48. LOREN
Chapter forty-eight
LOREN
K atie fidgets next to me, her legs crossing and uncrossing in the tight space of the car. I grip the gear shift and force my gaze to stay on the road. Angus lives outside of the city, out in one of the small villages that dot the landscape. He is one of the few Travelers willing to say much about his experience. After the very public executions of two Travelers in the Northern Territory fifty years ago, most Travelers kept their heads down. I can’t blame them; I want Katie to keep her status as a Traveler low-profile too.
Katie’s perfume fills the car, seeping into the upholstery and filling my lungs. Her syrupy cinnamon scent makes me salivate. She watches the scenery as we drive, unconscious of how obvious her arousal is.
There's the faintest hint of Max’s spicy scent that lingers, even though I know she’s showered. I’d heard her last night. The wall between Callum’s room and Max’s wasn't thick enough to muffle Katie’s rapturous cries. Max had satisfied her at least three times by my count– once in the tub which had nearly driven Callum into a frenzy.
Even my ice cold Alpha has a breaking point. I dragged him downstairs to my bedroom to give him space, but he’d needed to fuck me to the edge of oblivion anyway. Not that I’m complaining. It felt good for him to rut into me, to lose all of his carefully cultivated control with me.
Can she smell him on me? Has she learned how to pick up the way that scents intertwine?
Her perfume deepens, and she tucks her long legs toward the seat as she keeps her attention on the window.
I flex my fingers, trying to relax.
“Why is it that sometimes I can smell you like a shot of cologne in my face, but other times you’re barely noticeable?” She finally glances at me, before looking back out the window.
“Ah, we scent when we’re feeling heightened emotions. Like fear, anger, or lust. But only Omegas truly perfume.”
“So are you scared, angry, or horny?”
“What?” I glance over at her, and she’s studying me intently.
“You’re nearly drowning me in your scent. Clean laundry and old books.” She closes her eyes and licks her lips as though licking my taste from the air.
“Me? You’re flooding the car with cinnamon and maple. Are you scared, angry, or horny?” I tease.
She shakes her head. “I only smell you.”
“Of course –because I’m responding to you. I’m an Alpha, you're my Omega. Everything in me is biologically designed to respond to you.”
“It shouldn’t be possible,” she says, uncrossing, then crossing her legs again. “I was born a world away. How can I possibly be an Omega? We don’t perfume, most people just smell like sweat and B.O. None of it makes sense.” She runs her hands through her hair.
“You know biology isn’t my specialty, but my guess is that you were always an Omega with the capability of perfuming. But your genes didn’t trigger the right hormone cycle until you traveled here.”
But why Katie and her sisters when no other Travelers in recorded history have been Omegas? I can’t even begin to speculate. It shouldn’t be possible. And yet, here she is, the Impossible Omega. Everything about Katie is impossible – that she stands up to Callum, she plays easily with Max, she sees me as a man and not just as a Bellrose. Even her massive lack of knowledge about our world and society feels like an impossible gift – a gift to start over and create our own rules with her.
I pull off the main drive to a secluded stretch of forest that gives way to a sprawling field.
“We’re early, so I thought maybe we could stop and stretch our legs,” I say as I park. She’s perfuming so strongly that it’s making it hard for me to focus. Even a Beta will pick up on these pheromones. Angus is older, but I don’t want to risk him being riled up by Katie’s unsatisfied perfume.
Katie only nods, worrying her lower lip between her teeth. She has no idea the effect she has on me.
It’s lovely.
And makes me want to toss her to the ground and bury my face in her wet cunt.
Get it together Bellrose! My cock is already hard. But I must be patient. We’ve only just begun to explore one another’s bodies. She might be sore from Max’s attention last night.
“I, ah, packed a bit of lunch too.” I lean into the backseat and draw out a hamper I packed while Katie was getting ready. Another benefit to driving myself instead of taking one of the privately driven cars we have on retainer is that we can take all the stops we want. I hold up a large quilt, and Katie hops onto the balls of her feet.
“A picnic?” She looks genuinely surprised, and squeezes me in a brief embrace. “Oh Loren, I know you don’t know this, but I love picnics! My mom would take all us girls for special tea party picnics when we were little. This is one of the few truly happy memories I have of all of us together before our parents got sick.”
