.

They had crowded about in her small kitchen for a time, Tilly perched upon her counter while the two boys sat around the table with their glasses full of gin. It didn't take much to put Gene into a state though Ozzie took at least one more glass before he was just as flushed and chatting in a loud and rambunctious manner fit more for an Alpha than for a tiny Omega such as the likes of him. His tales were rife with sound-effects made with booming voices when he imitated Alphas and whooshing breaths whenever he simulated punches and Gene was near to fits with every comical moment.

Still, as entertaining as it was, she felt her eyelids begin to droop mightily and so near to midnight, she slid herself down from the counter and headed to the door.

“Alpha?” Ozzie asked softly.

“I'm off to bed. Gene, you can stay for the night. I'll take you home in the morn and you don't have to worry about comin' in. I think we'll live without yah for a day.” She flicked her gaze between the two of them and then smiled softly. “Don't act all shy in front of me, you little ticks. I know what you're about.”

Gene blinked slowly, not quite registering her suggestion.

Ozzie, however, got up and gave her a forceful push. “Of to bed with ye, ya great lumbering ape!”

She went, taking the time alone to filter through the events. A kidnapping. Not just any kidnapping but the kind that several of the boxers had suffered through the years—including Hugh. They found themselves stalked or ambushed on the streets with likely no guard and they were gone for good. Hugh had been taken by his own opponent in the ring and nearly killed. Cyril Muir had been taken by the bookies and left for dead. Who was going to take Ozzie? She moved to her coat that was hanging on the back of her chair in her room and reached into the pocket for the sodden black bag, opaque and ominous as it slithered in her hand. It was clear that whomever had taken Ozzie had determined that Hawk was a big enough threat that they must have her removed from him in order to taken him—the primary function of having Thom break it off with the boy being the wedge it would drive between manager and boxer. But she would still have come for him. There was a clue here. Or there would have been. A letter for ransom, probably...

She stripped to nothing and climbed under the quilts and blankets, her heat quickly warming the sheets as she thought deeper about the implications of the botched crime. They knew he was with her now. Whatever they were planning, it was all fouled up and, depending on who was after him, their efforts would now be focused on her as well. If it was only another boxer, that he was now protected again should have deterred them, but if it were anyone else—how could she be sure? None of them were safe. Not her, not Hawk, not Gene, and certainly not Ozzie.

The worry was cut short by a short and earnest moan from the other side of the thin wall on the other side of her headboard.

“Christ,” she whispered to herself, rubbing at her eyes with her thumb and forefinger. At least she'd done what she'd made a mental note to do—let them lose enough inhibitions to establish something. With a brewing curiosity, she pricked her ears and was rewarded again with another sighing moan that placed them clearly on her couch, probably a mess of tangled limbs and delicious Omega warmth. Her imagination, of course, was free to run wild with the salacious sounds that began to occur at increasing frequency and she moved her fingers down between her thighs to grip her steady and stiffening length.

With her eyes closed in the darkness and with nothing to distract her from the heavy wet sounds and impassioned sighs from the other room, she freely imaged Ozzie pale and nude in the lamplight, touched and fondled in every possible manner and giving as much as he gave with the slight and unimposing Beta who'd caught wind of his charms. Her mind's Ozzie, the perfect and brutal Omega, had a stiff little cock ready for a mouth to suck it and imaginary Gene was looking at it with that very same enamored gaze he'd given to the Omega's knee in the coach. In reality, it was likely that Ozzie wasn't the one laying on his back but Tilly's mind insisted on it.

She stroked herself, having to open her mouth to make room for her heavier breathing, the deep draws turning shallower and shallower as she imagined them finally reaching the point of no return, writhing and fucking against each other and somehow, as the image constantly shifted and altered in her mind, it flipped and morphed until Ozzie had gained those faint little freckles over the bridge of his nose...long hair, messy about his head...

I know where I've seen that gaze before. I know where I've seen the confusion and the ardor and the raw infatuation in that gaze and in only knowing, I should hate it but I don't.

She felt the crux of her pleasure hurdling toward her as she tumbled forward with every pounding stroke, punishing her flesh for even conjuring the memory of the way Hawk had looked at her.

“Oh my god,” she whispered to the ceiling, feeling a slow and strange trickle of unfamiliar tears escape the corners of her eyes as she tensed and shuddered in a sweeping and rapturous climax, catching what she could of her spend in one cupped hand while holding her twitching and convulsing shaft in the other as if to keep it at bay somehow. As if to deny that her traitorous flesh and mind had just come to release with the thought of the vexing and daringly pretty Alpha woman. She lay prone with her eyes still closed and her jaw agape, unable to process what had become of her for long moments. Never before had she come to thoughts of an Alpha. She was aware only vaguely of the continued groaning from the other room, peppered with soft yipping and just the slightest sounds of gentle slapping and she sighed a chuckle.

Chalk one victory on the board for Tilly Caird.

This at least would put the Omega in a decent mood for the next day which was something she really did need for both their sakes. She was to bring him to Hawk and pray for some kind of a resolution to this nightmare. Surely the Alpha would know which of her enemies could be after her. Surely she would be able to shed some light on the matter. She was in danger, after all.

Hawk is in danger.

She opened her eyes, staring up into the darkness. She had to protect her. Despite everything about her that Tilly didn't like...that she downright hated, she had to at least offer that protection. There was something about her, goddamnit, and knowing that the feeling was mutual made it even more difficult to let it go.

It must have only been a few hours before a loud banging roused her and she blindly pulled the blankets from her form and struggled into her trousers. Stumbling through the dark, she pulled on her shirt as she made her way to the door, heedless that it might be some villain calling in the middle of the night. Not even the rats in the city should have been stirring at such an ungodly hour, she thought sourly before she wrenched open the door, fully intent to set her large hands firmly around the throat of whomever should be disturbing her.

“Tilly!” Hawk gasped, winded and sweating, leaning against her door frame and appearing as though she might faint from strain.

“Lord,” Tilly mumbled, reaching to catch the poor Alpha when she staggered forward. Her limbs were cold but her core was an engine of heat and Tilly near-dragged her into the dark kitchen. “What the devil has you out this time of night?” she asked lowly, seeking not to rouse the lovers.

Hawk gathered herself, gasping and panting. Every move of her against Tilly's body and especially the manner in which her breath puffed against her nearly bare collarbone had the larger Alpha practically in a tizzy. Finally, she was able to reply, pulling a folded note from the inside of her greatcoat. “This. Niall told me it was delivered hours ago but I hadn't been at the gym. I was out trying to get one of the other boys off their guard somewhere and then I come back and there's this note. Where is Ozzie?”

Tilly plucked the note from her fingers and unfolded it to examine it, finding it a rather nasty bit of a ransom note.

Ah. I wasn't wrong.

“Ozzie is fine. It seems whomever has a grudge against you had clearly counted their chickens long before the chicks had hatched.” She placed her arms around the winded Alpha and petted her hair, pulling it from its ribbon so that she might fully run her fingers through the luxurious tresses and further calm her. “Shh. Ozzie has had a fine night and there's naught more to do about it. Everything's alright.”

“E-Everything...” she parroted, meaning to place a question at the end but failing to do so. “Y-You're certain.”

“He's on the couch with Gene and he's out cold, the little imp. Some blighter tried to steal him right out from under my nose tonight but the coward turned tail and fled afore I could even get in a proper swing. For all you've taught me, there seems not to be a ruffian who'll let me practice.”

That was enough to give Hawk a small breathy chuckle and her shaking hands came to Tilly's sides, her fingers like ice through the thin material of her shirt. “You're intimidating, Alpha. What can I say? Oh...don't...don't stop that. If you wouldn't mind...” Her head slowly tilted to one side to encourage the altruistic petting that parted the mess of her locks and her scent eased from the metallic tang of fear to a spicy earth-like scent of calm. Tilly thought for a moment, gauging the reaction she could garner from what she considered before she finally figured that it would be worth it no matter the cost. She dipped her nose down to the velvet flesh under Hawk's ear and slowly pulled in a breath.

A fire raging through an orchard. The tingle of warm whiskey and the rasp of the voice just after the swallow. Warm wax dripping from the heated wings of Icarus into the unforgiving sea. A breath and another breath and the memory of the orange slats in the stove that night at the gym, the dim glow illuminating the soft form of the Alpha beside her—so close she could have reached out and touched her and so far that if she had tried, perhaps the woman could have faded away.

She couldn't fade now. She was as real as ever and hauntingly tangible in her arms.

“Hawk,”she whispered, her heart pounding as she realized that she wasn't sure what she wanted to say. She felt lost and afraid and that was brand new for Tilly Caird. Her size couldn't help her here.

“Yes, Alpha?” she murmured, hiding her face against the nook of Tilly's shoulder.

“I need you.”

“Fuck,” Hawk sighed, relief flooding her scent. “Thank God.” She pulled back and through the darkness, her eyes somehow finding a speck of light and shimmering with it. “I thought I was going mad.” With one still-freezing hand, she reached up and grasped at Tilly's neck, pulling her down just until they could find each other in the dark.

Their lips met and Tilly saw stars.

Chapter Text

The note had gotten to her. She supposed that in being an Alpha, she should have first gone after the bastard who'd sent it to her but for some reason, she was even more concerned for the Alpha she'd left with Ozzie. Ozzie could handle himself. From how the letter was worded, it had been implied that no harm had come to him and if it had already, there wasn't much Hawk could have done about it. But Tilly. That stubborn and centered and kind-hearted Alpha who put her on edge every time she was around—she couldn't handle it. If Tilly had been harmed and it had been because she and Ozzie had roped her into this shit-hole of a situation, that would have been the last of it for Sasha Hawk.

In between fiery kisses, wet and impassioned in the dark kitchen with her back pushed up against the counter, Hawk tried to speak. “I—I've wanted you...I-I thought I was...crazy.”

“Not crazy,” Tilly told her bluntly, gripping her hair at the back of her neck and tilting her head to get a better angle for a soul-crushing set of open-mouthed kisses that had blood rushing south and throbbing hard between Hawk's thighs. It was only those two words but they set her ablaze with vindication—she had been lost with this and now, with just a sprinkle of that odd sort of magic, she felt free.

She's an Alpha. I'm an Alpha.

But when Tilly fought with her clothes and opened her shirt, stripping it from her shoulders and discarding it somewhere in the darkness, there was a carelessness that was cast over her—over the both of them. Somehow it didn't seem to matter at all that she found Tilly as attractive as she was mystifying. That she wanted to wrap her legs around this Alpha's hips and let her take out every frustration she'd ever had on her...with her...in her.

What am I thinking?

Rational thought was quickly overwhelmed by the rush of lust in her head when she was shifted and pushed up against the wall, Tilly's big hand holding her wrists above her head while the free one untucked the end of her bindings and unraveled them until she was bare and panting into their furious kiss. The boxers were often curious about her breasts and if she would allow them to play with her when she fucked them, some of them gathering the courage to simply ask and some of them only offering glances. This was the moment she decided that Tilly Caird wasn't going to be like anything she'd ever had before. The Alpha's mouth was on her throat, her neck, her collarbone, and then sucking at her breasts, mouthing her and huffing her shallow breaths between them. It was worship, pure and simple, and it was no doubt that Tilly had fucked her fair share of Beta girls, knowing exactly what they liked and how they liked it.

“Til,” she sighed, arching when the Alpha took a nipple between her lips and gently squeezed and tugged before enveloping it into that wet heat. Her breasts, having spent so little time exposed, were overly sensitive, the feeling of constant attention sending shooting tingles down her spine and stiffening her already rock-hard Alpha member into an uncomfortable tightness. She at once wanted to tell the woman to leave her nipples alone and to beg her never to stop.

