Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Saint
That first heat wave should not have felt as satisfying as it did.
We were quick and kept things simple. I gave Linus what he needed from a biological standpoint only, without emotional connection or half as much care as I’d told myself I would show him as we’d headed upstairs.
He’d sucked me off and then launched straight into the omega mating pose, and rut-addled alpha as I was, I hadn’t thought of anything but grabbing his hips and sticking my cock in him like a savage.
Feeling his wet heat surround me, having the hormones from his slick leech into my body, and being surrounded by his bubblegum scent had scratched every deep itch I had.
But once we were knotted and panting and I was able to maneuver us onto the bed so we could rest, spooned and joined, guilt seeped around the edges of my pleasure.
Guilt and something else I wanted to avoid.
That mating hadn’t been controlled at all.
I’d had zero mastery of my own thoughts or emotions.
Everything had turned out great, and after a few aftershock orgasms that I caressed and stroked out of Linus just by petting him as we caught our breath, Linus fell deeply asleep.
My knot went down and I inched away from him, but I didn’t get up or do anything more than shift us so we could settle under the bedcovers.
I forced myself to breathe and focus on watching Linus.
He was the smallest, sweetest omega I’d ever been with.
He hadn’t been bothered by my scar at all.
His body was still warm and flushed, from what I could see in the unlit room, hinting that his heat had only just begun.
I wanted to cuddle him like he was a teddy bear, like I was a child who needed the comfort of his toy.
Like a child lying in a hospital bed with a broken arm and a body full of lacerations and bruises.
A child who had just been told by strangers that his parents and sister hadn’t survived, only his little brother.
A child whose life had just been smashed beyond recognition and didn’t know who or what to hold onto anymore.
I grunted like I could scare the memories away and tightened my grip around Linus.
In his sleep, Linus moaned like I’d wrapped my hand around his cock.
I felt wetness against my groin as he arched his back, pressing his ass into me.
I sucked in a breath of his sweet scent, rigid with anticipation.
It would have been fantastic if he woke up for his second heat wave.
Then I could forget about the past and assert my control again. Over him and over myself.
The moment passed and Linus drifted back into deep sleep.
I’d no doubt that he needed it. It had already been late when we’d been thrown together at the auction.
It was well past midnight now. Heat need or not, his body needed to rest so he would have the energy to make it through the ordeal his omega nature was about to put him through.
I needed to rest and build up my strength, too, but that wasn’t going to happen.
I was too close to the edge, buzzing too much as I fought to keep control of myself.
I could do it. I wasn’t the traumatized kid lashing out at everything that I’d once been.
I’d been through therapy and recovery, which had inspired me to do what I did now, and I recognized the truths of everything I felt these days.
That didn’t mean I didn’t still feel the fear, the panic, and the hopeless grief from time to time.
I concentrated on watching Linus sleep, vowing to myself that I would protect him and make sure he had the best heat of his life.
His brother had played a cruel trick on him, and we still hadn’t sorted that out.
Lucas was a whole mess of bad ideas and bad choices.
We’d walked straight into another one, and we had to deal with that one first before I could sit the brothers down and help them come to a place of understanding and, from Linus’s side, strength with their relationship.
I almost fell asleep working out a potential path of understanding for the two of them when I heard tires on the gravel drive outside. Knowing it had to be Fenn, I kissed Linus’s cheek lightly, carefully pulled away from him so he wouldn’t wake up, then climbed out of bed.
I would have loved a robe or sweatpants or something to go down and greet my brother in. As it was, the only thing I had on hand were my trousers and shirt from the suit I’d worn to the auction. Fenn would have to deal with his older brother looking and probably smelling debauched.
Bless him, but Fenn was smart enough to text me from the front porch instead of knocking on the door or worse, ringing the doorbell and waking Linus or, I assumed, Lucas up.
“Thanks for getting here so quickly,” I whispered as I let Fenn in and gestured for him to head on to the den where I’d sat with the omegas earlier.
“Whoa, this place reeks of heat,” Fenn answered me quietly, taking the two ESA kits he had slung over his shoulder off and handing one to me. “Are they okay?”
