26. Nico
CHAPTER 26
Nico
Jez runs to her room at the back of the bus and slams the door. Things are thrown, dropped, pushed, smacked, and then something heavy-sounding slides across the floor and against the door, presumably. And then whimpering, moaning, a yell. And then a sob.
I exchange stares with Holden, Kai, and Thomas.
My head feels ready to explode. I’ve not slept well at all lately, and felt a bit weird. Something’s going around the crew and I don’t want to catch it—I can only assume that’s the weird hot sensation in my temples, and my stomach rippling from time to time. Now it’s worse than it has been, to be honest, though it wasn’t great inside the pub.
“I want to go in there,” I say all the same. She shouldn’t be alone, and she’s upset. We can’t exactly send Caylee in there either. This is our fault.
“Sound check’s in 45 minutes,” Thomas says softly, checking his watch.
“Shit,” Kai says with feeling.
“Why don’t we let you have a word. You’ve been around more Omegas in heat than we have and honestly, you’re probably the best man for the job right now,” Holden suggests.
He’s not wrong. Before playing music full-time, I worked part-time at a bar that was almost all female staff, and every one of them an Omega. It was educational times, to say the least.
I just nod. “I’ll see what I can do. Even just talk her off the cliff. If we leave her alone it’s only going to make her more angry at us. This photo needs to be addressed.” Everyone nods at this. Kai looks like he might actually explode. His face is red but his eyes are red-rimmed, like he was on a bender last night. And he wasn’t. I know, because I was there.
Whatever’s going on with all of us, it’s not good. And I can only imagine it’s her heat. She’s our match, apparently. And we all sense this tour might be doomed.
I have to give it a shot.
Kai steps toward the bus door and slams his hands over his ears as Jez’s sobs grow heavier. “I can’t listen to this. I’m going to break that door down. I’m heading into the dressing room.”
“We’ll come, too,” says Holden, as he ushers Thomas off the bus. The door closes. When I see their backs disappear toward the venue, next to the pub’s back door, I creep toward Jez’s room. Taking a deep breath, I rap lightly on the door with my knuckles.
“Jez, it’s Nico. Can I have a word?”
A whimper. But no reply.
“Jez, you can’t get through this alone, it’s not good for you.” And it’s not good for us. “Plus we’ve got sound check.”
A pause. “Are the rest of the guys with you?”
“No, no, they’ve gone into the venue. It’s just me. May I come in?”
After a moment and a sigh, the sounds of things moving away from the door indicates her agreement. Then it slides open, and she’s standing there with a blanket wrapped around her. My eyes goggle at the sight.
Not just that she must be roasting with her heat inside that blanket, but that she’s turned her room—somehow, in the short span of time she’s been on this bus—into a nest.
Everything is pastel. On the ceiling is a blue sky mural that makes the room look much larger. Pillows line the wall the bed touches. Some gauzy material hangs over the windows, still allowing light in but filtering it through the lavender material, giving the room a sort of glowy, magical ambience. A string of tube lights entwined with Christmassy tinsel has been draped carefully around the room, though it’s fallen down in a few places, but it twinkles on and off with a relaxing vibe. An incense holder has been blu-tacked to the built-in counter space, and three honest-to-God houseplants are also stuck down with adhesive. How she found the time to gather all this is beyond me. Probably had Caylee run out for it. But all in all, it’s a very pretty, relaxing, cozy … nest.
She built a nest, even though she hates us.
Jez backs onto the bed and sits down, again with her arms wrapped around her knees. Her eyes are red and puffy, and her turquoise tresses are tangled in a half-up, half-down style. Tears have streaked and dried and streaked again down her cheeks, and her makeup’s run slightly.
I hold up my hands to hopefully show I just want to help. “Look, I can help you if you want. Or I can just sit here while you berate me. Whatever you think would help the most, honestly. The others have gone into the dressing room. They agreed to leave me here to check in on you. I will leave if you tell me to. But since you opened the door—” I glance at the sliding door and she stares at her feet.