“I don't care if you're an Alpha,” Tilly rasped between her breasts before she took the other nipple into her mouth, suckling and flicking over it with the tip of her tongue. “I want you. That's all that matters.”

“Agh!” Hawk groaned. “Yes. Yes, alright. Yes.”

It was at her enthusiastic consent that Tilly growled low, the rumble sending chills through Hawk's form and forcing a gasp from her lips. The sensation of having that huge and affectionate Alpha nuzzling against her throat, sucking in her scent, it was intoxicating and erotic and it very nearly had her about to come off in her trousers.

“A bed. A bed, Til.”

She was lifted effortlessly, carried and then deposited in a dark room with a slight chill to it. It wouldn't matter. Their exertion and Tilly's body heat would be enough to keep her plenty comfortable, she assured herself as she quickly kicked off the rest of her clothes and flipped herself over onto her hands and knees. Tilly, coming up behind her, enveloped her in naked warmth, her Alpha member cradled against the cleft of her bottom.

Tilly murmured behind her ear, one hand reaching around to gently cup her breast, “Is this how you want me?”

“You'd like me to present, wouldn't you?” Hawk asked, feeling terribly naughty for having to say it out loud like this.

The Alpha chuckled, her hips moving to press her length—as large as one would have expected from an Alpha like her—harder against Hawk's body. “Who said you had to be the Omega?”

Hawk pressed backward, the dampness in that part of her that most female Alphas ignored becoming strengthened by her thoughts and her wants. She could feel the moisture pooling and dripping from her opening, tickling down the underside of her rigid shaft. With a small whine, she sucked in a heavy breath and peered up over her shoulder through the dark. “I want to be.” Her breath hitched suddenly and she heard a strange groan emerge from her chest when she felt Tilly's hand slide down her body, over her belly, and come to rest gripping her hot and ready length, her fingers sliding with the dripping moisture from her opening above it.

“God,” Tilly breathed against her throat, “you are incredible.”

The head of her was soft and pressed against Hawk's slick entrance, at first tentative and then with a bold pressure. A few small adjustments were made and Hawk reached around her own member to hold herself open with two fingers, hiding her face against her arm even though it was dark enough that no one could have ever seen the blaze in her cheeks.

“Do it,” she rasped, pushing her body backwards to insist with a greater pressure, “I want it.”

“I don't want to hurt you.”

“You won't.”

It was a strange barrier to break and the sensation was nothing short of bizarre. She felt invaded. Filled. Explored. There was something deep within her primal being that told her that this was something expected but at the same instant, repulsive. She took stock of every single passing fancy that came with the stretching and pushing that it took to finally fit at least most of the other Alpha within her. It was work, no doubt, even with how wet she had become and with the uncertainty of her pleasure, she had found that she'd lost a bit of her former oomf.

Tilly was quick to catch on, her hand that was still holding Hawk's arousal giving long and lingering strokes back and forth, gathering the stretchy fluid that leaked out of Hawk's body and using it to oil her motion. It felt good. It felt great, if Hawk was being completely honest with herself. Being opened like this, though; that she wasn't quite sure about yet.

“Y-You know,” she grunted, closing her eyes at the way Tilly's touch set fire to her flesh, “the Omegas always make this seem like it's...really good.”

Tilly paused. “Is it not?”

“It's...different.”

“Maybe it's just that it's...me?”

“That's not it,” she told her concretely. “Perhaps when you move...”

The Alpha withdrew until she was almost dropping out and then moved slowly forward again to fill her, this time much easier than the first and the motion sparking something undefinable low within her. “How's this?” Tilly asked, curiosity tinging her scent.

“Again, Alpha,” she sighed, closing her eyes and focusing on the shadow of something like pleasure existing ambiguously somewhere deep.

Tilly set a slow but steady rhythm that was comfortable at first, mounting her pleasure like handfuls of sand one on top of the other, the creation sliding over itself constantly and very gradually gaining in height.

“Mmmgh, Alpha,” she moaned, pushing back against every deep thrust. “Faster.”

Tilly took hold of her hip with one hand and continued stroking her cock with the other, her fist a tight, warm tunnel of sparkling gratification. Her thrusts became more shallow, rushing with a harsh intensity that had her panting, her breath puffing over the back of Hawk's neck until she began to give out strained little mewling grunts of exertion.

“I'm going to come,” Tilly breathed, mouthing the slope of her neck.

The barest hint of her teeth over Hawk's flesh had her tightening all of her muscles, clenching hard between her thighs until the Alpha groaned in protest and an odd liquid warmth filled her tight channel. The very thought of being bitten by those teeth now gritted together behind her in a grimace of orgasm was enough to bead her nipples and cast a shudder over her body, the first convulsion of her climax crashing into her and shooting her spend out over Tilly's rumpled sheets.

Oh my god. Her mind stuttered as another convulsion hit her. It wasn't anything like the short aftershocks of twitching spend that she had while fucking the Omegas. It was hard and it was near-constant, each wave just as intense as the last one. Oh my god. Oh. My. God. She couldn't help her shaking, her silent hissing scream while Tilly squeezed at the center of her and pulsed inside her body. She was still tensing long after the last of her seed had been expelled and when the shaking moved on to mere trembles, she reached back and weakly grasped at Tilly's hip.

The big Alpha was panting at her back, struggling to keep herself up. “Hawk?”

“Again.”

There was a pause. “Again?!”

“Please, Alpha.”

She wouldn't deny her, that wasn't the way she was built. Tilly moved her, pulling out of her and pushing her to lay on her back though thankfully, not upon the wet spot she'd made. Swooping down from above, Tilly claimed her lips and probed at her, easing her big body between her open thighs while she stroked at herself to bring herself back to full rigidity. For some, this was a process that could take some time but for Tilly, it seemed she was ready again in a relatively short period, thrusting deep again and drowning her moan between Hawk's lips.

“I want you to go hard this time,” Hawk told her, reaching up to tangle her fingers into Tilly's hair, clutching her shoulders and very softly raking her nails over the woman's skin. “I want you to pound this little cunt until I'm sore.”

“Oh my god,” Tilly blurted, sinking her huge shaft as far as she could into Hawk's tight opening. “Don't say it like that.”

She was grinning through the darkness up at her lover, her Alpha lover, her hand coming down to her own member and toying with it how she liked. When she'd first started out fucking, being on her back had been something of a taboo and now, after having been with so many of the boxers, it only felt right to be like this. The new part of it was having her pale thighs splayed open and to be speared by that monstrous Alpha appendage that felt like it might have torn apart any partner smaller than she. With a small giggle, she teased. “You don't want to know what you're doing to me?”

“I know what I'm doing to you, Alpha,” Tilly told her breathlessly, sinking her face down into Hawk's throat. “I cannot hear of it. I won't be able to last... If you want me to...to do this to you...”

“I do,” Hawk groaned, stretching beneath her and clenching her muscles to embellish her point.

“Ahn!”

“I want you to treat me like your precious little Omega. Breed me, Alpha. Make me wriggle beneath you and cry with all the joys you can give me.”

Tilly was somewhere between a grimace and a humored smile. “Please don't cry.”

“Hah! Then please, I beg of you, make me come.”

Every bit of her reservations had become a veil that was lifted up and away. That Tilly was an Alpha was no more of an issue than that she was a woman or a human being. All that mattered was this perfect and luscious pleasure that she could give with each pounding thrust and lunge that foamed the mixture of their essence together at her entrance. There was nothing on Earth save these two panting and desperate bodies struggling against each other in the darkness of a small bedroom with only thin walls separating them from reality. Her whole life, it seemed, fit into this small room with her Alpha working against her and within her, filling her up with hot flesh and seed. Her whole world and her mate.

Mate.

Her brain echoed the word and she emitted a harsh and strangled cry before she lost her voice again to the strained and breathy silence of tension and release. It was even more intense than the first time it happened, her thighs stretching open as far as they could go while her member jettisoned out long, watery amounts of her spend. Her back arched, her breasts thrust upward while she clutched and grasped at Tilly's large body, her entrance giving rhythmic spasms while she jerked and writhed in lascivious agony. Tremors and gasps were still coming to her when she came back to herself, clinging hard to Tilly's body and recognizing that the other Alpha had come again inside her.

“Guh...” she tried, unable to articulate herself.

The big Alpha brute was nearly boneless on top of her and gave out a tired chuckle in response.

They had to breathe together for a few moments, melded together as if one heaving form, still connected in intimacy and unwilling to disengage. It was all too new, too fresh, too raw. Like some terrible and seeping wound she'd opened in her soul.

I don't want to let her go.

“Til...” she sighed. “Don't move.”

“I'm going to crush you.”

“I'm not fragile. You won't break me.” At her urging, the heavy weight of her lover came over her gradually and she reveled in her own strength and might to fell this creature. After everything, here she was. Slightly breathless, she nuzzled against Tilly's ear and asked in a whisper, “Can we do this again sometime, Alpha?”

“Please not another go,” she mumbled into the bedding over Hawk's shoulder.

She laughed. “Not tonight. But maybe tomorrow night... I suppose the thing I'm trying to ask you is if you've had enough of me.”

“Fuck no,” Tilly blustered, turning her head to capture more of Hawk's scent. “If it's madness, let them put me away to rot with the rest of the poor souls in irons. I'm of the mind that next time we're driven to this, I'll be the mouse in the mews!”

“You only say that because you've twice caused my soul to leave my body.”

Tilly reached around them and worked to pull the quilts over them, her heat infusing the covers immediately and giving Hawk an overwhelming comfort against her despite the dampness of her spend and sweat. “I'd hardly thought myself such a capable lover, though none of the Beta girls ever did complain.”

“As well they shouldn't,” she said, closing her eyes and tilting her head to rest against Tilly's. “If you've somehow moved on from your grudges against me, I'd like to propose that this become something of a regular occurrence, with either of us at play in each role.”

“I am wholly past it, rest assured,” she replied. “And I would like that.”

“Good. Good. Thank god.”

Entangled and sated, they fell asleep together, waking the next morning to find themselves thoroughly scented and overly comfortable, loathe to get out of the mussed up bed and yet resigned to their fate. Tilly groaned at the light streaming in from the window, the harsh bars sparkling with tiny morning motes. “The letter, Hawk. I'd like to see it again.

She fished for it where it lay on the floor.

“You've an idea who wrote it?”

“Some,” she frowned while she handed it to Tilly, tucking herself back under the quilts and against her lover's warm body. “He's a snake is what he is and I shouldn't have been surprised when I thought of him.”

“Who?” There was a rumbling growl under the word and a rusty aroma in Tilly's scent that marked the danger lurking within her.

“Vega. A bookie.”

“And why should he have something against you?”

Hawk smiled, laying her head between Tilly's breasts and listening to her heart beat for a moment. “He wants to fuck me.”

“Christ,” Tilly said, rolling her eyes. “You'd think you were some coveted Omega.”

“Is that what you'll call me next time?” she purred.

The Alpha paused and then pinched Hawk's side playfully. “Maybe I will!”

Their mutual laughter was cut short by a harsh rap on the outside of the door and Ozzie's sharp and brutal admonishment. “Great work reeking the place up you randy pricks! Can a man get a cup of coffee around this place or what?!”

Tilly lay back down, letting her arms flop to the sides of the bed, groaning lightly. “Little tick can't make coffee.”

