Bonded By Christmas

Chapter 1 – Lacey

Chapter One

Lacey

The Christmas spirit is alive and well in the club. The stage is lined with string lights, and the floor has several trees decorated in random aesthetics.

Not to mention the holiday music blaring through the speakers.

I almost laugh.

It’s so loud, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was scaring away customers rather than bringing them in.

Not that I’m complaining.

There’s something about the season that makes it my favorite time of year, despite the dismal weather.

If I didn’t need to earn a paycheck, I’d probably hibernate winter away. Nah, I wouldn’t want to risk missing my all-time favorite holiday.

Then again, I wouldn’t mind not having to walk to work when it’s thirty something degrees outside and sleeting in Boston.

I could have gone in through the employee entrance at the back, but the front door was closer, meaning less walking time in the frigid conditions. However, it does mean I have to weave through customers to get to the dressing room, since I refuse to enter through the front of the pheromone clinic.

Tasty Treat is open twenty-four hours a day, only closing a few days a year.

The business has two sides, but we share employee-only areas.

The first side is the club, which features multiple stages for dancing and private rooms for a more personal experience.

The other side is the scent bar. Okay, that’s just what most of the customers call it. The official name is Tasty Treat Scent Clinic. It makes it sound more medically official than we really are.

Scent clinics are a brand-new endeavor that popped up out of necessity less than a year ago, but our location has only been open for six months.

Alphas and omegas used to have almost equal birth rates. A few hundred years ago, that started changing. The difference is so staggering now that nearly eight alphas are born to each omega.

Alpha and omega biology is complicated—even scientists don’t understand all the ins and outs and whys of how our systems are set up the way they are—but the truth is, we need each other. With the downturn in omega birth rates, packs have become the norm, but even that isn’t enough.

Alphas who don’t have regular contact with an omega can end up feral.

They lean into the hyper-aggressive stereotype that defines their designation.

They’re more likely to pick fights, have violent outbursts, and ignore rational thought, but soaking up omega pheromones can help pull a feral alpha back from the edge.

There just aren’t enough omegas to go around, and not every alpha finds the one for them. At least not before the decay starts to set in.

Once an alpha exhibits signs of going feral, they’re on the countdown to rabid. Basically, if a feral alpha ignores their biological needs for long enough, they pass feral and enter rabid territory.

Rabid alphas have all the symptoms feral alphas have, but as it gets worse, they can start to lose touch with reality completely, even failing to recognize family or friends.

It’s a heartbreaking process, and only one thing brings them back—bonding a scent-matched omega.

Scent bars, also known as pheromone clinics, are one solution to help avoid letting things get that far.

Feral alphas come in to spend time with unbonded omegas. They sniff scent cards with fabric swatches to determine which employee appeals to their senses the most, and even having access to omega pheromones a few hours a week helps keep them from tipping over the line into rabid.

It’s not a permanent fix.

They still need to find and bond their own omega, but it does save them from further mental decay.

On the opposite side of that equation, omegas who ignore their instincts long enough can end up touch-starved. My designation needs access to alpha pheromones, just like alphas need access to ours.

It’s the perfect job, considering how much I crave physical affection and cuddles.

Also, I’m a terrible dancer.

I worked at three different clubs over the course of a little over a year before coming to the conclusion, stripping just isn’t for me.

Working in the scent bar is a whole lot more fulfilling, anyway.

I tend to see the same clients on a regular basis, and it allows me to really get to know each one of them.

It’s something society has needed for a while, but clinics popping up is a new thing.

Back before there were laws to protect it, private services acted like any other facet of sex work, at least from what I’ve heard from some of the omegas who did house calls back before the laws caught up.

Okay, maybe it’s not exactly like sex work, because it’s more about a pheromones exchange than sex, but what we do is, at the very least, sex work adjacent.

It’s up to the employee to decide which ways they’re comfortable transferring those pheromones, and the laws now protect our right to do that however we see fit, so I feel accurate categorizing us under the sex-work umbrella.

My second favorite part of my job is that I can do it in my pajamas.

The top perk is helping alphas who otherwise would decline mentally, but being able to wear comfy clothes while I’m working is definitely what gave this gig a leg up on stripping. Well, that and the fact I was born with no rhythm. And damn, did I try to make dancing work.

