8. Reality Crash
Chapter 8
Reality Crash
T hursday rolled into Sunday before Brinley blinked her eyes open without the fever-cloud of lust fogging her every thought. What food she’d had in the refrigerator, and the nutrient-providing snack-like food Lennox had brought with him, had pretty much been depleted. Not that she had wanted to eat, but her alpha had practically force-fed her between every second or third knot. He’d been downright cruel.
Brinley sucked in a breath and propelled herself upright, despite the body-wide ache of her overtaxed muscles. Or, she attempted to propel herself upright, and found a heavy, muscular arm coiled tight around her torso.
The sight made her realize that they were both still sticky with residual sweat—and other things—even though it had been a few hours since their last round. She’d passed out before his knot had gone down. She’d passed out with him still inside her.
Brinley swallowed way too many conflicted feelings about that and tried valiantly to find the strength to shove at his arm. Her nest had become a disaster zone and from her current position she honestly wasn’t even sure which way was out.
Lennox groaned, the sound groggy, mildly agitated, and somehow sexy despite all her aches and pains. “Don’t be rude, baby,” he grumbled without lifting his head.
She frowned and pretended nothing in her chest reacted at the persisting endearment. It wasn’t meant as an endearment. It was just something he said to enhance intimacy with his partners in the moment. She already knew that. “ Lennox , wake up.” Her voice might have been a bit snippy.
His arm tensed, just for a moment, and he exhaled heavily before lifting his head. “You feel a little more stable now.” He raked his gaze over her as if he hadn’t seen more of her naked body than any other living soul. “Want that shower yet?”
She did, in fact. But she couldn’t play dumb, either, so she pushed again at his arm and did her best to shimmy an inch or two away from his alluring body heat. “We need to talk.” Maybe he hadn’t meant to. Maybe it had been one of those impulsive things she’d always been so afraid of. Of course it was. Even if she was an omega, he had enough resources to find one who matched him better, surely.
Lennox frowned and finally sat up, thereby freeing her to do the same. But he didn’t allow her to retreat further, instead looping his other arm around her from behind and hauling her closer as he leaned into what remained of the pillow-wall she barely remembered making. “What could already have you so worked up?” He stopped just shy of dropping her into his lap, but kept his hand on her hip.
Brinley tensed. The traitorous part of her—undoubtedly the same part that had magically summoned him to her apartment in the first place—wanted to melt against him and forget her agitation entirely. But she was too aware for that. “You marked me.” The words did not come out as forcefully as she wanted them to.
Lennox hummed low. “I did.” He bent forward and kissed the still-tender mark at the back curve of her neck, as if he had every right. “Because you’re mine.” His lips lifted to her ear. “And I’m yours—or I will be, as soon as you return the favor.”
Too many things rushed through her at his murmured words and Brinley finally found enough strength to shove away. She stumbled to her feet, tugged free one of the blankets that had nearly been kicked to the floor already, and pulled it up to cover herself before facing him again. “I am not yours,” she said, her voice shakier than she would have liked. “I’m just a … a nobody, who happens to be omega. You had your fun. Thank you, I guess. Let’s just call it even. This”—she motioned to the mark beginning to pulse with displeasure—“fades after a cycle if the claim isn’t reciprocated, right?”
She hated how much she didn’t know. It was hard to find information on something more than half of the world believed to be fiction .
Lennox found his feet in a singular movement. Somehow, being naked and dotted with an embarrassing number of bruises and hickeys from where she’d nibbled on his skin like a lunatic only made him look more like a predator. “No,” he said, gaze dark and steady. “We will not call it even. I didn’t come here hoping for a chance to play with an omega in heat. I came here for you , Brinley. For my fucking omega. I came here to take care of you, yes. Because that’s what a decent alpha does. He takes care of his own.”
Brinley didn’t realize he’d backed her into the wall beside the bathroom until her back collided with it and she found she could no longer retreat from his advancing form.
He raised his arms, caging her in, and leaned closer. His comparatively massive form practically swallowed her. “Now that your heat seems to have cleared, I agree we should clean up and talk about certain things. And seeing as your apartment smells like sex, and is devoid of any useful food, we should do the conversing somewhere else.” His eyes narrowed. “But make no mistake. The next time you sit on my knot—and there will be a next time—I look forward to feeling your teeth on my neck.”
She blamed their half-established bond and her damned omega biology for the way her apparently inexhaustible body fluttered and pulsed, just a little, at his demanding words. If only the world were so simple.
