Chapter 19
Lucien
A thick mat of chest hair tickles my nose. There’s a shit ton of ink so close to my face that the colors swirl together. As I blink, the distorted line of a bed frame and thick, parallel timber boards lead my eye to a crumpled ball of murder mystery costumes.
Oh. Lovely.
I’m on the floor.
Technically, I’m on top of Branson, who’s on the floor.
He’s snoring softly, and I’m stretched out on top of him. My fingers are knotted in a handful of blond hair. My face pressed heavily against his skin.
I can’t help noticing that I seem to be humping his leg with some urgency.
I stop immediately.
I keep perfectly still, but it’s a lot harder than it should be. His scent has invaded my senses. That rich, burned honey smell of home has gone straight to my dick.
I’m hard and horny. Hard and horny in a different way.
Not a heated way. A normal way. Or, in an almost normal way.
I feel it predominantly in my dick, like I used to before I went into heat.
A deep, tantalizing firmness, a tingling sensation spreading up my shaft.
A slow, sultry thickening that demands attention.
I resist the urge to nudge my cock against the solid slab of his thigh and try not to make a sound. I’m not entirely successful.
“Morning, my horny little omega,” says a fond, sleepy voice.
A pair of big hands travels slowly down my back, collecting the scattered tiny pieces of me and smoothing them back into place.
I don’t move or speak.
The hands on my back slide up my spine, pausing to roll over each knob of my vertebrae, and then travel downward again. They inch over the swell of my ass, kneading gently until my eyes drop shut.
Wait.
No!
What the hell is happening? What am I doing on top of Branson, and why am I letting him grope me?
“How did I get here?” I squawk accusingly. My voice is a little better today. Still raspy and raw, but more of a consistent husk than it was yesterday.
“You climbed onto me during the night,” he says, eyes dimming with disappointment. “Don’t you remember?”
“No. Of course I don’t remember. I was obviously sleepwalking, or sleepclimbing, or whatever you’d call it.”
I extricate myself from him, taking pains to ensure I don’t so much as look anywhere near his pants. The last thing I need is a glimpse of his hard alpha dong. It’s bad enough that I can still feel the impression of it against my belly.
It’s not that I don’t trust myself. It isn’t.
It’s that I don’t trust my dick. I’m horny as hell, and not in a good way, in an I could do something stupid at any second kind of way.
Branson lies on the floor at my feet, looking up at me. His hands are under the back of his head, and now, in addition to all the hair on his head, face, and chest, I’m being subjected to a healthy dose of the hair in his armpits as well.
I’ve never realized how sexy an alpha’s armpits could be. I’m not sure how I missed it.
How in the world did I not know that having an alpha on the floor at my feet with his pits exposed might well be the hottest thing I’ve ever seen?
Because it is. It really is. It’s hot in a way that makes my knees weak. A way that makes me want to slide my pants down and squat over his face. A way that…
Okay. Okay. I see what’s happened.
I’ve taken a turn down the wrong path, and I need to calm down and think of something else.
I close my eyes and take a deep, cleansing breath.
I’m instantly transported back to the fuck on the sofa.
My arms were slung loosely around Branson’s neck, and I was arching back without a care in the world, or any concern for the limits of my spine. Branson chased my nipples with his lips and teeth, and every time he caught them, I screamed and came harder than before.
“What’s happening to us?” I babbled, not really expecting an answer.
He slowed and stopped thrusting, reaching up and running a lazy hand through my hair. His gaze was unsteady, eyes threatening to roll back, but he forced them to find mine. He looked different, like himself but not himself.
He looked exactly how I felt.
“We’ve gone wild, Lucy,” he ground out. The sound vibrated through me, coaxing another shuddering climax out of me. “We’ve forgotten our conditioning. We’ve forgotten the rules, the real world, and everything that ever tried to tame us.”
My dick throbs at the memory, and once it starts, it doesn’t stop. It throbs so hard and consistently that it’s like the fucking thing has developed a heartbeat of its own.
“Do you want me to take care of you, Lucy?” offers a deep voice drenched in sex and honey.
I know I shouldn’t reply, but I’m not at my best, so I do. “How would you take care of me, hmm? It’s not like you can fuck me. Surely, even you know there’s no way I could take that right now.”
“I could suck you,” says the big man at my feet, his expression helpful and matter-of-fact.
It’s an offer that distracts me severely. It’s not that all alphas are hole-centric and reluctant to suck dick. It’s that enough of them are that it makes Branson’s offer give me pause.