I took lessons from the other girls, watched a ton of videos, and put my all into it.

Ultimately, it wasn’t meant to be.

I’m happier now, anyway.

My first appointment is with a married couple named Dan and Mark. They started coming to see me three months ago, and they’re one of my favorite appointments. They haven’t met their omega yet, but I hope they’ll one day find the perfect person to complete their family.

Until then, we hang out once a week, snuggle on the treatment table, and talk about bad reality TV or whatever chaos went down at their jobs since I’ve seen them last.

Or like now, they make out while I pretend I’m not the third wheel.

Whatever.

It gives me hope seeing two people so in love that they can’t keep their hands off each other. Even if I’m stretched out between them.

Okay, so it’s a little awkward, but I get paid either way. Also, I think it’s cute that they get so warm and fuzzy inside just from being around my pheromones.

Mark stretches an arm over my torso, wrapping his fingers in Dan’s beard.

I snort, preparing to climb down the bed to get out of their way. “Well, if I’m not needed, I’m just gonna go…”

They pull back, and Mark pats my stomach, laughing. “Sorry, Lacey.”

“Do you have plans for Christmas?” Dan asks.

I shrug, glancing between them. “Not really. Christmas Day is one of the few the clinic is closed, but my mom is on a cruise to celebrate her three-year wedding anniversary. I’ll probably order Chinese food and refuse to step outside in this abysmal weather.”

“Oh, sweetie.” Mark frowns. “No other family close by?”

“Not really,” I say, but it’s kind of a lie.

I do have a stepbrother. He lives less than twenty minutes away in the house his dads lived in prior to meeting my mom.

Once our parents bonded, his dads stole my mom away, and Wilder inherited their mansion.

The parents moved to Miami, and while I went to visit them last Christmas, this year they’re on a world cruise.

“It’s fine. Honestly, I have serious plans to binge-watch Hallmark and not leave the house. ”

“If we weren’t going to Utah, we’d have you over for Christmas dinner,” Mark says.

“I do make a fantastic honey-glazed ham,” Dan says, patting my hip. “Are you sure you’ll be okay? No one should have to be alone for the holidays.”

I laugh.

They’re very sweet.

I’m actually really happy on my own, at least most of the time. Sometimes it gets a little lonely not having a big family to celebrate holidays with, but it’s what I’m used to. It was always just me and my mom when I was growing up, so I think I got used to the solitude.

When I was seventeen, she met her pack. They bonded right before I turned eighteen, and I was forced to spend two awkward months living with Mom and her three new husbands.

Luckily, they’re very generous guys. They helped fund my first two years of college and even paid for my first apartment.

Though, I think that was simply to get me out of the house.

They were used to having an empty nest, and I was clearly cramping their style.

The four of them wanted to be able to enjoy their newfound bonds, and I wanted to not have to worry about seeing things my eyes never needed to see.

“I’m shocked some handsome feral alpha hasn’t snatched you up for his very own,” Mark says, quirking an eyebrow.

“We have lost three employees to bonding since we opened,” I admit. “But alas, no handsome alphas have attempted to woo me into being their sugar baby. So, here I am, working to pay bills.”

Mark and Dan tip me two hundred dollars after their visit. They usually give me a hundred, but they doubled it as a Christmas gift, which was a thoughtful surprise.

I flip the switch on the wall outside my room to indicate it’s ready to be sanitized and drop the sheets into the laundry container at the end of the hall.

The front desk gives us thirty minutes between clients so the rooms can be thoroughly cleansed of any lingering smells from other alphas. Which brings me to the only major annoyance that I have with this job.

I have to change clothes and shower between every appointment. No two alphas who come in for pheromone therapy are exactly alike, but most don’t react well to the scent of other alphas. Even smelling another alpha’s scent mixed with the omega’s scent they’re here to enjoy can agitate them.

Some are further gone to the decay than others, but it’s best not to risk it. Hence why I shiver as I jump into a fresh set of pajamas, following my shower. The wet hair during the middle of winter is by far the worst part.

It’s worth it, though.

Pulling my hair up into a messy bun, I close my locker. I need to check my schedule to see what’s next.