Chapter 4 #2
Ten minutes. Ten minutes until I can lock myself in my apartment and try to process the fact that I’ve been claimed by four alphas. Four. When most omegas would consider themselves lucky to be claimed by one.
Oh my God, what will Leah think? I was her emotional support beta.
I fielded her panicked 2 a.m. phone calls.
I held her hand when she cried. I was the calm, rational voice telling her she was in control.
She’s not going to suggest a psych ward; she’s going to look at me with so much pity I might actually spontaneously combust.
My hand drifts to my neck, fingers tracing over the marks.
Each one feels different. Rett’s is the most prominent, right at the junction where my neck meets my shoulder.
Tristan’s is higher, almost playful in its placement.
Diego’s is softer somehow, though no less permanent.
And Dane’s... Dane’s is at the nape, hidden unless I wear my hair up, but I can feel it like a brand.
I close my eyes, and suddenly I’m back in that penthouse, the city lights twinkling below us as four pairs of hands explored my body...
“Another glass?” Diego had asked, holding the champagne bottle aloft. We’d left the gala hours ago, continuing the party in their private penthouse. Just the five of us.
“I shouldn’t,” I’d said, but held out my glass anyway. “I have work tomorrow.”
“Call in sick,” Tristan had suggested, his arm draped casually across the back of the sofa behind me. He’d leaned in, and I got a whiff of his spicy ginger scent and a glimpse of the warmth in his brown eyes. “Stay with us a little longer.”
The champagne had made me bold. “And what would we do, exactly, if I stayed?”
Four sets of eyes had fixed on me with an intensity that should have been terrifying. Instead, it had been... thrilling.
“Whatever you want,” Rett had said, his voice low and so full of promise.
And what I’d wanted, apparently, was to kiss him. So I had. I’d set down my glass, walked right up to him, and pressed my lips to his.
He’d frozen for a split second, surprised by my boldness, before his arms had wrapped around me, pulling me against the hard wall of his chest. His kiss had been commanding, authoritative, his lips firm, a hint of expensive whiskey on his breath.
When we’d finally broken apart, both breathing hard, I’d turned to find the other three watching us with identical expressions of hunger.
“Don’t look at me like that if you’re not planning to do something about it,” I’d challenged. The champagne must have made me reckless.
Tristan had been the next to approach, a playful smirk on his lips, the dimple in his cheek a stark contrast to the raw hunger in his deep brown eyes.
His kiss was different. Teasing, but no less intense.
Then Diego, whose touch had been reverent, his calloused fingertips gently tracing my jawline.
And finally, Dane, his pale blue eyes a storm of hidden emotion, his kiss surprisingly soft before it deepened with a passion that left me breathless.
The world had narrowed around the five of us.
Clothes suddenly felt like an unbearable restriction.
My fingers went to the buttons of Rett’s shirt as his hands found the zipper on my dress.
A low growl of approval rumbled through the room as my dress pooled at my feet, followed swiftly by the rest of our clothes, discarded in a heap on the floor.
“Bedroom,” Rett had growled, his voice thick with an alpha command as he scooped me into his arms, my naked skin against the hot expanse of his chest.
And somehow we’d ended up there, a tangle of limbs and kisses and discarded clothing. I remember the feel of silk sheets against my naked back, the weight of Rett’s body over mine as he’d kissed his way down my throat.
“You smell incredible,” he’d murmured against my skin. “Like nothing I’ve ever—”
“You’re a beta,” Tristan had interrupted, his hand sliding up my thigh, his dark skin a beautiful contrast against mine. “How do you smell this good?”
“Does it matter?” Diego had asked, his lips finding my wrist, pressing a kiss to my pulse point.
Dane had said nothing, but his hands had been gentle as they’d cupped my face, turning me toward him for another deep kiss.
I’d been surrounded, overwhelmed in the best possible way. Four sets of hands, four mouths, all focused on giving me pleasure. I’d never felt so desired, so... cherished.
“Tell us what you want, Zoe,” Rett had commanded, his fingers tracing patterns on my inner thigh, making me shiver.
“Everything,” I’d gasped. “All of you.”
A growl of approval had rumbled through the room, a sound that had vibrated through my very bones.
What had followed had made me go weak. Tristan’s clever mouth between my thighs, making me cry out as he tasted me. Diego’s lips on my breasts, lavishing attention on each sensitive peak. Dane’s hands everywhere, touching, stroking, learning my body.
And Rett had watched it all, his eyes dark with desire, occasionally leaning in to claim my mouth in searing kisses that left me dizzy.