Brinley raised her chin and spoke as steadily as she could manage. There was no real sense in drawing this awkwardness out. “The only thing compatible about us is our biology,” she said. “You’re one of the wealthiest, most successful businessmen on the freaking planet. You’ve even figured out how to more or less stay out of the spotlight. On the other hand, I’m a broke reporter.” Her voice cracked as another unpleasant realization dawned and she fought not to drop her stare. The reality only buttressed her point, no matter how much it hurt. “A recently unemployed reporter.” They were opposite in every conscious way. There was no way he wouldn’t see that for himself with it spelled out in front of him.
One corner of Lennox’s lips lifted in a slow, confident smirk that did all the wrong things to her insides and utterly confused her brain. “You’re both right and wrong,” he said. “If journalism means that much to you, then once the building is fixed up, you can have it. Run your own publication from it if you want, or use it as one large office for yourself.” He straightened and dropped his hands to her hips, hauling her from the wall and up to his chest effortlessly. “I don’t give a shit what you do for work, as long as it’s what you want to be doing. I tend to be busy. It’s better if you have something that occupies your time.”
Brinley braced her hands on his chest, not sure if she was trying to push him away or simply hold herself upright. “You’re saying too much.” He wasn’t making any sense at all. “I haven’t agreed to this.” Her heart raced like a thunderstorm in her ears and she wondered if she had, on some subconscious level. She scrambled for something to latch onto. For one straightforward question to focus on, or argument she could make, and something he’d said replayed in her mind. “What building?”
Lennox chuckled, pressed his lips to her forehead, and swiftly pried the blanket away from her. Then he picked her up and strode into the suddenly too-small bathroom, setting about turning on her even smaller shower while keeping her at his side.
Brinley ducked her head enough to avoid the temptation of glancing into the mirror and repeated herself. “Lennox, what building? What are you talking about?”
He met her questions with his own. “How do you think I knew you would be home? Knew you’d fallen into heat?”
She would have crossed her arms over her chest if he wasn’t holding her so close. “You’re the one who pointed out you have resources. Some elite, overpaid spy? How should I know?”
The deep, rich sound of his chuckle filled the air between them again. “No spies. Just very well compensated investigators, one oversized check, and a pair of highly motivated lawyers.” He extended an arm to check the water, then ushered her into the shower stall ahead of him before pulling the door closed.
The space was cramped with both of them, but she already knew that. Worse, she only minded slightly more than she had the other time they’d taken a moment to bathe themselves—during a brief stretch of semi-clarity she’d enjoyed on the second day. She was pretty sure it was the second day.
Brinley shook the thought from her head, let herself enjoy the sensation of the water gliding across her skin, then moved aside a bit in the interest of sharing and said, “That doesn’t really answer my question. What building?” She didn’t even know how to articulate her confusion.
He watched the water run down her torso, curving over her breast and sluicing down her belly, for a long moment. A sound like a low, appreciative groan carried from him, nearly overshadowed by the straining pipes.
She was very perversely grateful for her body’s sore, overtaxed state. Under normal circumstances, that attention—that sound, that stare—would have had her aroused and squirming in seconds.
Lennox found his voice before he succeeded in dragging his eyes up again to hers. “Your former place of business went out of business on Saturday,” he declared. “Everything it was, from the dirt to the license, belongs to me now.”
Brinley’s mouth dropped open.
Lennox slid his hands over her sides and tugged her closer, pulling her more directly into the path of the spray. “The business is done. Waters is done. But the building can be fixed. I’ll let you have that, if you want it. That’s what I was referring to, baby.”
Her heart beat harder, louder. Holy shit. It didn’t seem possible. It was definitely illogical. “I … I think I’m more confused now than before,” she said on a whisper.
His lips lifted in a grin and he reached for her soap. “Let’s wash, find some clothes, and head out. We can have a better conversation with food in our stomachs.”
She was still nodding, and wondering if she was perhaps not quite out of her heat after all, if only to explain the confusing daze encompassing her mind, when Lennox set to work scrubbing her clean. And it felt good. Physically, of course, but also on another level she couldn’t define. It was different than after care. Hours had passed since they’d last had sex. This was just … care.
Brinley had no idea what to do with that.
****
Lennox could sense her confusion, her uncertainty, despite that their bond was incomplete. She was too in her head. He’d recognized that about her the night of the masquerade party. She had the instinct to reach for him, but continued holding herself back. It might have been admirable if it weren’t also rather frustrating.
But he needed her to trust him, to listen to him, so he held that minor irritation in check.