Hawk near-shouted back to him. “Piss off, ya demon!” Even still, she got out of the bed and pulled on her trousers, realizing far too late that her shirt and bindings were probably still strewn about in the kitchen—evidence of their desperate state the night before.

“Borrow some of mine,” Tilly told her, helping her dress by pulling an overly-large sweater over her head and finger-combing her hair before she found a ribbon to tie it.

Presentable, she looked at the other Alpha, clothed as well and standing just as barefoot and uncertain. She wanted to tell the woman that everything was going to work out perfectly. That there was nothing to be concerned of—ever. That they could be mates.

Is that even true?

Did it matter? She took a long breath, annoyed to find herself shivering a bit through it. “Well. Um...”

“We should investigate this letter,” she interrupted, suddenly averse to meeting Hawk's eyes and curiously distant despite smelling heavily of Hawk and sex. “Today. Now. While I've got Gene with him here and I can get the landlord to keep a watch out.”

“Right.” Hawk nodded, keeping a professional air to mirror that of Tilly's. “That's right. But coffee first.”

“Of course.”

Deep, in a place just beyond Sasha Hawk's heart, she felt a chasm begin to spread open.

Chapter Text

Tilly felt the way Hawk drifted away from her more than she observed it. It was a gradual sort of loss and it was in how little the woman looked at her—though she had to admit, it was on both ends. She felt as if her eyes would be burned as though she stared at the sun if she were to gaze upon Hawk for any length of time and so she kept her sight averted. It was as though she were too beautiful and as if Tilly could not even hope to compare. Too much to look at. Too much to be reminded of.

Soon, however, the necessity to create a cohesive plan to protect Ozzie overrode her personal conundrum of romance and the four of them were scattered sipping coffee in her cramped kitchen. The two smaller men were closer together, nearly shoulder-to-shoulder, having created quite the connection the previous night and loathe to relinquish their bond.

“I propose that we take Oz to the gym and leave him with my father,” Hawk suggested, giving the first and likely best solution. “Then you and I can take ourselves to Carmon, one of the other bookies, and see what he might be able to do for us. Whether he knows anything about this plot or not. If he does then maybe he'll be able to help us do something about it. If he doesn't, we're on our own.”

“And your father?”

“He'll galvanize the forces. An attack on one manager is a threat to most of the managers. If they think their strength is being undermined and they're not being taken seriously, they'll likely help us out.” The side of her face quirked. “I mean...they'd help him out. I don't know how a lot of them feel about me.”

“Are you wont to make enemies?” Tilly asked, chuckling and unsurprised.

“There are some who have nothing to say about me...which is to say that they could be considered allies.” She took a sip of her coffee. “No friends, though. I've none of those. Unless you count the boxers.”

Oz snorted. “They're not your friends.”

“That is true enough,” she conceded readily. “They let me plow them for a warm place to sleep some nights.”

Tilly felt a sudden twinge of something within her chest and was alarmed to find it to be related to jealousy, twining about her organs and throbbing insistently. The thought of Hawk laying back and holding a brutish Omega's hips as he rode her and held her down was at once both arousing and infuriating. How the Alpha had ever deigned to lay with her when she had held so many of the boxers—and had been held by the boxers—was a mystery in and of itself and it forced upon her an insecurity that was distinctly unlike her. She wallowed in it, frowning and sipping her coffee until there was none of it left to sip. Only then did she cut the silence among them.

“Alright. We take Ozzie to the gym, we leave him in good hands.”

“I'm going with him,” Gene said, puffing out his chest to appear the capable Beta.

“Of course you are,” Tilly smirked. “I'd no intention of letting him out of your sight, Gene.” That seemed to calm him significantly and he settled back down, attempting to discreetly touch the boxer's hand under the table.

The day was gray and dreary and the morning sunlight diffused through the clouds to cast the streets of New York with a strange and foreboding sense, small bits of snow spitting out from low-hanging clouds as if only to provide an accent for the biting December. The Beta and the Omega huddled against each other while the two Alphas remained separate and for good reason. Tilly had never once before witnessed the sort of connection she had shared with Hawk and such things were only whispered of in the quiet places. Alphas weren't meant to be together and this was an unforgiving world—such things were not even spoken of unless one was in the right place at the right time. That even Ozzie knew could have been dangerous and it was enough for Tilly to create an even larger physical space between she and Hawk.

The gym itself was much warmer than the nipping breezes but it was kept fairly chilly still to counteract the boxers' exertion which explained why the Omega they encountered within was bundled tight with her heavy woolen cloak as she watched the boxers spar with wonder.

“Miss Abigail?” Tilly asked, prompting the tiny girl to turn about from her place and give a polite little curtsy. “What in the world are you doing here?”

Her clear and brilliant eyes were huge and alight with fascination and she happily bubbled out her reply, obviously taken with the foreignness of the gym. “Miss Molly is with Mr. Hawk and Mr. Brighten has agreed to show me how a boxer does his practice. The Madam was looking for the both of you and your little one.” Her eyes caught Oz where he stood alongside Gene and she gave the two of them a deep curtsy as well. “Good morning. I hope you are found well, Omega.”

“Well as ever, Miss Abby, though some blighter did think it would be a laugh to put a bag over my head.”

Miss Abigail blinked, unsurprised. “It seems to happen more often these days, does it not? Oh, here is my mistress.” She turned and gazed lovingly to Miss Molly as the Alpha strode with Vincent Hawk toward them, her back straight and her posture regal. Her scent was strong and spicy and laced with a warning which made her appearance in a blood red cloak seem even more ominous. Behind her, a timid little male Omega peered out from around her skirts, his mere presence causing Ozzie's scent to sour and a low growl to come from his throat.

Thom.

The madam regarded Tilly evenly and looked straight down her nose at Hawk while she addressed them. “Ladies. Gentlemen.”

“Miss Mitchell,” Tilly greeted her, giving a modest bow if only to be polite. Clearly the woman had something important to say to them and by the glint in her eye, it was almost as though she wanted them to know that she had toyed with not telling them at all. “Is there something wrong, Alpha?” She mentally congratulated herself when the woman appeared to preen at the word.

“Something wrong?” she asked, her voice smooth and deceptive. “This entire outfit is what's wrong, though Mr. Hawk seems to be intent to change my mind about it.” She passed Vincent a small smile that teetered on the brink of flirtatious and didn't seem daunted at all when the man quickly scooted away from her and barked at Sam for having thrown a clumsy swing. “I hadn't known where to go so this seemed the most logical spot.”

“But Orville...”

“There is a bit of a problem with your little Orville, Miss Caird. I had thought that perhaps you would have known already but apparently you don't. It seems that while he was off to his tavern this morning from his home, he was snatched off the street by some ruffians.”

Her body filled with an unanticipated tension and adrenaline shot out into her limbs. She twitched with it, the motion culminating in a slight gasp of shock and a jerk backwards. “Orville? Why?”

“I believe this will shed some light upon the issue. It is hastily scrawled and I had thought that another copy should have found its way to you as you are the one for which it was written. I do loathe being the one to bring about such news.” She reached into her coat and with two fingers handed off a small note to her.

Her hands trembled as she opened it.

Caird,

An even trade of the two. No harm, no foul. Sundown. Hangman's Elm.

-X

“A brave fool,” Tilly growled. “I'll have him hanged from that elm, whoever he is.”

“Another reason I've come,” Miss Molly provided softly, turning to face the cowering little Omega behind her who shyly hung his head. “Thom?”

His fingers came to Miss Molly's cloak and his bunched the fabric hard, his soft scent stringy with nervousness and fear when he was placed in the spotlight before their judgment. His voice was breathy and clearly displayed his urge to flee and also his urge to seek his Alpha's protection. “It was...it was the man who'd taken Cyril...the devil himself...” he began to weep, large dripping tears leaving shining tracks over his cheeks while his hideous fear strengthened his scent and wrinkled Tilly's nose. “He told me he would have my sister if I didn't do what he wanted. He could not get to m-me but he could...he could have her. If I t-told...if I t-t-told anyone...he...” Unable to go on, he broke and hid himself within Miss Molly's cloak, wrapping his arms around her and wordlessly begging for her acceptance.

“Shh, sweeting,” the Alpha cooed, stroking his head through the wool of her cloak. “Ah. Omegas,” she offered as commiseration.

Hawk stepped forward. “The man who took Cyril Muir...” She looked toward Tilly with a serious expression, her brows tight together. “We've had our suspicions. No need to go to the Hangman's Elm and no need to ask Carmon for his advice.”

“How is that?” Tilly asked even as she placed a large hand on Ozzie's neck and began to soothe him with the steady pressure.

“You remember the man I mentioned.”

“Vega.”

“I'm certain of it. He's a violent brute and we can't waste any time dilly-dallying if he's got your little friend with him. He might say there's no harm to be done but the man is just as Thom describes. If he were to go to hell, he'd give the devil a run for his money.” She paused, thoughtfully giving a soft glance to Oz. “Muir was a hell of a boxer...and he very nearly killed him. Would have...”

Miss Molly sniffed. “I can take your boxer, if you wish. He'll be safe with me.”

Tilly took Gene's hand and placed it on Ozzie's neck, silently teaching him the subtle squeezes that it took to calm and comfort an Omega while Hawk replied.

“My father and the others here should be able to keep an eye on him. It's not that I don't trust you, Alpha. It is only that he should be familiar here. How is it that the Alpha managed to get close to Thom?”

The Omega peeked his eye out from behind his madam's cloak. “Through letters, M-Miss Hawk. He would leave them for me in hidden places. Sometimes I would see him leave them in the middle of the night though only once or twice. He was a stealthy Alpha. Left them in a slot in one of the trees by the street. The first of them he had slipped into my pocket when I was in town with my mistress.”

“As I said,” Tilly muttered. “A brave fool.”

“And quite committed, I should say,” Miss Molly murmured. “To work so hard at this and by such round-about means...I can't imagine what he could want with your Omega.”

Hawk pinched the bridge of her nose with her fingers. “He's not my Omega and Vega Kowalczyk doesn't want him. He wants me.”

Miss Molly chuckled through her nose and lifted her fingers to her lips. “Oh dear.”

Again Tilly felt something inside her that threatened her resolve. She wanted to take Hawk into her arms and growl and possessively hold her and sequester her until there were none who could threaten her or steal her or lure her away. It wasn't natural for an Alpha to think this way about another Alpha, surely, but it didn't stop her and it couldn't ever halt the way her feelings tumbled over themselves and piled as if snow slowly but surely in ever-increasing layers of complexity. It was both simple and complicated and still, she felt Hawk disconnecting. Her scent was mingled with Tilly's but still very much independent from hers, her behavior more and more like that of a woman who was beginning to regret the night they'd spent together.

The Madam fluttered her lashes and shrugged her shoulders. “Far be it from me to judge a man for his perversions but going so far as to extort you by holding an Omega captive. That is something I simply cannot abide. Should you need assistance from me, Alphas? I've a few tricks up my sleeves if anything should go awry.”

“No,” Tilly said thickly, clenching her hands into fists. “I'll be taking care of Vega.”

Hawk directed Gene and Ozzie to the loft and Tilly noted the way Thom's wide peering eyes followed them as they left.

“I don't suggest your interference, little one,” she warned the tiny toffer. “You've done enough.”

Castigated, he retreated again and snuggled against Miss Molly's side as the lot of them left, Tilly and Hawk slumped into the coach that had brought them there with their boots tucked near the foot-warmer.

