16. First Heat
Chapter sixteen
First Heat
I didn't feel well. The tell-tale signs that my heat was imminent showed up the morning after my date with Tiago. I wasn't ready.
"Are you okay?" Ali asked, as we all sat around the living room, watching some action flick the guys had been eager to see.
I looked up from the blanket I was rubbing between my fingers, pulled out of my thoughts. "Yeah, I'm fine. Do you need anything?"
"No. You just seem out of it today."
"Just thinking," I told him softly. The others would probably hear us talking, but they were all on the sofa and I was curled up on the armchair with Ali sitting on the floor and leaning back against my chair.
"About?"
"Nothing, just life in the center."
"Better here?" He raised a questioning eyebrow.
"Yes, Ali, it's better here. You know that." I smiled at the man who had been nothing but friendly since the first time I laid eyes on him. It made sense that I was more comfortable with a beta, but there was something special about this particular one.
"It's my turn for a date this weekend," he told me. "Is there anything in particular you'd like to do?"
My lower lip wobbled. "I don't think I'll be able to do anything this weekend."
"Why not?"
A cramp hit me, a minor one, but painful. Ali's sharp eyes caught my discomfort. "What's going on, Mel?"
The others turned to us, worried looks.
"I'm fine," I bit out. "Just . . . fuck."
"Just what?" Angel asked in his calming deep voice. "Melody, tell us what's wrong."
"My heat is about to start." A tear trickled down my cheek and I swiped at it angrily. I would not be weak, even if I felt a terror inside me that was unlike anything I'd felt before.
"We should have discussed this earlier, but I thought we had more time," Angel sighed. He turned off the TV and came to sit on the arm of my chair. "Have you thought about how you want to handle this?"
"What?" I stared up at him through damp eyes, though no more tears fell. "There's nothing I can do about it."
"You have options," he told me carefully. "You could shut yourself in your room and go through it alone. We would not touch you."
"The hell she's doing it alone!" Zeke burst out at the same time as I shouted, "No!"
"I can't do it alone. I did that once and it nearly killed me."
"Okay," Angel said, reaching out a hand and laying it on my shoulder.
I shied away, despite the heat bringing me comfort. I didn't want to need anyone.
"The other option is to pick one or two of us to get through the heat and the rest of us will stay away."
Peeking up at him and then sweeping my eyes over the other men in the room, I hunched my shoulders. "You would do that? Leave me alone if I only chose one of you?"
"As long as that one is me," Micah grinned at me. "Just kidding. I'd let you be."
The others nodded, though Zeke looked angry. "This is why we wanted an omega, isn't it? To rut? What's the point of having her here otherwise?"
Angel growled, a low, rumbling sound that was very threatening. Zeke took a step back, baring his teeth, then he spun around and left the room.
"He's right, it's not fair to anyone to leave them out," I said dejectedly. "I'll need you all."
"You don't have to take us all," Ali said. "We can wait."
"No, it's my purpose as an omega." I buried my fingers in the soft blanket on my lap. "I'd like to go to sleep now. It usually takes a lot out of me when things really start."
They let me go and I trudged up to my room, feeling irritable. The room felt all wrong when I stepped inside and I hissed, tearing everything off the bed and throwing it on the floor in a heap. I didn't have a lot, but it still pissed me off just existing.
Curling up on the empty mattress, I tossed and turned until I finally fell asleep.
It was still dark outside when I woke in pain, sweat soaking my shirt and pants that I'd fallen asleep in. I whimpered as the pain hit, hard and fast. If I were at the center still, this is when they'd be piling me into the van to go to the heat dens. Just thinking about the endless rutting there had me scrambling to the bathroom to empty my stomach.
I brushed my teeth and then took an icy cold shower, trying to bring the temperature of my body down. It helped, but only for a few minutes. I needed an alpha knot.
For the next hour, I writhed in pain as cramp after cramp hit me. The bed was too hard and I crawled off the offending mattress and into the corner where I'd thrown my bedding. Gathering it all up in my arms, I crawled into my closet, which was still mostly empty and started to arrange the bedding. It wasn't enough, but it was the first time I'd been able to nest in a year.
Halfway through building my pathetic nest, I was hit by three back to back contractions that had me screaming wordlessly.
The bedroom door slammed open and I heard footsteps. "Mel, where are you?"
Ali burst into the closet, stopping dead when he saw me curled up naked on the blankets. "May I enter your nest?"
"Yes, please, help me, Ali!" I begged. "It hurts so much."