Then she does something I totally don’t expect. She nods, stands up, and takes my hand, drawing me to the bed.
It’s a hell of a lot softer and more luxurious than our cots, though ours aren’t bad, all things considered. She sits me down beside her, and rests her bare feet on the edge of the bed.
“I can’t do this. Not on and off for an unknown length of time. I want this tour more than I want anything. I want this chance. I want?—”
And then, she’s crying. She buries her face in her hands as her shoulders heave up and down.
“Oh, God, Jesamine, please. I didn’t mean to upset you more.”
“It’s not you! It’s not even Kai! It’s the fans—your fans. What they did, that photo was hideous, horrible! I’ve had media talk about me before, and fans make shit up online every day to seem relevant. Sometimes it’s even out of love! People are crazy. But this was done to make me look fucking tragic, and make Kai look like a stud. It was done to make me look like a laughingstock. Or to support what he said the other night.”
I nod. “You’re absolutely right. What they did was wrong. Unfortunately, shit like this isn’t unheard of.”
She wipes her nose on the back of her hand, and that’s when I notice the spreading damp between her legs. This poor Omega.
I want to comfort her and make her know she’s safe. That whatever feelings exist between us all, that she’s in good company that would never try to take advantage or risk her safety. No matter what.
I place my hand flat on the bed between us and turn to look her in the eye. Those big, beautiful blue eyes that almost match her hair in this light. I’ve never sat so close to her, or looked so closely at her. She is stunning, and no smudged makeup, no hair color, no horrific heat can change how perfect she looks to me.
Did I make a mistake in coming in here?
“Has that, that sort of thing happened to Fable?” she asks.
I almost laugh. “You really want to talk about that right now?”
She bites her lip and nods, then wipes her cheek.
“Well, if you were even a casual follower of us—before.” Before Ten to One. “—You might remember that incident with … Nyah. And how it was spread on every gossip site, entertainment news page, everywhere.”
She looks at me with an iron gaze, eyes flicking between mine. A shiver runs down my back. She nods again. “I knew you had an Omega, way before I met you all. I heard she fu—” She stops.
“Fucked us up.”
“Yeah. That. Did it really happen? The way it was reported?”
“No. No it didn’t. She wasn’t our scent match.” I clear my throat, not wanting to point out the utter proof of that right now, sitting beside me. “She was a really fun tour mate who turned into a bed mate who turned into the greatest actress I’ve ever known, at least. Pretended that she was in it for forever. We marked her. She seemed delirious in love. Her band put out that single that was at the top of the chart for that entire fucking next summer.”
“Oh yeah, the one with the ridiculous chorus. Lots of tra la las that I think were meant to be ironic but just came across as, well, a bit shit, really.” She almost gives a chuckle. Then she stops. “Oh.”
“Yeah, but don’t worry. We’re over her now. Just maybe some of us aren’t so much over the hurt and burned trust. Not to mention the shitty things the press said about us. Saying we discarded her.” He shakes his head. “Other way around.”
She seems to consider this. “That was, what, like six years ago?”
“Yep. But, honestly Jez, this is about you. I just wanted you to know none of us on a stage are immune to that bullshit. We’re a bit more used to letting it roll off our backs. Still leaves a mess, but you get good at moving on.” I pause a beat. “Can I help you get through another day of this?”
“And then I get my suppressants tomorrow,” she says, as though completing my thought. I smile.
“Will that end your heat right away?”
A shrug. “I don’t know. Hoping whatever doctor I see will be able to tell me for sure.” She starts to squirm in place on the bed, shifting her hips slightly from side to side.
She holds up a hand, palm facing me. “This—this isn’t who I am. I am not just an Omega in heat. I’m not even just a performer trying to write songs that connect people, even though that’s my dream. I’m afraid that letting any Alphas help me, gives them a power I’ll never get back.”
