by Leta Blake
He closed his eyes, concentrated hard, and wrangled his mind back from the lust-addled field it’d been romping on. Vale wasn’t here now. It was wrong to include him in this, especially when Xan was giving himself up so earnestly.
Jason had been wrong. Again.
Some alpha he was going to be.
He breathed in and out, calming himself. Beneath him, Xan shook and his body pulsed around Jason’s cock. His heartbeat thundered wildly under Jason’s palm. He cried out softly, a sour desperation slipping into his scent.
Guiding them both down to the mattress, Jason sunk in deeper as they went. “Hush,” he said soothingly. “I’ve got you.”
Xan bore down on him, taking Jason in to the root, and then he broke into soft tears, fingers clenching in the sheets. Jason nuzzled the back of his neck. “It’s okay. I’ll give you what you need. Don’t cry, Xan.”
Jason caressed Xan’s back until he loosened around him, and then, while Xan cried against he mattress, he fucked into him with long, firm strokes. He took his time, making sure to angle just right, leaving Xan shuddering, begging, and twisting in the sheets.
“Talk to me,” Xan said through his tears. “Say the things I like to hear.”
Heart aching, he whispered against Xan’s shoulder. “That’s it. Take it like a good little omega. Open up for me, slut.”
“Don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”
“I won’t. Not now.” Jason sped up his strokes. “You want me so much.”
“So much,” Xan gasped, arching his back and groaning loudly, tears still leaking down his face.
“You want me to fill you up with my baby?”
“I do. Oh, Jason, I do.” Xan shuddered hard. “I love you.”
Jason paused in his thrusting and Xan went still beneath him.
“I didn’t—” Xan started, his breath harsh and wet.
“Don’t. Shh.” Jason smoothed back Xan’s dark hair and kissed his shoulders. “Of course you love me; you’re my omega. And I’m gonna knock you up.” His own throat clogged with tears, and he pressed his face to Xan’s back.
A hard knot of resolve gripped his guts. This was the last time. It had to be. Because Xan loved him…and not as a friend. As a true lover, and that fantasy had to end. For both of them.
“Please make me come,” Xan whimpered. “Please. I wanna come. Help me. Make me.”
Jason hitched Xan’s hips into position so each thrust jammed against his prostate. Holding back his own emotions, he fucked Xan hard and fast, forcing him to take his cock to the base. Just the way Xan liked it best.
“Fuck!” Xan cried, his asshole stretched impossibly wide around Jason’s dick. “I’m gonna—!”
“Do it!” Jason urged. He wanted to flip Xan over, see his face one last time as he came. “Show me how you love my dick.”
Xan convulsed, his entire body warping with the grip of orgasm. A cry wrenched from his throat and he pulsed around Jason’s cock. Jason closed his eyes, imagined a descended womb he could punch up into, and he pumped his ecstasy into Xan for the final time.
When the trembling high wore off, he nuzzled Xan’s neck, kissed his shoulder, and pulled out slowly. Xan collapsed against the mattress, spent and still shaking. Jason’s come slipped from his gaping asshole, and Jason had a strange urge to use his fingers to shove it back inside. Instead, he grabbed a towel from his dirty clothes hamper and handed it over.
“Was it good?”
Xan nodded, his cheeks flushed from tears and his chest red with exertion. He wiped at himself and then stared at the wet stain on the bed sheet. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right. I’m the one who made you come, so I guess it’s my fault.”
Xan dressed himself shakily, and Jason did the same. Their unusual silence weighed between them. Normally, Jason would be talking again by now trying to stave off Xan’s descent into guilt, or they’d chase Xan’s darkness away by making plans for the next time.
“I need to get back to school,” Xan said quietly once he was dressed, his bow tie askew and his eyes downcast.
Words stuck in Jason’s throat. There was a lot he needed to say, but he didn’t know how to start. All that came out was, “Yeah.”
Finally, Xan glanced up to meet Jason’s gaze. “I’ll see you in class?”
“On Monday.”