“Well now I feel like an utter moron,” Tilly confessed. “I've brought Orville into the whole damned mess and now here I am with a ransom for an Omega who isn't even mine. His mate is probably half-feral with rage and hasn't a single clue as to how the poor man even got into this mess. How do I explain this to his mate?” A sinking feeling haunted her. “And what if he's hurt? How can I live with myself?”

Hawk's eyes were on Tilly's feet. “You've fairly summed up how I've thought of this whole debacle when thinking about you.”

“But I'm an Alpha. I can take care of myself.”

“Omegas can do very well by themselves, Til. They're not helpless. If he thought it was too dangerous to help you then he wouldn't have done it. When they're built, they're given a heaping mound of courage packed into those little bodies and it gives them something to fight with. He'll be alright. Vega can't afford to kill him.” She was frowning and almost lost in thought. “It's difficult for a lot of Alphas to understand the types of strength that Omegas have. There are few who can compare to an Alpha and none who have Alpha strength but they have their own soft control all the same. Some managers can only understand their boxers by their physical power and to know them only by this facet is not to know them at all. An Omega is more than that and in this they are wholly different from an Alpha and should they accept this part of them—their undying compassion and courage—they should be unstoppable against any threat to come against them.”

She knew that Hawk described Omegas but still, between the words and their ascribed meanings, Tilly was certain that there was something of an autobiography of Hawk herself leaking through—how the Alpha understood her own capabilities and her own internal strength. After all, she was by no means a small Alpha, but she was not the strongest nor the largest.

Tilly cleared her throat. “Do you suggest then than an Alpha cannot hone their own compassion?”

She smirked. “Clearly that cannot be the case since you seem to have more than enough compassion to go around and a decent grasp of it. What I mean is that some Alphas, myself once included, have a tendency to underestimate the fairer sex.”

“And what about our sex?”

“What do you mean?”

“Us. Women. Do you believe that Vega should have attempted this against...say...your father?”

She laughed, leaning back and regarding Tilly with humor sparkling in her eyes. “If he were to find my father attractive, you mean. I suppose not. It is the strange line between a Beta and an Alpha for us that doesn't exist for men. Had I remained a Beta, I should have been perfectly available. I was raised with the idea that one day I should likely bear children...we all were. There were two in three chances that would be the case. Had I been a man, there would only have been a one in three chance...do you see?”

She nodded slowly. “Yes. It is expected of us to become mothers and then...”

“And then we're Alphas. But it doesn't remove our womanhood. It only strengthens it.” She shrugged one shoulder. “Without that extra softness to us, we lose something that helps us when we fight against our enemies.”

Tilly smiled. “You're calling men weak.”

The Alpha chuckled. “That was not my intention. Every one of our sexes is strong in different ways and is no lesser for our differences in strengths.”

She reached out and tentatively placed her fingers on Hawk's knee. Emboldened when the Alpha didn't flinch away, she leaned forward. “How long to our destination?”

“Ten minutes, give or take. Why?”

Tilly put her other hand to the side of Hawk's thigh and rumbled a deep and low purr from her chest. “I'd like to celebrate your differences.” She leaned forward further and pressed her lips against Hawk's, pleading with her to open up and accept her the way she had the night before, both pliant and aggressive in her pleasure. While she was accepted, she felt Hawk's fingers grip at her shoulders, both pushing and pulling in turns.

Breaking the set of titillating kisses, Hawk sighed and groaned. “You...you still want me, Alpha?”

“Of course I do,” she replied, starkly shocked at the rush of relief she scented in Hawk's aroma in the small space of the coach. “Have I given you reason to think otherwise?”

“I...I cannot explain it. This morning. You couldn't...you couldn't even look at me.”

A pang thrummed in her heart. “I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Hawk...Sasha.” She felt Hawk gasp at the use of her name and her warm hands came to Tilly's neck. “It was as if I should be blinded to look at you. You're so beautiful...though if you should prefer that I call you handsome...”

“No. Beautiful is good. Beautiful fits.”

She smiled, warmed and filled with a fuzzy contentment as Hawk pulled her in for another kiss and she worked to unfasten the front of Hawk's trousers, gleefully releasing her Alpha length into the heated palm of her hand.

“Ahn!”

“I don't want you think that I'm indifferent to you, Alpha,” Tilly told her, giving soft and loving strokes over Hawk with her thumb. “You've aroused in me an avalanche of emotions and I'll admit that most of them have been of the terrible kind.” Hawk snickered with her, looking down at her own rigid shaft pulsing in Tilly's grip. “But I've come to know you, Alpha. I've come to want you. To feel this desire for you. I want everything about you. Every power you hold. I am at your command, Sasha. Tell me what you want.”

She hissed and sighed, her eyes meeting Tilly's and her resolve clear with her demand. “I want your mouth, Alpha.”

Tilly wasted no time, squeezing herself downward until she could administer delicate licks and kisses upon the flushed flesh of her mate's turgid organ. With Hawk's fingers threaded in her hair, massaging her scalp, and urging her on, she suckled and licked and stroked, taking as much of her as she could into her mouth and working her with every bit of knowledge she had about how she herself liked to be touched. The heady, musty scent of their mingled Alpha scents was fringed with the spice of their mutual arousal and she hummed around her lover, urging that hot member deeper into her throat.

Hawk couldn't hold her silence, a low whine emitted while she opened her thighs further and panted in her pleasure, murmuring soft phrases of encouragement while she gripped and tugged at Tilly's long hair. After some time, she twitched in Tilly's mouth and groaned softly. “I'm going to come! Til!”

Tilly took Hawk's spend into her mouth and gulped it before she even bothered to think about it, withdrawing and giving her mate a few loving strokes to tease her overly-sensitive appendage. Smiling up, she hummed with her distinct Alpha pride.

“Look at you,” Hawk breathed, still gathering herself, “all full of yourself.”

“Should I not be?”

The coach came to an easing stop and Hawk put herself back together, grasping and holding Tilly's chin with a tight grip. “I'll let you know when you're allowed.” With that, she opened the coach door and slid out gracefully, leaving Tilly to follow, simultaneously pleased and allured.

“So this is where the dragon has his lair,” she sneered, unimpressed with the pub that sat upon a grimy-looking northeast corner of a somewhat busy intersection. The dirty snow had a way of making everything look like it was nearly in shambles and it did nothing to help this place, the establishment having the obvious look of a front for an underground fighting ring. She suspected it had most likely been raided more than a dozen times.

“A dragon? More like a lizard,” Hawk sniffed. “Come on. If he's not here, I can pick the lock to his office and see where he might be keeping the little one.”

She caught Hawk's hand and held it for a moment to bring the Alpha's attention back to her. With a very serious murmur, she warned, “Should he lay a hand on you, Hawk, I'll kill him.”

There was a dangerous glimmer in Hawk's stare. “Likewise.”

Chapter Text

Vega's office lock had been picked so many times that she'd memorized its particular patterns by now. He hadn't bothered to replace the lock or even come up with any decent security at all. Of course, that was probably because the bastard hadn't anything incriminating in there. There were books lined up neatly in his bookshelves, papers stacked in tidy stacks in the drawers, and everything placed in a logical and orderly manner upon his desk. He was certainly fastidious at the very least and it did nothing to help their search. Sneaking Tilly down the hallways had been something of a chore and now that they were inside the office and there was nothing at all to lead them to the little Omega who'd been snatched, Hawk could feel her blood pressure rising.

“Surely there has to be something,” Til mused in a low tone, trying not to speak too loudly for the patrons in the bar not so far away and, of course, the bartender that had been half-asleep next to the tap. “He must have some records or copies of the notes he sent.”

“Vega may be an ass but that doesn't mean he's a fool,” she replied solemnly.

Tilly nodded to the side with concession.

“There's a ring downstairs. It's a crud-filled shithole and the Omegas most certainly do not fight there but the Alphas do.”

Til raised a brow. “Have you?”

“Ah.” Hawk smirked. “I fought for a while. A short time before my father knew about it. I was good.”

“And Vega?”

She snorted. “That priss? Never. Never fought a day in his life. The prick came from money. Some banker's son. He found out he had a better chance of getting what he wanted out of life in the underground.”

“That was?”

“Blood. Sex. Thrill...all of that.” She shrugged. “It's this way.” She led Tilly out of the office and kept a sharp eye out while they made their way to the back of a dim hallway and down a set of narrow, twisting wooden stairs that curved around a corner and emptied into another narrow hall. It smelled like blood, heavy and metallic, along with the rank stench of old straw and Alpha stress. She raised her nose, testing the air for any hint of an Omega's signature sweetness though over the residual mess of odors, it might have been difficult to pick up. For a moment, she thought she detected it and she paused. “Til,” she whispered, “Do you smell that?”

“A whiff. S'Orville.”

Ducking a slight bit to create a smaller profile, she crept forward toward the archway at the end of the hall where it met the outside of the fighting ring. There were risers around a pit-like ring in the middle that was surrounded by thick wooden boards, the design to allow for anyone to see the fight no matter where they stood and if they were to arrive from any direction, they would have a disadvantage to anyone seeking to spot them from below. It was not an ideal circumstance but then again, what part of this whole mess had been in any way ideal?

Tilly Caird. Just about the only good thing to come out of this.

Almost immediately after she appeared in the doorway, she saw Vega stand, his attention drawn to her and so she stood fully, strolling out into the light from the various gas lamps burning about the room. The man had been sitting on one of the risers, his hands flat together before his mouth and his elbows balanced upon his knees. He looked like a man who needed to think about things. A nervous man. A waiting man. The appearance of Tilly ducking as not to hit her head on the doorframe behind her and then standing at full height behind her seemed to make him blanch.

“Vega,” Hawk greeted. “Just the man we wanted to see.”

Tilly loomed, her scent a hard warning that she was not a woman to be dealt with lightly.

His mouth twitched but he seemed to remember himself, picking up all of his scattered thoughts to formulate himself back into the suave snake he always was. His long, flat mouth artificially curled at the edges. “Ladies...what brings you here?”

Tilly's voice boomed. “Couldn't wait for the hanging.”

“Ah. Miss Caird. I sense that the cat has escaped from the proverbial bag. I hadn't known the two of you were on familiar terms...”

“Oh I didn't tell you?” Hawk said, making a show of examining her nails. “Til and I are close.” She flicked her eyes to him. “Very close.” She watched his face as he attempted to not understand what she had meant by saying it. He knew and he knew well—he was simply adept at hiding things that affected him, though he couldn't hide the gentle twitch of his fingers as he reacted to the news.

“It is always beneficial to have friends from such various backgrounds.”

Tilly stepped forward. “Where's the Omega?”

“I beg pardon?”

“Don't fuck with me,” Tilly bellowed, her Alpha voice inciting a pleasured and nervous little giggle from Hawk's throat as the timbre of it vibrated in her heartstrings and caused Vega to visibly flinch.

He blinked in quick succession, his eyes fluttering as he regained his bearings and swallowed. “Pardon, Alpha. Perhaps a deal can be made.”

“Of course,” Tilly stated, causing Vega to perk up but only for a moment when she followed it with her next words. “The deal is that you give me Orville and I don't send you straight to your maker for having sent his mate into fits.”

“That is not the sort of deal that I—”

“That you had in mind?”

Hawk watched the huge Alpha step upon the risers and walk down them as if they were stairs, approaching Vega until he was clearly threatened. He retreated quickly, looking more like a Beta and less like an Alpha with every step that Tilly took closer to him. He slithered like some hideous human weasel through the spaces between the wooden risers until Tilly stopped.

