Healing The Ruthless Alpha

Chapter 18

“How can an ordinary omega have the kiss of the goddess?” Alpha Warren laughed. For the first time, a look of panic crossed his face. He did not have the situation under wraps like he always did and he knew.

So this was the reason Warren and my father teamed up with Kade to keep me in this rotten pack. I should have known they would never be sorry for how they treated me. I should have known that it was never my place to determine my value to them. They would treat me as they liked until they decide I was worth more than the way I was treated. After toiling and labouring for these people without ever receiving a proper thank you, they had found another use for me and did not want to let me go.

“There is no need to deny it,” Kade said, cutting his father off. His lips curled as he spoke to Cahir. “Sihana is my mate. I may have rejected her in the past but the rejection isn’t complete so there is no way I can let you have her.”

He had a five o'clock shadow, eyes that desperately needed sleep and his sandy hair looked as dead and lifeless as his eyes. He glared at an unflinching Cahir. When he turned that glare on me, the heat in his eyes made me swallow.

“She is my mate and I don’t share.” Cahir pulled me closer to him, half-lifting me into his thighs, his long and calloused fingers resting on my inner thigh. Kade growled which made Cahir sigh. “Shut up, you stupid mutt.” Boredom tinged his deep baritone.

“Cahir –“

“What can you give me in exchange for a healer?” My breath caught in my throat as he threw out that comment without batting a lash.

“What are you asking?” I muttered, speaking for the first time in the meeting.

Me. I was the healer.

Did the goddess really give me two shitty mates? How could I seat here and listen to him talk about trading me as if I was fish or a – a commodity to be sold. My eyes stung and my wolf who had been purring from the contact with her mate perked up, going silent.

“Silver Moon wants the healer but by right, she is mine. What can you give me, Alpha Kade?” He leaned forward, crossing his arms on Kade’s desk. “I won’t let you have her for nothing.”

“What do you want?” Kade asked, his eyes glowing with satisfaction. “Name your price, Alpha Cahir.” My father and Warren shared matching looks of contentment.

“I think a fifty percent discount for oil export to Alpha Blood will be a good start.” He smiled at the men whose expressions crumpled. ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

The mainstay of the Silver Blood pack was their petroleum. It had been close to five decades since we discovered our land sat on a multitude of crude petroleum which boosted our financial situation and put us on the map.

“I think not!” Kade snarled at the blatant attempt to rip off his pack. “We can offer you a five percent discount, nothing above that!”

I listened to the men haggle with a burden on my heart, a weight that threatened to crush me from inside. They were going to trade me like livestock. My mate and my pack, with my father in the mix. Tears threatened to spill from my eyes but I held them at bay, adjusting myself on the seat. Cahir grabbed my legs as they slid off his thigh, pulling me back to him. I wrenched away so hard that I hit my leg on the table.

“Stay still.” He growled, pulling my legs back to his thighs and holding them in place.

“I’d like to leave,” I wriggled my legs to free them from his grip but he growled again, his eyes turning dark. The chill of fear that straightened my spine was nothing compared to the grief crushing my heart.

“Don’t you want to hear what you are worth to your new mate?” Kade asked with his eyes on me and a cruel grin lifting his lips. Deep satisfaction sparkled in the depth of his eyes that made my skin flush.

Stupid, stupid girl! My heart ached when I thought of how foolish I had been to even consider mating with a man like Cahir. He was cold and cruel, a murderer that did not care for anything past his own gain. What could I give to a man like him? Why would he want to mate with a woman like me who could give him omega pups? The only relevance I had was my gift from the goddess and he could trade that for something better.

“We have a surplus of wolf’s bane I would like to sell to you,” Cahir continued as if ver spoke.

The men started to haggle again as Cahir proposed exporting wolf’s bane to Silver Moon and selling it at a price sixty percent less than the market price. This would mean he could kick out the other importers of wolf’s bane with his low prices and there might also be an increase in the substance abuse in Silver Moon.

Wolf’s bane was controlled among our kind because of its effect. Those that could grow the plant needed to make the substance were monitored as well as its import and export but despite the control, people still found ways to abuse the product as it was one of the quickest ways for a wolf to get inebriated.

“No, we don’t need that much wolf’s bane,” Kade put his feet down.

“Ah, then I really need my healer.”

The men went back to haggling and in the end, Silver Moon agreed to allow Alpha Blood to trade wolf’s bane on our land twenty percent cheaper than our usual importers and also, Silver Moon would give Alpha Blood a ten percent discount on petroleum export for the next three years. In exchange for all these, Silver Moon could keep ‘the healer.’ They kept mentioning ‘the healer’ as if I was a piece of cloth and not a living, breathing person sitting right there in the room with them.

Did Cahir ask me to this meeting with the need to humiliate me? What had I done to him to deserve this kind of treatment?

“We didn’t do anything,” Asena said in a quiet voice. Her grief leaked into me causing my chest and my throat to close up to the point of pain. My lungs constricted and my stomach hardened as I felt nauseous.

“Why – Why is he acting like this?” My wolf asked in a broken voice.

A pain sharper than the pain I felt when Kade rejected me pierced into my chest. Why did it hurt so much? Was a second rejection more painful than the first? Who could I ask? I had never heard of anyone pathetic and undesirable enough to get rejected twice.

“I don’t know.” Despite Cahir’s dangerous and ruthless aura, ver expected him to be this cruel to me. Even if he didn’t want me, even if he found me disgusting and repulsive like everyone else, could he not spare me the heartbreak of listening to him trade me like wood?

“We will draw up the contract. It will be ready by tomorrow morning.” Warren said with a wide grin taking up half of his face. Kade kept his eyes on me, his gaze drilling a hole into my face but I refused to look up at him. I did not want to see his triumphant smile any more than I wanted to hear the unspoken words between us.

No Alpha would choose an omega like you. No matter what, the stain of your rank will always hold you back.

Even as a healer, I did not think I would be able to heal from the wound Cahir just inflicted on me. The scars on my heart were too many but he came and he ripped out my heart without pity.

Really, Cahir Armani was a ruthless alpha and I cursed the day I met him.

“It is nice doing business with you.” Cahir stood, letting go of my leg. He grasped my hand and pulled me to my feet, hugging me to his side.

“What are you doing?” Kade scowled at the hand he had on my waist. “We just agreed you could not take her!”

“Yes, I am well aware.” Amusement danced in Cahir’s tone, his expression remaining blank. “But until we sign a blood contract, I will hold on to her.”

“What are you saying?” My father shouted. “We already sacrificed so much to keep the girl and you –“ He spluttered, red in the face.

“Relax, Markus.” He held me tighter. “I have no interest in your daughter. The minute the contract is completed, I will leave.”

“But –“ Father tried to argue.

“Until then,” Kade cut in with a burning gaze. “Don’t even dream of putting your hands on her.” With a silent chuckle, Cahir lifted me off the ground and carried me out of the office.