"I know, baby." He dropped to all fours and crawled into the nest with me, staying a respectful distance away. He was too far and too clothed.
Without saying another word, I grabbed his shirt and tugged on it, letting him know I wanted it off. The beta quickly peeled his shirt over his head and gave it to me.
Putting the shirt in a corner of the nest, I scooted closer to him. "Hold me?"
"Of course." Ali wrapped his arms around me, pulling me into his lap and surrounding me with his crisp citrus scent. It calmed me a little, but the pain was still there, a tight noose around my middle.
"I need more," I whimpered unhappily.
"I can't give you a knot," he reminded me. "I'll get one of the alphas. Who do you want?"
My mind was blank at that thought. I didn't want an alpha in my space, but I knew it was the only way I'd get any relief. "Tiago."
"Okay." He eased me back onto the blankets. "I'll go tell him."
"Come back," I begged.
"I will." He left and the closet was suddenly empty and lonely.
Panic clawed at me and darkness threatened to take over my vision. What if he didn't come back? What if he and the others left me here in pain, like the Orion pack had done?
A keening sound cut through the air and it took a moment for me to realize I was making the heartbroken sound.
Footsteps pounded into the room and Tiago was there, throwing off his shirt and tugging me against his firm body. "I'm right here, you're okay. You don't have to do anything you don't want to," he assured me.
He was wrong. I didn't want any of this, but my designation and biology insisted. I burst into tears, clinging to him like he was a lifeline in a sea of crazy emotions. The heat washed over me and I buckled under the pain.
"Please," I begged. "Make it stop."
"I will," he promised, shifting me so he could tug his pajama pants off. His cock, long and stiff, sprang free, precum already gathering at the tip.
I leaned down and took him in my mouth, savoring the salty flavor on my tongue. It helped ease the pain slightly, but I knew the only thing that would really get rid of it was having a knot in me. My body craved it.
Tiago knew. He eased me off his cock and fisted it, watching me carefully. "Do you want to be on top? You can control it."
"No, I need . . . just take me," I begged. I couldn't take what my body needed, it was admitting defeat. Instead, I flipped over and presented, my ass in the air, slick dripping from my pussy. "Please, Tiago."
He ran a firm hand up my spine, making me shiver. He felt cool against my overheated skin.
His hard lenght bumped my lower lips and I whimpered, pushing back, desperate to feel him inside me.
Tiago murmured something as he eased inside me, but I didn't hear it, I was so lost to the heat.
My walls clenched around him, grateful for the invasion and for something to hold. I pushed back against him, wanting him to rut me hard and fast. He obliged, one hand gripping my hip, the other stroking my back as he started to thrust into me, hitting that perfect spot.
When I was in heat, it took very little to throw me into an orgasm, but this was different. Tiago was moving with the purpose of pleasing me and bringing me to climax. The alphas in the heat dens had merely tried to get themselves off and any pleasure my body wrung from the act was secondary.
Tiago leaned over me, reaching under me to roll a nipple in his lithe fingers until I unraveled and came, squirting more slick all over his cock and legs. It soaked the blankets under us and I heard Ali suck in a breath.
I'd known he was there, from the way his sweet citrus wafted over Tiago's hazelnut scent, but now I looked at him. He was hard, palming himself over his plaid sleep shorts, but being respectful. Lifting my hand, I beckoned him closer and he came, dropping down to lie beside me and kiss my forehead.
Tiago was moving slower now, watching the interaction. I growled my displeasure at him and he chuckled, then resumed his hard pounding until we were both gasping. Ali's golden eyes never left mine as he watched me fall apart on Tiago's cock again and again.
"I can't hold on much longer, baby," Tiago grunted, his thrusts becoming irregular. "Do you want my knot?"
"Yes!" I wailed.
He hunched, pistoning into me, as I felt his knot swell and stretch me to the limit, locking us together. He pulsed deep inside me and every gush of warmth made me shudder in pleasure and horror. I hated that I needed this, but the pain was gone as he gently eased us onto our sides, his knot keeping us joined.
Ali stretched out in front of me, his hand cupping my face, thumb caressing my cheek. "You did so well," he crooned. "You let him knot you, just like you needed, even though you were scared."
"So good," Tiago agreed, nuzzling my neck from behind. "You're so perfect."
I let my eyes drift closed for a moment, even as my skin temperature rose again and my slick eased Tiago out of my body in a rush of fluids. One knot wasn't enough.