Chapter 15

Iwake up to a slow blooming awareness of being emotionally raw and physically destroyed, like I’ve gone ten rounds against a Mack truck and lost.

But as I become more awake, I determine that something is not quite right. While there’s an arm resting over me and a faint rumbly purr behind me, the weight feels wrong, as is the timbre of the purr.

The scent is a giveaway, even without the other things. My heart rate escalates as my body rises to panic in an instant.

“Woah!”

I don’t even get a chance to struggle before my wrists are pinned to the bed above me as I’m rolled onto my back, and a heavy leg is thrown over mine.

I blink. “Noah?” I croak. It’s not so much a question as an expression of confusion when I see who it is.

He smiles, and his expression has an easygoing, almost innocent, quality.

I’m naked, and he is fully dressed, and while I’m glad that he is, I also feel at a disadvantage.

I’m also thinking about all those tattoos and the piercings…

I wriggle.

He’s a lot more efficient about handling me than Seb is… or maybe Seb likes to let me wear myself out. Whatever the case, Noah has me pinned and incapacitated in an instant, his touch is surprisingly light.

My eyes shift to the open door. “Where’s Seb?”

“Missing him already?” Noah drawls, his smile widening.

If only there was a simple yes or no answer to that question. Am I missing him? I don’t know. But I’m freaked out that he’s not here, and Noah is. I can’t answer.

“He had to step out for a minute.”

“Why?”

Noah chuckles. “You always wake up with this many questions?”

“Where is he?”

“Well, Ash came back, and now the two of them are working through their difference of opinions.”

I want to roll my eyes at his ridiculousness. He means they’re fighting. Again.

Although, I can’t hear any noises, which either means one of them is unconscious or they’ve gone somewhere else to try to kill each other.

“You’re probably wondering why Ash didn’t come in last night while you two were” —his eyes lower to my naked breasts— “getting intimately acquainted.”

“I am. I thought what Ash said goes.”

I want answers, but I’m also getting a familiar flutter in my belly from how Noah looks at me, and my words are more about seeking to distract him than anything else.

His answer is a heavy sigh, and I watch as his head lowers, purposeful and slow. My belly takes a tumble as I anticipate the rush, and then it sweeps over me as he takes my nipple into his mouth and sucks.

I’m a mess of conflict. I shouldn’t want this, but it feels so good. He swirls his tongue around, and, when he lifts his head, he blows lightly. The wash of cold air makes my nipple pucker before he lowers his head once more and encloses the stiff peak in his hot wet mouth, and sucks again.

The sweet rhythmic sensation pulls a cord straight down to my clit, and the arousal that, lately, never fades flares to life.

His lips pop off, and his eyes shift to mine.

“Ash was called away not long after Seb brought you here. You’re probably wondering why I didn’t stop him: I’m at the bottom, if you haven’t figured it out. Wading in with Seb is well above my pay grade and disposition. Dragging a man off a woman when he’s in the middle of fucking her is never a great idea. Seb can fuck me up on a good day, and they’d be picking up my pieces if I’d interrupted that. If Ash wants to go at it, that’s his choice.”

The strange softening inside tells me I’m worried about what’s happening to Seb, when I really shouldn’t. If Ash had been here, he would have stopped him, and none of what followed after Seb fucked the blonde girl would have happened.

Noah must take my lack of conversation as an indication that he should continue, and his head lowers again. He sucks my nipple into his mouth. My emotions are all at sea, and it takes a few beats for my body to catch up. When it does, it’s like I’m drowning in need again. He swirls his tongue around and sucks again, his hand rising from my waist to cup my other breast, before he pinches the nipple between his fingers and thumb, rolling it roughly in time with the rhythmic pulling of his mouth.

His lips pop off, and he draws in a deep breath, continuing to torment my nipple with his fingers while watching my reaction.

I try not to squirm. But I do. My breathing gets all uneven. I’m confident he knows that I’m aroused.

“I thought you’d be more mellow after,” he says, releasing my wrists and propping his head on one fist. “But you’re definitely not. Still, if super-controlled Seb can’t keep his shit together around you, Ash and I have less than no chance. I’m amazed the two of them have left me with you this long. They must be really going at it.” His hand slides down again, coming to a stop where my skin is slightly crusty where Seb’s cum has dried. He frowns. “He has marked you. Did he come inside you?”

