Cracking Ice 7

by N. J. Lysk

  “Because I thought they would be sympathetic,” he clarified, a little edge to his voice. “I talked to her before coming in and asked her to be discreet about us.”

  “Did you... Did you pay her?”

  “No,” Keenan said simply. “But I will give her one hell of a tip.”

  At that, Carry couldn’t keep from snorting. “Okay, I was going to anyway.”

  “Glad that’s sorted,” Keenan told him, smirking a little.

  Carry rolled his eyes at him, but he didn’t mind letting Keenan take care of things for once. Take care of him.

  It was an odd feeling, the trust and the ability to relax that it implied, but for all that it was new, Carry didn’t feel any of the usual hesitation. He could rely on Keenan, that much he had no doubts about.

  HE’D WANTED TO KNOW for a while, and maybe he could blame his sudden outburst of bravery on Carry’s own encouragement. He was certainly scared enough to need any support he could get.

  “You don’t have to tell me, but...” he started, then paused long enough for Carry to feel the need to poke him on the side.

  He caught the offending hand and pressed it against the small portion of bedding left between their torsos. Carry allowed it and Keenan continued, “How was the first time? Your... your first heat.”

  Carry’s scent faded a little, which was to be expected with such a sensitive topic, but it was the acidity that really worried him. And even so, he was still pressed close, face resting on his own bent hand instead of against Keenan’s very willing shoulder but close enough his breathing was stirring Keenan’s hair.

  He didn’t speak at once, but stayed close enough to hide his face, which was how Keenan knew he was thinking of closing up further.

  He didn’t, he swallowed and rubbed at Keenan’s thumbs between his own fingers, almost a nervous gesture—as if Keenan’s body had become something he could fiddle with. “I was too young and I— Well, I only cared about hockey, really, so it wasn’t like I paid that much attention in health classes.”

  Keenan could sympathize with that much, at least—although he suspected Carry had done much better in school while obsessed with hockey than Keenan had managed by virtue of being told he would be forbidden to play if he didn’t get passing grades.

  “Your parents...?” he suggested, worried he might give offence. After all, Carry didn’t want to tell his parents about them. He hadn’t said anything about them beyond that and all Keenan knew was that they had money and threw too many parties for Carry’s taste—which, in truth, was probably the definition of anyone who threw parties at all that were not to celebrate a victory on the ice.

  “Sandra,” Carry said, like it should have been obvious. “She... she noticed I was burning up. My parents thought it was a fever, some flu or whatever. And so did the doctors, but Sandra insisted on coming in with me and told them about...” The hand that had been playing Keenan’s flew into the air to supply the words its owner lacked or didn’t want to say.

  “Dizzy spells.” He remembered the symptoms preceding the body’s maturation to the point where conception was possible. In that, at least, alphas and omegas were the same. Everyone’s cells needed a lot of energy to enact fundamental changes to themselves. The changes could start as early as eleven, but it wasn’t until an omega neared their first heat cycle that they became noticeable. “Hunger?”

  Carry nodded and Keenan’s hand clenched on the empty bed where it’d been abandoned. Carry was upset, but if he’d wanted to be closer, he’d have moved. “And then...?

  “Then they ran a blood test, just to shut her up.”

  “Oh.”

  “They wouldn’t tell us what it said, just insisted at least one of my parents had to be present for me to get the results.”

  “Your mum came?” Keenan guessed, since he knew Joshua Johnson was the kind of CEO who often missed family holidays.

  “They both did, for once,” Carry said, sounding more curious than resentful. “I don’t know what Sandra told them, but they were worried when they arrived.” He stopped there, then gulped audibly and tried to roll over into the space between them so his back was to Keenan’s front. Except he was small for a hockey player, but not for human standards and there simply wasn’t enough room. Keenan moved backwards to avoid an elbow to the face, then pressed close with a sigh. “Warn a guy,” he whispered into Carry’s ear.