At the door to Jason’s room, Xan stopped him with a hand on his chest. “I’ll see myself out.” He swallowed hard, tears welling in his eyes again. “This was the last time, wasn’t it?”
Jason nodded.
“You’re different now. He’s made you different.”
“It’s not him. It’s because…we’re Érosgápe.” He didn’t know how else to explain.
“I understand.”
But Xan didn’t sound like he understood at all. In fact, he sounded like he was going to cry some more, and guilt mixed with Jason’s own sadness.
“About what I said during…” Xan cleared his throat. “It was…”
“It was part of the game,” Jason lied for him softly.
Xan’s eyes darted to the floor. “Right.”
Jason tilted his face up, stroking his chin with his thumb. Xan’s mouth crumpled as he fought tears.
Jason tugged him into a hug. “I’m sorry. When you find your Érosgápe or find the right omega to contract with, this hurt will go away. I promise.”
Xan tugged out of his arms and cleared his throat. “Yeah. Whatever, right? We’re friends helping each other out. That’s all.”
Jason swallowed his reply.
Xan turned away. “See you in class.”
Jason watched him walk down the hall to the staircase. His heart ached and his balls thudded from their recent release. As he turned to go back into his room, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye and smelled tobacco smoke. Sitting on the steps going up to the attic, Pater stared at him meaningfully.
Jason’s skin went hot as fire. “How long have you been there?”
Pater shrugged and indicated the three boxes on the stairs beneath his perch. All labeled as Autumn Nights ornaments. “I could use some help.”
“Of course. Sure.” Jason wiped his sweaty palms on his pants and double-checked to make sure he was buttoned up. Downstairs, he heard the front door open and close.
Taking the biggest box from the attic steps, he smiled to cover his nerves. “Let’s decorate a lot this year, huh? If Vale comes over for any of the celebrations, I want him to be impressed.”
“Perhaps.” Pater stood and ran his fingers through Jason’s hair, straightening the mess. “So, that was the last time with him?”
“What?” Heat crept up his throat and suddenly he could smell it: the scent of him and Xan together wafting out of his open bedroom.
Pater sighed and lifted a smaller box of ornaments waiting on the attic stairs. “Just say it was the last time.”
“Yeah. It was.”
“Good.” Pater shifted the box to his hip and stared into Jason’s eyes. “Omegas don’t like it when their alphas fuck other people without permission.”
Jason swallowed. He’d never heard Pater be so crass. He usually spoke of making love or, if talking about something less emotional, just plain sex. “It was the last time,” Jason repeated. He couldn’t explain more or better than that. Not without giving away Xan’s secret.
“There’s a lot at stake here for you.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Jason fidgeted, but his pater didn’t seem done with him yet.
“Xan needs to be careful,” Pater said. “Boyish indulgences are fine—typical even, despite the Holy Book of Wolf—when you’re young, horny, and stuck together at Mont Nessadare. But if they aren’t renounced, they can cause real problems when you start to woo an omega.”
Jason nodded wordlessly.
Pater started down the attic stairs, and Jason followed. “If Valendo Aman hears about it, he won’t like it. Contract or not.” He shook his head. “Just keep what happened today to
yourself and make sure you don’t do it again.”
Jason sighed. “Please, Pater, don’t be disappointed in me. It was a goodbye thing. I promise. It will never happen again.”
Pater lifted a brow. “I’m glad to hear it. Now, go shower and open your windows to air that room out. It reeks of sex.”
The roots of Jason’s hair burned, and he wished the floor would open up and devour him whole.
“Then bring these boxes downstairs to the conservatory to help me sort through them.” He gave Jason a pale smile. “We’ll decide what we want to put out for the first Autumn Nights celebration this weekend.”
Jason smiled. “You’ll invite Vale to The Feast of Alpha’s Blessings?”
“I had planned on it.” Pater shifted the box in his arms. “And yes, we’ll make everything very nice. For your Vale.”
That evening, after Jason had taken his final dose of alpha quell and before he headed up to bed, his pater pulled him aside and handed him a small stack of papers with ragged edges. “These are the poems I thought appropriate for you to see right now.”
Jason took them, his head swimming. “Thank you.”