I shake my head, lowering my hands to a more natural position.

“No? Well, that’s interesting.”

Interesting isn’t the word that comes to mind.

“He’s marking you,” Noah elaborates. “That’s what alphas do.”

He says the word alpha like it holds significance beyond the usual understanding of the term. “Alpha?”

Noah grins. “We’re all alphas. That’s what we became after we were given the virus.”

I swallow. “That’s what was in the vial… He said… Am I going to become an alpha?”

Noah chuckles. “No. Not at all.”

“Then what am I going to become? Why did Seb inject me?” My heart rate takes a sharp hike as the panic sinks in. “Is this why you have... glands on your… on your…”

His grin turns predatory like he knows I’m not only thinking about the glands on his cock, but the studs lining the underside. Not studs, bars, I correct myself. I don’t claim to have great familiarity with cock piercings, but whatever he’s had done there is extreme. “Yes. It’s why Seb wants to come on you and not in you.” His tone has a soft, easy-on-the-ear quality to it. He doesn’t strike me as someone who ever shouts. “He will want to come in you as well. But there’s more of a significance to him marking his territory, so to speak. Warding off other alphas. Getting his scent all over you is instinctive. Except, Seb can’t mate you.”

I hear his words they don’t make much sense. He makes it all sound so animalistic. They’ve given me something. Something that changed them and will likewise change me. Only I have a terrible feeling there is so much more to this than the glands on their cocks. And how does that even work? How does a virus do something to you physically?

I suppose viruses do things physically to people all the time. Usually, they cause damage and even kill the host.

My heart rate takes off at a gallop. “Am I going to die?”

“Hey? No, definitely not.”

I calm some. “But I’m going to change.”

“Yeah, you’re going to change.”

Tears prick my eyes and leak out the sides. He brushes them away with his thumb, first one side, then the other. “We’ve all been changed or we’re going to. Everyone. In stages. There is no getting around it or denying it. No one is coming to save us. It’s too late now, even if they did. For Ash, Seb, and me, and even for you, now that you’ve been given the virus.”

“Make it stop.”

“I can’t make it stop,” he says. “You’ve already been given a dose. Sometimes it takes more than one. But in your case, I think not. Never heard of anyone getting a score that high before. 99.99%. Best I’ve ever seen is in the low nineties.”

“The black box on the shuttle?”

He nods. “That’s how we pick. They think it’s only women, but, occasionally, it’s men, too. Still, that’s far more unusual, and I’ve never met one myself. But, yeah, the machine tells us how compatible you are… I mean, most people are compatible in one way or another, but we’re looking for certain characteristics at this stage.” He smiles, and I realize that he really is deceptively pretty up close. His buzz cut actually emphasizes the classically handsome lines of his face. “I probably shouldn’t be telling you all this, but you’ll learn soon enough.”

“Noah?” I say, when his eyes lower to my breasts again. I worry he’s going to get distracted.

He lifts his head.

“What am I going to become?”

“An omega,” he says, without hesitation. “A special one. Possibly the biggest prize in the universe. And every alpha is going to want a piece...”

I’m given no chance to assimilate that when Noah stands. “Come on, it’s time to get you cleaned up. They’ve already been gone a long time, and it will only set Ash off again if he returns and finds you covered in Seb’s dried cum.” He hauls me from the comfort of the bed, directing me through the communal room and into the bathroom. “I’ll get you some clothes,” he says, then leaves me to shower.

I’m feeling numb in one way and anxious in another. But I’m glad for this brief respite from their overwhelming presence, and when I step out, a towel and clean clothes are waiting for me.

I dress efficiently, needing the armor of clothing. As I’m tightening my laces, I hear voices.

Footsteps draw near, and Ash steps into the open doorway of the bathroom.

He has a thick lip and a black eye. If Ash is the winner, I don’t want to see Seb.

We stare at one another for moments that seem to stretch out. Those dark, obsidian eyes feel like they reach into my soul, seeing far more than I’m comfortable with.

“Come on.” He gestures with his hand.

In the communal room, Seb and Noah sit at the four-seater table, which is now covered with plates loaded with breakfast food, as well as mugs and glasses of juice.

Both of them lift their heads as Ash escorts me to the table. Seb has taken a beating. His nose is puffy, and the hollows under both eyes are turning black. The knuckles on his hand wrapped around the mug are red and split.