  Carry shrugged against him, tugging on his arm in a way Keenan had learned meant he should hold him tighter. Carry relaxed against him, turning his face to press it against Keenan’s bicep for a moment before he curled up further, stretching his neck until his cheek was against Keenan’s chest. “Then they told us, that I was... that I was an omega. Claimed they had done the test because they suspected it, even though they only did it because Sandra insisted and the client is always right... And then they gave me suppressants, right there, and they gave my mother a prescription to get me more. It was the only thing they could do, legally, because I was under the age of consent.”

  “It— Did you want them to do something else?” Keenan asked him with some difficulty.

  “No, of course not!” Carry tensed up, but the offence apparently wasn’t enough for him to stop cuddling close. He exhaled, stirring the hair on Keenan’s arm over him. “Just... it was like suddenly they could decide for me. It was like... I know it’s stupid but right then it felt like they had decided I was an omega. Like... like they were just saying it.”

  “Oh.” He tried to imagine it; presenting not as a change in yourself you slowly became aware of but as a diagnosis you got from a doctor. “I’m sorry it happened like that.”

  Carry made a noncommittal noise. “How was it for you?”

  Once again he could not help but be aware of his good fortune... Or was it privilege? But it was truly random chance that made people present at all; a combination of events no human controlled—at least not outside bad science fiction films—led to a gene being inherited that meant presentation was possible, and then another series of equally random events in their lives meant it either was activated or not. Whether they presented alpha or omega seemed equally random.

  “Oh, I... I got the symptoms, especially the hunger,” he added, wishing to give detail if he could offer nothing else. “And my parents asked me if I knew it could be that I was about to present. I said I knew and they said it was better if I tried to come home early from training for a few days.”

  “And?”

  “And I did,” he said simply. “They knew what they were talking about and I really hadn’t paid attention in school because I’d figured it wasn’t my problem.”

  “You thought you’d be a beta?” Carry sounded surprised, although since most people were betas, it would have been a very reasonable expectation.

  “No, I didn’t think about it,” Keenan tried to explain. “I was a beta then and I was worried about my grades because I had to keep them up if I wanted my parents to let me play.”

  Being an alpha hadn’t changed his life that much, other than making him even hornier than teenage hormones had. He’d been seventeen and taking his basic exams for the second time, there had been no other student at school who’d presented, so that at least had saved him from getting teased. That and the muscles his relentless training had afforded him.

  Carry tensed at that. “That’s pretty... strict of them.”

  Keenan sighed, cuddling close. “They were right, needed to get my GCSEs, at least. But it wasn’t my thing and I didn’t see the point.”

  “Pretty sure you were right,” Carry said.

  “What?” Keenan asked, shocked.

  “You’re here now, playing as a pro and not using anything they taught you in school, right?” he asked, and he meant it too, he was open enough it was undeniable.

  “Well, I had PE classes...” Keenan offered weakly.

  Carry laughed, his joy vibrating into Keenan’s own bones. “And you had lunch, too? Needed that to know how to eat?”
r />   He seemed so sure of himself, as usual. So sure of Keenan too, like... Like his athletic abilities were not simply obvious but... Valuable.

  Keenan earned about as much as a surgeon thanks to those abilities; he shouldn't have needed anyone to tell him.

  But it was still hard to accept from Carry, whose intelligence was so obvious both on and off the ice. Carry’s scent was vanilla and cream, softly amused and happy, so he couldn’t be teasing. And yet... “I don’t get it; you got your A Levels, didn’t you?”

  At this, Carry tugged until he could turn around to face him again. Keenan allowed it, of course, relishing the intimacy of Carry looking him in the face, even if it was only to shoot him a disbelieving look. “I took A Levels because they wouldn’t let me play for real until I was 18 anyway. And I was in Venice and my teammates hated me because they knew I was better than them, so... I didn’t have much to do other than train. And I like languages,” he added, blue eyes skittering away like he was embarrassed.

  “You’re good with your tongue,” Keenan told him, earning himself a laugh and a groan.

  He didn’t realise he’d been trying to distract him until Carry failed to fall for it. “Did you want to stay in school?”

