Chapter 18
Bane
Max leaves the library like the room is on fire.
Not running. Not quite. But close enough that I can see the panic in every line of his body—the rigid set of his shoulders, the way his hands curl into fists at his sides, the slight stumble when he hits the doorway because he's moving too fast for legs that clearly don't want to cooperate.
He doesn't look back.
Good.
Good.
I sit in the chair and stare at the space where he was. The indentation in the leather cushion. The warmth still clinging to it where his body pressed against mine.
What the fuck just happened?
I breathe in.
That's a mistake.
It's still here. Whatever I smelled when I caught him. When my hand wrapped around his arm and his face was inches from mine and his eyes went wide and terrified and—
It's everywhere.
Clinging to the leather. Soaked into the arm of the chair where his sleeve brushed. Hanging in the air like perfume, except no perfume smells like this. No cologne. No product. Nothing manufactured or bottled or bought.
This is something else.
Sweet. Warm. Layered. Vanilla first—rich, not cheap, like the real thing scraped from a bean. Then honey. Golden and thick. And underneath both of those, something darker. Smoke. Burnt sugar. Like caramel left too long on the stove, charred at the edges but somehow more intoxicating for it.
My mouth waters.
Actually waters. Like I'm hungry. Like I'm starving and someone just put a meal in front of me after days of fasting.
I grip the arms of the chair. Fingers digging into leather hard enough to creak.
What. The. Fuck.
I've smelled things before. Perfume on women at galas. Cologne on men at business dinners. Even the occasional whiff of something stronger—pheromones from alphas posturing at each other in boardrooms, that sharp, aggressive scent that makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up.
This isn't any of that.
This is—
I don't finish the thought. Won't finish it. Because finishing it means acknowledging what I already know. What some part of me has known since the first time I walked past his room and caught something faint and wrong and right in the air.
Max Carter is not a beta.
The thought lands like a hammer. Final. Undeniable.
Because betas don't smell like this. Betas don't make your hindbrain light up like a fucking switchboard. Betas don't make alphas shake and sweat and lose their minds from a single whiff of lingering scent in an empty room.
Only one thing smells like this.
This.
This scent that's making my hands shake and my blood run hot and my cock—
Fuck.
I'm hard.
Already. Just from the lingering ghost of him in an empty room. Just from breathing air that he breathed. Just from the memory of his face inches from mine, those dark eyes blown wide, that scent pouring off him like he was made of it.
I shift in the chair. The friction does nothing to help. Makes it worse, actually. The pressure against my zipper is almost painful. My cock strains against the denim, thick and insistent and completely, absolutely out of my control.
This is Max. Max. Margot's son. My stepbrother. The kid I told was nothing. The charity case. The outsider. The problem.
The omega.
God, the word alone makes something in my chest crack open.
Something primal and ancient and hungry.
Something I've read about, heard about, fantasized about in the dark when no one was watching.
Every alpha wants this. Every alpha dreams about finding the scent that rewires their brain, that makes the world narrow to a single point. The one.
I didn't think it would be him.
Hell, no one thinks it would be anyone in their family.
My hand moves without permission. Drops from the arm of the chair to my thigh. Slides inward. I feel myself through the jeans—hard, throbbing, leaking already. The denim is damp at the tip.
No.
I'm not doing this. Not here. Not because of him.
I stand up. Too fast. The blood rushes and my vision spots. I brace one hand against the bookshelf. Breathe.
Except breathing means smelling him.
His notebook is still on the side table. The pen beside it. He left them when he scrambled up, when he fell and I caught him and the world tilted sideways.
I should leave them alone.
I pick up the notebook.
The leather is warm. Soft from years of handling, the edges rounded, the spine cracked. It smells like him. Concentrated. Intense. Like he's been holding it against his chest, carrying it everywhere, pouring himself into these pages.
I don't open it. I'm an asshole, but I'm not that kind of asshole.
But I hold it. Press my thumb against the cover. Feel the texture.
And I bring it to my face.
Fuck.
The scent hits me like a wall. Vanilla honey smoke sugar want. My cock pulses. My vision goes hazy at the edges. Every nerve ending in my body lights up simultaneously.
