Chapter 5
T hey were all looking at me. This was absolutely ridiculous. How was I supposed to cope with the fact that these guys were my mates and I had just been dumped by my fiancé? Now I was heading into a heat I couldn’t stop, and on contract to have sex in a room full of wealthy people with a bunch of alphas who seemed to want to back out at the last minute.
Too much.
My brain was not equipped to handle this level of fuckery.
Kai smoothed a hand down my back. “You don’t have to go out there.”
“I do if I want to get paid.”
Amir sat down hard next to Kai and me, draping himself lazily over the back of the couch. “Fine. Your choice, princess. I have no interest in showing off my mate to the world. Frankly I’m not even interested in having a mate, and while I don’t want to give up a payday, I won’t be dragging you out there if you don’t want to go.”
It wasn’t fair that Amir saying he didn’t want a mate was like a knife to the heart. I didn’t want a mate either so it made no sense that it would hurt if it was reciprocal.
I sucked in a deep breath, half-grateful their scents weren’t there to muddle things, and half-annoyed that I couldn’t drown in those fragrances. I didn’t have a choice but to go out there. The pay was so good and it was the only way I was ever going to recover from how hard Jerry had fucked me over. I had to.
“The show starts in twenty minutes,” Miles said quietly.
“I have to do it,” I told them. “I need the money and I don’t want to get anyone in trouble.”
“What do you need that much money for?” Diego asked.
I turned to him, watching his hands flex like he was trying to keep himself from reaching for me. I didn’t have the mental fortitude to tell the whole story. Maybe after the heat when I wasn’t so raw. I didn’t want them to know how badly I had fucked up trusting Jerry. I had already spilled that he had betrayed me, but they didn’t know everything.
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I’ll do it. Please don’t ruin this opportunity for me.”
Miles looked relieved, and Amir looked the opposite, quietly stewing with his brows pinched.
“If we need to get other alphas to help me?—”
“No!” they chorused.
“Okay, okay,” said Amir. “This is complete insanity, but I’d rather let them see her than let anyone else touch her.”
Diego sat down on the other side of Kai and hauled me onto his lap. My conscious mind managed a half second of protest before my body went feral and I locked every limb around him. “I’ve got you,” Diego said quietly.
“What the hell are we even supposed to do with a mate?” Amir asked. “We can’t keep doing this job if we have an omega at home.”
Diego adjusted my weight and put his hands over my ears as if I were a toddler they were afraid of cursing around. “We’ll talk about it later.”
“Let me take care of her,” said Miles. “I haven’t taken any neutralizers for my scent blockers so she’s not going to react to me the same way as you guys. I’ll watch her until it’s time to get her on stage. You can all go out there and wait.”
Not a single one of them looked like they wanted to do that, but they all complied, Diego passing me over to Miles.
When they had left the room, Miles let me take the respirator off. The air was still thick with their scents, sending goosebumps rippling over my skin, and slick pooling between my thighs, but it wasn’t as strong as if they were in front of me.
“I’m sorry,” said Miles as he did his best to tidy my makeup while I was stuck to him.
“For?” I snuggled up against his chest, needing the security of his arms.
“I never would have offered you this job if I had known you were our mate.”
I pressed my fingers to his lips to silence him. I didn’t want to think about that part right now. The encroaching heat was making it too difficult to think and I didn’t dare consider the future, or what having mates actually meant. Only the next few days mattered.
“Nest?” I mumbled. All I wanted in this second was to crawl into a mountain of blankets and drag the alphas in after me.
“I’m sorry, sweetness. There’s no nest on stage, but I promise there will be something here for you whenever you need a break. It won’t be as good as a nest you make yourself, but I’ll get something put together once the show starts.”
“You’re still sure I’m going to be good at this?”
“Absolutely.”
“You don’t mind them seeing me?”
“I look at all of this a bit differently than the others. I don’t want anyone in that audience to touch you, but I do love the idea of them squirming with jealousy and desire for someone they can never have.”
That declaration had lust curling in my belly, my brain summoning up the images of all those people salivating over me, and my body lit up at the concept.