  “Ugh, no,” Keenan said with completely honesty. “I couldn’t wait to get out of school.”

  “But your parents insisted?” Carry asked with what Keenan could now tell wasn’t coldness but interest. Carry knew he wasn’t good with people, so when he spoke to you, he wanted to make sure he understood before offering any judgement or advice.

  It made Keenan’s chest tight to think of being worth the effort. Carry didn’t complain when he tugged him a little closer, needing... Needing to know Carry was there. That was all, really.

  “Yeah, my parents... Well, my dad’s a lawyer. Solicitor,” he clarified because maybe it’d mean something to Carry. “And my mum’s a scientist—something about bacteria and genetic therapy, last I heard.”

  He glanced up and found Carry nodding, gaze lost in the distance. “So they wanted you to do well in school because they did.”

  “Well, yes, pretty much. They didn’t... They always said that I could do well, when I wanted to. And it’s true, if I sit down and study, I can get it, but I hate it and I forget it right away after the exam, so what’s the point?”

  “Indeed,” Carry said solemnly, his scent cold like he was concentrating.

  Keenan’s breath caught. Back when he’d been in school other kids had agreed with him about the pointlessness of school, of course, but those kids hadn’t had a plan for their own lives, they just hadn’t liked school. It’d never really felt like they were coming from the same place. Like validation. He certainly didn’t approve of lazing off and wasting one’s time gossiping and partying.

  No one who had their shit together had ever approved of his own plan to play professionally. And yet here was Carry, a full five years younger than him and as sure of it as his parents and teachers had been that Keenan needed to apply himself and prepare for the real world.

  “Do you... do you really think so?”

  That got Carry’s blue eyes to meet his, scent turning lemony in surprise. “Yes,” he said simply, like he could not even conceive Keenan’s doubts.

  “But, like, when...” He tried to think of the reasons he’d been given so many times—by his parents, who had always insisted his passion for hockey had to be balanced with a life outside the ice. With a future off it. “If I get injured or when I get older and I can’t play... I mean, I have to do something then, don’t I? So...”

  “You’ll coach,” Carry said easily, fingers caressing Keenan’s knuckles—half affection, half tease. “Like you’re doing with those kids?”

  Keenan paused, brain scrambling for a flaw. “I guess... I never...”

  “What did you think you would do?” Carry sounded and smelled genuinely puzzled, like for him Keenan’s path was simply that obvious.

  “Um, go back to school? Get some qualification?”

  “Oh, I... I didn’t mean to tell you what to do,” Carry said hesitantly.

  “No!” Keenan said at once. “You’re not, you’re right; I would like to coach, if they’d hire me.”

  That got him another sceptical look. “Like they’re going to say no to you once you make captain and get a few Cups under your belt!”

  “A few Cups, really?” Keenan asked him, smiling. He couldn’t help it. He’d never give Carry a collar, perhaps not even a ring, but he could see this: that they’d hold up a cup together.

  “If you think we can’t, you’d better be changing your mind fast,” his lover warned him, the scent around him like pressing your face to the ice. And yet, he was smiling, eyes bright and firmly on Keenan’s. This, it seemed, was something he felt no need to hide.

  “If you say we will,” Keenan told him softly, daring to reach out to trace his chin with his fingertips. “I know we will.”

  Carry kissed him first, catching his wrist and tugging to bring him forward until he could lick at Keenan’s lips to be allowed in. Keenan conceded, sucking on his tongue and rolling onto his back, hand already around Carry’s waist to bring him along. Carry rubbed his knee between Keenan’s legs, his own hand holding onto Keenan’s hair to keep him in place for Carry to devour his mouth.

  There was nowhere else for him to go, but it still felt... good to know. Like Carry was finally admitting he felt it too, the fire burning between them, unquenchable no matter how many times they did this, so intense that a part of Keenan was afraid of bonding for its own sake. There could be nothing more than this, not without burning him from the inside out.

  Their hips found a rhythm, familiar by now. Carry was on top, heavy with muscle and a little rough like he was still desperate for it... He shoved Keenan’s left wrist onto the bed besides his head and Keenan trembled all over, confused and too hot and...

