32. Scarlet Sage
Scarlet Sage
The first wave of intense heat tears me out of sleep before dawn.
It pours through my body in a long, brutal rush that leaves the sheets wet beneath my thighs and my hands twisted into the blankets.
My nest smells of cedar, cinnamon, cardamom, and the green sweetness of my own omega perfume.
Every scent is amplified until breathing feels like swallowing.
Wes lies behind me, one heavy arm across my waist. Roman is curled against my front, his face tucked close to my throat. My body recognizes both before my eyes open.
Alpha. Beta. Mine. The thought rises from a place beneath language.
I push closer to them, desperate for skin, pressure, anything that might quiet the ache hollowing me from the inside. Wes wakes with a rough sound, his body hardening against my back as my scent changes around us.
“Scarlet.” His voice is thick with sleep and the deepness of an alpha.
I reach behind me and catch his hip. “Closer.”
Roman lifts his head. Cardamom and cinnamon roll through the nest, warm and grounding, but it’s not enough. I need him against me, inside my space, wrapped through every place Wes can’t reach.
He reads the plea in my face and slides one thigh between mine. “It’s all right. We’ve got you, love.”
His mouth meets mine while Wes’s hand moves along my stomach. The cramp rolling through me tightens, and I bite down on Roman’s lower lip.
He groans.
Wes’s fingers spread below my navel. “A wave?”
“Yes.” The word breaks apart as the pressure sharpens.
Roman kisses me through it. Wes presses his palm more firmly against the cramp, his chest sealing to my back while his purr rolls through the mattress.
The vibration sinks into me, but it’s not enough. I need more. I twist between them until I can reach both. One hand slides into Roman’s hair. The other finds Wes’s neck and pulls him down until his mouth closes over my shoulder.
Their scents collide around me. The ache swells.
“Need you,” I whisper.
Roman’s lips travel along my jaw. “Which one of us?”
“Both.”
Wes’s teeth scrape my skin without breaking it. “Good answer.”
His hand slips lower. I’m already drenched.
Slick coats my thighs and the blanket beneath me, more than any heat I’ve endured.
My body has spent years learning to survive these days with toys, cooling packs, and locked doors.
Now it has two men in the nest, and every instinct inside me celebrates by becoming greedier.
Wes’s fingers slide through my wetness. My hips jerk into his hand. Roman catches my mouth again, swallowing the sound as Wes circles my clit. I reach between us and find Roman hard beneath his briefs. His breath falters when I close my hand around him through the fabric.
“Love.” The warning in his voice dissolves into a groan when I stroke him.
Wes watches over my shoulder. His eyes have gone dark, alpha power filling the nest until my omega purrs in answer.
He catches Roman by the back of the neck and pulls him into a kiss across my shoulder.
Their mouths meet hard. Roman’s hand tightens in my hair. Wes’s fingers continue moving between my legs while he kisses his mate, and the sight of them sends another spill of slick over his hand.
Wes’s mouth curves against Roman’s. “She likes watching us.”
Roman turns his face toward me, lips swollen. “Do you?”
“Yes.” My answer is breathless.
Wes kisses him again, slower this time, their tongues meeting while Roman’s hand slides down my body and closes around Wes through his sleep pants.
Wes gives a deep, involuntary growl.
The three of us move together. Roman strokes Wes. Wes works his fingers inside me. I keep my hand on Roman, caught between their bodies while the nest fills with purrs, harsh breath, and the slick sound of every touch.
My mind blurs at the edges. The heat strips thought down to sensation.
Wes curls his fingers, and I cry out.
Roman’s mouth drops to my breast, and his tongue circles my nipple while Wes drives me toward my first orgasm. My hand loses its rhythm around Roman, but he covers it with his and moves us together, guiding my grip over his cock while he strokes Wes with the other.
All three bodies remain connected. The pleasure rises too fast.
“Wes.”
“I’ve got you, little omega.”
The name pours through me. I come around his fingers, clenching hard enough to make his hand still inside me.
Roman bites gently at my nipple, his purr vibrating against the sensitive skin while my orgasm runs its course.
It doesn’t satisfy the ache. It only deepens it. I roll onto my back and reach for Wes. “Knot.”
His control fractures across his expression.
Roman pulls my soaked panties down my legs while Wes strips. I watch the two of them touch as they move, Roman’s palm dragging over Wes’s chest, Wes catching Roman’s wrist and kissing the inside before lowering himself over me.
Roman settles beside us, one hand wrapped around his own cock while the other strokes my hair away from my face.
Wes rubs himself through my slick, and the head of his cock catches on my clit. My body opens for him before he enters, my hips trying to force him where I need him. He pushes inside with one slow thrust, and the stretch drags a broken sound from my throat.
“Look at me,” he says.
In his gaze, I see my own hunger reflected.
