14. Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fourteen
Leah
T he food smells like heaven and torment. My stomach pinches so tight it’s nauseating. I can’t remember the last time I ate. The guards at the facility gave me scraps, just enough to keep me alive. My belly aches so sharply I wrap my arms around it, as if holding myself could make the pain go away.
Their spoons clink on their bowls as they eat.
It smells delicious. The warm, earthy aroma of beef and bread wraps through the air and makes my mouth water.
They trade comments. Soft, meaningless things about crumbs and kitchen supplies, about how this bread really is as good as Gabriel bragged.
It’s familiar. A wrenching comfort. I used to have these kinds of meals with my parents where we’d talk and laugh like the world couldn’t hurt us.
But there’s no way to forget who I’m with now. Not when every line of Ronan’s jaw, every ripple in Jax’s arms speaks how easy it is for them to put me in my place. The sensible thing would be to tear my eyes off them and pretend they don’t exist.
But my body doesn’t care about sensible.
My skin buzzes, nerves humming from the inside out, sliding deep down into bone.
It scares me, how much my Omega craves their scents, their voices, their presence.
Something inside me pounds, hungry and urgent, and I’m terrified of it.
I trust nothing about this part of me. Every time it rises, I want to bury it with the rest of my bad memories.
But Gods, I want to eat. I want to reach across the table, grab that hot bread, and gulp down the soup until my stomach expands so much it hurts. I grip my own wrist to keep my hand still.
They’re all on the floor with me. Ronan leans back against the opposite couch, broad hand loose around his bowl.
Gabriel chews his bread with a little smile, as if nothing on earth could catch him off-guard.
Jax sits cross-legged, massive and calm, his eyes never fully off me.
They’re terrifying, beautiful in a ruthless way.
It’s a problem, because there’s a part of me that wants to crawl closer.
But I can’t forget. My heat is making everything crackle with want and I can do nothing about.
I clench my thighs tight, glance down, check for any ache, any wrongness in my body.
I don’t hurt down there. I’m not used or stretched or raw.
They used their fingers. Their talented mouths and tongues but no one penetrated me with their cock.
They helped me, cared for me, dressed me in this robe instead of the towel.
They kept their promise.
They didn’t lie to me and take what they could when I lost my mind to the heat and that’s…confusing. They could have. I would have welcomed their cocks.
I should still be out of my mind because of my heat. At the facility I would wake up in a pool of sweat and slick, wrung out and nauseous, not remembering how or who threw me back into my cell .
I don’t remember anything once a heat hits.
Why am I now awake, aware, and present? The haze simmers in the background though, and a weird chemical taint burns off my skin.
That hasn’t been there before, but Hardwick did inject me with one last huge dose of chemicals she clearly expected me to die from.
Then again, I’ve never had a heat with my scent-matched Alphas, so who knows if how I’m reacting is normal or not. This is unchartered territory.
I’m so tired, everything in me drooping, eyelids weighted, head heavy and floating. The exhaustion isn’t just in my bones. It’s sunk into the lining of every thought, making it impossible to move off the floor. Hunger is still a sharp ache, but even that’s dulled by fatigue bearing down on me.
I know I should eat, to provide strength for what’s to come more than anything else, but that’s too much effort. Something else more urgent scratches under the surface.
Gabriel settles into the rug, legs stretched out, trying to catch my gaze. "Would you like me to run a bath for you, Leah?"
Blank confusion swims in my head. I don’t answer.
I don’t know how. Is this another trick?
Another excuse to punish me if I choose something wrong?
But he just smiles, and a dimple presses into his cheek.
"I’ll get a bath ready, if you like. Doesn’t have to be now," he adds, shrugging like it’s nothing.
Ronan stands, gathering the empty bowls. He leans in and nods at my untouched soup. "I’ll leave yours here, just in case."
As he moves the aroma of our combined scents wafts over the soup. My slick, thick and heavy with the fullness of my arousal and the deep musky notes of his cum woven through the fabric of his denim.
He’s still wearing the same jeans I slicked all over when I orgasmed in his lap, the evidence of what happened between us soaked deep into every seam. My gut knots because I’ve made a mess.
The guards at the facility ridiculed me for it even though I couldn’t control it.