She glows, happiness lighting her up like a lamp. It’s a pure light, not artifice but true enjoyment. I want to kneel before her and soak up the glow. After growing up with so many people who simpered and preened for Pack Bellrose’s attention, to find an Omega who isn’t hunting my money or my connections is a freedom I never knew I was missing.
It's like I can take a full breath around her, when I’ve been breathing shallowly my whole life.
“What about here?” She points to a clearing away from the road, half shaded by a reaching finger of forest. Our own private meadow with a scattering of bright pink and white wildflowers.
“Most excellent,” I say, and follow her toward the spot. She shakes out the quilt, letting it settle into an island of fabric amid the grassy sea.
“This is like a dream,” she says. “A good one.”
“What kinds of dreams did you have before you came here?” I ask. She stiffens for a moment, then relaxes. No walls erected. Good.
“Not a lot; I wanted to retire with full benefits from the Army, and to eventually travel for fun.” She shrugs. “There wasn’t a lot of time for dreaming. If I wasn't working, I was managing mom’s finances and my sisters. My dream was for them to be independent and happy.”
“Sounds like you had to be the responsible one early on,” I say, and pull out little boxes of food and plates.
“Yeah; but it wasn’t like my parents did it on purpose. I know mom really tried to ensure that Layla and I didn’t end up babysitting the littles all the time. But when dad got sick it just couldn’t be helped. She couldn’t take care of him and all of us at the same time.”
I hear the hint of pain and perhaps even resentment in her voice. Gods, I want to kiss it all away until it’s just a distant memory. I want to reassure her that she’ll never have to bear that kind of load alone. But I know that’s not what she’s ready to hear.
“I know that feeling; as the oldest son and first born Alpha, there were expectations for me to start my own pack, to find an Omega and maybe a couple of Betas and settle down and produce more heirs. To hope that one of them had strong enough genes to shift into their wolf like my father can.”
“Your father can shift into a wolf? Like actually transform?” She gapes at me. I busy myself with filling her a plate while I take my time answering her.
“Yes; I thought I told you before. He’s one of only a handful of Alphas strong enough to shift. We’ve lost the old magic. There are hundreds of stories about ancient Alphas being able to shift into wolves to defend their packs. Actually, the stories say everyone could shift, just Alphas were the strongest.” I hand her a plate of fluffy scones with spoonfuls of cream and jam.
Katie shakes her head, her hair swirling like a cloud around her chin. “You know that sounds bonkers, right? That is the stuff of fairy tales and fever dreams back home. It’s not biologically possible to reconfigure all your bones and blood vessels and internal organs. It can’t happen; it defies the laws of physics.”
She takes a bite of a jam and cream scone to emphasize her point.
“Perhaps it seems impossible because you've never seen it done. But, trust me, my father shifts every year at the Solstices.” I watch her chew, fixated on the way she licks the cream from her lips, and how her eyes close in pleasure as she eats.
“It hurts him; the shift can be painful. But he still does it. Maybe I’ll take you to at Winter solstice so you can watch.”
“Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it,” she says around a mouthful of food.
“You’re impossible,” I say, and lean forward to nuzzle her. I can’t help it. She reels me like a siren singing a ship to the rocks. Instead of pushing me away, she leans into my touch.
“Mmmm, you’re cute when you explain things to me. I can’t imagine why all the students in your lectures aren’t chasing you. I think Lilly would have been very happy to be your teacher’s pet.”
“Lilly?” I shrug. “No, she’s just eager to become a professor. But, I wouldn’t notice even if they were.”
It’s true; Max always seems to notice the ones who were interested in me long before I picked up on it. But I can’t imagine ever noticing another person other than Katie. She fills all my senses: her skin soft beneath my fingertips, her scent an intoxicating sweetness with just enough spice to keep it from cloying; the strength of her voice, unafraid to command an Alpha. And Gods Above, she is beautiful.
My cock aches, wanting to feel her. Wanting to stretch out her lean body and feel how tightly her cunt grips me. How wet she is for me. I can still smell her arousal. She’s sitting with her legs kicked out in front of her and they relax, parting slightly.
Oh gods forgive me. I know I need patience, and I won’t push her for more than she wants. But, I am a man undone.