The Knot was hot.

Sensory overload. Alpha scents mingled and wafted over me with complete pheromone overload. It was like sitting in a room filled with sixty television screens, each of them playing a different porno.

My omega instincts had reacted the second I stepped into the club, overwhelming my nervousness, causing my cock to swell to half-mast and my juices to start flowing. If one of them chose to take me right here and now on the dance floor, my body would be ready for them.

But I wouldn’t.

The combination of being insanely horny, in heat and also terrified of what we’d come here to do, had me in a cold sweat. My palms were clammy and the goosebumps hadn’t gone anywhere. Chuck was eyeing me nervously as we stepped up to the bar.

“Don’t look like you’re being led to your execution, man,” he shouted in my ear over the roar of the pounding dance music. “People are gonna think I roofied you up or something.”

“Gah,” I exclaimed, shaking my head and trying to get back into the night. We had a plan and right now I had to focus on it.

I leaned against the bar as Chuck ordered for us. I couldn’t hear what he said, the place was just too loud. Bodies grinding and pulsating on the dance floor that was absolutely slammed with people. I could make out the alphas and the omegas, and a couple of betas that mostly kept to themselves on the fringes of the crowd.

Scents were everywhere, masking the smell of cheap liquor and smoke that found its way in from outside. Reminding myself of what we came here for, I looked out across the crowd for a possible…suitor…

“Your ass nice and lubed up there, boy?” A gruff voice behind me spoke. His words hit me like a cattle prod to the spine and I jumped around to find myself face to face with a grizzled alpha, well past his forties, covered in tattoos and piercings with a thick white beard. He was literally licking his lips at me like I was tonight’s dinner.

“I can smell that heat from across the fucking dance floor. You looking for someone to break you in? Cause let me tell you, I’ve broken in my share of boys and you won’t find a better alpha than me to open that hole of yours.”

My throat closed on me and I stepped back in terror, bumping into Chuck, who wrapped an arm around me.

“Beat it, grandpa,” he said casually. “This one ain’t for you.”

Grandpa gave Chuck an eye, sizing him up, but decided against it. He sniffed the air and gave me another look.

“You change your mind. Come and see me,” he said before turning away.

Once his back was turned, I shivered and looked at Chuck.

“This is a bad idea,” I told him. “I can’t do this!”

“Sure you can,” he interrupted me, forcing a drink into my hand. “You have to. You want to be sold off by Marcellus to some slave-trading alpha that’ll leave you in a cage between fuck sessions? No? Then drink this and pick someone. He doesn’t have to be your fucking Prince Charming. Pick someone tolerable and get him to take you home. The way you’re smelling tonight should make it easy.”

I gulped the drink in one go and almost threw up. Whiskey.

“Jesus, Chuck!” I gasped, slamming the glass down on the counter. “What are you trying to do? Kill me?”

He just chuckled and turned his attention back to the dance floor.

“What about him?” he asked, pointing to an alpha who did actually have some good moves on the dance floor. He was shorter than I liked, but buff and dressed well.

“Or him?” Chuck pointed to another guy who was shaved clean and wore a top knot.

“No way,” I replied. “Not with that hairstyle!”

“Hah,” Chuck laughed, sipping his drink. “Snob. Come on, man. The night’s getting shorter. Pick one and go talk to him.”

“Okay, okay!” I stammered, summoning up my courage as my eyes searched the sea of gyrating bodies. I could see some of them starting to catch my scent, and it wasn’t long before I had several of them fixated on me. It was an odd feeling knowing just how badly these alphas wanted me. Growing up as an orphan, you develop this feeling that nobody ever really wanted you, and it can be hard to shake.

“Come on, man,” Chuck said. “It’s not that hard. There are hot guys all over the fucking place here.”

“Give me a minute!” I gasped, sniffing the air and doing my best to isolate the scent I found most pleasing. Sometimes an alpha’s scent can tell you a lot more about him than his looks.

I sifted through the scents, matched them up with the owners and finally my eyes landed on an alpha who was leaning against the wall, casually holding a beer bottle. He wasn’t even looking at me.

He wasn’t the world’s best looking guy, but he also wasn’t the worst. His body was better than his face, and he didn’t look as enthused by the club as the rest of the guys here, which made me think we might actually have that in common.

“Him,” I muttered, nodding in his direction. “He’ll do, I guess…”

Chuck followed my gaze to the guy, then gave me an odd look.

“Really?” he asked. “He isn’t exactly the sexiest man alive.”

“Look, you wanted me to pick one and I did!” I blurted out, more annoyed than ever. This was not how love was supposed to happen – as an escape tactic to avoid a life of slavery. “Now get off my back about it!”

Chuck looked shocked and I instantly felt bad.

“Okay, I’m sorry. This is just hard for me okay? I’m gonna go talk to him now.”

I set my glass down on the bar and made my way through the crowd, but before I was even halfway across the dance floor, the door to the club opened and carried in a scent that almost knocked me on my ass.

I froze in my tracks, whipped around to face the door and laid eyes on the sexiest alpha to ever live.

Yes, I thought, overcome with desire and relief. That’s the one.