A Storage Tent
Elowen
Somewhere in the back of my mind, behind the fog of my heat, I know that I’m not touching an alpha.
The man in front of me is clearly a beta—a very sexy beta—but he’s soaked in the most delicious dominant scent. Chocolate and sunflowers with something primal underneath.
Something that makes my blood hum, my teeth ache, and my body clench with a need so raw it hurts.
“That—that feels so good,” the beta moans loudly. His heart is slamming against his ribs so hard I can feel it through his shirt. He says something else, but I can’t really hear him.
My hand is wrapped around a cock, hard and velvety and hot against my palm, and the sound the beta makes when I stroke him sends a shudder through me, because the sound means he’ll stay. It means he's not pulling away and I can keep touching the skin that carries the scent that I need.
Yes.
More.
Mine.
Unable to hold back a second longer, I slide down the beta’s body.
My knees hit the ground, but I barely feel it.
The dirt floor of the storage tent is cold through the thin fabric of my scrubs, but the sensation is distant. Something happening to a body I'm no longer fully living in.
My hands find the beta’s waistband and pull. The metal button of his jeans gives way with a sharp pop, and the rasp of the zipper is loud in the quiet space. Then I hook my fingers into the material and yank, dragging his jeans and his boxers down over his hips, freeing his cock.
The scent is stronger here. Sweet and musky at the same time, layered with the alpha pheromones soaked into every inch of him. His cock is hard, jutting out from a thatch of dark blond curls. It’s a perfect size, and to my heat-fogged brain, it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
Opening my mouth, I lean forward and swallow him down.
The beta gasps, a choked, helpless sound. His hand flies to the shelf behind him, gripping it hard enough to rattle the frame, and his other hand hovers near my head, his fingers trembling.
The fact that he’s not forcing me deeper feels…sweet?
The few men I’ve been with have always been so rough with me. Like their pleasure matters more than my comfort, but not this man.
It’s almost like he cares about me.
I know that’s stupid. I’m a stranger to him, but my body doesn’t know that.
He feels so familiar. So safe and good.
And, right now, I’ve never felt anything more wonderful.
A fresh gush of slick soaks through my drenched underwear, and I can feel it dripping down the inside of my thighs, clinging to the rough fabric of my scrubs.
I hum and bob my head, feeling the weight of the beta’s shaft on my tongue, the salty taste, the way his hips jerk forward and then stop, like he's fighting himself. It's all secondary.
What I care about are the alpha pheromones clinging to his skin.
The rich, dark layers of it blooming in my throat with every breath I pull through my nose. It's so concentrated here, woven into this beta’s skin, his sweat, the thin trail of hair below his navel. I press my nose into the crease of his hip and inhale so deeply my lungs burn.
More. I need more. I need the source.
I need….
Delirious lust coils deep inside me, making my womb spasm and my pussy flutter.
I need a knot.
A thick, wide, painfully large knot.
I pull off the beta with a gasp.
My mouth is wet and my chest is heaving. The storage tent spins around me as the scent of chocolate and sunflowers mixes with the beta’s natural citrus aroma. It floods every receptor I have, consuming me. It’s above me, around me, pressing against my skin like warm hands.
My hindbrain erupts, a roar of recognition so loud it drowns everything else.
This one is mine too.
Him, his alphas, his whole fucking pack.
Mine.
"Perrin?"
It’s deep, vibrating through the humid air and settling somewhere at the base of my spine.
It carries a wonderful amount of authority and power.
"Perrin, you in here?"
The beta—Perrin. His name is Perrin. He sucks in a shaky breath.
"Yeah." His voice cracks, and he clears his throat, trying again. "Yeah. In here, Cliff." His hands drop to his waistband. I hear the scrape of denim as he pulls his pants up, the frantic clink of a belt buckle, and something inside me snaps.
No!
A high-pitched growl tears out of me—sharp and feral and nothing I've ever heard come out of my own mouth before. My hands shoot out, clawing at Perrin’s wrists, trying to wrench them away from his jeans. He's putting it away. He's taking that beautiful cock away from me.
The scent, the warmth, the closeness.
He's pulling it all back, and every cell in my body revolts against the loss.
"Hey—What are you—Don’t!" Perrin snaps, wrestling with my hands and his zipper at the same time.
Somewhere behind me, the canvas flap shifts.
Daylight slashes across the tent floor in a bright wedge.
I'm vaguely aware of the change in light, the shift in air pressure, and the heavy footsteps, but I can't make myself care.
I'm still grabbing at Perrin, still trying to get back to the skin that smells like everything I need.