“How about a fight, Alpha? You like fights. You're a betting man,” Tilly told him, jutting out her chin. “Why don't you fight me? What sort of stakes would you have for such an event?”

Vega's eyes were wide in complete disbelief. “You cannot expect me to agree to such a thing!”

“Why? Because you're weak?”

“I-I-I...I am...” His speechlessness was more than Tilly's patience allowed for.

“You're weak.” She put up her nose. “And pathetic. Having your thugs do your bidding for you. There's no wonder you have to stoop to such levels for intimacy.”

Vega spat back, “How dare you!?”

“How dare I?!” Tilly pulled up her sleeves and Hawk's heart started to pound. “Where is the Omega?!”

At the sound of her voice resounding through the arena yet again, another Alpha appeared from a separate doorway, larger than Vega with a mean face and the stature of a boxer. Hawk recognized him immediately as one of Vega's errand boys, Hardy. The man often lived up to his name in the ring, taking hits like he was was getting spritzed in the face with some harmless water. Scarred and weathered, he looked up at Tilly and put his hands in his pockets, very obviously expecting his boss to notice him and he wasn't disappointed long.

“Hardy,” Vega breathed, calming a bit. “Good of you to come.”

Hardy nodded to Hawk. “Miss Hawk,” he said before he shifted his attention to Tilly.

“This is Miss Caird,” Vega told him, stiffening his back and straightening his waistcoat. “She seems interested in a fight and I'm certain you'd be more than happy to indulge her, would you not?”

Hawk felt her brows come down into a deep furrow. The man had been fighting for years. His size was comparable and he was practiced in the art, as it were. Tilly had obtained but one simple boxing lesson from her. It was hardly enough. She'd be mad to agree to this and surely she shouldn't have to...

The male Alpha straightened and tilted his head, carefully considering Til as an opponent. “I'd say I could arrange somemat like a fight.”

Hawk stepped forward. “All we want is the Omega. We don't need a fight.”

The man was already stripping his shirt and kicking off his shoes, moving into the ring with practice and poise and Tilly was not going to let him look her in the eyes without meeting his unspoken challenge. She was going to fight him and the bastard knew it, his smug smirk prominent in his features when she began to pull off her coat and sweater, tossing them to the risers before she swept herself straight into the ring.

“Til,” Hawk told her, coming down quickly to the wooden barrier, her hands on the top of it and her full weight against it, “Don't let him goad you.” A pulsing strange sort of excitement was welling up inside her and she recognized it as the same sort of excitement she had when Hugh had been her fighter. A challenge and a good one at that. When he'd been about to sidle his ass in the ring and face a bigger, presumably better, boxer than he was—when she knew he could win. She reached out over the short wall and grabbed at Til's arm, pulling her over and pressing that wrist against her chest. “Don't let him make you feel like you're no good. You're plenty good. You've toppled men in bars before and the bar's only just above us.”

“You think he'll give me trouble?” She teased, raising a brow.

“You might come away worse for wear,” Hawk admitted. “That's what I think.”

Tilly turned to face her fully, letting her free hand come to Hawk's shoulder in a brusque and yet tender squeeze. “Will you still want me if I'm ugly?”

Hawk pushed her. “Who says you aren't now?”

“That answers that.”

Hawk sighed through her nose and watched Til shake out her arms. She was holding herself just as Hawk had told her and seemed to be recalling every bit of their lesson before she'd even begun swinging.

Hardy took the first shot. It was a measuring jab and Tilly barely reacted, taking it rather than letting him know where her weak spots were right away. She dodged the next few, her eyes searching him for where she might get in a quick hit as he tried to weigh her out. As two brawlers, it would be difficult for them to meet in the middle without clashing hard and it was this that worried Hawk the most. It was a siege from either side and it wouldn't be pretty.

For the most part, Tilly did well. They were nearly five minutes in before she took the first shot to her face and by that time, she had the male Alpha sweating and at least a little frustrated. She was unorthodox, certainly, and had been making to grab him—something a brawler didn't quite expect when they were making their usually-slow movements. When he threw a hard cross, she caught it in an open hand and redirected his momentum, managing to make him stumble so that she might capitalize on his mistake. He couldn't correct fast enough and she managed to get an arm around his neck from behind, ripping him in the ribs with a fair amount of might that had him grunting in pain at every blow. She couldn't hold him forever though, even if Hawk was whooping and hollering at her that she was doing great. Praise could only go so far when it came to miracles.

Another ten minutes and she took another shot to the face, blood spattering the straw by her feet. She recovered quickly and managed to knock Hardy to the ground before she backed up and took stock of her lips, split by his knuckles. Bleeding, sweating, and nearly out-of-breath, the two of them stared at each other, fists up, from across the ring.

“Like animals, aren't they?” she heard Vega snicker. “Not even civilized.” He'd come nearer to her, perhaps five feet from her with his arm against the wooden barrier as he watched them circle each other. “Savages.”

“You're one to talk,” she spat.

“You know me,” he told her. “I don't bother with such brutish pursuits. An Alpha doesn't have to be some reckless, unchained dog. He can be refined.”

“Yah,” Hawk chuffed, “Refined. That's what they call it when you fuck an Omega to death, isn't it?”

His eyes darkened and he drew up, his scent suddenly soured and sticky as he faced her. “I don't think I like what you're implying.”

She raised a brow at him and crossed her arms, her arrogance and anger frothing together in a volatile brew. “You gonna fuck me to death over it?”

Vega's hand on the wooden barrier balled into a fist and his knuckles turned a brilliant white. “I'm curious—”

“How we know? We've known. Jot that down, you slimy tick. We've all known it was you that drove Fox into hiding. You think about the questions his manager was asking? It was because of Muir.” She chuckled, unbelieving of his sheer gumption. “I still, to this day, cannot believe your gall. Was he really causing you such a mess? Was it that important to you? We heard, you know. The rumor was that it was you and deep down we all knew it.”

“I beg to differ,” he growled back, his eyes flashing and his teeth gritted. “You're in my territory here, Hawk. I'll have you ruined.”

“You think? Well tell you what. You try to touch me and I snap your neck before you get a good grip—how's that?” She smiled at him. “You want to try me, Alpha? I'll put you in the ground.”

“I didn't kill Cyril Muir.”

“No. You didn't. He's still alive, though you did try, sir. You tried very hard. So how about you bring me the little Orville, you put your tail between your legs, and you leave me the fuck alone.”

His eyes flicked back to the fight where the two big, tired Alphas were still taking swings at each other, most of them blocked. Hardy had grabbed Tilly and begun to lean on her, letting her lean in return while they traded rips and huffed out big breaths. “My fighter hasn't lost yet.”

“It makes no difference to me. I want the Omega.”

He took a breath and reached out for her. “And I want you.” She caught his wrist to stop him and found a shine of madness in his eyes. “If I can't have you, Hawk, I swear to god I'll kill you.” There was a metallic flash in the dim lights and she found him to have produced a blade in his other hand, swiping it at her as she lifted an arm to defend herself. Her shriek alerted the boxers who broke from each other and turned.

Pain did different things to an Alpha depending on their nature and Hawk was less patient with it than Carmon would have admired. Rage sparked a wildfire in her, her first impulse to seize him despite the blade he still swung. Another bit of pain was nothing to her. Her Alpha strength seemed to take him by surprise, his clouded eyes clearing as she swung him and lifted him, hurling him as if he weighed no more than a hefty head of lettuce over the side of the short wooden wall. He tumbled bodily over the rushes and dirt, his grace and poise entirely lost as he crumpled and flopped like a doll.

Shockingly, he scrambled to get up, wild and disheveled, he made a loud and short sound that rattled around in his throat as something of a war-cry. The blade was still in his hand and he faced Hawk, poised as if to charge her. He didn't make it. In fact, he didn't even get to finish taking his first step toward her.

Tilly's big hands had reached him before his shoe could make it to the floor for the first time and with a gut-wrenching pop, Vega's spinal cord had been internally severed. It was quick, ruthless, and in Hawk's opinion, far more than he deserved. It would have been much more satisfying to have watched him get fucked to death.

Still...

“Til...” she said, staring at Vega's corpse where his living body had once stood. “You've...”

The Alpha was breathing hard, looking down at what she'd done with her lips gently parted and her shoulders squared, her hackles still raised.

Hardy cleared his throat. “Lord...” he crossed himself the way she'd seen Hugh do it a thousand times before, “He's dead.”

Tilly raised her gaze back up to Hawk, obviously shocked at herself as she very slightly shook her head. “I...I just...he hurt you.” She looked to Hawk's bleeding arm. “I can't abide it. Couldn't... I said I'd kill him if he hurt you.”

Hawk let her face fall into an easy smile. “I suppose you meant it then, didn't you? I think we're done here, Hardy. Perhaps a constable, then...”

The Alpha raised a brow as he wiped away his sweat. “For this blighter? Per'aps the East River.”

Chapter Text

The worst part about waiting around for so long as the Alpha in charge of the constables decided what he wanted to do about the whole affair was that she was still subjected to the smell of this place. The man who addressed her was a tall older gent who had the air to him that he was a true military man—a man who had seen plenty of this sort of thing. His commiseration was clear from his scent and in all of the questions he'd asked her, taking down the details as best he could with a stub of a pencil and a small pad. His name was James Couver and he was clearly in no surprise over being here.

“So Miss Caird,” he rumbled. “You did find what you were looking for.”

She tilted her head toward Hawk who was sitting off on the risers with the little Orville. They'd found him as riled as ever, snarling and gnashing his teeth locked in a broom closet on the second floor. Hardy had known exactly where he was and he wasn't hesitant at all about leading them to him. There was no honor among thieves after all, and especially not when the leader of them all was dead. They had the Omega wrapped in a blanket and set up with a steaming cup of coffee as he gave his statement to another of the constables.

“There wasn't anything else you were looking for?”

Tilly tilted her head. “Maybe an explanation. The truth. I got it.”

“And you didn't like it.”

“Who would have?”

Couver should his head. “Vega Kowalczyk was a brutal man, Miss Caird. I know you weren't here to do what you did. A chat with the other boxer was enough to tell me that. Laws on murder aren't as clear cut here as they are in other places, Miss Caird. I could have you hanged for this.”

“Are you?” She couldn't hear any indecision in his voice. He'd already made up his mind.

“No.”

She let him have a little smirk, the saucy smile pulling at the freshly scabbed cuts that marred her lips. “He had you backed into a corner didn't he?”

“The state of my debts is irrelevant.”

“Like hell it is. You've got a little weasel in his office sniffing out his books right now, don't you?”

The Alpha looked at her steadily. “And you, Miss Caird? Will I find your name in there?”

“You can bet not.”

“How about we live and let live here, Alpha.”

She nodded slowly. “That's got my vote, if you're askin'.”

“I'm not askin'. I'm telling. You stay out of any more trouble and I won't live to regret letting you off like this. All of this—boxers, bookies—it's trouble.” He flashed his eyes over to where Hawk sat with Orville. “You take you and yours back on home and forget about all of it. There are men in this city that will drive you into the gutter. One of them dies and a dozen seep in to replace him.”

“So I've done you no favors.”

“I wouldn't say that,” Couver told her, sniffing and gazing down at Vega's corpse with undisguised disdain, “but a known evil is better than an unknown, I suppose.”

“Well,” Tilly told him, smiling, “good thing that's not my concern then, hmm?”

“Take your Omega and go home. If I need you, I'll be in touch.”