I need to leave. Now. Before I do something I can't take back. Before someone finds me in this library smelling Max Carter's notebook like a fucking animal.
I set the notebook down. Set it down carefully. Precisely. Exactly where it was.
My hands are shaking.
I make it to my room in under a minute. Down the stairs, across the hall, past the shared lounge—empty, thank God—and into my space. I close the door. Lock it. The click of the deadbolt sounds like a gunshot.
My room is mine. Navy walls. Dark furniture. The bed I've slept in since I was sixteen, upgraded twice but always in the same spot. Trophies from school gathering dust on the shelf. The framed photo of Mom I keep on my nightstand that no one talks about.
This is my space. My territory. Safe.
Except it's not. Because the scent is still in my lungs. Still on my hands from where I touched his arm. Still burned into my memory like a brand.
I can still feel the bird-bone delicacy of his forearm. The way his skin was too warm. Fever-warm. Heat-warm. The way he weighed nothing when I pulled him back from falling. Like he was hollow. Like he was disappearing.
I lean against the door. Press my head back against the wood. Close my eyes.
My cock throbs.
One hand drops to my belt. Muscle memory. The buckle clinks as I undo it. The button pops. The zipper drags down and the relief is immediate—the pressure easing as I shove my jeans and briefs down just enough.
I wrap my hand around myself and hiss.
Already slick. Already leaking. Pre-come smearing across my palm as I stroke once. Twice.
Max on the stool in the kitchen. Wincing when he sat down. Perched on one hip because he couldn't bear weight on—
Why was he hurting?
The thought should kill the mood. Should make me stop. Should make me think about anything other than what I'm thinking about.
It doesn't.
Max in the library. Hair falling across his face while he wrote. The way his pen moved across the paper—quick, sure, graceful. The way he bit his lower lip when he was concentrating. Teeth pressing into soft pink flesh. The indent it left behind.
I stroke faster. Grip tighter. My breath comes in harsh pants that echo off the walls.
Max falling. My hand catching him. His face inches from mine. Those eyes—dark, liquid, wide with surprise. The pink of his mouth. The flutter of his pulse in his throat, visible beneath paper-thin skin.
And the scent. God, the scent. Pouring off him like a wave. Like a gift. Like something I didn't earn and don't deserve.
I think about what it would smell like up close. Not a whiff in a shared chair. Not the ghost of it on a notebook. But close. Nose pressed to his neck. His jaw. That spot behind his ear where scent glands concentrate in omegas.
I wonder if he'd let me.
No. He'd shove me away. Tell me to fuck off. Look at me with those guarded eyes that see right through my bullshit.
You're nothing. You're nobody.
I said that to him. Meant it. Or thought I did.
Guilt should make this stop. Should soften me. Should remind me that I don't deserve to be thinking about him like this. Not after what I said. Not after the way I treated him.
It doesn't stop.
Max's mouth. The way he says "fuck you" like he means it. Like he's not afraid of me even though he should be. That flash of fire underneath all the damage. The bite.
Submission with teeth. That's what I see when I look at him. Someone who wants to surrender but refuses to go down without a fight. Someone who'd make you earn every inch. Every gasp. Every shudder.
My hand moves faster. Rough. Punishing. Like I'm trying to get this out of my system. Like if I just come hard enough, fast enough, it'll purge whatever this is from my blood.
Max on his knees. Those dark eyes looking up at me. Lips parted. Waiting.
"Tell me I'm good. Tell me you need me."
The thought comes from nowhere. Hits me like a truck. Because it's not Max's voice in my head—it's mine. Saying those words to him. Begging for something I've never begged for from anyone.
Tell me I matter.
My orgasm hits without warning.
Violent. Consuming. My vision whites out. My back arches off the door, hips snapping forward into my fist. Come spills over my hand, my stomach, soaking my shirt. Wave after wave that seems to go on forever, that wrings every drop of tension from my body and replaces it with something worse.
Something hollow.
I slide down the door. Hit the floor. Sit there with my jeans around my thighs and my come cooling on my hand and my chest heaving.