She shudders as if this admission alone somehow diminishes herself.
I shake my head. “I’ll tell you this for free, and you decide what next step you want. Our previous partner, which was quite some time ago as we discussed, had many male crew members, band members, friends following her from city to city. She was not loyal to us. She treated us like toys. And we allowed it.” I lean to the side, propping myself up with an elbow. “She tried to leech power from us . Hell, I think she did. You—you owe us nothing, and we take nothing. I know about Thomas and Holden. Kai knows, too. You are our opening tour mate. In that way, you’re under our watch. We ask nothing in return. Not power, not control, not rights. This is because we know better, now. She taught us.”
She stares at me then tilts her head back, inhales slowly, and lets out a smiling sigh. “Okay, Mr Fiore. I accept your very gracious offer to help.”
With that, she pulls herself back against the cushioned headboard attached to the back of the bus, and slowly, inch by inch, she spreads her legs. That’s my cue.
I crawl toward her and take the hem of her shirt. “May I?”
“Let’s be quick. Sound check.”
“Oh, fuck, I forgot! Yours is first though. Maybe the guys can start ours while they wait.”
“If they’re smart, they will,” she says with a smirk.
“In that case.” I raise and lower my eyebrows at her, then give her a cheeky grin, and we’re off.
I lift her shirt from her body and the breast spillage over the top of her black bra stiffens my cock to granite. In seconds I have her bra off and I’m looking at the most fantastic, delicious pair of breasts I’ve ever seen.
I bury my face in her heavenly skin and inhale her scent. Even through my suppressants and the headache that’s been building steadily for days, I know this is the scent I want to be wrapped in forever. Dammit.
With my lips wrapped around one nipple and the other hand cupping her perfectly palm-sized breast, I pull down the shorts she’s changed into and her panties come with them. All soaked, of course.
“Shall I?” I saw, between mouthfuls of breast. She nods and that luscious blue hair falls into her face. She pushes it back and shudders, her body getting ready for the release it so badly needs.
“Right, well, I’ll do my best.”
I lower myself to her thighs, licking my way up their insides, first one, then the other. Then I pull her legs apart a bit more, and press my mouth to her glistening folds. She tastes so exquisite, of spring arriving, of the first buds on the trees. And as for buds, I find hers in seconds and lick her like an ice cream, sliding one finger in and out of her seam while I do this.
The mewling and whimpering sounds from her turn to groans of what sounds like agony. I want to ask if she’s okay but that means removing my tongue from her clit. Instead, I slide a second finger into her, in and out, reaching around in a hook until I find the spot that makes her scream my name. And by God, I nearly cum just from hearing that.
Her body rocks and waves as her orgasm ripples through it, flooding me with more slick. God, I want more than anything to give her my knot and watch her take it all in. I have to shake myself from this.
“Oh, Nico. That was so—so.” She heaves a breath and her magnificent breasts rise and fall like a hypnotic dream.
“Need another round?” I lick her off my lips, and she smiles in a state of bliss. It didn’t take long or much, that’s for sure. But from what I know of Omegas in heat, they could go about twenty rounds and not be fully satiated. And we don’t have that kind of time.
The cruelest realization of my life.
“One for the road,” I blurt, and lower my mouth to her nipple again, squeezing and twisting the other as my three fingers on my right hand slide inside her, using the same motion. But she tries to sit upright.
“Give me your knot,” she gasps.
I hate to do it but I glance at my watch. We have ten minutes if we’re to make it on time; if we’re pushing for Holden, Kai, and Thomas to start our sound check first, before we arrive, then maybe twenty, tops, before someone comes looking. And that could get really fucking awkward.
I bite my lip. This is the biggest test of my resolve, my everything. My ability to stop. My ability to let go of my own fears—that she’ll steal my heart as Nyah did, and then destroy it. Even though I just got done telling her we expect nothing of her, that this is more or less a friendly, tour mate special.