“Or I could stroke you,” he suggests seamlessly. My dick twitches hopefully.
On the floor, Branson’s head tilts to the side as if to get a better vantage of me.
His tongue peeks out between his lips. A glistening hint of pink that travels leisurely across pearly white teeth.
“I could lick you where you’re sore.” My hole decides to get in on the action, clenching repeatedly until a tiny trace of slick spills from me.
Branson’s eyelids flutter, threatening to close as he inhales, but he fights it.
“Let me help you, Lucy. My venom will help you heal.”
That snaps me out of it.
Please.
Alphas and their ridiculous determination to believe that their venom can heal bruised holes. It’s ridiculous. It’s been refuted in medical study after medical study, yet their dedication to the cause remains unshakable.
“That won’t be necessary,” I say firmly. Unfortunately, my voice chooses this moment to fade to nothing on won’t and squeak loudly on necessary.
The heartbeat in my dick doubles its pace.
My thumb finds its way to my waistband, hooks itself into it, and starts pushing down.
Branson’s lips curl in satisfaction, and a distinct I told you so air laps at my balls.
I can’t have that.
No. I’ll do many things, but I won’t stoop to letting an alpha think he knows me better than I know myself. Instead, I hurl myself into the bathroom, lock the door, and lean against it heavily as every ounce of my blood rushes to my dick.
What the fuck is happening to me?
Why am I so horny?
My heat is over. I know I didn’t pay as much attention in sex ed as I should have, but I really don’t think this is normal. I should be feeling better now, not crazed.
I stuff a hurried hand into my pants and loosen my drawstring with the other. I start stroking before I’ve managed to free my dick properly.
I groan in relief.
On the other side of the door, an alpha groans so loudly the shower door rattles.
I ignore it and focus on the matter at hand. I stroke firmly, squeezing my root and dragging the sensation up my shaft.
God, it feels good.
And it feels good that it feels good. Man, I missed my dick so much.
I love this. Love how it feels. Love the tight squeeze.
Love the decadent sensation sinking into my bones.
The gentle flutter of my hole. The hot ring of pleasure throbbing between my legs.
The empty ache of a fuck tunnel begging for more.
Wait.
What?
What the fuck is going on with my ass? And more to the point, why am I not coming from jerking my dick?
I keep tugging and tugging until my right hand cramps up and my face is drenched in sweat, and…nothing.
I’m spewing precum like a machine and my balls are rocks the size of a fist. My orgasm is right there. I can fucking feel it, but I can’t get it out. I can’t let go.
I sink to the floor, changing hands, tugging myself harder and with a lot less coordination.
It doesn’t help.
I’m on the edge. My vision is hazy, and the heartbeat in my dick has synced with the one in my chest. The mark on my neck pulses and aches. I’ve never been this close to orgasm and not come. It’s fucking horrendous.
I jerk harder and faster.
I have to come. I can’t keep it in. I’m going to go insane if I don’t.
A whiskey voice rumbles on the other side of the wall. The sound slithers under the door, under the floor tile, and enters my body through the soles of my feet. It burns a path up my legs, pooling in my balls, forcing me to bite back a pained sob.
My orgasm is everywhere. Under my skin. Close to the surface. Swollen and distended. Fighting for freedom. Desperate for freedom. Desperate for freedom. A massive, unstoppable force that my body can’t contain.
Yet, I can’t fucking come.
After God knows how long, both my hands are cramped into unwieldy claws, I’m panting like a dog, and my dick is too sensitive for me to keep touching it.
I accept defeat gracelessly and drag myself to the shower. I shampoo my hair twice, and yes, I do spend a little more time than usual washing my ass, but not for any special reason. Definitely not because of anything Branson suggested.
I’m highly committed to personal hygiene. That’s all.
I pat my ass dry as carefully as possible and go back and forth on whether it’s a good idea to sneak a peek in the mirror while I’m in here.
It’s obviously a bad idea. The aftermath of a heat-fucked hole is one of those things that’s better to imagine than it is to see for yourself. Everyone knows that.
Against my better judgment, I take a look.
It’s the wrong decision.
My asshole is bright red and puffy. A thick, swollen ring that looks like exactly what it is. A wrecked hole. A ruined orifice. A fucked-out fuck hole that’s been knotted with gay abandon.
I thought there was no way it could look worse than it feels, but I was wrong. Dead wrong. To make matters worse, when I see it, I don’t feel any horror or even a smidgeon of regret.