Stare at the ceiling.
What am I doing?
Max Carter. The kid I told was nothing. The outsider I wanted gone. Margot's charity case who I dismissed as weak and pathetic and beneath me.
The omega whose scent just made me come so hard I saw stars.
I want to laugh. Want to scream. Want to punch something.
He's been here for—what? Three weeks? And in that time, I've watched my father bend over backward to make him feel welcome. Watched Atlas get that look in his eyes whenever Max walks into a room. Watched Zero go from hostile to murderous in the span of days.
And I told myself I was different. Told myself I saw through it. Saw through him. That I was the smart one. The one who didn't fall for the big eyes and the wounded act and the defensiveness that's obviously hiding something deeper.
Turns out I'm just the last one to figure out what he's hiding.
My phone buzzes. I ignore it.
My hand is still wrapped around my softening cock. Sticky. Disgusting. Evidence.
I need to shower. Need to clean up. Need to scrub his scent off my skin and out of my lungs and pretend this never happened.
But first—
I bring my clean hand to my face. The one that caught his arm. The one that held him up when he stumbled.
I breathe in.
Faint now. Fading. The barest trace of vanilla and honey and smoke.
My cock twitches. Already. Already starting to fill again just from this ghost of a scent on my skin.
"Fuck," I whisper to the empty room.
I'm so fucked.
I shower. Long. Hot. Scrubbing until my skin is raw and red. Washing my hands three times. Letting the water run until the steam fills the bathroom and I can't smell anything but soap.
It doesn't help.
The scent is in my head now. Carved there. Permanent.
I dress. Clean clothes. Different shirt. Like that matters. Like changing my outfit is going to change what just happened.
My phone buzzes again. I check it this time.
Dad: Everything good at the house? We're heading back now.
I type: All good.
All good. Right. Everything's great. Your stepson is an omega going through pre-heat, I just jerked off thinking about him, and I'm pretty sure at least one of my brothers has already done worse.
Sitting like you've got a stick up your ass.
The realization hits me slow. Cold.
The way Max was sitting in the kitchen. Perched on one hip. Wincing. Moving like his body was a minefield and every shift was a potential explosion.
That wasn't a bad workout.
Someone hurt him.
And in this house, with these people, there's a very short list of suspects.
Zero.
It hits me with the force of absolute certainty. Zero, who's been gone all day. Zero, who pushed past me this morning without a word, jaw tight, eyes avoiding mine. Zero, who looked at Max that night by the pool table like he wanted to tear him apart.
Zero, who always takes what he wants and deals with the consequences later.
If he’d smelled Max…
My hands curl into fists.
Something hot and violent and possessive rises in my chest. Something that has no right to be there. Something I haven't earned and don't deserve but can't control.
If he hurt Max—
If he touched Max—
I stop. Force my hands open. Force my breathing to slow.
This isn't my business. Max isn't mine. Isn't anything to me. I told him he was nothing. I meant it.
Didn't I?
I stare at my reflection in the bathroom mirror. Wet hair. Hard eyes. Jaw tight enough to crack a molar.
"Get it together," I tell myself.
My reflection doesn't look convinced.
I think about the library. About Max curled in the chair, pen moving across paper, completely absorbed. The way the tension bled from his shoulders when he was writing. The way he almost looked peaceful for the first time since I've known him.
He was writing something. Not on the laptop—the notebook. The leather one he carries everywhere. The one that smells like him.
I wonder what he writes about.
I wonder if he writes about us.
I shove the thought away. Pull on my shoes. Head for the door.
Atlas needs to know. If Zero did what I think he did—if he touched Max, fucked Max, used him the way Zero uses everyone—Atlas needs to know.
Because Atlas is the one who handles things. Atlas is the one who keeps this family from imploding. Atlas is the one who will know what to do.
And because if I go to Zero myself right now, I'll kill him.
I pause with my hand on the doorknob.
When did I start caring?
I don't have an answer.
The door opens. The hallway is empty. Max's door is closed. No light underneath. No sound.
Hiding again.
I head for Atlas's office.