Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
Elevator, Omega Hotel
Nervously, I smooth down the front of the violet tailored shirt, which is too large for me. I had to borrow it from Bird, however, and I love that even laundered, it smells faintly of cookies. I hike up the black trousers, which are slipping down my hips.
The letters HO that are on the shirt pocket feel like a brand.
I take deep breaths, attempting to steady myself in the tiny elevator. I huddle next to the car operating panel, as slowly the buttons light up.
One, two, three…
The elevator is a modern one that Maya insisted was fitted, tearing out the old and replacing it with the new when she moved in. But it has been mocked up to look like an Art Deco elevator with walnut veneers, etched glass, and decorative bronze ironwork around it like a birdcage.
I have always hated traveling in these claustrophobic elevators. I press my nails into my palms. My chest is tight.
I am alone with Icarus. He is leaning against the elevator wall opposite me.
He is holding his arm over his middle casually, trying to make it look like it isn’t because he’s injured.
I’m certain that Ellington broke one of his ribs.
Yet Icarus has refused to do more than pull out his pain meds from his desk (he gets headaches from working too late into evenings), and swallowing a couple.
I need to at least hold an ice pack over his ribs.
Perhaps, I can persuade him to settle me quickly with this new pack and that I can handle this alone.
Then he can go and tend to his injury.
I glance at Icarus.
Unlikely.
My Alpha is vibrating with an emotion that I can’t work out. Dominant pheromones roll off him in waves. His gaze is fixed fiercely on the panel like he can set it alight and stop the elevator from moving up toward our destination.
Room 234 is on the ninth floor.
I swallow, as rage joins my fear.
What type of pack will I find there?
What type of Alphaholes see a female omega putting on a show dressed as a sexy elf and then demand that she becomes the Christmas companion for their lonely male Omega?
I’ve been around the Hotel Omegas long enough to hear scandalous stories about Alphas who only want them to play boardgames, while having a captive audience to regale with stories of their wartime glory days, to those who need help in ruts because they’re feral and are desperate to hide this truth from their elite circles by using the hotel’s valued discretion.
I wrap my arms around my middle.
Four…five…six…
The silence is heavy between Icarus and me.
Will this mess up the heist? Zoe’s routines?
Ollie has promised to arrange with Lashonda to take over Zoe’s schedule. I trust the Sinner pack, who love my daughter as the only pack child, to care for her well.
Yet my eyes are wet with tears that I may miss spending Christmas Day with my daughter.
If I must lose creating these precious memories with my daughter, however, then I will not miss the heist that will change her entire future.
It’s December twenty-third.
I have two days left to figure out how to take control of this hotel empire, while working for this guest pack.
I clench my hands.
What type of pack has to buy the services of a strange Omega to be friends with their male Omega?
Maybe the Chief Alpha is a billionaire asshole who won’t even take a break from his business over the holidays to spend time with his pack. Clearly, he has no idea how lucky he is. None of the staff are allowed a vacation…or to bond.
Yet I know how their male Omega must feel: Logan never prioritized me over work.
My expression softens.
I won’t take out the righteous anger that is eating through me, and is making Icarus look a moment from hulking out, on a neglected Omega.
Bird made me understand that the divide between the guests and HOs is a complicated one.
He has never blamed the guests for picking him out of a catalog like he is no different to a delicious cocktail on the minibar menu.
When I once challenged him on it, when we were lying together in our dorm, he shrugged.
“The services of the HOs have been a tradition amongst certain elite packs for generations,” Bird replied.
“Most of them have been raised not to question it. They don’t see it as any different to the way that they treat any staff in a hotel, you know?
Some are cruel and entitled, some are kind and respectful, but most are simply thoughtless.
They don’t see me as an equal. So, why should they be anything but dismissive? ”
“Assholes.”
“Not everyone can care about other people like you can, sis. I think most packs are just too lost in their own worries.” He grasped my hand, stroking over the back of it.
“We know better that most that everybody has their own problems, right? I bet that the other kids at school were jealous of us. The Frost siblings from the billionaire pack. It must have looked like we had fucking everything. What a joke. So, I just hold onto the knowledge that I don’t know the nightmares that could be in the guest packs’ lives.
Then I try to make things better for them and bring them joy, while I’m with them. ”
It's no wonder that my sunny brother is so popular.
But it’s killing him.