Jesus, I am an arsehole of the lowest order.
But I can’t say no. She’s an Omega—should be our Omega—asking for my knot, to get through her heat. Who am I to hold back?
I undo my black trousers and quickly step out of them and my boxers. I stand before her, beside the bed, stroking my cock which is hard and wet with pre-cum as my knot inflates just looking at her.
Her eyes widen as she gapes at me and her mouth is open. It’d be just as delicious if she took it in there, but I know where she wants it. I climb back on the bed, back up to her waiting thighs. Gently, slowly, I ease the head of my cock to her entrance.
“This okay?”
“Give it to me, Nico, I want it now. Please.” Hearing her beg is about the most angelic thing I’ve ever experienced.
“Okay. You tell me when to stop.”
“Not necessary,” she says as she pulls me in, her hands locked onto my hips as she leans back down into the mattress. I straddle her tiny frame and slide my cock in all the way to the knot. Her hips move in time to my thrusts, in and out of her slick-drenched seam, easing her open as much as I can.
“I’m ready, please. We don’t have time to waste.”
“You just want this that bad, huh?” I tease, but it comes out more guttural than I mean it. But rather than having a negative effect, she yanks me toward her, her hands cupping my bare ass now.
“I do. Give me that fucking knot,” she hisses, her blue eyes bright and wide, but her lips curled in a devilish smile. Fuck me.
I thrust up inside her glorious folds once, twice, then on the third go, slide my knot between her lips and feel it wrench her open further.
A groan escapes my lips as she throws her head back in ecstasy—I hope. Not pain.
“All of my knot’s inside you, baby. That’s the best feeling I’ve ever had, and that’s the truth,” I whisper, leaning carefully over her, my hands weaving into her hair. I place a kiss on her hot forehead.
“It’s so goddamn huge,” she manages. Then she laughs out a kind of half-moan, and raises her hips which takes the knot in even further. “I don’t want you to leave.”
My knot to leave her, or me to leave her side? I’ll take either one.
I grab hold of her hips and we crash together, our soaked skin, her soft curves, my fingers pressing into her flesh, and then as she throws her head back and I feel her core muscles grip me deep inside, I grunt out a warning.
“You ready, baby?”
She can only nod, eyes squeezed shut in the throes of her own orgasm as mine rushes to join her. My seed spills all around her as I pull my cock out and flail onto my back beside her.
We lie there staring at the blue sky and clouds of the mural on the bus ceiling, our breaths coming in gasps. Then together we turn to look into one another’s eyes, and I swear, I see my future there. Our future.
“You are a beautiful star, Jesamine Jacobs,” I whisper. “And I will never say no to any help you need.”
She smiles and time stops. I raise a hand to her cheek and she holds it there. “Thank you, Nico. God. Thank you, so much.”
I could stare at her for hours, amazed at how quickly this has all turned. Now, though, we need to get cleaned up. We have a show to put on. And it’s going to be really hard to think about anything else. But I’m thanking every saint I can name for this experience, and for the glowing grin beaming off her face like the sun.
“Better?” I ask, hopeful.
“Best.” A massive sigh shudders out of her. She cocks her head and considers me, the barest hint of concern on her lips. I wonder what she’s thinking.
Not time to dwell, though. We hop into action and she provides wipes and towels. I sneak a peak of her bare ass as she pulls herself into clean panties and a skirt with built in shorts beneath. In a minute we’re both dressed and presentable, though she takes another minute to brush her hair and spray some product into it. It’s only soundcheck and then we’ll have time to eat and get ready for the show afterwards.
And maybe, talk more.
“Before we go,” I say, sitting on the chair at the small vanity tucked beside the bed. “Setting all heat-related stuff aside for a minute, we need a united front for the fans, the media, everyone. What if we put out a video with all five of us, solemn, and sober.”