I smiled quickly, proud of my brother for being a good guy. That was why he’d been hired both as a cop and an ESA, after all.
“I can’t speak for Lucas, but Linus is sleeping after his first wave,” I said, glancing toward the stairs and practically feeling Linus somewhere above me. “It’s been a rough night for him.”
“Sounds like it’s been a rough night for both of them,” Fenn said.
I grunted. “I’m already getting the feeling that any trouble Lucas gets himself into is trouble he brought on himself and probably deserves.
” Maybe I was being too hard on him, but he’d sent Linus into a terrifying situation as a joke.
I wasn’t inclined to forgive him, no matter how my training had told me to approach all people.
“Yeah, about Lucas Cahill,” Fenn said, wincing and rubbing the back of his neck. “I called into the station to ask about him as I was getting ready to come out here.”
“And?” I asked, crossing my arms and bracing for the worst.
“The man has a rap sheet a mile long,” Fenn said what I was expecting. “Small things, really. You could even call them petty. Shoplifting, parking tickets for days, but also one count of breaking and entering, and even one count of solicitation.”
I scowled. There was no way Linus knew any of that about his brother. I guessed that the progression of crimes meant Linus was either getting bolder or more desperate.
“What about these smugglers?” I asked, shifting my weight a bit as a wave of restlessness swept through me. I felt instinctively like Linus was waking up and would need me soon.
Fenn’s expression changed to one of excitement. “Okay, here’s where things start to go off the rails,” he started. “Since you didn’t give me names or anything, I had to go off of context clues, the whole smuggling from sea and land, plus this address.”
“Did you find anything?”
“I found out a lot,” Fenn said. “Such as the Barrington Special Investigations unit has been tracking the sea-based smugglers, the Dumfries gang, for a while now. They’re a pretty big operation, but they’re clever and have managed to evade capture for years.
Also, Lucas Cahill has been a person of interest connected to them, but only for the last week. ”
“Only one week?” My heart thumped faster as the importance of what I’d stumbled into started to make sense. “He did tell us he’s done a couple other exchanges for these people.”
“He has,” Fenn confirmed. “The investigation into his involvement is still in the super early days, but he is on the BSI radar. And this is where it gets really interesting.”
I braced myself for what he was about to say, even though I could now hear faint movement from upstairs.
“As soon as I phoned in for information and once the guys at the BSI figured out what you have on your hands here, everyone jumped into motion,” Fenn said.
“How?” I asked. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that the BSI is scrambling to plan a sting operation as we speak to finally catch and arrest at least some of the players in the Dumfries gang. They’re putting together a plan to get out here as soon as they can with all the right technical units and authorizations so that they can surround whoever shows up to collect the merchandise and arrest them.
They’ll use those men to get to the heart of the gang. ”
I gaped at my brother. “I didn’t bring a nice omega like Linus out here so that he could get caught up in a police sting,” I said. “He’s just gone into heat. He’s sweet and lovely and so vulnerable.”
Fenn smirked at me. “You’re smitten,” he said.
“I just met him,” I argued.
“Yeah, but I know you,” Fenn said. “You’ve just met him and you’re smitten.”
“He’s in heat and I’m taking him through,” I insisted. “That’s all. You know omega hormones cause alphas to feel a deep sense of responsibility and attachment.”
“Yes, they do,” Fenn said. “And you like him. A lot.”
I huffed in frustration. We could stand there all night with Fenn teasing me. “Look, either way, Lucas has gone into heat, too. He has a Heat Lightning system, but he needs you.”
“And the cops need him to catch the Dumfries gang,” Fenn said.
“I don’t want Linus getting hurt in all of this. He’s already been through a trauma tonight.”
Fenn looked at me funnily, but he didn’t say anything. He knew I was kinky, but he was my little brother, and that’s where the conversation stopped.
“Okay,” he said after thinking about it for a second.
“But here’s the thing. Lucas can’t get wind that any of this is a set-up or that the police are coming.
He can’t know that I’m involved with the cops or that they’re on to him.
And he definitely cannot call the Dumfries gang to tell them not to come because they’ve been found out.
Everything has to continue the way he thinks it should. ”
“What do you want me to do?” I asked.