  “Keenan?” Carry had stopped. His blue eyes were dark, all pupil, but still so... The bond between them was wide open, but that didn’t help him put into words the mix of nerves, tenderness and arousal that Carry emanated. His scent was sweet and enticing, except... “Are you okay?”

  Dangerous. Almost too much. Keenan forced himself to wait out the dizzying wave of arousal—Carry’s as well as his own—before he spoke, “Yes.”

  It was true, inasmuch as it could be when he couldn’t seem to stop shivering. He wasn’t cold, it was not...

  Carry, in contrast, was still as a statue on top of him and suddenly Keenan remembered what Carry had asked when... His lover’s eyes were lowered and slowly Keenan became aware there was something in his scent that didn’t match. “Carry? What’s wrong?”

  “I...” Carry’s eyes were closed, his hand still clutching at Keenan’s wrist, his body bent over his own. “You just...” Keenan waited for him, the bond was still sweet, but with a hint of spice that he associated with arousal but couldn’t process right now. They’d stopped, so why...? “You just showed me your neck.”

  He tensed a little, suddenly becoming conscious of his position again. Not just the fact that Carry was on top of him—with a hold strong enough it’d have been some struggle to get him off—but of the way he was stretched out under Carry, like... Like he wanted to be, for Hades’s sake. The tension running through Carry’s body wasn’t fear or discomfort... He was turned on. By Keenan showing him his neck, of all things. Keenan’s own cock throbbed under his lover’s weight.

  “I can show you again,” Keenan told him in a whisper. He’d have liked to touch him as well, but he wanted... he wanted to give him this. He’d known Carry was special, but he’d never seemed that untraditional in bed, for all his rebelliousness everywhere else.

  At the offer, his whole body clenched, a shudder running through him like electricity and a whimper leaving his lips like Keenan had hurt him.

  But the caramel and baked apples of his scent was nothing like pain, or maybe, it was close enough to the edge as to be indistinguishable from pleas
ure.

  “Carry,” he said, the answer simply coming to him, a revelation from the gods or logic itself. But the truth, either way. “You can bite me.”

  Carry choked on air and Keenan’s hips twisted up onto him, his cock so unbearably untouched he just couldn’t— But Carry was already bending forward, kissing him hard, his left hand holding him by the throat even as the right kept Keenan’s dominant hand on the bedding, his knees pressing against the sides of Keenan’s thighs like he meant to pin him in place.

  Keenan opened up to the kiss, just like he always would for Carry, and the avalanche of the bond opening between them drowned any possible thought, leaving only sensation; the soft skin of Carry’s balls brushing his thighs, Carry’s arse grinding down on his cock, Carry’s mouth kissing him like that was its own sort of mark.

  Then Carry took his mouth away and Keenan gasped for the air he’d refused in favour of his lover’s lips, opening his eyes to seek a reason for the interruption. He wanted... Carry was watching him, lips pressed together, eyes stuck on... to Keenan’s throat.

  Keenan thought about asking again. Offering, really, but... It wouldn’t have been right. It wasn’t just a bite that the omega wanted from him. Finally, when Keenan really was about to beg to be touched in any way at all, Carry exhaled and leaned in.

  Keenan closed his eyes, holding his breath and feeling Carry’s own warm exhalation over his face, his chest... his throat, pulsating under Carry’s fingers—just tight enough to feel.

  The touch was soft, deliberate. A kiss, then another, and Keenan felt the high sound leaving his throat as it pushed against Carry’s palm—nowhere near making it hard to breathe but there, undeniable and unforgettable. It was like the touch rippled through his body, an expanding emotion that filled him up and then spilled all over the space between them, in their minds and in their bodies—a shudder that could have started in Carry’s bones or his own. Carry’s next kiss had a hint of tongue that had Keenan throwing his head back to ask for more, and he was given more: teeth scrapping against his stubble, Carry’s legs pressing harder against his sides, Carry grinding back onto his dick—just once, enough to tease but no more.