Chapter 18
Maisie
I’ve pulled the bedding from my bed and half-finished my task before I stop, wide-eyed and afraid when it hits me what I’m doing.
I am building a nest.
An omega only builds a nest when she wants to nest, and she only wants to nest when her heat is on its way.
It’s been a week since I moved in with four alphas, yet it didn’t occur to me at any point that my biological needs might start asserting themselves.
I kept my heat at bay since I was eighteen, when I first perfumed.
I was with Derek then, and only an alpha could have helped me through the painful sexual need that hits all omegas every three months.
Derek is a beta, so I went to my doctor and asked for suppressants so my body wouldn’t spend five days craving sex with an alpha the way biology designed it to.
But I haven’t been taking my suppressants.
Not for days now.
In Nevada, when Derek was waiting to choke me in my room, a motel worker intervened, saving my life and nearly costing him his. I left everything I had behind in my room. All I thought to grab, and only because it was inches from the front door, was my purse.
I had money and my suppressants, the only things I really needed, so I was fine. I’d already left my cell phone behind in Oregon. Since Derek knew everyone I would call, I didn’t bother getting another cell phone. Who else would I call?
I had my purse with my suppressants in my apartment above the flower shop. I can’t remember what I did with the purse, though. Was it hanging on the hook beside the front door? Or did I leave it on the counter between the living room and the kitchen—potentially the worst place of all?
I stare down at the pillows and comforter I laid out on my bedroom floor.
Then I pick everything back up and put it on the bed again.
I don’t want to do it. But I ignore the biological urges flooding my body and make myself do it anyway.
Once I’m done, I cross the room and duck into my adjoining bathroom to check my reflection in the mirror.
My cheeks are rosy, but it’s not super noticeable unless someone knows me really well. The four alphas in this house pay close enough attention to everything I do that they absolutely would notice.
And Lawrence, the deputy sheriff, who sometimes sits outside the house when Hunter, Elias, Knox, and Wyatt all have to go to work, would have been trained to notice people behaving strangely.
Usually, we chat for a bit when I take him snacks before I head back into the house to continue baking pies.
With my heat on the way, I see myself thrusting the drinks and snacks at him and running back inside.
He’s a beta, so I’m not likely to want to jump his bones, but if he sees arousal in my eyes, would he try to jump mine?
My lips are red, at least the bottom lip, from biting on it more than usual.
There’s a slight…
What is that?
I lean closer to the mirror to get a better look at my pupils.
Neediness, I decide. And arousal.
My pupils are slightly dilated. Not a good sign.
I’m hot even though I’m in shorts and a tank top. Bad sign.
And my breasts are at least one size bigger. When I touch my nipples, I wince. Swollen and sore. Heavy and achy. Worst sign of all.
Turning from my reflection, I lean against the sink and wrap my arms around myself, chewing my lip as I ponder what I intend to do about it.
I need heat suppressants.
Getting hold of more in a big city was easy.
Almost any doctor can and will prescribe heat suppressants for an omega who requests it.
Omegas don’t have to be slaves to their needs like they were before someone invented suppressants, safe to take for an omega’s whole life without side effects, if she wants them.
The thing is, most omegas don’t want to be taking suppressants all their lives.
Sex during heat—five days of intense sexual need, when our bodies are in a desperate battle to procreate—feels good.
Really, really good. I’ve heard sex with an alpha during heat is the best kind of sex of all.
The sort betas crave. Because who wouldn’t want a big, strong, sexy alpha railing her non-stop for five days straight?
Sex with Elias when it wasn’t even my heat was… incredible doesn’t do justice. He was late for work because we made love again in the morning. He didn’t care. I should have, but I didn’t either. He just laughed as he turned his alarm clock off and slid back inside me.
My pussy throbs, and I order myself to stop thinking of sex. It’s not helping me control urges I’ve had for a very long time. Years, in fact. When I was with Derek, I loved him, but I’d secretly wanted to experience heat with an alpha once, just to see what it was like.
