11. Ari

11

ARI

He was almost certainly hallucinating.

Ari tried in vain to focus on the woeful cold and flu tablet selection in front of him. He wasn’t sure why his brain decided to torture him with scent memories of Juno when he was so congested he couldn’t breathe. Orchards and sunshine, a picnic of tart and sweet flavours. Kissing bare sun-drenched shoulders before stealing a bite of dessert. A laughing flick of her hair revealed a bite mark. Heat pheromones bloomed, sweetening her scent until his mouth watered and cock stiffened.

That was different. His imagination had never conjured a bonded, close-to-heat Juno to taunt him.

His fever must be higher than he thought.

“Hi Ari.”

“Oh, bloody hell.” He recoiled, his throat croaky with illness.

“How’ve you been?”

She was a fucking vision. Kind and beautiful, with obvious sympathy radiating from her.

And here he was, an unwashed string bean.

“Teaching,” he replied lamely. Ari gestured at the shelves in front of him. “Trying to cure whatever super virus I’ve picked up.”

An adorable little wrinkle appeared between her eyes. “Wouldn’t a pharmacy be better for that than a convenience store?”

The long pause that followed was agonising. “I’ve well and truly botched that up, haven’t I?” Ari said wryly.

Juno blinked. “No, I think you’re just…not well right now,” she said slowly. “Are you done for the day?”

“Hmm? Oh yeah. Alistair told me to fuck off and rest.”

“That was nice of him. Will you be ok getting home?”

The last thing he wanted right now was to be jostled around on a twenty minute tram ride but Juno didn’t need to know that. “Psh. I’ll be fine,” he bluffed. “Just gotta go to the pharmacy and then woosh straight home.” Ari was unsure of why he decided right now was the time to start incorporating sound effects into his vernacular.

He pointed to his left. “That way?”

Juno’s mouth was set in a polite smile. She clasped his outstretched arm and directed it in the opposite direction.

“I knew that,” Ari said with a head waggle he wished he could undo. “I was just testing you.”

“Ahh, I see.”

He looked down as her hand slipped off, his body already craving her touch again. A healed bondmark on her delicate wrist commanded all his attention. Ari had already scented that she was bonded, but it was very different seeing the curved white scar tissue. It sent every alpha impulse in his hindbrain roaring, howling at him to claim her too and did he not fucking know she was his?

Not yours.Reason warred with instinct as he tried to control himself.

“Congratulations by the way,” he rasped. “Everett or Ollie?”

Juno followed the direction of his gaze and shyly covered the bondmark. “Both, actually.”

“They’re unbelievably lucky, Juno.” Ari fought to keep his voice from breaking. “I hope they know that.”

“They do,” she said, ducking her head.

Fuck, that was probably too far. The last thing he wanted was to make her uncomfortable.

“I better go,” Ari said, even though he could stay in this fluorescent-lit aisle surrounded by overpriced merchandise with her forever. He began walking away, every atom in his body screaming to turn back around.

“Ari wait.”

Juno stepped towards him hesitantly.

“Can I take you back to my place?”

Ollie hadn’t batted an eyelid when Juno said Ari would be coming home with them. Just gave him a head nod and a “Good to see you, man” before pointing in the direction his car was parked.

“He’s sick,” Juno told her pack when she arrived with him in tow.

“With what?” Isaac asked, as if the last time they had seen each other hadn’t been the equivalent of Isaac standing victoriously over Ari’s defeated corpse.

“Just a little viral bug, I think.”

He was swiftly ushered into the kitchen and the rest of the pack followed, drawn to his pathetic countenance like well-meaning flies.

“What was that remedy that Mama made us growing up?” Ollie asked Isaac, clicking his fingers. “With that little fruit — not orange, but similar—”

“Calamansi,” Isaac answered promptly. “Shame we don’t have a tree here like we did back then.”

Ollie emerged from the fridge holding a lemon. “What about this?’

Isaac gave a noncommittal shrug. “Close enough,” he said as he began pouring from the kettle that Juno had just boiled.

Everett leaned casually against the counter. “Toss a bit of whiskey in there, can’t hurt.”

“Good idea, if he’s drunk he won’t feel a thing,” Isaac said sardonically, earning him a squinty-eyed death glare.

“I’m going to Google this and you’ll be eating your words,” Everett sniffed, pulling out his phone.

Juno was making her way carefully over to the table, taking tiny steps so she wouldn’t spill the steaming bowl of hot water she was holding. There was a towel draped over her forearm and when she had placed the bowl in front of him, she pulled a tub of strong-smelling menthol ointment from her pocket.

“You have to steam your head, Ari. Put this in here and then breathe in the fumes while you’re trapped under the towel. Here, sit down and I’ll set it up,” she fussed insistently.