She’s nodding, so I continue. “Something along the lines of, ‘You guys ought to know you can’t believe everything you see. That photo was not what it seemed, blah blah blah. The fan used it to spread misinformation, and while we’re thrilled to pose with you guys, the real ones know we don’t let stuff that looks this crazy get online, nor was this an actual pose. Use your rational minds and accept that what you see is not usually the full story. And frankly it’s not a story that it’s anyone else’s business to know, so it’s best to let it go.’” I pause, staring at her wide eyes as she’s nodding enthusiastically before I wrap it up.
“Then, ah, something like, ‘We kindly ask that this is what you do, and that you continue to join us on tour, have fun, be good to each other, and not assume where no facts support. We love you all.’ That kind of thing. What do you think?”
“My God, are you a professional speech writer in your spare time?” she gasps.
I laugh as I slide open the door and gesture for her to go first. “No, but I do write a good chunk of the lyrics, with Kai. Mine just aren’t emotionally very deep like yours and his. Wish they were. My style is a bit more bare-facts.”
She shakes her head like she’s in awe of this ability, but I don’t think she sees herself the same way. “Thank you for helping me feel like I’m going to survive this, somehow. But if you don’t mind—” She places a small, feather-light hand on my arm and I wonder how someone so seemingly delicate can play guitar so powerfully.
“I’ve always sensed something between you and Enzo. I love Arcadia. I’ve seen them twice and they’re incredible inspiration.” She pauses, looking down. “I know what it’s like to feel you missed you . And while I don’t think I’m on some gold-paved road to superstardom, I am opening for fucking Fable on Fire , a bigger dream than I could ever imagine. So I think I can speak from my experience so far, anyhow, and say your road isn’t his. And his isn’t yours. I don’t know how close you guys are, and I apologize if I’ve way overstepped polite observation. But I say it because, well, I’ve compared myself to you guys for so many years. And everyone in Ten to One . And at the start of this tour I told myself that all the time I spent thinking those things, examining everyone’s every move online, wondering what they had that I didn’t, I could’ve written a hundred more songs that took me somewhere.”
I smile and a warmth floods my neck and cheeks and ears, a way I haven’t felt around anyone in so long. “Thank you, Jesamine. That’s all I can say in return. You’re very perceptive. And I suppose that’s how you create the kind of art you do.”
She runs her hand down the back of her neck and smiles. “After sound check, let’s talk to the guys. If they’re okay with presenting this message with me, I want to record it.”
“They’ll absolutely be. We’ll do it. Let’s get you on that stage.”
I pray to all the saints I’m right.
* * *
After the soundcheck, by a miracle of said saints, everyone agrees. Because it’s beginning to feel at last like we’ve all subconsciously come to the conclusion that what’s good for Jez is good for us. And I don’t mean that in a selfish, what’s in it for us way. But that we’re only going to be really happy when she is. And that’s one more way to know she’s our Omega.
We record the video in Jez’s band’s green room, and the video goes live ten minutes before she’ll hit the stage. So the crowd has time to watch it tonight, if they’re still digging for info on that fucking photo.
I see her face, and the Jez who I knew from three years ago. Two different people. Before, she was sort of known for doing everything she could to grasp control. After our interaction on the bus, I feel like she’s finding her feet on her own. She seems lighter.
Maybe it was the video. I don’t fancy my chances that it was me giving her a quickie that did it. But as she stands tall in the wings, guitar around her shoulder, waiting for her moment to go on, the pain and fear flashes there that I remember from the moment we told her she was off the talent show.
I want to take it all away, once and for all, for good. So all she knows in its place is security, self-worth, and the confidence she deserves to have at all times, no matter what any audience member or fan or journalist says.
We’ve been working apart for too long. We need to work together. Be on the same page. And the messiness that’s unfolded so far proves that we could be greater as a whole. We just all carry a fear we haven’t figured out how to tame yet.