I look away as my mind is flooded with memories of last night.

I sit down heavily into the seat, feeling my cheeks heating. I don’t care where we are or about the new rules. I don’t even care if this is part of their sick process or even if their being alphas gives them rights: I don’t deserve the way he treated me last night.

Ash pushes the nearest plate loaded with scrambled eggs and crispy-looking bacon toward me.

At least the blonde girl isn’t here. I might lose it if I see her again.

“She looks pissed at you,” Noah says cheerfully to Seb. “You must have done it wrong.”

“She didn’t come,” Seb says, shoveling a strip of bacon into his mouth and chewing determinedly.

He is just going to go there, then. That’s not even the part I’m pissed about. “I’ll never come for you,” I hiss, glaring at him now. I hope he has the mother of all headaches and Ash won’t let him have access to painkillers.

“Fine by me. Not going to knock myself out trying.”

“Wow,” Noah says, giving a low whistle, “and after you marked her. You know they expect more from?—”

“You marked her again?” Ash cuts in.

Seb had his dick inside me. I’m still struggling to work out how him coming over me could possibly be worse.

Ash’s nostrils flare like he’s thinking of launching himself over the table at Seb again, and I tense, bracing for the fallout.

Seb stabs his fork into the pile of scrambled eggs on his plate before shoving it in his mouth.

“Next thing we know, you’ll be sinking?—”

“Noah!” Ash barks, and it carries the whip of a thunderclap. There is a sharp, insistent quality to it, and it shuts Noah right up.

My breathing turns erratic, and my heart rate surges again.

“Look what you’ve done now, asshole,” Ash says. He rests his hand on the back of my neck, rubbing it soothingly. When I remain stiff and tense, he scrapes his chair back, plucks me from my seat, and drops me onto his lap.

He purrs, a deep rumbly sound that I’m now realizing is part of being an alpha, perhaps similar to the way they’ve changed their cocks. His hands are soothing as they move over me absentmindedly. “We’ve got enough shit going on without your baiting.” He drags my plate across, gets a fork full of scrambled egg, and holds it to my lips. “Open.”

I shake my head vigorously.

“I’m not going to put the fork down until you take it. I’m sure Seb has already had the conversation about the easy and the hard way of doing things. So open your mouth like a good girl.”

I open my mouth. Partly out of shock. He puts the fork in, and I close. And when he slowly draws it out, the food is still in my mouth.

I chew slowly. He leans in to kiss my lips right over my mouth while I’m eating.

“Perfect,” he murmurs. I don’t know if he’s praising my ability to eat a forkful of eggs or something else. He fills another forkful and proceeds to feed me.

I take the food because the atmosphere around the table has taken on edgy undercurrents, and I don’t want to witness another explosion.

Ash presses his nose to the curve of my neck and sniffs. “She smells good.”

“How is this going to play out?” Noah asks.

“I don’t know,” Ash says. “But there has been another breach.”

“What is a breach?” I ask before he can put the next forkful in.

“Open,” he says, with his eyes on mine. Although he says it softly, I understand it’s an order.

I open.

“What did you tell her?” His gaze shifts to Noah, and he puts the fork down on the plate.

“I said we gave her a virus,” Noah says, looking cagy now. “She asked about the knot.”

“Asshole,” Seb mutters.

Knot? Is he talking about the glands?

I swallow the eggs that now taste like ash in my mouth. “What’s going to happen to me?”

“You’re going to change,” Ash says, shooting a glare at Noah. “Physiologically and physically. I’d say it has already begun. First, it will be nerves. Pain receptors change to pleasure receptors. Not everywhere, but concentrated in certain locations. Not enough to stop your body from responding to injury as it should, but you will become more sensitive. You’ve seen our knot, the glands on our cocks, and omegas get a gland too.” He smirks. “Only one, though, and in a different location. Yours will produce slick.”

Slick. The word has a salacious feel, and I immediately think about the unnatural amount of lubrication my body seems intent upon making.

His smile grows like he can read the direction of my thoughts. “It helps. Both the entrance and where the gland presses up against the front wall of your pussy, are highly sensitive. If you get the angle right, the results are spectacular.”

I swallow. I don’t tell him it’s already happening. The look on his face says he already knows.