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Instead, there was a secondhand flush of pleasure and relaxation from two solid orgasms, paired with the gruff affection of a man who was better than he seemed to think he was. Shared love for Mia, shared friendship with Emiel, shared fond exasperation for Byron.
Speaking of whom...
“Oh, are we biting Nat now?” Byron crawled through the sea of pillows, naked and tattooed with his limp dick hanging down. Luca must have released his knot while Nat and I were... occupied. I glanced over to find both omegas curled up with Emiel, dead to the world until their next peaks approached in a few hours.
“You can wait your turn, you self-centered—argh!” Nat’s grousing was cut off as Byron grabbed him and flipped him over onto a mound of cushions, ass in the air.
“I did,” Byron said smugly, and promptly bit into one round butt cheek
Nat yelped and flailed. “What thefuck! Oh my god, you completeasshole!”
Byron gave him a long, lascivious lick before pulling away. “You’re a beta. It doesn’t matter where I bite you. And this way, you’ll have something to remember me by for a few days.”
“Every time I fucking sit down!” Nat complained, finally managing to right himself. “Fuckingow!”
Through the hazy bond, I felt Byron’s smug amusement. And beyond, barely perceptible, two sated, sleeping omegas with Emiel a contented presence in the background. Unable to help myself, I started laughing, and found that I couldn’t stop.
SEVENTY-THREE
Zalen
IN SOME WAYS, WAITINGa few hours for Luca and Mia to surface from their period of rest was an exercise in self-control. After all, we were more than a day into the heat, and I still hadn’t come a single time.
In other ways, the lazy stretch of time spent guarding the nest from threats that didn’t exist was the deepest peace I’d experienced in years. Before my life had fallen apart, I’d sometimes stayed awake half the night, simply so I could feel Julie’s sleeping mind nestled inside my own. I’d let her dreams wash over me as a series of emotions, drinking in the long stretches of absolute serenity in between her REM cycles.
Of course, the crash that omegas experienced between the peaks when they ovulated wasn’t precisely sleep. For one thing, they didn’t dream. It was simply the physical price they paid to sustain the wild bouts of need that happened each time a new egg was released, ready to be fertilized by an alpha or male beta’s sperm.
Back when alphomic lines hadn’t been so thoroughly mixed with beta lines, it wasn’t unusual for omegas to whelp quadruplets, quintuplets, and even sextuplets—potentially with a different sire for each pup, if it was a pack mating. Most purebred omegas had four nipples, or sometimes six. Thesedays, singles, twins, and occasionally triplets were more the norm, and extra nipples were becoming less common. But even so, omegas still peaked up to a dozen times in the heat nest.
And in between, they rested.
I was on the fringes of the bond, still connected only by the ephemeral link through Nat’s blood. But I could enjoy the hazy sense of five other people brushing up against my thoughts. And soon, that bond would deepen to its full potential.
Somehow, much to Byron’s disgust, both omegas and Nat had ended up in a messy pile half on top of Emiel. Byron had flopped down next to me, not having bothered with clothing after the last round. He hadn’t gone feral yet, but we’d clearly entered the ‘who gives a fuck’ stage of this heat.
Which, honestly, was when the real fun started—assuming everyone in the nest was happy.
“They’re starting to come out of it,” Byron said, lifting his head from where it had been thrown back against the beanbag chair he was resting against.
“Mm-hmm,” I agreed, my dick once again making its presence felt as omega horniness filtered into my consciousness from two directions. “You doing okay?”
I knew the answer already, of course. But I wanted to hear him say it.
“... Yeah,” he said, after a slight hesitation. “Yeah, I am. You?”