I take a deep breath.
Seven…
Almost there.
Eight…
One more floor…
All of a sudden, Icarus lurches forward and slams his hand against the large red button: The emergency stop.
I fall to the side, as the elevator lurches to an abrupt halt.
An alarm wails out. The light cuts out.
I stare at Icarus in shock.
He leans close to me, slotting a key from his pocket into the panel and overriding the alarm.
“What are you doing?” I hiss.
Icarus’ chest is rising and falling fast. He leans his hand on the elevator wall above me. He cages me in the small space, pressing my back hard against the wall. His spicy hot apple cider and nutmeg scent flood over me.
I grip onto his tie.
I am trembling with the thrilling feeling of anticipation just before I fall — or jump — off a ledge.
I’ve always known that Icarus would catch me, even if my wings break.
Except, here is my usually controlled and sensible Icarus standing on the ledge readying to jump off with me.
Seeing him unraveling like this is electrifying.
Icarus’ eyes flutter shut, as he sinks his fingers into my hair roughly, dragging the ribbon out and allowing my hair to swing free around my cheeks.
He rests our foreheads together.
Icarus is breathing hard. “We have five minutes.”
Then he kisses me hungrily.
I whimper, as he thrusts his tongue deeper into my mouth like a claiming.
He pushes his thigh between mine, holding me in place by my hair.
I am intoxicated by his scent and his overwhelming but perfect kiss.
We have kissed in so many different ways.
But this is different.
It’s not about sex.
It’s a desperate scream, as if the Alpha is trying to imprint himself on me.
He pulls back, searching out my gaze. “I love you, Grace.”
He looks close to feral.
Yet the words hit me with a sincerity like I’ve never truly heard them before.
Except, I’ve heard them but not felt them.
I stare into Icarus’ beautiful blue eyes and suddenly, words burst from me that are suddenly so easy to say that I wish I’d voiced them years ago, “I love you, Icarus.”
Icarus’ eyes gleam with tears. “I swear that I am not going anywhere. No matter what, I will not leave you with—”
I kiss him, and he melts against me.
I clutch onto his tie, winding him even closer to me, until I can’t tell where his body stops and mine begins.
I purr, and the vibrations go through the kiss. Icarus groans, chasing after the sensation with his tongue.
“I’m your Alpha.” He kisses down my neck.
“And I’m your Omega.”
Desperately, I bang my head against the wall in pleasure, as he licks up and down my scent gland like he needs the taste of me on his tongue to get through handing me to another pack.
Then he loses his typical stiffness entirely, wildly unbuttoning my trousers. “Grace…”
I fumble at the buttons on his trousers just as desperately. I drag out his hard cock from his underwear, delighting at the forbidden thrill of doing this in the elevator.
I stroke up and down his shaft, twisting over the head, until he growls.
When my loose trousers drop to my knees, Icarus grabs me by the shoulders and pushes me against the wall. I catch myself with my hands, while he holds me in place by my hair, which sends delicious sparks through my scalp.
He suppresses a groan from the pain in his ribs.
I arch my back to make things easier for him, pushing out my ass hopefully.
In a frenzy, Icarus rips my panties. I let out a shocked breath.
I am panting.
I feel the press of Icarus’ teeth on my throat, as he holds himself back from biting and bonding me, at the same time as his cock presses at my slick coated pussy.
“I love you,” I chant; the words have now been freed from my soul, “I love you…”
Icarus pushes into me in a single, long, deep thrust.
I howl in pleasure.
He snarls, fucking me harder and faster than he ever has.
He pistons into me frantically, holding me with his hand, teeth, and cock. And I know that he is claiming me. He’s an Alpha, after all. One who is being forced to take his Omega to another pack.
I will have his scent covering me.
It’s a risk, but the pack will likely assume that since Icarus is the manager, I have simply helped him through a rut. His scent may be enough to protect me from them becoming too close to me because he has such uber dominant pheromones.
And we both need this.
Can we come, before the elevator starts to move again?
The danger makes the pleasure wind faster through me.
Icarus slips his free hand around me, finding my clit and working me ruthlessly.
And that’s enough to take me over the edge.
Ecstasy crashes over me.
Icarus hugs me to him like I am his entire world, as he comes deep inside me, just as the lights spring on and the elevator lurches upwards again, carrying us up to the ninth floor.