"You are deficient in many nutrients from starvation and recent estrous."

There was no point in arguing. Whether it was a vitamin or poison, if he wanted her to take it, it would be a simple thing for him to force.

As she swallowed the tablet, Shepherd said, "The blue pills I found in your coat pocket. Do you know what they were?"

Disgust was clear in her expression. "They were supposed to be heat-suppressants—cost me a week's worth of food. I had been taking them for days before I came to the Citadel to beg for your help. Clearly, they didn't work, and you didn't help, either. So... as far as I see it, they were a bad joke."

Reaching across the table for her free hand, Shepherd wrapped his great paw around her wrist. All he need do was squeeze and her bones would be crushed and broken. She took it as a subtle warning to watch her tongue.

Tracing his thumb over her pulse, he explained, "I had a lab analyze your pills. They were quite the opposite, little one—designed to prompt your heat-cycle."

Opposite? Fertility drugs... Other girls in hiding had been taking those pills. Dozens of the Omegas could have gone into heat unexpectedly, exposed, just as she had been. That was exactly the point he was trying to make.

With her head in her hand, she heard him outline precisely what she was already thinking. "Someone clever is using your needs to hunt down the Omegas. They know the females taking those pills believe in their effectiveness and don’t anticipate they’ll go into heat out in the open. And like you, they will be mobbed, hunted down, or taken."

"That's barbaric. You men are so fucking evil..."

Shepherd knew it was a generalized collective of males she was referring to, not him specifically, and did not allow more than a hint of anger to come through his voice. "Where did you get them?"

After a deep breath, she admitted, "From the same men peddling drugs on the causeways. Anyone has access to them. I approached as a Beta, covered in the smell of another."

"The smell of another?"

"Those who are strong enough to leave our hiding place steal the clothes from the dead rotting on the streets. We use their scent to hide our own, as you must have noticed when I came to you. It is unpleasant, but we need supplies, we need food. We do what we have to, to survive."

"Why was a young female chosen to approach the Citadel and not someone older, with less chance of entering estrous or attracting attention?" Shepherd demanded.

"I volunteered."

"Why?"

"I am healthier than most of the others, have lived for years passing myself off as a Beta, and am trusted to think objectively for the collective as I have no mate or children."