Father shuffled past them in the hall, a dark expression on his face, but Pater only rolled his eyes at him. “He’ll get over the poetry eventually. But perhaps you should take them to your room to read.”
Jason had intended to do just that. He couldn’t imagine reading Vale’s poems while his parents breathed down his neck, watching for his reactions and fretting. The words of the first poem danced on the page, and he started quickly toward the staircase before stopping and turning back to his pater anxiously.
“Yes, Jason?”
“I just wondered, before I read them, I guess I want to know—” He stroked his hair off his forehead and frowned, bracing himself. “Are they any good?”
“Oh!” Pater smiled, his hazel eyes crinkling around the edges. “I thought they were quite good. Beautiful work. He has a nice way with language and description. He’s rarely rococo. He’s honest.” Pater’s eyes went distant, obviously remembering something he’d read. “When you’re older, there are some poems of his that you really ought to see. But not now. Not at this juncture.”
“Miner!” his father’s voice called from the study. “Join me, please.”
Pater called over his shoulder. “Of course, Yule. I’m on my way.”
“Do you think new information came in? About Vale?” Jason asked, torn between following his pater to see what was going on and rushing up to his room to read what Vale had crafted.
“If it did, you can wait until morning,” Pater said. “But I think this is about the squabble he had to settle today at the shipping yard. He likes to relive his heroics for me, you know. So I can be impressed by him all over again.” His eyes gleamed, and Jason laughed. “Go on now. Up to your room. Be enthralled by your Vale’s words.”
Jason dashed up the stairs, locking his bedroom door behind him. He paced for a few seconds, trying to get the energy out of his legs. The room still smelled of Xan, despite having changed the sheets and leaving the window open.
He picked up the bookmark he’d gotten from Vale and pressed it to his nose. He could still smell Vale’s house and even the sharper note of mint from the garden, but the musk of Vale’s slick and the perfume of his skin was gone now, stamped over by the heavy scent of the sex he and Xan’d had earlier that day.
Frustrated, he tucked the bookmark into his pocket. He shouldn’t have fucked Xan. Or maybe he should have. He didn’t know. It was all so confusing. He didn’t owe Xan anything, but in that moment, buzzing with alpha expression, he hadn’t been able to tease out what he wanted from what he wanted. And Xan was so desperate, and, if he was honest, so in love. It’d been a heady mixture, and he’d given in. He couldn’t really regret it…though he did.
He sat down at his desk, but the microscope and slides were still out. He didn’t want to take the time to put them away before reading. The scent of Xan’s jizz floated by him again, and he stood up, gripping the sheaf of papers tightly. The window opposite opened onto the sloped roof below.
Jason stepped over to it, climbed out, and settled on the slates. The night breeze flowed over him, chilling his bones. His nipples ached from the cold and his nose burned, but it was better than reading Vale’s poems in a room reeking of his mistakes. Was being an adult alpha always going to be so confusing and so hard? He hoped not. What had been fun and games in the dorm now seemed like so much more with so many more potential consequences.
He hoped Xan was okay tonight. He hoped he wasn’t alone.
A layer of clouds obscured the stars, but the moon, determined as always, broke through, pale and judgmental. Jason shuddered at the scarred, all-seeing, all-knowing eye of the wolf-god.
Two alphas weren’t supposed to lie together. Not even as a favor to a best friend. Not even as alpha expression. Not unless you meant to leave the other unmanned.
To kiss and caress, to care? That wasn’t the way of wolf.
According to the Holy Book of Wolf, omegas had been created to prevent unnatural acts like that. And they’d been created for breeding, of course. To carry on the race. And because reproduction was the most sacred duty to wolf-god and to the world, spending seed in another alpha wasn’t something that could be borne by religious or secular law.
Under the cold, watchful eye of the moon, Jason wondered if he’d been grievously wrong to have thought it so silly a rule before. Now he’d hurt his best friend, broken his heart, and disappointed his pater. And if Vale found out, he’d be unhappy.
