Forty-Eight
FORTY-EIGHT
Mia
MY brAIN FROZE like a flower dipped in liquid nitrogen. It had just begun to slip into the soothing, warm molasses feeling of a really good orgasm, and apparently it was not prepared to deal with Luca’s sex-drunk request.
I’d been living so deep in denial that it was embarrassing. I hadn’t even warned Nat that I might be out of action next week if the extremely dodgy Mexican heat blocker didn’t pan out. I hadn’t talked to Zalen or Byron about it. In fact, I hadn’t thought about it at all if I could avoid it.
When the Princess debacle had popped up, I’d jumped into it with both feet. As long as I was dealing with a life-or-death emergency, I had an excuse for not making contingency plans... for not thinking through the reality of what I was facing.
And now Luca wanted me with him during his heat, which might well start as soon as tomorrow. I was expected at work tomorrow. And the next day, and the next day, and the next. I’d given no one the slightest hint that I might need to be absent. What if I took off this week to stay with him, and then the heat blocker didn’t show up on Friday like it was supposed to? Or it did , but it ended up being a fake?
I couldn’t disappear off the face of the earth for two solid weeks with only a day or two of warning. But I couldn’t abandon my friend to a heat that he obviously found traumatizing when he’d specifically asked for me to support him.
My breathing had grown fast and shallow. Why hadn’t I made better plans? Why had I ignored what was coming for so long? Fuck, fuck, fuck ... I was about to have the world’s most awkward panic attack, stuck fast to another omega by two dildos and a faux-leather harness.
What should I tell him?
Christ , what should I say?
“S-sorry,” Luca stammered, sounding mortified. He was shaking, a full-body tremor. “I shouldn’t have asked that. You’ve got the restaurant to worry about, and your pill is coming on Friday, and you and Zalen aren’t even like that with each other. Sorry, forget I—”
Unthinking, I wrapped my arms around his chest from behind and squeezed hard, cutting him off. The abrupt movement shifted the harness, sending a jolt of confusing pleasure outward from my core and driving a startled hiss from Luca.
“Not now, okay?” I asked unsteadily. “Not like this. We’ll talk afterward, I promise.”
He hesitated, then nodded—a final shudder running through his body before he went limp in my hold. And maybe this was why omegas didn’t usually get involved with each other in the absence of alphas. Without an alpha, there was no one around to short-circuit the feedback loop of omega anxiety when it reared its ugly head.
This can wait twenty minutes , I told myself firmly. I rested my forehead between Luca’s sharp shoulder blades and held onto him, even though the mood had been comprehensively ruined by this point.
Idly, I thought back to all the lurid alphomic romance novels I’d read in my teens, when I’d been trying to figure myself out as an omega born to beta parents. Back then, I’d been seriously freaked out by the cliched storyline of the omega protagonist helplessly going into heat and ending up mated, sometimes to as many as half a dozen animalistic alphas.
In this moment of mingled guilt, nervousness, and uncertainty, I began to see the appeal for the first time in my entire life.
Give up control.
Make it all someone else’s responsibility .
Luca covered one of my hands with his, threading his fingers between mine and squeezing. We waited until our bodies finally released the knotted toys. It felt like an age, time ticking by in painfully slow increments. By unspoken agreement, we cleaned up and covered ourselves, Luca offering me an oversized tee from his dresser that hit me at mid-thigh.
The nest reeked of pre-heat sex hormones, but there was nothing much to be done about that part.
I sat on a handy beanbag chair, my elbows resting on my knees as I scrubbed at my face—half-hiding my expression from Luca, who lay flopped on his back among a pile of pillows.
“Seriously, I’m sorry,” he told the ceiling. “That was heat-brain talking, but it was still a shitty thing to ask.”
I made myself sit up straight, letting my hands drop. “It wasn’t,” I said.
“It was,” he insisted. “You don’t owe me anything, Mia.”
I didn’t like the way this conversation seemed to be heading.
“I’m not sure ‘owing’ comes into it,” I told him. “Look... the truth is, I haven’t made plans like I should have done, because this whole situation is seriously freaking me out. I’ve been mostly ignoring it and hoping it would go away, to be honest.”
Now it was Luca’s turn to drag a hand over his face, stretching the porcelain skin. “I don’t think it’s going to go away. What are you going to do if the Mexican pill is no good? Have you decided?”
The trapped, panicky feeling began to rise in my throat again. “I can’t ask Zalen or Byron to help me so soon after your heat.”
“Yes, you can,” Luca said.
“They’ve got important jobs, too!” I protested. “A hell of a lot more important than mine, if we’re being honest.”
“Mia, they’re alphas .” Luca sounded tired. “Helping omegas in heat is kind of hardwired in.”
Desperation—not to make a fuss, not to be a burden—pulled the next words from me. “I thought about asking Emiel?”
Luca stilled. “Do not ask Emiel. I’m serious, Mia. Don’t.”
“Why not?” I asked, my mouth still running ahead without input from my brain. “I think he likes me all right, especially after we saved Princess... and I know he’s stand-offish, but it’s heat ! Instinct would kick in, wouldn’t it?”
I was babbling. Luca sat up, giving me the full weight of his focus. “Mia, no . Emiel doesn’t do heats. He doesn’t do talking about them. He absolutely, one-hundred percent doesn’t do having them.”
“Why not?” I demanded, not sure when my stupid thoughts had galloped away down this path. I needed to shut up. I needed to stop talking , right the fuck now.
“I don’t know,” Luca said. “And, I mean, I guess it isn’t my business, or anyone else’s, really. But trust me on this. You do not want to ask Emiel. Talk to Zalen. Or Byron, if you don’t mind dealing with non-stop innuendo. And if you’re not going to do that, then get on one of the rent-a-pack websites and lock down the dates you need. I’m guessing there’s been a spike in demand with the heat blockers getting cut off.”
I was heading back toward panic-attack territory. Forcing myself to take slow, deep breaths, I closed my eyes until the dizziness started to recede and my thundering heart slowed down a bit. Luca, bless him, didn’t push while I was trying to drag my shit together.
Finally, I was able to look at my choices with something approaching clarity. I couldn’t go back to Nat with my tail between my legs. The humiliation would be unbearable. The idea of letting rent-a-pack alphas fuck me when I was out of my mind made me feel nauseated. It sounded like even mentioning my heat situation to Emiel would be a quick way to undo the fragile rapport I’d gained with him.
“I’ll talk to Zalen,” I said hoarsely, trying to ignore the fresh wave of guilt at the idea.
Luca nodded. “Good. Now, as much as I hate to say this, both of us should probably try to get a decent night’s sleep.”
He didn’t look like there was much chance of that happening, in his case. He also didn’t ask me to stay in his nest with him, which I could understand after what had just happened. The idea of lying alone on my borrowed bed in my borrowed room felt daunting, but I’d just done a spectacular job of making this whole evening about me. I knew how exhausting that kind of thing could be when you were stressed out and on the receiving end of it.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll set an alarm and talk to Zalen first thing in the morning. Get as much sleep as you can. I’ll make French toast when you get up, if you can stomach it.”
“That sounds good,” Luca said, his facade of being all right firmly back in place.
I slunk back to my room shortly afterward, my clothing rolled in a messy bundle beneath my arm. The next few hours were spent ricocheting between helpless horniness at the prospect of being tag-teamed by Byron and Zalen, and helpless panic at the idea of having to ask, out loud, to their faces, if they’d help me.
Not for the first time in the last few weeks, I had no idea how I was going to get through another exhausting day of work in the restaurant tomorrow.