Everett let out a triumphant bark of laughter. “Hope you’re hungry, Isaac. Whiskey is good for a cold because it acts as a decongestant,” he crowed, shoving his phone at his prime.

Isaac snatched it and gave the screen a few agitated taps before ramming it back into Everett’s chest and knocking the wind from him. “It also says it’s ineffective because it dehydrates you. Stop cherry picking your Google searches,” he said distastefully.

Julian sidled up to Ari and Juno. “Once you’re done with steaming, you should be eating warming foods with ginger and garlic,” he suggested earnestly.

“Like hot food?” Everett asked.

“No, warming. To restore his Qi.”

“You know, like the way Ba always made us congee when we were sick,” Ollie said, squeezing honey into the concoction he and Isaac had made.

“I do make a mean congee,” Everett mused, massaging his chin. “It was pretty much the only thing Juno would eat when she was in—” He did a double take at Ari and then promptly shut his mouth.

Juno was draping the towel over Ari’s head. He wondered when he was going to wake up with the weirdest lingering memory of this fever dream he was in. Miles appeared and a sleeve of cold and flu tablets was discreetly tucked into his palm.

“Thank me later when the others are done with…whatever this is.” Miles waved a hand at the assortment of cures being shoved at him and Juno told him to go away.

Under the towel, Ari shut his eyes so the strong fumes wouldn’t make his eyes sting. He breathed in the stringent menthol smell and was surprised to feel its effects on his sinuses immediately. His relief turned to gratitude. His gratitude transformed into hurt. Because seeing this pack be a family hurt. For them to show him an iota of the care that they probably showed each other on a daily basis, hurt.

His craving for human connection had been denied to the point of starvation and now he was about to lose it over some home flu remedies.

The towel was pulled off and Ari blinked at the sudden influx of light. That was certainly why his eyes were stinging — definitely not for another, way more emotional reason.

It was just Juno in front of him, the previously chaotic room now empty.

“It’s not a trick,” she whispered directly into his bared soul. “We just want to take care of you.”

She hugged him with her whole body — arms squeezed around his shoulders, nose tucked into his neck and god help him, breasts pressed against his chest. Uncaring of catching whatever he had. Then she was gone, but he would always remember how that felt.

“Now put your head back under there,” she ordered with a smile.

Your omega needs you.

Ari opened his eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling. His fingers scrambled to find his phone and he squinted at the illuminated screen. A quick calculation from what he last remembered — watching a movie with Juno on the couch — and he deduced he’d been asleep for a couple of hours.

“I just don’t get why he’s doing this.”

His hackles rose at Juno’s forlorn sniffle. Ari rose and Juno caught his movement out of the corner of her eye.

“Ben, I have to go,” she said into the phone, looking aggravated. “Yes now. I’ll call you tomorrow. I will. Go away, smelly. No you are! Ok bye.”

While she was distracted, Ari managed to blow his nose discreetly and stuff the tissues in his pocket. His head felt clearer but he probably needed one good knock-out sleep to be out of the woods.

“Sorry, that was my brother,” Juno said, her smile not reaching her eyes. That wasn’t ok. Ari needed her happy and shining all the time, reality and life be damned.

“What’s got you so upset, Juno?” he asked, voice gravelly with sleep.

She slumped back onto the couch and played with the strings on her sweatpants. “I’m just dealing with some stuff from my old pack.”

“The ones that bonded you against your will?” Ari strove to keep his voice calm but couldn’t completely temper the rough edge to it.

Her nod was so small and timid it sent his protective instincts haywire. “Tell me,” he urged. “Please. Please, Juno.”

It wasn’t his place or his right to ask but he had to. He had to know.

“They know I’m with this pack now,” she said quietly. “My previous prime has been working with Alpha Brotherhood. They…uploaded a LoopTok video together. Like why? What are they trying to do?” Her knuckles whitened and she let out a shaky exhale. “Hate this feeling of being on edge waiting for what he’ll do next.”

Ari’s brows knitted together. “Can I see?”

Juno handed her phone over, averting her head when the video started playing, clearly affected. Ari made sure to turn the volume down as low as possible, and wished he could provide her with even a small measure of consolation by taking her hand.

He watched it several times. Once the red fog over seeing Juno’s abuser cleared, he began to process it more dispassionately. The engagement on it was frustratingly high. Lots of shares. He scrolled through the extensive comment section and quickly concluded it was a dumpster fire.

Can’t believe my tax dollars are funding this bullshit.

Alpha supremacy rise up!! Don’t let the omega agenda win, brother!

i’ve been training to take a knot alpha ;) forget your omega and let me show you how a beta f–

Ari cursed and shut the app. He had another thought and checked the official social accounts of NOC. Standard, rote government bullshit. Fuck.

Juno was watching him curiously. He handed her phone back to her with a renewed purpose.

“I need to talk to Isaac.”