There was something James Couver wasn't telling her but she very much thought that he would never be in touch. She had the strangest suspicion that she'd done Couver a terrible sort of favor and not one she wanted any details of so she made her way to Hawk and gave her a short nod to signal that they were done and when Orville stood up, he moved to her and wrapped his arms around her waist.

“You are a big, stupid Alpha,” he said, his voice distorted as his cheek smushed up against her belly.

“And you're a tiny idiot,” she replied, patting him on the head. “Let's get you back to your mate before he goes into fits.”

“Yes, please.”

Mate.

She looked up. She might have looked a fright—her hair messy in its bun and curled from her sweat. She could feel the skin under her eye swelling a bit from a brush with Hardy's right cross and her lips were both cut from the center down across to the left side. They throbbed painfully and it occurred to her suddenly that she would have to forgo kissing for a little while if she were to have any chance at healing them properly. She wanted to touch Hawk. She wanted to hold her and fuss over the bandaged slashes on her arms and curse the very day the bookie had been born into this world for putting such marks on her handsome—beautiful—mate.

“Ah, look at you,” Hawk told her, careful not to put too much warmth in it. “A wreck of an Alpha. A decent boxer though, for a first go.”

“Stood up fairly well,” Tilly preened.

“You'd make a good brawler. I think Hardy was surprised.”

“Damn right he was surprised,” she replied. “You want to be picked up, O?”

“No,” the Omega told her, detaching from her waist and leading the procession of the three of them to the outside where it was snowing in big fat flakes that came down in lazy swirls and circles over the cobble.

It was dark and the three of them sat in the coach in an exhausted silence, reeking with the stench of that horrible fight pit and all of them ready for a good soak and a warm bed. Orville left them first with the suggestion that neither of them assist him in the explanation of the event to his mate lest they fall victim to the vitriol of a supremely peeved Omega who was likely tearing at his hair in his frustrations. So they let him go and they pressed on, sitting across from each other with a strange tension floating between them.

Hawk spoke into it softly. “I cannot believe you've murdered a man.”

“You cannot believe it? How do you think I feel?” she said, calmer than she felt.

“You killed him because of me. We're both at fault here.”

Tilly knitted her brows incredulously, “It was my hands on him. You've no obligation to take any part of the guilt, though I cannot say that what I feel right now is 'guilt.' He hurt you.” She put out her hands and pushed the sleeves of Hawk's coat and sweater up until she could see the white bandages that were slowly becoming soaked through with her blood. “I'll change these at home, if you'd like.”

“I would,” she said.

She tickled her fingers down the sensitive flesh of Hawk's wrists and then pressed her thumb into the palms of each other hands, prompting the other Alpha to grasp at her. Tilly's voice toned down to a murmur. “You know, I couldn't think of anything when it happened. I couldn't think of anything beyond that he had harmed you and that if I did nothing, he would harm you again. I've never felt that way before and I hope to God I never feel that way ever again. To see you in any kind of danger...”

Hawk grinned. “I threw the man ten feet.”

“And still,” Tilly chuckled, “I still thought of you as a damsel in distress.”

“Hardly,” she sassed. “I tossed him like the paper boys toss the morning's edition. You snapped his neck like you were putting down a wounded chicken. Against either of us, he was doomed from the start.”

She was laughing now as the coach stopped in front of the gym where they would collect Ozzie and Gene. Putting out a hand, she led Hawk inside, refusing to let go of her even as they wandered into the large room where Oz had Gene in the ring.

“What the devil are you doing with the poor Beta?” Til asked, her voice still rife with laughter when she found the two of them stripped to the waist with their fists up. “You'll knock him clear to Hell!”

Oz stood up straight. “I'm not really gonna hit 'im!”

“Hit me!” Gene argued. “If I'm to learn much of anything, I'd best be hit!” He looked scrawny next to the muscular Omegas and terribly pale to boot. His hands were wrapped and he was already sweating.

Hawk, of course, was grinning. “What do you think you're going to do, Beta? Fight the Omegas?”

“One of these days, I might be an Omega, Miss Hawk,” he told her, his expression determined. “I might as well get the hang of it now. I don't want to be powerless. I don't want to be blown by everyone else's whims!”

“Well if that's the case,” Hawk told him, “you'd best learn everything you can from Ozzie. Once you've presented, if you ever do, I'll be sure to set you up a fight or two.”

He gasped. “T-Truly?”

“If you don't mind mucking up your pretty face.”

His eyes flicked to Tilly and he seemed to think for a moment, taking in her split lips and what was likely to become a half of a decent black eye. It was a difficult moment for him, she was sure, but he seemed to come to his conclusions fairly quickly. “If I'm to have my own life to live rather than a half life under my father's control, then I'd do it. I don't much care for how I might look.”

“Then by all means,” Hawk told him, squeezing Tilly's hand softly.

She squeezed back. “Alright. Enough of your shenanigans. We've had a bit of a trying day and if you're to come home with us, then you'd best get your arses moving.”

Oz came to the ropes and leaned on them. “Actually, Miss Hawk, if you're not to be staying in the loft this evening...”

“Agh,” Hawk waved her free hand to them. “Don't give me any details. This just means you can't be late to train tomorrow morning.”

Tilly addressed Gene, “And you're not allowed to be late come tomorrow afternoon. No matter how sore you are.” At his pinkening cheeks and horrified expression she added, “From training.”

“Yes Miss Caird,” he nodded.

“No matter how sore you are!” Hawk roared with her laughter as they walked into Tilly's apartment, the loud sound of the Alpha's laughter startling the two cats and sending them scurrying into the other room. While she was still laughing, Tilly had turned on most of the oil lamps and had begun to start a fire in the hearth to warm the place up a bit. “His face when you said it!” she wheezed, fanning herself with her hands. “My god, I thought might faint on the spot. Good lords, I will remember that look upon his face for the rest of my days. Ah! I could have bet that Ozzie would plow a Beta but I never would have thought to point it out.”

Tilly turned on her as the fire crackled to life. “I hadn't meant it like that.”

“And yet!” she cried, cackling hard.

“How should you like me to point out your positions, even upon accident?” She asked dryly.

Hawk subdued her laughter and sat haughtily at the kitchen table to unravel her bandages. “I shouldn't imagine I should be embarrassed at all. After all, there's nothing wrong with with using what I've got and enjoying every second of it.”

“Excepting that it's with me,” Tilly answered, setting up some water to boil.

“You say that as if it being you were somehow worse than it being any other Alpha.”

She shrugged. “Maybe it is.”

“If anyone thought this of us...that we were...you know,” Hawk said, her eyes cast to the floor, “they'd hardly have the stones to confront you about it. Especially after you've killed a man.” She grinned. “Let's be honest here, though. Nobody thinks of things like that. Two women are friends, Alphas or not, and everyone just assumes...”

“Assumes it's platonic?”

“That's what my father thinks.”

Tilly sat down and helped her take the bandages off, setting fresh ones down that she had gathered from all the times she'd cut herself with the knives at work. With care and a fresh cloth dipped in the boiling water, she waited for it to cool a little and then dabbed at the dried blood around the edges of Hawk's wounds, taking care not to disturb the fresh scabs. She worked to carefully tend to the wounds and then to wrap her arms in the white strips. “You should see a doctor.”

“Tomorrow.”

“These will need to be sewn. Tonight.”

She pulled her arms in, drawing them to her lap and away from Tilly. “No...”

“Sasha...”

At the sound of her given name, she pouted. “I don't want to.”

“You're scared of the needle?”

“Don't even say it!” she whined. “Just...just let me be and let me...let me...” She moved from her seat, shifting down to the floor and to her knees at Tilly's feet where she put her hands on the insides of the Alpha's thighs.

“Oh no,” Tilly told her. “You're not distracting me from this. You need a doctor. Is there one that you know well?”

“Nowiki,” she mumbled, putting her forehead against Tilly's thigh. “For certain you won't let me distract you? I'd rather have the scars...”

“I've gotten sewn up dozens of times,” she offered softly. “If it helps, I'll hold your hand.”

With another bit of serious pouting and hemming and hawing and frowning, Hawk finally agreed with one last parting demand that Tilly thought she would be very much qualified to fulfill.

“I'd better be spoiled after this. And I don't mean with drink.”

“Of course, Alpha,” she agreed as they wandered out into the cold toward the doctor's house.

Chapter Text

If she was being completely honest with herself, she felt much better after Nowiki had taken a peek at her and had quickly sewn her up. Vega had managed, when he was being manhandled, to slice her again, giving her two rather deep cuts, one on either arm. The first one was the more difficult of the two to sit through with the kind doctor tending to her with all of his poise and grace. He didn't tell her anything important as he was doing it as he must have known—seen it in her eyes—that she was unable to hear anything over the incessant ringing in her ears. She recognized that she was still shaking even with clean bandages and stemmed bleeding and she hated to show this sort of strange weakness. It was one thing to laugh about Tilly having to hold her hand while she obtained these stitches, it was quite another to have taken her up on the offer.

She pouted to herself as they walked through the lightly falling snow back to Tilly's place. “I hope you know, I'm not like that.”

“Like what?”

“Weak. It's just...the needles. I can get punched in the face, I can have bottles broken on me, I can have furniture thrown at me, I can be cut by fucking knives but I can't seem to...” She grumbled, glaring at the ground.

“I don't think you're weak.”

“You called me a damsel.”

“It's not weak to have a fear. I'm terrified of things that make less sense than needles, certainly. Plenty of my fears can't even cause any physical harm when it comes down to it.” She smiled through the dark and Hawk felt a little better. “I'm absolutely horrified by spiders, and I'm not afraid to admit it. It doesn't matter how damned small the little bugs are, they scare the skin from me. I used to have Hugh swat the ones in the broom closet and the cellar, you know.”

Hawk chuckled, trying to ignore the pulsing ache of her wounds. Nowiki had given her a pain powder but he had insisted she not take any until twenty-four hours had passed as it would cause her to bleed. “I suppose the Omega thought he was some pumpkins for doing it for you too.”

“Don't you know it,” Til laughed. “He acted like my bleedin' hero.”

“Ah yes. Seems like him.”

Tilly unlocked the door to her place and let Hawk in, the whole apartment comfortably warm from how they'd left the stove heating up and the fire in the hearth, the air and glowing with the oil lamps still lit. The cozy atmosphere had Hawk shedding her outer layers fairly quickly and then turning about to give Til a curious glance. Would she still be game for...being together? Her body tingled half with anxiety and half with anticipation while her wounds throbbed. As much as she had thought at the doctor's home that she was in no mood for intimacy, being here again and being so comfortably warm was beginning to change her mind.

Til shed her own coat and sweater and moved further into the kitchen where she began to prepare something for the two of them to eat, pulling out vegetables and chopping them expertly on her cutting board while Hawk moved about to watch her.

“What...what are you making?” she asked, hoping she wasn't going to be too much of a distraction. The last thing they needed was another trip to get stitched up.

“I thought you could use some soup,” she explained, smiling wide. “You've hardly had a bite all day and I'm sure all that stress you've been under is making your stomach a bit touchy. It is mine, that's for sure.”

She nodded, curiously watching as the woman took the cuttings and set them aside while she brought water to boil and began to throw some things into the pot. “You're uhm...a bit of a professional. How'd you get to be in charge of the restaurant at the Muir?”

