Good Girl by Sam Hall

Chapter 42

I was coming into heat.

We headed back to Apothecary, to Marcus’ fortress, I realised, back to the room that they’d abandoned as everything fell to shit to try and remake something. But as I stood there, I felt the sweat pricking at my brow, coating my hand as I tried to wipe it all away.

“Omega?” Rhys asked, looking me over slowly, a picture of alpha male satisfaction.

“I think I’m…I…I’m coming into heat.”

Well, I had everyone’s attention right then. My mates were shoved to the side so the alphas could come out to play, and they were hungry.

“And what do you need from us, omega?” Bren asked, moving closer, but not enough to touch.

“I…”

“Whatever we have is yours. You know that.” Orion’s voice was gently chiding. “You just need to ask.”

“I figured this might happen,” Marcus purred, but that earned him some dark looks from his mates.

“Yeah, well, you can sit this one out until you’ve told Cyn her story,” Bren said, then smiled toothily. “You need to earn your position by her side.”

“Yeah?” Rebellious Marcus was back in the house, his shit-eating grin spreading before he looked down at me. “That what you want, Cyn? I’ll tell you the story of you and me while my mates please you?”

I nodded on automatic, the two things equally desired yet also competing inside my head, but the alphas, they moved in close, stroking their hands lightly down my arms or my back.

“How do you want this, Cyn?” Bren said with a growl, the alpha in him rising. “Any way you want it, we’ll give it to you. You just have to ask.”

“All of you,” I ground out, feeling hot, so hot, my hands going to my shirt to pull it off.

“Well done, Cyn,” Marcus said. “Having all of them focus their energies on you is a singular pleasure. Take all of them, everything they’ve got.”

His eyes glittered as he considered just how that’d go, and then he settled back in a chair as the guys moved to strip off the clothes that were sticking to me, followed by their own. I was swept up into Orion’s arms, his eyes boring into mine for a second before he smiled and deposited me on the bed, settling my head in his lap, the other two taking up position on either side of me. Then they just started to stroke me, every inch of my body, dragging my awareness with it, but it wasn’t how I needed. Marcus watched me shift restlessly, trying to force their hands closer to where I ached, and smiled.

“The first time I actually saw you was what determined the trajectory of our relationship. I’d been lurking around the backyards of the houses in your neighbourhood like a creeper, identifying which ones had daughters that were omegas, which narrowed the field dramatically. It took several days, but one time I was tramping through the trees, and there you were, sprawled out on the thick bough of the tree outside your window, book in hand, long hair moving in the breeze…” Marcus frowned. “That’s when I understood what omegas were.

“You were just a girl reading, but as I stood there, I saw it. You were too young for me to be creeping on, so my plans to steer you towards my mates and clinch the deal died as I watched you read. The unselfconsciousness, the peace and tranquillity and…a little sadness. I’d never felt protective before.

“Suddenly, I saw omegas for exactly what they were—precious things that could so easily be eaten up by the jaws of the world, without the prerequisite strengths to protect themselves. It took everything I had to walk away, leave you be, not come snooping around your house, because if I could, someone else could. Any one of the alpha fucks I’d run into at school or camp or once we were running with the gangs could’ve found you.”

A hand slid up one of my thighs, another doing the same on the other side, both men chuckling when I spread them open, but their palms slid back down to my ankles to the sounds of my growls.

“We’re gonna tease you a little, omega.” Orion tipped my head back, kissing me slowly, sweetly. “We want you desperate for us when the time comes.”

“Am,” I whined, getting restless, but the alphas, they moved, pinning me to the bed, making sure I got the message before they settled back.

“We were honour-bound to report any newly revealed omegas, to see if the gangs could get in before the academies swept in and claimed them. If our bosses had found out what I was hiding, if any of them had caught wind of you…” Marcus stiffened in his chair. “That’s when it all started, from one need—to make sure you were safe from all of it.”

He shook his head, looking down until the play of Rhys’ fingers around my knee drew a little whine. Marcus’ head jerked up, his eyes narrowed, and the omega in me loved to see the war he fought to stop himself from joining us, but his hands dug into the armchair and he held himself still.

