Page 54 of Slow Heat

Ridiculous, Pater had called this reaction in alphas. Even Father had agreed jealousy was primitive and undesirable in a modern man. And yet Jason hated the idea of Urho’s hands on Vale. Hated Urho. Hated how much he hated him.

What if Urho was there now? What if he was touching Vale, pleasuring him, while Jason sat alone and tortured in his room? They weren’t contracted. Vale might not care a whit for the protocols. He might not care at all that they wereÉrosgápe.

Jason bit back a scream. Desperate, he grabbed his wine, tossed all of it down, and shuddered as the burn battled the cool of alpha quell in his veins.

He couldn’t stand it. He wouldn’t stand it. He had to make sure.

Heart hammering, he slid the window over the roof open and put one foot out.

At the sharp knock on his door, he jumped and bumped his head against the window frame. How could his parents have possibly known what he was planning?

“Jason? There’s a phone call for you.”

Father’s voice sounded annoyingly smug to Jason’s ears. How could Father sound so calm when Jason’s insides were shredding apart?

Father went on cheerfully. “You can take it in my study.”

“I don’t want to talk to anyone.” He was sick of the calls from his school pals trying to ferret out gossip about his situation.

Father laughed. “I think you’ll want to talk to this person.”

Jason rolled his eyes, took a deep breath of the cool night air, and pulled his foot back inside. “Tell Xan I’ll return his call tomorrow.”

“It’s Vale, son,” Father said with an amused huff. “Come on down and speak with him.”

Vale.

His heart leapt and his knees went weak. “Yeah, um, hold on. Just a second.”

He paced over to the mirror by his closet and looked himself over. His pants were wrinkled, his shirt a mess, and his hair scrubbed every which way. Unacceptable. He patted desperately at his hair and tried to hold back the excitement inching up his throat.

The door opened and his father peered in at him, laughing. “It’s a phone call, son. He won’t have any idea what you look like. Calm down.”

Jason ran his hand over his hair one last time and darted past his chuckling father and down the stairs, practically running to the study. After shutting and locking the door, he collapsed into the large leather chair behind his father’s massive wooden desk, before gripping the phone receiver in one hand.

“Hello?”

Could he have sounded more breathless and wild? Probably not. He cleared his throat and prepared to try again with a more even, steady tone, when Vale spoke.

“Are you surprised to hear from me tonight, Jason?”

The buzz of his name in Vale’s mouth zipped up his spine. “A little. But I’m glad, too. I think. I mean, I don’t know why you called. Maybe I shouldn’t be glad.” He was babbling like an idiot. “I hope I should be glad?”

“I’m not calling with bad news if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Oh, good.” Jason clunked his forehead down on the desk and rolled it back and forth. Wolf-god help him, he was a failure at this. A total failure.

The wine climbed through his veins, undoing the alpha quell’s work a little more with each breath. He was too hot; he unbuttoned the top of his shirt so he could breathe better.

“We had so little privacy tonight.” Vale’s voice was delicious. Jason wanted an entire bathtub filled with it so he could luxuriate in that honey for hours. “Do you agree?”

“Yes,” Jason said, his heart lurching. “Did you want privacy with me?”

Vale laughed. “It would be imprudent to be entirely alone right now. But I did wish I’d had more of a chance to speak with you one-on-one. I don’t know that we exchanged more than pleasantries all night.”

“I wanted to talk with you, but Pater kept interfering. I think he wanted you all to himself.”

Vale hummed. “Omegas do enjoy each other’s company more often than not. There’s a certain shared experience that comes from being sent away to omega schools so young, among other things.”