She hadn’t liked the idea of traveling to his residence, despite that they both agreed they needed somewhere to speak with a reassurance of privacy. He could have paid to shut down a restaurant for the day, or bought out a nearby event space, but Brinley had flippantly suggested eating and talking in his car instead. She’d clearly tossed the words out as something like a challenge disguised as a joke. Her phrasing and her tone had reminded him of the way she spoke about herself in financial and situational terms. So he’d agreed.
It was unconventional, certainly not his usual style, but it offered the privacy they required. At least since he’d had the foresight to drive himself to her apartment previously.
“Well, this’ll teach me for running my mouth,” Brinley muttered as she balanced her take-out brunch in her lap. She lifted the breakfast burrito carefully, leaning forward as she did, making sure the entire thing remained positioned over the recycled plastic carton.
Lennox bit back his smirk and dug another bite out of his own meal. He would help her learn not to worry about making a mess. This wasn’t the time for that lesson. Instead, he calmly finished his bite before opening a more critical conversation. “You have questions, Brinley. I’m willing to answer them, but you have to ask.” He waited until she had lifted her gaze again. “In return, I expect you to keep an open mind and consider that my answers might just be truthful.”
She scrunched up her lips and for a second he couldn’t tell if she wanted to argue or was offended at his insinuation. The moment passed and her expression settled back to neutral. “That’s fair.” Her gaze dropped back to the meal still balanced in her lap. “I don’t even know where to start,” she said on a whisper. “I can think of plenty of ways you could have found me—learned my name, where I live—but none of that equates to chasing me down or whatever it is you were talking about with my job.” She winced. “My former job.”
Lennox reached for his coffee, sitting in the secondary slot in the console between them, and took a gulp of the too-bitter liquid before answering. “It’s the same as why I bothered having you unmasked in the first place,” he said. “I warned you, didn’t I? One night wouldn’t be enough. You ran off before I could persuade you to voluntarily tell me your name or how to find you, so I had to get creative.”
Brinley frowned around her latest, smaller, bite and lowered the burrito. “But that doesn’t make sense,” she said as soon as she’d swallowed. “ Why did you have to find me? Were you worried I would sell the story of our night together for some quick cash? Did you just want another roll under the sheets with an obviously stupid omega?”
Lennox growled low, set down his coffee, and reached across the console to catch Brinley’s jaw in a firm grip. He dragged her head up enough to trap her wide, beautiful brown eyes in his stare. “You’ve clearly developed a disdain for yourself, perhaps specifically for your omega biology, and we’ll work on that. Together . Because you are going to learn, whether you want to or not, that I’m not going to disappear. And you, Brinley, are not stupid.” His lips curled over the world, the idea itself angering him.
He watched Brinley take a deep breath. Saw her gather herself.
He didn’t give her a chance to argue. “The issue here is that you overthink,” he declared. “You’re always searching for a rational, external explanation.” Lennox carefully adjusted in his seat, moving to rest his half-eaten brunch on the dashboard so he could reposition to face her better. “The problem with that is that sometimes, some things, are intuitive. Instinctual.”
Her brow furrowed. “You didn’t even know I was an omega before—”
“Precisely.” He tightened his grip on her jaw ever-so-slightly. “I knew you were mine the moment I laid eyes on you in that party. I didn’t give a fuck if you were omega, beta, human, or something else altogether. You could have been something I didn’t know existed until that night. I wouldn’t have given a shit.” He tugged her forward, just enough to tilt her own meal precariously in her lap, and lowered his voice. “Because I knew the one thing that mattered more than all of that, Brinley. I knew you were fucking mine , and whatever it took, I was going to make sure you knew it, too.”
Brinley dragged in another breath and busied herself with restabilizing her food. She tried to pull from his grip, and when that failed, she licked her lips. “That was just … alpha-omega nonsense. It wasn’t anything.”
Lennox barely restrained the next growl, and for her own sake, he moved his hand from her jaw. He chose instead to settle it on her thigh in a firm grip. “You’re the one who just pointed out I had no way of knowing what you were.”
She opened her mouth with the clear intent to argue.
“This is you denying your instinct again, baby.”
She snapped her mouth shut and glared at him.
“You can feel it,” Lennox pressed. “You’re just afraid to. If anything, that is where we differ. I’ve always heeded my instinct first.” He gave her thigh a squeeze. “And that, Brinley, is why we’re here in this car right now.”