"What the hell, Perrin?"
The voice from the entrance isn't angry. It's stunned. Like someone walked into a room and found the furniture on the ceiling.
“We have shit to do.” The man snarls, clearly an alpha, and my hands go still. “You can’t sneak off and fuck some random chick in the middle of a job.”
"Cliff—I can explain—she just—" Perrin is stammering, one hand holding his jeans up, the other trying to gently pry my fingers off his belt. "She was sick. Or I thought she was sick. And then she—I didn't—"
"Put your dick away and get out of the damn tent." The alpha’s voice is low and tight, the kind of controlled that's one degree away from pissed. "Now, beta."
"I'm trying," Perrin mutters, and I hear the scrape of his belt buckle, the rushed tug of a zipper, and the sound breaks something in me.
I lunge at Perrin.
My hands find his shirt, his arms, his shoulders, anything I can grab. He pulls back, and an inhuman snarl rips out of my throat.
I need Perrin’s skin.
I need the scent.
He can't take it away from me.
He can't leave!
My instincts are screaming that if he leaves, I’ll die, and I believe it completely.
"Jesus—Cliff, she won't—" Perrin's stepping to one side, trying to detach my fingers without hurting me, but I'm climbing him again, fisting his shirt, dragging myself up his body.
Heavy footsteps cross the tent in three strides.
"What the fuck, lady?"
A hand clamps around my upper arm and yanks me backward, and the alpha—Cliff—is right there. So close I can see every striking feature on his face.
He has high, sharp cheekbones under warm tan skin. A strong, straight nose. A jaw that looks like it was cut from stone, hard-angled and clean. His dark hair has fallen over his forehead, damp with sweat, and his brows are heavy and expressive over deep-set eyes that are nearly all black.
He looks about forty years old or so. Maybe a few years younger.
And his body…
Every line of him is sculpted. Broad shoulders rolling into thick arms corded with muscle, a chest that expands with each heavy breath, abs that I can see flex beneath his thin, black T-shirt.
He looks like something out of a myth.
And his scent…
It hits me like a freight train. Smokey dark chocolate.
Mine.
It’s not the faded aroma on Perrin's cock. This is the source, undiluted and devastatingly wonderful. It pours off Cliff’s tan skin in waves so thick I can literally taste him in the air. It fills my mouth, my lungs, the hollow spaces behind my ribs, and every nerve in my body ignites at once.
My grip on Perrin goes slack.
My hands fall to my sides.
And my body turns toward the alpha like a compass finding north.
Cliff's grip on my arm loosens, but he doesn’t let go.
Yes, hold onto me. Pull me closer. Soak up my scent.
Kiss me.
Fuck me.
Claim me.
Cliff’s eyes narrow, scanning my face like he's trying to figure me out. His nostrils flare, once, twice, pulling in short, sharp breaths through his nose. And it hits me…
He can't find my scent.
The realization hits like a bucket of cold water through the fog of lust. The scent-blockers. He can’t smell me.
I’m a sensory void to this beautiful alpha, and it’s devastating.
A whimper escapes me. Small and broken and so pathetic it makes me hate myself.
Cliff's dark eyes narrow as he frowns. Something shifts behind them, his confusion deepening. "What are you?" he whispers, almost to himself.
“Cliff?” Perrin says, and the alpha’s upper body angles away from me, his weight shifting toward the tent entrance.
Is he leaving?
I jump.
Arms fly around his neck, legs around at his middle, mouth on his before either of us takes another breath. Cliff grunts, clearly shocked as I push my tongue into his mouth.
Big hands grab my hips, trying to shove me off, but I lock my ankles around his trim waist and wrap my arms around his neck.
Mine.
I swipe my tongue over his, and the alpha goes still.
His whole body goes rigid. His fingers freeze mid-push.
I feel the exact moment he tastes me.
His breath hitches, then a sound rips from his chest that vibrates through my entire body. Deep and raw and hungry.
His hands stop pushing and start pulling.
He yanks me against him so hard it knocks the air out of my lungs.
One hand buries in my hair, fisting it at the root, the other grips my thigh hard enough to bruise. He kisses me back like something broke loose inside him. Teeth and tongue and a growl that doesn't stop, that rolls continuously through his chest and into mine.
There's no control in it. No calculation. He's lost to the same desires I am.
Past thought, past reason, past everything civilized.
We're two animals in a dark tent, tearing at each other, and his scent is spiking so hard the air feels heavy with it.
He breaks the kiss and drags his nose down my jaw to my throat. One long inhale. His body shudders.
"Omega?" he breathes against my skin.