I shrink inward, arms tightening around myself, but Ronan doesn’t flinch.
He doesn’t look down at himself, doesn’t break the easy calm around me.
He just carries the empty bowls away, leaving me with our scents braided through the air as the fever prickles back to life.
My nerves twist and I know blind arousal will claim me soon enough.
I press my thighs together, need humming up my spine.
I want…something. Gods, I want, but the shape of it is a blur, and confusion and fear knot everything inside into one long, tangled ache.
I can’t tell what’s hunger, what’s heat, what’s exhaustion, what’s desperation.
I’m unspooling in a place where nothing makes any kind of sense.
A couch pillow appears in my line of sight.
The emerald color snatches my attention, the satin gleaming in the soft light.
Jax holds it out, big hands bracing the fabric, his expression open, just a glimmer of mischief in his eyes.
"Is this what you’re looking for?" His smile is slow, warm, nothing but a genuine offer.
A lightning jolt of surprise shoots through me. This is exactly what I want. Something soft to hug and anchor me, as stupid as it sounds. I move before sense catches up, taking the pillow from him and then I tense, waiting for the trap. But nothing comes.
A restless craving for more softness grows, a longing to burrow into something until the world goes quiet. I want— need —anything I can pull around me. Blankets, pillows. I want them so bad it hurts . I clench my fingers so hard my nails dig into the heel of my hand.
I’ve been here so many times before, hating this compulsion for anything soft.
I was young, in Haven’s basement, when I learned that was bad.
That I couldn’t have what my instincts screamed for, but I was so cold.
Every part of me ached for warmth and softness, so I’d gathered every scrap of clothing I could find and piled it all around me, just so I could feel halfway safe.
It was dark. Nighttime. But Lars still found me. He plucked my nest away one piece at a time and let the chill creep back in. His shoes crunched on old tile. "Omegas like you don’t get nests."
I panicked and made the mistake of holding onto a frayed scarf Mom had knitted for me. "Please. Let me keep this. Just this one thing." Famous fucking last words they were.
He yanked the scarf out of my grip and slapped me so hard my ears rang. "Stupid Omega. Don’t you know that nothing is yours?"
He took everything out of my room and made me kneel for hours on my knees, arms stretched above my head until my shoulders screamed, and I shook with the strain. If I lowered my arms, he lashed my back with his belt until I lost consciousness from the torment.
I never saw my scarf again. I never had another mattress at Haven.
Or a blanket. The softest thing I lay on every night was concrete.
The old memories echo, tightening my chest as I sit on plush carpet yearning for softness I dare not reach for.
As though, through the memory, my brain takes in the pillows, throw rugs and other soft things piled on the couch behind me.
I grip the single cushion Jax gave me, trying so hard to stick to the rules.
Jax leans forward, voice soft, brow creased with worry. "What are you saying, Leah? What rules?"
I clamp my mouth shut, realizing I must have been speaking out loud. But if I tell him, he’ll punish me. But he asked me a question, and he’ll expect an answer. But if I answer him and he doesn't like what I tell him, what will he do? I shouldn’t say anything. I shouldn’t.
He waits, quiet and patient. "What are the rules, Sunshine? You can tell me. I promise I won’t yell or make you uncomfortable. I’d like to know so I can help you."
Help me? I’m well past help . I curl tighter around the pillow he gave me, but the fragments spill out anyway because what choice do I really have?
None. That’s the point. Regardless of what I tell him, he’ll do whatever the fuck he wants because he bigger.
Stronger. And there’s nothing stopping him.
"No nests. No softness. Omegas don’t get things. Not unless they’re good, and good Omegas never break rules." My voice trails off, because I was never good.
Jax folds his big frame so he’s eye-level with me. "What happens if you break a rule?"
Heat seeps over my skin, but I swear I can still feel the old cold at Haven, the bite of concrete on my knees.
I flicker between fever in this living room and numbness in that cell, never sure which belongs to me.
The words are jammed in my throat, cutting and jagged.
They hurt while they sit there and scrape my throat raw, but I must answer because an Alpha asked, so I push them out.
"Kneel on concrete. Arms up and over my head. I’m not allowed to cry. Or make a sound. Just take my punishment. An Alpha can lash me if I’m bad and I have to start again."