Miles only grinned at me. “I take it the idea isn’t unsavory to you?”
“It should be,” I admitted. “I’ve never been watched or thought I would like it, and maybe it’s the heat hormones, but fuuuck me. The other people out there can’t touch me, right?”
“That will be your choice,” said Miles. “It depends on how many tips you want and whether the others are going to be willing to allow anyone to touch you.”
“I don’t know how to do this, Miles. It was already a lot before the whole mates thing.”
“The only thing you have to do is let them take care of you. They might break you a little, but I promise they’re very good putting their playmates back together.”
Desire was like a heartbeat pounding through my body and I squirmed, curling my fingers against Miles’s shirt.
“They’ll make sure you like it. We’ve never had any complaints from an omega who performed with them.”
My brain screamed, two thoughts ping-ponging around in my head. One—I despised the mention of them doing things with other omegas with a fiery fucking passion. Two—my pussy was taking on a life of its own at the thought of what they would do to me.
“I know they’re going to take extra care with you being who you are,” Miles added. “Your only job is to take everything they give you. Allow them to get you through this heat.”
“Are you always on scent blockers?”
“Usually. At least one of our pack needs to be clearheaded, so I’m not going to neutralize mine until your heat is over.”
I pouted. I really wanted to know what his scent was. I knew Miles wasn’t going to perform with me, but if I was a mate to his pack, I was probably a mate to him as well. How would I react to him? I was already embarrassed as fuck over how I’d reacted over the others. I’d always been familiar with the phrase “wanting to climb someone like a tree,” but I had never experienced it before.
“What do I do when I go out there?”
“Just walk through the door. They’ll be out there already. Go straight to Kai. There’s usually a slower work-up to the show, but honestly I have no idea if they’re going to be able to hold themselves back once they get close to you.”
I gasped at the rush of slick, my panties turning damp and heat rolling up my spine. Miles’s grip on me tensed.
“Fuck me, you smell so good, sweetheart.”
I didn’t even care that I couldn’t smell Miles right now, I wanted him to flatten me out on the couch and have his way with me. “Miles…”
“Easy does it. As much as I would love to take care of you myself, I can’t do that. I’m not on contract with you, and you can’t fully consent to anything new once the serum has been administered. Kai, Diego, and Amir are the only ones who can touch you.”
I whined. My skin was so hot and my pussy was throbbing. “Please.”
“I’m sorry. The show starts in a few minutes. Everyone is getting seated and then you can go out and you’ll forget all about me.”
I clung to coherency, but I could feel it slipping away with every moment that passed.
“You’re going to have so much fun,” Miles promised. “They are very good at what they do and you deserve nothing less than to be ruined while feeling like the most exquisite, desired omega in the world. Every single eye out there is paying a fucking fortune to be here; they’re paying to see you . So let’s give them a proper show, yes?”
Part of me wanted to tell all those people to go fuck themselves, another part wanted me to drag Miles to the floor and take what I needed, but the quieter third part very much wanted to know what the other alphas would be like.
I wasn’t an actress; I was just desperate, and in three days I could save myself from everything that had been taken from me.
I swallowed hard, glancing toward the door that would take me to the stage. Miles looped an arm around my waist and led me down the hall to the elevator that would take us directly to the theater.
Miles kept his arms around me while we waited for the countdown clock atop the doors to run out. Someone from the crew attached a mic to me.
“It won’t be on long,” Miles explained. “It helps set the tone for the start. Ready?”
“I think so.”
He nuzzled my cheek and whispered in my ear. “Have fun out there for me. I’ll be watching.”
Then he pushed me toward the door, his palms warm against my shoulder blades.
“And three, two, one…”
He nudged me through the door and out under the spotlight that swiveled to illuminate me.
Their combined scents almost took me out at the knees.
Sunbaked cedar.
Clove and nutmeg.
All wrapped up in Kai’s cinnamon.
Fucking hell. I’d be lucky if I remembered my own name during this, let alone the fact that a room full of people were already staring at me, waiting for me to get railed.
Reality fell away like grains of sand in an hourglass. All I was able to focus on was the three alphas in front of me.
Showtime.