“Please,” I’d begged.
“Soon,” Rett had promised. “We’re going to take such good care of you.”
And they had.
Tristan had been first, sliding into me with a smooth thrust. He’d propped himself up on his forearms, his muscular shoulders flexing with each movement. “So good,” he’d groaned against my neck. “So fucking perfect.”
Our combined release had left me boneless and wanting more.
Before the last tremor had even faded from my body, Diego was there, gathering me into his arms. He’d whispered endearments in Spanish as he’d moved inside me.
His dark hair had fallen across his forehead, and he’d brushed it back impatiently, his gaze never leaving mine.
“Hermosa,” he’d murmured, “Eres una diosa. Beautiful. You are a goddess.”
Dane had surprised me. The quiet one, who barely spoke, had been intensely vocal during sex, a steady stream of praise and dirty talk that had made me blush and burn.
“So fucking tight,” he’d growled. “Fuck, darling, take all of me.”
He'd barely pulled away, leaving me a trembling, over-sensitized mess, when Rett was there, moving over me with a dark, possessive purpose. He’d positioned himself above me, his powerful body caging mine, and entered me with a slow push that had felt like being claimed.
“Mine,” he’d growled, and the others had echoed him. “Ours.”
That’s when it had happened. As Rett had moved inside me, bringing me to the edge of another climax, he’d lowered his mouth to my neck.
“Let me claim you,” he’d whispered. “Let us claim you.”
In that moment, I’d said the words that had changed everything.
“Yes,” I’d gasped. “Yes, claim me. Make me yours.”
His teeth had sunk into my flesh, and the pain had blossomed into something else entirely. A white-hot pleasure that had torn a scream from my throat. And as I’d climaxed around him, the others had followed suit, each finding their spot, each marking me in turn.
Four claiming bites.
“Mine,” they’d growled.
And I, lost in the most intense pleasure of my life, had echoed, “Yours.”
It was a lie, of course. I wasn’t theirs, not in any way that mattered.
Betas were temporary distractions to most alphas anyway.
A fun night, a casual fling, but never a future.
I’d learned that lesson the hard way with my ex back in uni.
Two years together, only for him to drop me the second his family introduced him to a ‘suitable omega.’ He’d looked almost apologetic when he said it.
‘You understand, right? Betas don’t bond like omegas do. ’
And now I had four sets of teeth in my neck like some kind of collector’s item. Either this was a cruel joke, or I was their temporary fix for a drunken itch.
“Miss? We’re here.”
I jolt back to the present, my face flushed and body uncomfortably warm from the memory.
The cab has stopped in front of my apartment building, a six-story structure of weathered brick.
My eyes catch on how normal it looks. The window boxes that will burst with flowers come next spring.
The way the sunlight hits the brick. All so normal when there’s a storm roiling inside me.
“Oh,” I say, fumbling for my purse. “Right. Thank you.”
The driver is looking at me with a knowing expression. “Whoever they are,” he says, nodding toward my neck, “they’ve got you tied up in knots.”
I laugh, a short, slightly hysterical sound. “You have no idea.”
I pay him and add a generous tip for putting up with my weird behavior, then step out onto the sidewalk in front of my building. Home. Safety. The one place in the world where I don’t have to deal with alphas and their possessive bullshit.
I head through the tiny lobby and skip the elevator for the stairs. I’m fumbling for my keys at my apartment door, my head still spinning, when the door across the hall cracks open. It’s my nosy neighbor, Mrs. Grant. A woman who lives for gossip and complaining about the recycling bins.
“Zoe, dear, I was just—” she begins, then stops dead.
Her eyes, usually darting around critically, are wide and fixed on my neck. Her mouth hangs slightly open. The scent of four powerful alphas is clinging to me, an invisible cloud I can’t wash off, and she can clearly smell it.
The usual busybody annoyance is gone from her face, replaced by something else. Shock.
“Oh,” she says, her voice pitched a bit too high. She takes an involuntary step back, away from my door. “You’re looking… well, never mind. I should get going. You have a good day, dear.”
Before I can form a reply, she gives a short, awkward nod and quickly shuts her door.
I stand alone in the hallway, my keys in my hand, staring at her closed door. Never once in three years have I ever seen Mrs. Grant so... tongue-tied. She’s never rushed to end a conversation with me before. There’s a sudden, unsettling silence where her usual nosy questions used to be.
I haven’t even unlocked my door, and my own hallway already feels like foreign territory. My normal life is officially over.