“Ah. A regular tale that is. My Ama used to drive the deliveries for a farm just outside town. The farm, of course, had a distillery and so we were bringing crates of food and also crates of whiskey down to all the bars and the restaurants that sourced from us.” She sighed with wistful nostalgia as she stirred what would become the broth and her eyes gained a faraway look. “My Ama used to take me with her on her rounds and I'd ride in her lap with the reins half in my hands and when she'd deliver, I would run abouts and chat with the barkeeps and the patrons and sometimes if I was funny enough, some of them might stick a coin under my little cap. When I got older, I helped her unload and I was polite as can be and she started giving me a few nickels for myself out of her lot. Sometimes I went to school. Sometimes I didn't bother.”

“And your mother?”

She smiled warmly. “A very beautiful Beta. She passed from the pox when I was ten or so and from then on it was my Ama and I...two peas in a pod. When the hotel was built, all the farms were competing for Muir's favor. My Ama told me the little farm we worked for would never get anywhere with a large hotel like that—they would want things for much cheaper than we could sell them for.”

Hawk leaned forward in her seat, intrigued and attracted by the increasingly alluring scent of the soup.

“She was half-right, anyway,” Til said, dumping ingredients into the pot and stirring again. “They didn't want any of our food. They wanted our whiskey. Muir had somehow come by a taste of it when he was around town and decided he had to have it sold at his hotel—a local flavor would no doubt be welcome to find the Muir Grand Hotel. The first delivery of it, I was there to provide with my Ama. The hotel was beautiful and sparkling and so foreign to me. Everything was marble and gilded and I couldn't believe something so large could be so richly done up.” She chuckled at herself. “Mr. Muir was there, as he wanted to snitch a bottle of whiskey straight from the first crate and so of course we gave him one. He must have noticed how struck I was by the whole affair and he asked me my name.”

“You met Charles Muir,” Hawk blurted suddenly, drawing Tilly's gaze.

“I did.”

“He hired you?”

“Well...not right then and there. He ran the hotel himself for a while, making sure that everything was smoothly running. He had an arrangement with the distillery that he should get his own personal bottle of whiskey every week to have at the meetings for his investors and since my Ama was busy with her normal deliveries, I was sent to give Mr. Muir his personal bottle.” She puffed up. “I dressed up as best I could every time, got right up on the best horse we had, and took that bottle right into the Muir and as if I were some princely visitor, I knocked on Mr. Muir's office door and placed it right down upon his desk.”

Hawk felt her jaw hanging slightly open. “Charles Muir. One of the richest men in America and you wandered right into his office every week as an errand girl.”

“Whiskey delivery service,” she laughed. “Anyhow, the man isn't anything like you'd expect. Yes, he's terrifyingly ruthless at times but he was never a man who couldn't appreciate a job for what it was. He recognized that I didn't have to clean myself up or ride our best horse just to give him a bottle of spirit and he told me, eventually, that it was in how my shoulders were squared and how my jaw was set.” Til pulled a ladle from a drawer and began to pour the soup into two wooden bowls. “One day, he looked particularly harried and so upon my opening the door to his office, I took one of his empty glasses and I poured him a decent serving. When I put the bottle down on his desk, he had taken a drink and was contemplating me...and that was the day he hired me.”

“As manager,” Hawk stated flatly.

“No. As a waiter. I could have been hired as a dishwasher or some other lowly peon, but he thought me quite polite and attentive and I did exceptionally well. And the rest...” she shrugged, “Is history.”

Hawk chuckled and covered her eyes with her hand, trying to imagine Tilly, the huge brute that she was, walking up to a table and taking their drink order. With such a commanding presence and a demanding work ethic, it was really no wonder that a man like Charles Muir should take a liking to her. “Hm. And what does he think of you now?”

“The man himself doesn't handle the day-to-days of the American hotels anymore. His son—”

“Cyril,” Hawk blurted. “The little howler used to be the best boxer in the circuit until...”

Tilly nodded. “He went off to England to find himself a titled gent. Found quite the catch in a handsome Beta. Don't remember the poor blighter's name but he was polite.”

When the soup in the bowls wasn't so hot anymore, Hawk managed to sip some of it, shocked at how wonderful it tasted as it didn't seem to have taken much work to create. Of course, Tilly was a master at making things seem simple when they were in fact tortuously complicated. She sipped and ate and contemplated everything. There was a strange bit of thread that seemed to tie everything together, an interconnectedness that was almost tiring to follow as it webbed through events and tethered seemingly unrelated events and circumstances as if through some divine guidance. Charles and Cyril Muir, Vega, Hawk, and Tilly, Hugh and the other boxers. There had been plenty of men around her when she was younger who had stated plainly that the world was such a strange and small place when it came down to it but she had never taken it as fact before this moment. The world, she thought, must have been terribly small for all of this to have happened to seemingly unrelated folks.

She finished her soup looked upward at Tilly who was just finishing hers. “So? What now?”

“What do you mean?” Til asked.

“I've my boxer, your little Omega friend is safe...will this be the last time I see you?”

Tilly leaned against the counter, setting her bowl down. “I suppose I haven't been overt about much. To be frank, Hawk, I don't think I want to let you go.”

She smiled, feeling a bubble of unrefined joy begin to form in her chest. “You know, I've begun to think the same about you...but then, I hadn't the same sort of vitriol toward you from the beginning.”

“Ah,” the Alpha sighed. “You know what they say about strong emotion. There is just one slip between hate and love. Of course, it would be much like me to trip over my own feet.”

The bubble inside her expanded and she almost lost her ability to speak over the lump in her throat. She swallowed several times. “...love?” Hot tears clouded her vision.

Fortunately, it seemed that she wasn't the only one who was going to have a bit of a misty moment over the inadvertent confession as Tilly was grimacing and chuckling, wiping her eyes on her wrist. “Oh dear. I suppose I should just come out with it. I think you had me at the very moment you managed to flip me right over your back. If I'm being truthful, it was...such a new experience and I...I'd never met a woman like you before.” She was looking at the floor, bashful and open, offering raw bits of herself as though fruit from the vine. “When you were receptive to me...when you kissed me and let me touch you...” She shook her head.

“What, Alpha?”

“I just couldn't believe that this was possible. I had always thought I should be like my Ama and find a steady Beta girl and here I am falling in love with a woman who...”

“Fights Omegas like dogs?”

“Who's strong.”

Hawk laughed. “Is it jarring?”

“It's foreign. It's new. It's terrifying, I'll admit. I've never been with someone who knew just what they wanted. It's always been a game of trying to read a woman and trying to unmask her potent sexuality and here you are and you know what you want and you demand it of me. I...I love that. I love...” she looked up, her eyes filled with vulnerability that was so rare for an Alpha. “...you.”

Hawk narrowed her eyes and let the pause remain pregnant for a small while before she said in a low and sultry sort of tone: “A bed then, Til.” With that, she got up and let the Alpha follow her to the small bedroom where the sheets and quilts were still messy and still reeked of Alpha and sex. Just the scent memory of having that huge cock buried to the hilt inside her was enough for tingles to tighten her nipples and draw from her that aching rush of blood to her groin. “Should I tell you what I want from you, or should I take orders this time?”

Tilly came up behind her, one of her warm hands coming out to caress Hawk's side, her fingers exploring in a way that was half sensual and half ticklish, a sensation that teased and taunted even without the Alpha's knowledge of it. Her voice was low and husky and her breath was hot on the shell of Hawk's ear. “You can order me about if you wish. I don't mind taking orders from you. I should make a request, nevertheless.”

“And what is that?” she asked, leaning back so that she could press against Tilly's chest, encouraging that wandering hand in its journey across her belly and then upward. Time seemed to slow as the Alpha carefully unfastened her shirt, letting it gape open at her chest and then her belly until it was taken from her, her breasts still hidden under the loose bindings. She turned her head toward Tilly's neck and shut her eyes, eager to focus entirely upon the tender touches of her Alpha's fingers as those bindings were slowly unraveled to bare her.

Til's voice was a murmur, her lips touching the tip of Hawk's ear and causing her to shudder. “I want you to show me what it's like.”

“What it's like?” she gulped.

“To be a woman and an Alpha.”

Her bindings fell away and she took in a sharp breath when Til cupped her sensitive breast, rasping over her nipple with her palm and giving her a comforting squeeze. She shivered, raising her hands to her shoulders and then back to grasp at Tilly's, arching her back to encourage the Alpha to touch her breasts further.

“Do you like that, Alpha?”

“Yes.” She groaned. “The boxers are shy about touching me. I can't get enough.” She gasped when she felt a teasing little pinch to one of her nipples and then the other, the stimulation enough to fully arouse her. “God, I want to be naked.”

That was the cue they took to break from each other and Hawk turned around, returning the favor of stripping Tilly to the waist, her mouth coming to the large Alpha's chest to nibble and nip at her collarbone and breasts until they were both a mess pheromones, mashing together for skin-against-skin and lips-against-lips, their kisses short and fiery before transforming into deep, demanding rituals of intimacy that conjured the fiends of lust in their hearts. Fingers locked into hair, strong steel grips fought for dominance in a play that was half-trivial and half-serious as each of them took a turn pinned up against the wall, thrusting with their tongues and nipping with their teeth.

“Uh! Til!” Hawk moaned while the Alpha mouthed at her neck and her throat and her shoulder, grazing her teeth over soft, feminine flesh. “Don't mark me...my father will kill me.”

Tilly growled against her throat. “I'll kill him.”

“No doubt you would. I want to ride your cock, Alpha.”

“I want it this time,” Tilly breathed in argument.

She sighed. “Fine, but only because I'm partial to you...but after?”

“After.”

Satisfied with the promise Hawk quickly divested Til of her trousers and let herself be divested as well before she pushed her down to the rumpled sheets. “How should you like me, Til? Above you? Under you? Or maybe you'd like to present to me like a naught little Omega who needs a nice swat to her bottom?”

Tilly laughed, the sound rumbling through Hawk's chest and making her bite her lip with humor. Where she lay upon the sheets, she looked up, her head consciously tilted off to the side in a rare display of submission before she sat up and contemplated the question seriously. “You know, I think I'll have a hell of a time on my back, if I'm honest with you.”

“Then we'll do it how the boxers like it,” Hawk suggested, kneeling onto the bed and plopping herself down. “I'll lay on my back and you can straddle me. The boys don't like to feel caged at all—like they're owned or dominated.” She smiled. “So I got used to being on my back.”

Til nodded, tentatively moving with Hawk's adjustments so that she was kneeling, her knees planted to each side of Hawk's hips while her Alpha member boldly jutted from between her legs. Hawk looked at it in the warm light, marveling at the differences she noted between her new lover and her former ones. Where Omegas were small—Til was big. She licked her lips and wondered if the dripping moisture that strung from between a woman Alpha's thighs tasted anything like the slick she guzzled from a heated Omega's ass. Their eyes locked and Hawk's hands came to her mate's thighs, a placating touch to show her that she was ready.

Til reached around herself, touching Hawk's ready cock and slipping the head between two fingers to hold it steady. Even that basic touch against her was enough to make her mouth open involuntarily. She was far too focused for this, every nerve in her shaft attuned to the process of copulation and ready to fire at will. She tensed as she felt the first kiss of the wet lips just behind Til's swollen member and held her breath while she was slowly sheathed by that tight, constricting heat.

“This is rather novel,” Tilly mentioned off-handedly, easing downward and adjusting as she went. “Now I know what you meant when you wondered about it. It's a different sort of feeling, isn't it?”

“Ugh, yes,” she managed, breathing out in one rush of air. “You are very tight, Til.”

“Well you're big. You can't hardly blame me. I can't imagine how it was for you.”

“Don't brag.”

With a smug smile, Tilly worked herself downward until she was sitting flush against Hawk's hips, her hand upon her stomach as if she were amazed at the length she had taken into herself. “How extraordinary...this feeling...I can't tell whether I like it or not.”