With Derek, when heat came around, I took the pills that made the pain manageable and built a nest on a rug when I craved soft, cozy things to ease my aching body.
I wasn’t the least bit interested in sex with Derek.
He was a beta and couldn’t make me feel the way only an alpha could. My body knew it, and he knew it too.
So I nested and counted down the days until my breasts were no longer sore, my stomach stopped cramping, and I stopped having dreams about growling alphas who covered my body with bites as they knotted me.
Their cocks would swell and lock inside me, extending our climax and driving our pleasure even higher.
I would wake with the fading memories of dominating alphas who weren’t shy about taking what they wanted from my body, claiming me in ways that felt so primal I wanted to live in my dreams forever.
But I would wake with a moan of frustration and my hand buried between my thighs on sweat-dampened sheets.
Derek never asked about what I dreamed about. I think he knew it would only make him feel inadequate in some way. But now I’m away from him, living in a house with four alphas who have told me repeatedly and shown me much more than that, that they’d do anything for me.
Instead of taking a pill, I could have them.
Still pondering my options, I walk downstairs, needing to talk about this.
It’s quiet, just me and Wyatt today.
After a morning spent with him watching me bake pies while he reclined in a dining chair and sipped on his mug of coffee, he went out to his workshop, and I went upstairs to wash up and nap for a bit.
Life these last few days has felt so normal, but in the happiest, most perfect way.
There’s been no pressure for sex. No talk of relationships or the future, which I think they must know still scares me, even though there’s been no sighting of Derek in town.
Just five people laughing, getting to know each other, and learning to live together.
Wyatt’s workshop, which is more of a shed, is about a minute's walk from the back of the house. He told me before he went out that he’d leave the door open. If I needed anything, I should shout; he’d hear me.
The warmth of a mild fall early afternoon feels good on my bare legs and arms. We’re fast approaching jeans and sweatpants weather, but for now, I’m happiest in a pair of shorts and a tank top like today, or a thin cotton dress so I don’t roast in the kitchen, where I spend most of my day baking.
As I run down the back porch stairs and head toward Wyatt’s workshop, I’m still not sure what I’m going to tell him about my heat.
I need to say something before my scent gets stronger—there’s a reason an omega’s scent is called a perfume—and their body reacts to it.
It will trigger their need to dominate me, and this rampant, desperate need for five days of sex is not something you want to surprise someone with, if only so we can let our bosses know why we’d need to call out of work.
Not wanting to interrupt him too much, I mentally rehearse what I’ll say when I get in.
I’ll tell him I need more suppressants from the doctor in town or maybe find out from the sheriff if my purse survived the fire.
That’s it.
But I’ll see what he says first. If he offers to help me through my heat, then I guess I’ll say yes. It would be rude to say no, wouldn’t it?
Don’t look at anything he’s working on in case it’s private.
The moment I push the partially open door the rest of the way, all thoughts of little white pills to kill the sexual fire that floods my body every three months go out of the window. I see the half-naked man, shoulders and tanned back glistening with sweat, and all I do is want.
Elias said Wyatt had a workshop out back, but he never told me what Wyatt makes, and I was too shy to ask in case he thought I was prying.
It’s like a furnace in here. Hot and smoky, it smells of heat and cold iron.
Two minutes ago, I was all about nesting—laying out blankets on the floor and hunting out even more soft and cozy things to snuggle on. In here, my thoughts are not soft or cozy.
They are primal and raw.
There’s a big wooden table with clamps that I want Wyatt to splay me out on and fuck me on it.
Hard.
With his back to me, he plunges the end of a red-hot metal tong into a large wooden tub of water. It sizzles, steam rises, coating him in fine sweat. As he picks up a rag from beside him and drags it over his brow, every muscle in his back ripples.
I whimper.
At the small sound, he glances my way, doing a double take. “Maisie?”
He says more words, but they come from far, far away.
Distantly aware that I need to stop staring at his sweat-glistened chest, all I hear in my head is the pounding of my heart, and my mind is full of sex.