Roman’s hand slides between our bodies, finding my clit while Wes moves. The heat turns every deep stroke into hunger. Wes drives deep, pulls back, and fills me again while Roman keeps pace with him.
Their hands meet over my body. Wes’s fingers cover Roman’s for a moment, directing the pressure before Roman turns his wrist and grips Wes’s hand instead. Wes bends to kiss him.
They remain linked over me, their mouths moving together while Wes fucks me. I lose whatever remains of restraint to my omega.
I grab Roman’s hair and pull him to my mouth. He kisses me while Wes’s lips move along Roman’s neck. Roman reaches back, gripping Wes’s ass and urging him deeper.
“Harder,” I beg.
Wes answers with his body.
The bed shifts beneath us. Pillows tumble against the wall. My nest closes around all three of us, saturated with our scents and the pounding rhythm of Wes’s thrusts.
Roman speaks against my mouth. “Tell him how good he feels.”
“Full.”
Wes growls.
“More,” Roman says.
“Deep. I need more.”
Wes’s control burns away. His hips drive harder. The base of his cock swells, the growing knot catching each time he pulls back.
My body clenches around him. The wave rises again, hotter than the first. Sweat slicks my skin. Roman’s fingers move faster over my clit while Wes reaches between us and closes his hand over Roman’s cock.
Roman cries out against my throat.
Wes strokes him in time with every thrust.
The three of us fall into one rhythm. Wes inside me. Roman’s hand between us. Wes’s hand around Roman. My fingers tangled in both of them.
“Come for me, little omega.”
Wes’s command tears an orgasm out of me.
I arch beneath them, crying his name as his knot pushes inside and locks us together. The stretch floods my body with another rolling crest. Wes shudders over me, his hand tightening around Roman until Roman comes across my stomach with a raw groan.
Wes turns his head and catches Roman’s mouth before they bring me into a rough and hungry shared kiss. Wes finishes inside me on a shout, breaking the kiss.
I lie beneath them, full of Wes’s knot, Roman’s release warm on my skin and their scents thick enough to taste.
The need should recede. Instead, it snarls back to life.
My body rocks against the knot. The movement draws a helpless sound from Wes.
“Again,” I whisper.
Roman looks down at me. His hair clings damply to his forehead, and his eyes hold the same feverish hunger burning through me.
Wes presses his face to my neck. His teeth settle over the place where a permanent mark belongs. Every part of me opens toward the pressure.
“Bite me.” The request leaves my mouth before thought catches it.
Wes freezes.
Heat rages around the pause. My instincts push toward his teeth, demanding the bond, demanding every door closed behind them.
Wes lifts his head. “No, sweetheart.”
The refusal cuts through me, sharp and burning. I make a wounded sound and reach for him, but Roman catches my hands and brings them to his mouth.
“Scarlet.” His use of my name forces my eyes toward him.
Wes remains buried inside me, his knot holding us together while his hands cradle my face. “I will bite you when you ask me outside the heat.”
“I’m asking now.”
“You’re asking for relief.” His thumb strokes my lower lip. “I want forever.”
His words should comfort me. The heat hears denial. Rejection. My scent spikes bitter at the edges.
Roman presses his forehead to mine. “Stay with me, love. We’re right here.”
I breathe him in. Cardamom. Warm cinnamon. Roman.
My certainty flickers. For one terrible second, his scent shifts. Cardamom becomes too sweet, unfamiliar, layered beneath the chemical trace that clung to the poisoned bundles.
My stomach drops, and I pull away from him. “Who are you?”
His face goes pale.
Wes’s purr stops mid-vibration.
The room tilts. Cedar remains sharp behind me, but the other scent slips beyond recognition, close enough to touch and impossible to name. It’s wrong. Fear crashes through the heat.
He doesn’t grab me. He brings my hand to his face and presses my palm against his cheek. “Scarlet, eyes on me.”
I study the shape of him. Dark-blonde hair, damp at the temples. Hazel eyes, widened with fear. The faint scar near his chin. My fingers trace it. “Roman.”
His breath shudders out. “That’s right, love.”
The cardamom and cinnamon return all at once.
I fold toward him, sobbing into his shoulder as Wes holds both of us. His knot remains locked inside me, anchoring my body while Roman repeats my name against my hair.
Wes’s voice is low above me. “That was loss of scent recognition.”
Roman’s hand closes around mine. “Cole said hospital.”
“I know.” Wes reaches for the phone. “As soon as the knot releases, we’re going.”
The outdoor security lights flash on. Wes’s body stiffens over mine, alpha turning from mate to defender in one breath.
Roman reaches for the tablet on the nightstand and opens the camera feed on the greenhouse. A hooded figure moves between the rows, carrying a narrow metal case toward the back door.
My heat doesn’t care about the threat outside. Need builds sharp and overpowering. Fever burns through me, and I claw at Wes’s back.
“Alpha, I need you.”