“Instinct,” she repeated, as if to herself. Brinley lowered her gaze and reached for her burrito again. “Earlier, you said you bought the entire company I had worked for. Did you do that on instinct, too?”
A grin tugged at his lips and Lennox eased back, opting to let her get some more food in her system. He pulled his own back into his lap and set about stabbing up another bite. “In a manner of speaking, yes. I looked it up once I learned where you worked, and when the report from my investigators came in, I couldn’t ignore the reality of the conditions you were working in.”
“But I was fired,” she said from behind a quickly raised hand.
He inclined his head. “I didn’t learn that tidbit until the deal had already been presented.” He popped his own bite into his mouth, lowered the fork, and plucked his phone up from the mount where it had been charging. As soon as it was unlocked, he swiped to the text conversation from his lawyers, where they had verified the deal and even sent a picture of the contract with Neil Waters’ signature. He tapped that and zoomed in just enough to make the scribble clear, then held it out for her to see. “It’s done,” he said. “Relief packages will be presented to the existing staff based on their individual merit tomorrow morning.”
Brinley stared at the screen for a long minute, her face a blanket of shock.
Lennox returned his phone to the dock.
Seconds passed in a heavy silence as Brinley nibbled at her burrito with her brow scrunched and her eyes distant. Lennox watched her, trying to give her time to process.
Finally, after chasing her last bite with a large swallow of her drink, she said, “Okay. Maybe I overthink sometimes. I’ll give you that.” Her shoulders stiffened. “That’s still a lot to do—a lot of money, a huge investment, a damn big commitment —for a woman you basically don’t know.”
Lennox tucked the top lid of his food container into the notch that held it shut, then tossed the entire thing into the back to be cleaned out later. “You’re right. It is a lot, but it’s also already done.” He offered her a patient smile. “We might as well get to know each other.”
Brinley studied him for another second before slowly inclining her head. Her expression softened as she opened her mouth to respond, but his phone lit up with an incoming call, catching her attention.
Lennox glanced toward the screen, fully intending to ignore it for the time being, and felt a growl of irritation build in his chest. What had gotten into that woman?
“Isn’t that—”
“My ex-fiancée, yes,” Lennox said tightly, still glaring at Matilda’s name on the screen. Twice in the same week? What deity had he pissed off?
Brinley let out a choked, bitter laugh. “If you want me to agree to an unbreakable mating bond,” she said as she gestured to the phone, “you had better be willing to answer that call in front of me. On speaker.”
The sudden challenge in her voice, in her eyes, spurred him into motion and Lennox flashed her a smirk as he reached out to catch the call. His thumb swiped across the screen and he tapped the necessary button without bothering to lift the device. “Matilda,” he greeted, keeping his tone cold.
On the other side of the line, his one-time fiancée drew a sharp breath. “Finally. Where have you been? I’ve been to see you three times this weekend and they tell me you’re not even home!”
He found himself arching a brow. “What they should have told you was that you’re unwelcome on my property.”
She huffed. “You changed your codes.”
“I did.”
“How am I supposed to pop in to see you, Len?”
He barely bit back the growl. “If you’ve called to whine over the loss of a privilege you never should have had, I’m hanging up.” And regardless, he was blocking her damn number after this conversation.
“Len, wait,” Matilda said quickly, her voice suddenly warm in some attempt to sound sultry. “I’m sorry I was rude the other day. I’ve been thinking, maybe it’s time we reunited. You know we look good together.”
Brinley looked between him and his mounted phone with dramatically arched brows.
He couldn’t offer her any reassurance. He was too busy trying not to vomit all over himself, or lose himself to the irate outrage her frivolous words triggered. Somehow, he held himself mostly together. Mostly . “The only thing I know is that neither of us was ever interested in marrying the other in the first damn place. I won’t say this again, Matilda. Stay the fuck out of my life, away from my family, and off my goddamn property. Or you’ll be hearing from my lawyers.”
“Len—” His thumb descended on the screen, cutting off the obnoxious voice of perhaps his biggest single regret.
Brinley set her emptied food tray on the dashboard and slumped back into her seat. “So … I can add ‘crazy ex’ to the list of expectations, then.”
Lennox exhaled heavily and reached again for his coffee. “Don’t worry about her. She loses interest more quickly than a toddler.”
Brinley was quiet for several seconds, opting to sip at her own drink and seeming to lose her focus out the window briefly. At length, voice quiet, she finally said, “All right then. I can’t promise how long I’ll be free, seeing as I need to be job hunting, but I can give you today.” Her gaze met his, clear and searching. “What do we do next?”