Page 10

“That’s what they tell us,” says Knight.

“I don’t know anything about scent matches.

Other weird things are happening. I bit one of my mates, one of the other alphas, and we, uh, we’re kind of connected now.

Also, our alpha teeth… I don’t really know what’s up with that.

All Calix said was that it wasn’t normal. ”

“Alpha teeth?” says Theodorus.

“Yeah, like when your teeth expand in your mouth before you—”

“What?” says Theodorus, looking him over. “I suppose it feels like an expansion, I guess, sort of, but I don’t think anyone’s teeth actually grow . What do you mean?”

“Uh…”

I feel a sudden tug through the bond, and my own teeth start to expand in my mouth, just like they did before I almost bit Lotus. I gasp at the sensation.

Across the way, Knight’s teeth are expanded, too. Somehow, it affected me through the bond when he did it—or he needed me to be affected before he could do it to himself? Whatever the case, Theodorus is shocked.

He gets up from the table and starts sweeping the chess pieces into the wooden box he brought along. “You, boy, need to come with me.”

“Come with you where?”

“We should talk to my omega,” says Theodorus. “She’ll want to see this.”

lotus

AFTER I SUCK Striker, he goes down on me. We get into a little bit of a cause-and-effect issue, where we get the other off which turns one of us on, so that turns the other person on, and we can’t end the sex. It just goes on and on.

Which… not exactly a problem, per se, I have to admit.

Eventually, I tell him to knot me, though, and he does, and fucks me nice and deep and toys with my clit and we both come like crazy, and then, locked together, we kiss and kiss for a while.

I notice he has his teeth, probably because we’re kissing, but I don’t say anything to him about them.

I’m not sure why I’m able to control myself like that, why I’m not begging for his bite. I wish I could say it was predictable, when I get lost to the pleasure that way, and when I don’t. But it’s not. Sometimes, I feel like I have my wits about me. Other times, I feel like I’m out of my head.

I break the kiss and reach up to touch one of his teeth. “You thinking about biting me, alpha?” I breathe.

He pulls back, shocked. “Oh, shit, they did that again, huh?”

I giggle. “You don’t seem to be able to tell when this happens.”

He sits back, still knotted into me, and examines his canines, furrowing his brow as he runs his finger over the tip of them.

I feel his cock jerk as he does it.

I giggle. “That feel good?”

He laughs, embarrassed. “They’re very sensitive, yeah.” He turns his attention back to me, running his tongue over them. “I would, uh, love to bite you, Lotus,” he breathes, his voice reverent and turned on.

I like it. I writhe a little, stuck here on his knot, spread out beneath him. “I don’t know if we should, though.”

“We shouldn’t,” he says, firm. He drags a hand over my body, between my breasts, down my belly. “No one else is here, and I don’t want to lose my shit like Arrow did. You and I are knotted together—” He groans. “Fuck, we shouldn’t have done this. We’re alone. Why wasn’t I thinking?”

I throw an arm over my face. “Okay,” I say in a defeated, quiet voice, “I can’t live like this.”

“Like what?”

“You know like what,” I say. “Like I have to be thinking all the time that each and every one of my mates is a threat to me.”

“I will never hurt you, Lotus,” he says in that same firm voice.

“Not on purpose,” I say wryly. “Not if you’re in control of yourself. But how often are we not in control of ourselves, Striker? How often are our instincts taking over us? And how do we ever trust each other?”

“These aren’t instincts, sweet omega,” he says, gently pulling my arm away from my face. “These are unnatural tendencies put there by a mad scientist who high-jacked our instincts for her own purposes. We already fight them.”

I look into his eyes. “It’s just that it feels like I barely have time to breathe before everything gets turned on its side.

And Calix tended my bite last night until it scarred and then just left.

And I can feel him, in the bond, and it’s like, it’s waves…

now and again… I really feel him and then…

I forget we’re even bonded because it ebbs out…

” I blow out an annoyed huff of air. “Nothing is predictable. Everything’s strange and intense and new and I don’t understand any of the rules . ”

He nods. “Yeah, I see what you’re saying.” He tilts his head. “That’s interesting, about the bond, how it varies in intensity. That’s actually a good thing. I think it might drive us all crazy if we have each other chattering away in our brains all the time.”

“It’s not like I can hear his thoughts,” I say.

“No?”

“No,” I say, “but if he’s got a strongly held conviction, it comes through. Like earlier, he was insistent that some omega needed to be taken outside to calm her down, and I got that really clear. Not in words, though, just… I knew it.”

“You think he felt us?” Striker’s grinning.

I gasp, hand over my mouth. “The sex, you mean? Fuck, I didn’t even think of that.”

“That’s going to be incredibly inconvenient,” Striker says, but he looks delighted. “You think he feels it when you come?”

“Well, when we were… right after the bite,” I say, “yeah, we could feel each other.”

“Shit, that’s going to make sex pretty awesome,” he says, shaking his head.

I reach out to brush my fingers over his belly.

All of my mates are very perfectly shaped, though I imagine this has a lot to do with the way they were treated in the facility, with nothing much to do except lift weights and do strength training, but they are all muscular and I like feeling his warm firmness jump under my touch. “Maybe you should bite me, sweetheart.”

He sighs, carefully lowering himself over me.

We kiss again.

He kisses my jaw and then runs his teeth over my ear lobe and settles in a spot just beneath my ear. He licks that spot and grazes me there. “This is my spot,” he tells me in a husky voice. “I just know that.”

“You do?” I gasp.

“Yeah.” He kisses it. “But I don’t want to hurt you, baby girl. I’m in control of myself right now, and I think I might lose it if I bite you. I’d rather do it when our mates are around, or when we’re sure that Dr. Acker isn’t a worry anymore.”

Suddenly, I’m stabbed by a rush of want for his bite so intense that I’m right on the edge of begging.

And Calix is there, surging in me, smothering it, keeping the words from forming. He won’t let me beg for the bite.

Because we’re bonded, I know this isn’t out of jealousy or anything like that. No, he sensed within me what I desired and he is acting out of service to me, protecting me from myself .

In that moment, my love and gratefulness to Calix overflows, spilling out like gleaming bright golden liquid rushing out of a fountain. I gasp and sigh at the sensation of it.

I clutch Striker against me and he rocks into me, moving his knot against me, and that feels good, really good, and I whisper that I love him, Striker, but I send through the bond to Calix how much I love him, and he feels it.

Also, I feel him react to the idea I discussed with Striker, the poeticness of taking away Dr. Acker’s memories.

How did I communicate that to him? I didn’t mean to.

I’m not sure if I want my mates to know every little thought that flits across my brain. Some things I think aren’t for anyone else to hear. Some of my thoughts are just momentary worries. They don’t matter.

Calix is retreating from me, though, the sensation of him drifting out, leaving me here, with Striker, present. We are kissing again.