A strange swell of emotion pummeled Jason—joy and grief combined. He didn’t ever want to make Vale unhappy, it hurt him to the quick even imagining it, but the idea that he could hurt Vale? That his actions with Xan might provoke feelings in his smug, older omega, feelings that cracked his cool, mature exterior? That made him nearly giddy.
Not that he deserved strong feelings from Vale. Not after what he’d done today.
But he would deserve them one day soon! He’d be a better man, a better alpha, and he’d earn Vale’s devotion, love, and submission.
Just as soon as he was allowed to do so, as soon as they’d settled all the frustrating preliminary issues in the presence of attorneys.
Jason sighed, closed his eyes, and let go. He allowed the night breeze to carry off the events with Xan, the awkward conversation with Pater, and the jealousy and fear that Vale might be spending time with another alpha while everyone else forced Jason to follow ‘protocol’. He released the impatience burbling inside and waited for calm, drifting with the alpha quell.
When he lifted his eyes the clouds had parted and the stars shone down. He shifted his attention to the papers in his hand, the sheaf of them ruffling with each sigh of wind.
The opening lines of Vale’s first poem cut into him like glass, beautiful and shiny. He pressed a hand to his throbbing heart as he read the next line, and the next, and the next.
Every word chosen by Vale.
Every word a prism through which to know him.
Every word perfect.
Just like his omega.
He memorized them all with ease and then lay back in the darkness, staring up at the sky, pondering the meanings for hours.
CHAPTER NINE
“Do you think bringing Urho was a good idea?” Rosen whispered into Vale’s ear as they waited on the sidewalk for Yosef and Urho to climb out of the backseat of the car the Sabels had sent to collect him.
Vale glanced over at his handsome friend. Rosen wore his hair down in a long, flat wave across his shoulders, the brown turtleneck and creamed-coffee jacket fit him well, and he looked casual and relaxed in comparison to Vale’s own deep green suit and white shirt. At least Yosef was equally dressed up in a berry red suit, which alongside his white hair and trimmed beard, made him look like a lean, handsome version of the Old World’s fairytale of Santa Claus.
Vale peered up at Jason’s house—no, mansion—
wondering where on earth the old Sabel family had found such large pieces of granite for the front and just how they’d transported it all here. The house looked cold on the outside, but Jason hadn’t seemed like a cold man, nor had his pater seemed cold over the phone when issuing the invitation.
“Urho is the muscle of the group,” Vale murmured. “I doubt I’ll need to employ him, but I don’t want them thinking I’m helpless.”
“What do you think they’re going to do? Kidnap you and force you to consummate the imprint?”
Vale snorted gently.
Rosen went on, “And they’d perpetrate this crime during Autumn Nights first feast?”
“No, but I don’t want to take any chances. Besides, Urho is part of my life. Miner, Jason’s pater, said to invite my closest friends. That’s the three of you.”
“Yes, but Urho is an alpha. The alpha you’ve written poems about. The alpha who’s helped you through heat how many times now?”
Vale shrugged, hoping his unsettled stomach didn’t lead him to vomit in the bushes. “If they want to contract with me, they’ll need to accept all of you. Isn’t that what Yosef told me just a few days past?”
“You’re scared.” Rosen slung a protective arm around Vale’s shoulders. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
Vale rolled his eyes and dumped Rosen’s embrace. “Jason’s on alpha quell. Everything should be fine.”
“Even with Urho here?” Rosen asked again, clearly thinking Vale had overstepped in bringing him.
“Especially with Urho here,” the man himself said, his voice deep and comfortable by Vale’s ear. Vale turned to see him straightening his simple gray suit and black tie. “Come along now, gentlemen. Let’s not dally.”
Vale led the way up the path, Urho directly behind, and Yosef and Rosen followed at the rear with their arms linked together. Always the couple in love. If they weren’t such dedicated friends, Vale’s envy of them might turn poisonous.
The house loomed despite being only three stories high, with the top floor appearing to be an attic. It was the granite front and the wide windows staring down at them like blank eyes that gave it such an imposing air. At least the windows at the bottom were lit up with warm lights, like honey pouring out onto the well-tended lawn.
