Reluctant Bonds: Alpha Kyros

"Please, Malric," Kyros screamed, throwing his full weight against the hands holding him. The silver cuffs around his wrists burned him. “Don’t do this!!”

Four wolves pinned him, men who had bowed their heads to him that very morning.

He winced when one of them fisted a hand in his hair and dragged his head up so that he had no choice but to look at his father kneeling in the middle of the courtyard.

A silver chain smoked against Alpha Theron’s bloody and heavily injured body. After hours of single-handedly fighting off traitors, he was weak.

His beta, Malric, stood behind him with one fist twisted in his hair and a hunting knife pressed to his throat. 

The pack stood around them in a frozen ring. Some of them were still in their nightclothes, dragged from their beds; all staring in horror, but not one of them moved.

"Look at you being so emotional," Malric sneered, his lip curling in disgust. "You are weak, boy, and you cannot afford to be. That is the same problem I had with your father."

"Kyros, look at me, son," Theron rasped, his voice steady even as the blade bit into his skin. "Don't listen to him. Don’t let anything that happens here today change you."

"Shut up!" Malric snarled, slamming the knife into the back of his head. "Your weakness is like cancer poisoning this pack."

"Somebody help him!" Kyros cried, his eyes darting desperately to his pack members surrounding them. "Please, he's your alpha!"

They all avoided his gaze, nervously shifting away from the gunmen holding rifles at them.

Malric let out a low and ugly laugh.

"See what I’m saying," he sneered, shaking his head as he always did when Kyros failed the same drill twice. "How can you be looking to them for help when you’re above them, Kyros? You are their king! Their master!”

“An alpha is a leader,” Alpha Theron yelled. “He is a caretaker of his people. Not a slave master.”

Kyros yelled as white-hot pain burst from his shoulder. One of his captors had jabbed a knife into his shoulder. 

“You bastard!” his father snarled, struggling fruitlessly against his bonds. “He’s just a child. I’ll kill you!”

 “Sixteen years is not a child!” Malric snarled. “Keep talking, and I’ll do more to him."

He turned back to Kyros when Theron snapped his mouth shut. 

“Goddess, you have so much to learn. But don't worry, with him gone, I’ll teach you." His voice dropped into something almost gentle. "You think I don't see you hiding behind that tree every evening, pining to join their games? You still have that weakness in you, that hunger for camaraderie and companionship.”

His voice hardened. “An alpha does not get friends. He gets followers!"

His eyes swept the scared crowd. 

"Your father held you back. Every time I tried to make you hard, he made you soft." Malric spat, his voice rising with rage. "This pack should be the greatest of them all, leading the others, not sending them aid whenever they come begging. But no, your father wanted peace."

"Peace is what makes us a pack." Theron said hoarsely, lifting his chin against the blade.

"Learn," Malric snarled, his eyes locked on Kyros. "This is what happens to weak men."

"No, please!" Kyros begged, thrashing wildly. “I'll do anything, I'll—”

Malric dragged the silver blade across Theron's throat with all his strength. 

When he let go, Theron's head fell back at an angle no living neck could bend, and his body pitched forward onto the ground.

The scream that ripped out of Kyros tore his throat raw.

Malric casually wiped the knife on his trousers, as if he didn’t just kill the man who had seen him as a best friend since childhood. 

He tossed the knife at Kyros’s knees. 

“Pick up the knife,” he said coldly. “You get to defend your position today. If you win, you prove you have what it takes to be an alpha, and I’ll let you live.”

His lips curved into a dark, malicious smirk. “If you lose, I'll bring out the Luna from the dungeons and kill her.”

* * * * * *

Kyros jolted upright as someone suddenly patted his shoulder, pulling him back into the present. 

"Sorry, sir," the bartender said nervously, snatching his hand back. “Your phone has been buzzing nonstop.”

The bartender watched him warily. He had been wondering all evening what a man in an expensive outfit was doing in a rundown bar in the sketchy part of town.

Even lost in thought, there had been something dangerous about him that nobody tried to start anything with him. 

Even the rowdy drunks around the pool table had left two empty stools on either side of him without being asked.