“I could have brought you to my pack, initiated you quick, before anyone else did. That’s what most alphas would do. But when I saw you there, free, innocent, just enjoying your pleasures in a way I would never understand, you weren’t an omega that needed claiming. That would come, and I knew just how fucking sweet it would be when you asked for it, begged for it, need scoring your voice.”

But his eyes grew cold and flat.

“All of that would’ve be lost if we’d forced things. Rhys moped around for months, longing for a girl he’d barely even seen, and I wanted to punch him because he didn’t even know. He hadn’t seen the way your face lit up when you were reading a passage that delighted you or the way your hair fell over your shoulders or the long, slender shape of your fingers as you turned the page. The sensation of observing you was so fucking different to when I first saw the guys. They made me hard, made my hands go to claws, wanting to rake them down their skin, but fuck…”

Marcus stared into my eyes, the intensity making my skin burn in response.

“Alpha…” I said.

“Not yet. They’re right—you need to know. Back then, I was at war with myself. Part of me wanted to surround you, hem you in, make you dependant on me in every way. Set up your mother’s company and make sure you knew it was me that gave you the safety and stability. Have my goons surrounding you, keeping other alphas at bay. Do every fucking thing I despised Benson and his class for doing, but for such a better, more noble cause.”

He shook his head definitely.

“It was high-handed and bullshit, but I knew then as sure as my next breath that we needed to wait. This was a hunt, a long game—the ones I like the most.” I twisted in Bren’s grip as Marcus’ hand slipped lower, rubbing the heel into the lump in his pants. “I admit, I got caught up in that.” His fangs flashed as he smiled. “The chase was so fucking hot, it was hard to stop. I’d slink into your life and out again, hovering on the perimeter, observing and then slipping away again. And then Benson attacked you.”

My whines now weren’t lust induced, but remembered fear, the fever of my rising heat making it difficult to determine past from present.

“He showed me exactly how it could be if we forced you and pushed you. I saw what he did, and I saw the aftermath. You shrank into yourself, only coming out to talk to your shrink or train with your PT. You didn’t lie in trees, you didn’t traipse around in the forest. You made your life smaller because of his fucking actions.” His eyes fell to the floor. “Because of mine. I didn’t know what to do with that, having no experience whatsoever with this, so I focussed my efforts where I could. Benson and his ilk, all of them that would go down, and only when you were safe would it be time to bring you into the fold.”

His eyes darted across the room, searching for and finding Orion’s.

“But my Orion had other ideas, a grand plan to save us from his father’s bullshit, not realising I had one in play.”

Marcus got up, undoing his shirt buttons and pulling the fabric away to the panted sound of my appreciation, then he threw it away as if the garment offended him personally. Rhys moved in, rubbing his cock against my thigh as his mouth found my neck, sweeping his hand up my stomach, and Marcus watched it all like it was him that was doing it. Bren’s lips traced the curve of my breast as Orion’s hand slid down and wrapped lightly around my throat.

“Of course he did. Part of me believes if it weren’t Orion, it would’ve been Bren or Rhys bringing you into the fold, right when I wasn’t sure I could keep things secure. Right when I needed you the most.” Marcus’ hand went to his belt, undoing it with a snap, his pants and underwear following suit. “I built everything in preparation for this, for us, and yet when you walked in that door, it felt like it was all slipping through my fingers. You brought it all back, what we were supposed to be, how it was supposed to go, and right when I thought I was going to get it, I realised that for them to have what they needed, I might need to be the collateral damage. Me or you. I chose me the first time, when Benson touched you. This time, I chose you.”

He sank down on the bed, crawling towards us, grabbing my ankle and placing a searing kiss there.

“I’m going to kiss my way up your thighs now, unless you tell me otherwise. I’ll bury my face in your hot little cunt, and when I’ve bathed my face in you, I’m going to slide up and work my knot in, right as I bite down on your throat. Because I need you, Cyn, so fucking much, in ways I don’t understand.”