“Raise yourself up a little bit. A few inches.”

Tilly did and Hawk found her leverage and began to gently thrust upwards. Tilly took in a breath and leaned forward, her hands finding their way to either side of Hawk's head while she closed her eyes and frowned, obviously focusing hard on the sensation of a rigid shaft nudging in and out of her.

“Is that alright, Alpha?” Hawk asked, feeling sweat begin to form at her hairline—not only from exertion but also from the intensity of holding herself back.

“It's odd. It's strange. I don't know if I like it still. There's...something.”

“That something,” Hawk told her. “It gets good.” Every thrust sent a wave of flaming pinpricks rippling out from her groin, shooting through her spine to be dumped in every limb and she trained herself to breathe while Til began a cooperative motion that slapped them together. The Alpha above her moved a bit, tilting her hips and adjusting her sitting position in a clear attempt to get more of that odd pleasure. When she settled upon a particular position of her hips, she rocked back and forth, her breasts moving in time with with each motion, hypnotic and so unbearably arousing that Hawk had to close her eyes.

“Oh...” Tilly sighed. “Oh yes...that's good. I do like that.”

From her experiences, it was at first a lucid sort of pleasure and it was gradually worked upon over and over again with each building thrust. She couldn't watch the way Tilly's face would change, how her body would tighten. She could already feel her starting to clench her muscles as the shocks grew and grew.

“Oh. Oh! Oh yes. Uh huh. Yes. There. There! That feels good.” Her words devolved into short, panting moans and the bounce of her hips became less controlled with every wet slap downward that bounced her proud Alpha length against Hawk's belly. “Ah! Ah! Ah! Sasha!”

Hawk cried out, the sound jarring to her own ears. “Til! God! Make me come. I need it! Please! Take it all. Take it all!”

There was a sudden and relentless tightening that forced Hawk's eyes to open, her vision tunneling as blackness curled in from the sides. All she could see was Til's pinched features, her tight grimace as she was gripped by her overwhelming climax. Spend shot from her stiff Alpha cock and Hawk felt it, hot and sticky on her cheek, neck, and chest. She tensed over and over again, milking Hawk of her own release with every tensing and pulsing grasp of her wet hole.

“Good lord,” Til managed through a wheeze. “What sort of devilry is this?” Her stomach was still minutely twitching with tension as she sat and panted, looming over Hawk on shaking arms. “Now I understand the draw...how should every woman not wish for this? I have made plenty of women scream but I had thought...I don't know what I'd thought!”

“How about you think your way right into making me scream,” Hawk told her with a gentle smile upward.

“Oh I've gotten...oh...” Til fussed over the splatters of pearlescent emission she'd spurted on Hawk's face, taking up a bit of a sheet to wipe at it even while the smaller Alpha laughed and pretended to struggle.

With a fair bit of laughter from either side, Hawk pulled Tilly down and pushed her, wrestling a bit and delighting in the comfortable shared affection of lovers. They nibbled, tickled, and cuddled until they came to rest finally sitting up together while facing, Hawk spread open upon Tilly's thighs and their lengths pressed against each other, their jovial merrymaking paused for the realization of their coinciding arousal. Hawk swallowed before she made a conscious attempt to formulate a ball of saliva, letting it drip from her lips over the tips of them both before she took to stroking each of them together against each other in long, sweeping gestures.

“Mm,” Tilly groaned, pulling Hawk close so that she could once again mouth her neck, very gently sucking her flesh as not to leave any true marks. “You're so incredible. How anyone could deny themselves this...”

Hawk kissed her, losing her in delicious wet sounds and the fire of mutual pleasure. She could feel Tilly's hands mapping her, squeezing at her shoulders, her fingers easing between them and pinching at her nipples and testing the weight of her modest breasts. Tilly caught the salacious moans and mewls that escaped her in her mouth, cutting her off from all her desperate sounds as they both began to rock with their hips.

Hawk whispered into her mouth. “I want you to plow me, Alpha.”

Tilly brought her hands to Hawk's bottom and lifted her easily, lining her up with that huge engorged cock and then bringing her down to gradually impale her, the thick girth stretching her body open but sliding in despite its size thanks to the copious amount of moisture that had pooled at her center. She was so aroused that she could feel it pressing against that particular place inside her almost immediately and she took to her keening, pulling herself close to Tilly's body in a tight embrace with her arms around the Alpha's neck and her head tucked up beside her lover's.

“It's alright,” Til told her, sliding upward still until Hawk was as open as she could possibly be, speared by that huge shaft that filled her and pressed even deeper than before.

She nipped at her lover's ear, panting and whining as her own member rubbed, trapped between their bellies. “Move, Alpha.”

It was, at the first, slow and sensual, the rocking of their bodies a methodical and easy set of motions that allowed for them to worship each other with wet kisses, erotic touching, tasting, and feeling between each other as they each learned and mapped every inch their joined forms. The rise of Hawk's pleasure was as gentle as thick falling snow, blanketing the earth and the meadows and the cities, growing and growing on top of itself until she could feel her moisture frothing out of herself and every mewling keen morphed into a breathless cry for relief. She had conquered this creature, this Alpha and their mutual enslavement to each other was complete—if only she could give a mark! If only she could take one! Her release came to her insidiously, creeping in soft contractions until she was speechless and shaking, lost to every intermittent convulsion while she clung to her lover, burying a gripping hand into her messy hair and tightening her thighs until she was most certain that Tilly could not have unburied herself if she had ever even wished to.

“That's a good Alpha,” Til murmured into her ear as she was wracked by each wave, her body clenching hard around Tilly's turgid length and squeezing until she could feel the evidence of her lover's climax spurting out of her from around the base. She thought wryly that it was a good thing that Omegas in heat were knotted—else they would never keep a pup!

“Oh Alpha,” Hawk breathed. “Oh my Alpha.”

They remained in their sticky embrace for some time, exhausted from the intimacy and the intensity of their bed play while the night moved on. Moving to their sides, they lay together, facing and simply breathing together, Hawk moving a free hand to Til's hair, smoothing it back.

“Mm. Your arms. Do they bother you?”

They did. She could feel her heartbeat in her wounds. “No.”

She scoffed as if she could hear the lie. “Alright.” Softer: “Alright...” Just before she blew out the bedside lamp, she sighed another one. “Alright...”

It had been a few weeks and the boss Beta, Bazaretti was beginning to notice that there were new bruises on her face. His smooth lines of questioning were answered with open honesty—that she was learning how to fight. She wasn't normally a sight for customers, hidden back within the kitchens and running everything smoothly so he he did not protest it, letting her do what she would and claiming that he would not worry for her—for now. Hawk had come to teach her more than just the basics and had begun to spar with her seriously over a number of days along with giving her endurance and weight training regimens. Whenever the two of them grappled, it was a spectacle for the present Omegas and she often found herself as the underdog champion that Niall and Ozzie screamed for from outside the ring. She had both won and lost though the first win she had ever managed had elated her to no end. Hawk, it seemed, was getting prouder and prouder of her handiwork with every passing day.

It was morning and she had just finished putting away a delivery, wiping her sweat from her brow and then tying a strip of cloth around her forehead to pull the strays of her hair back from her face. Everything was in order for the night and it was fairly quiet with only a few guests in the dining room for their breakfast. She had planned on taking advantage of the peace and quiet to work on her orders but as her ears pricked, she heard some kind of commotion from beyond her realm.

The kitchen door swung open wildly and one of her waiters stumbled in, his face as pale as a sheet while he trembled and sought to hide somewhere.

“What in the devil is going on?” Tilly demanded of him, placing her big hands on her waist. She wondered suddenly if she was going to have to put her new found battle skills to the test despite her sore muscles though she couldn't imagine what sort of renegades would run straight into the hotel to cause harm.

“Th-th-the...!” he stammered, leaping out of the way with a strangled “eep!” when the door was opened behind him to reveal the short but relatively intimidating form of Cyril Muir.

Tilly crossed her arms and solidified her stance. She liked this Muir—she really did—but for the little snarling beast to come to respect one, one had to be just as fierce. “Mr. Muir,” she greeted, nodding to the waiter so that he would slink from the room.

The Omega was sporting his typically serious scowling expression, his black slashing brows knitted in the middle and his sharp hazel eyes cutting into her as if shards of golden-gray glass. There was no curve to his mouth that betrayed his mercurial mood and his scent was curiously flat in the same manner as many of the other boxers she'd met. His hair was dusted with a bit of snow as was the jet black mantle of feathers that adorned his relatively broad shoulders and his voice, when he spoke, was deeper than she had remembered.

“Miss Caird.” There was a pause as he studied her, taking in her bold stance and the bruises about her face. “I know this is a bit of a surprise, my coming. I apologize if I've interrupted you.”

She turned her head a smidge to study him. “You haven't sailed all the way from England to see me.”

“Oh,” he chuckled, “but I have.”

Any humor she thought she might have found in this situation was suddenly gone and a weird roiling sensation filled her guts. “Why should you want to speak to me? Why not send me a note?”

“Because a note will never properly convey what I have to say to you, Miss Caird.” He took in a deep breath, turning from her and wandering slowly toward one of her counters, examining the utensils and the platters that were neatly placed for use. With deft hands, the little one loosened and untied his cravat, pulling it away from his slender throat in a puzzling move that sparked Tilly's rampant curiosity. When he turned back around to her, and looked up, he jutted out his chin and the light filtering in from the nearest window illuminated his pale throat, the perfection of it marred by an ugly, brutal scar that ringed it as a permanent and painful collar. Whenever she had seen and spoke to the Omega before this, she had never been graced with a view of his neck and this had her mind racing. Muir's mouth twitched downward. “When I left New York, it was not of my own volition. You've done me a great service and though you could not have known what you'd do for me with your actions, that cannot erase the weight of your favor to me.”

“I don't understand.”

“You don't have to.”

She swallowed. “This is about Vega...this is about...”

“This is about vengeance,” he told her, his voice frighteningly flat. “Which is why I've come. A man nearly ended my life and you, through circumstance, ended his. I'm going to give you ten thousand American dollars, Miss Caird. If you choose to think of it as blood money, that's not my concern. I urge you to take it, as another favor to me.”

She heard an odd gasp and recognized it as her own. “Mr. Muir...”

“If you no longer wish to work in my employ, I will instruct Mr. Bazaretti to accept your resignation without question. If, however, you do choose to remain here, I will promise you, Miss Caird...you will never want.”

Tilly almost felt as if she could vomit. Ten thousand dollars? What in the world did Cyril Muir think she was going to do with ten thousand dollars? “You...you can't give me that much money.”

“I can do whatever the hell I please.”

She couldn't argue with him there. The man was resolute and astoundingly intense even in his calm. Considering her options, she made an immediate decision. “I'll stay...I've no other wants save a good house. I'll stay.”

“Good. You'll find the funds will be transferred to you by way of my solicitor. I will not leave New York until I've settled the the whole affair and made certain all parties are satisfied. Namely myself.” His cheeks reddened a bit. “You're welcome to join my mate and I for supper tonight and I encourage you to do so.”

It didn't sound like she had much of a choice in the matter so she merely nodded to acquiesce.

“Well.” He sighed. “With all that business settled, I can give you this.” He pulled a small folded note from his pocket and handed it to her, nodding his head before he pushed through the kitchen door and he was gone as quickly as he had arrived.

Looking down at the small piece of folded parchment, she smiled at the almost unintelligible scrawl that she recognized immediately.

Hugh.