Kyros ran a tired hand through his hair. He couldn’t believe he had been so tired that he had fallen asleep at a sketchy bar.

"You alright, man?" the bartender asked carefully, wiping his hands on a rag that had seen better days. "You were kinda... growling."

"I'm fine," Kyros replied flatly, looking down at his phone.

There were eight missed calls from his PA. He answered the next one.

"Mr. Aldemir, thank goodness!" she exclaimed, the words tumbling out of her in a rush of relief. "Everyone’s waiting for you at the restaurant. The celebration dinner started an hour ago, sir, and they want to toast the—"

"I won't be coming," Kyros said flatly, pressing two fingers to his temple. "Tell them to go one without me."

"But sir, t—"

“Have the jet ready for ten tomorrow morning,” he cut in. “Goodnight."

He ended the call and let out a long, tired sigh. He had chased that multi-million-dollar deal for eight months but felt nothing when he finally signed it. 

He had shaken hands, accepted the congratulations and smiles, walked out of the building, and kept driving until he ended up here. 

The money, the power… it had all stopped filling anything inside him a long time ago. 

Every win tasted exactly like the one before it, like ash.

He drew in a deep breath, dropped a hundred-dollar bill beside his twelve-dollar tab, and walked out while the bartender gaped at it. 

He was a few feet from his car when someone suddenly slammed into him and grabbed him.

Kyros spun around with his fist raised, and then he froze.

The omega was soft and breathtaking, all generous curves under an oversized sweater, with a wild mass of dark curls and wide hazel eyes swimming with tears.

There were fresh scrapes on her face, as if she had recently been in a fight.

Her scent reached him a heartbeat later, soft and sweet beneath the sharp tang of her fear, and for some reason, his wolf, which had been restless all day, went completely still. It was as if she was a soothing balm. 

"Please, help me!" she sobbed, clutching his shirt. "They took my baby! I smelled an alpha, so I ran this way."

Kyros caught her wrists before she could rip the fabric. "Slow down," he said soothingly. "Who took her?”

"Traffickers," she whispered, glancing back at a dark alley across the street. "They took her into a warehouse back there. They said if I want her back, I have to come back and trade myself for her."

Anger slammed into Kyros. Omegas were prized merchandise in the skin trade because of their beauty and ability to heal from things that would kill a human. And they were easier to catch than regular shifters.

He had seen what was left of the ones his teams reached too late.

Before he could answer, two human thugs came sprinting across the street, and the bigger one clamped a hand around her arm. 

"Got you, you little—" the man snarled.

Kyros snapped his wrist with a wet crack, then drove an elbow into his jaw, dropping him.

Before the second one could react, he grabbed the back of his head, lifted, and slammed him face-first into the concrete lot.

Heat poured through Kyros's veins; he had been aching all week for something to let out his restlessness through. This was exactly what he needed.

"I am alpha Kyros," he said, stepping over the unconscious thug. "Let’s go get your baby."

"Follow me," she said, already running.

At the end of the alley, yellow light leaked from under a warehouse door along with rough male laughter. 

Kyros pulled her into the shadows and pressed his unlocked phone into her hands. 

"Stay here," he ordered quietly. "If this goes south, call the contact Raff and tell him Kyros said to come."

"No, I'm coming with you," she insisted, gripping his sleeve. "There are at least fifteen of them in there. I can hold my own weight. I'm not completely helpless! While you distract them, I’ll find Zuri and get her out."

He loomed over her, expecting her to shrink back. Instead, she tipped her chin up and glared at him through her tears, and something in his chest twisted.

He breathed in the air from under the door, catching sweat, gun oil, and mostly human scents. 

"I've faced worse odds," Kyros said evenly. "What's your name?"

"Aylin," she replied.

His brows furrowed in confusion as his wolf shifted within him at the name. But he couldn’t dwell on that at the moment. 

He rolled up his sleeves while Aylin snatched a rusted pipe from a scrap pile. 

When two men walked from around the building, he let his wolf surge until the world went crisp and slow.

"Stay behind me," Kyros ordered her, adrenaline surging in him.