He always knew what was required, that was Marcus’ saving grace. He might control our lives, but he did so in a way that was so careful to give us what we needed when we needed it, and I needed him. The guys seemed to move as one then, all those cautious caresses becoming something much bolder. Rhys cupped my breast, pinching down on the nipple as Orion sucked my gasps away, then teased out more as his kiss deepened. Just as that spun me higher, I felt the prickle of Bren’s stubble on my breast as his mouth claimed my nipple, sucking hard.

“That’s it, that’s what she needs,” Marcus crooned. “Over and over, Cyn, that’s how this is going to be. We’re gonna drown you in pleasure, keep you welded to this bed until no one will ever mistake you for anything but ours.”

I couldn’t reply as he dropped his head down, kissing my inner thigh and spreading me wide.

“Fuck, Cyn…” he groaned, trailing a finger through my copious wetness. “Do you have to be so pink and wet for us?”

That wasn’t a conscious choice but an inevitable reality, a low growl of approval coming from him as my slick gushed freely, right as he forced a finger inside me. I was groaning, gasping, writhing in their grip as he pushed another in.

“Good girl,” Orion rumbled. “Such a good girl. You’re opening up for him, our errant mate. He doesn’t deserve you, but he will, I promise.”

“Even if we have to kick his arse to make it so,” Rhys added. “Taste her, Marcus. I know you’re dying to. The time for holding back is over, mate.”

And it was. He launched himself at me, his tongue going everywhere his fingers weren’t, sucking down my slick, then licking my clit over and over in long broad strokes until I screamed. An orgasm washed over me, my cunt plucking at his fingers, wanting more, more, and there was no comedown afterwards. Marcus took that as a sign, rolling my clit around between his lips, pushing the flat of his tongue up against it for a series of powerful sucks.

“Turn her over,” Marcus rasped out when he finally pulled away. “I need to taste her everywhere. I want to bury my tongue in her, lick every inch. I want my senses swamped by her. I need her so fucking much.”

My hand whipped out, grabbing him by the back of neck, not letting him pull away when something eminently vulnerable crossed his face. I held his eyes. He wasn’t going to retreat behind that façade. I stared at him, and he stared back, until finally, he broke.

“I need you, Cyn.”

“Not Cyn,” I croaked out, my throat feeling impossibly thick, and he blinked, then peered at me closer.

“Omega?”

We were strange creatures, binding ourselves to each other on two different levels, unsatisfied until we were joined via both. I nodded, his eyes widening as I shifted my grip, dragging him down on top of me. I needed that, the weight of him, them, everything, pushing me down on the bed, grounding me, and then I moved. I wrapped my legs around his waist, opening everything to him, and just like Marcus, he took everything we had and then gave just as much back.

Rhys’ hand slid down between us, giving Marcus’ cock a slow swivelling stroke, but Marcus shook his head frantically at that.

“Not gonna last long,” he said with a sigh, his eyes falling half closed, but they opened again when Rhys swiped Marcus’ cock against my seam. “Fuck, Cyn, omega, you feel so good.”

“Then feel all of me.”

I moved, a long arching stretch that seemed to allow him to slide home that much quicker, the burn harsh but wanted. It hurt to love Marcus, but we wanted it anyway, because of what came with it. My eyes flicked open, going wide as I felt him push deeper and deeper, forcing me to surrender, to accept him into me, and I did. I met his downstroke, embracing this connection with every muscle, until finally, I felt the pop of his knot.

“Fuck…”

Marcus looked impossibly beautiful and young right then, his eyes betraying something that rarely seemed to happen for him—surprise. He looked up, searching the others’ faces, and they all nodded. He wanted to say something, do something, but instead, he just gasped out, “Omega…” Then the heavy weight of his body crushed into me, his teeth, his lips on mine, as he began to move. Not far, not for long. We couldn’t, but with the frantic need that comes from a heat, he pushed me to my limits.

My body sang like it was filled with pure light, my focus on the here and now receding, because something else was shouldering it out of the way. This was it—the moment the omega rose. I was crying out something incomprehensible because I couldn’t find the words to express it, so instead, I pushed my head to one side, baring my neck, and myself, to Marcus. To them.

“Yes, omega…” he ground out, then thrust as deep as he could. It felt like he pierced my soul, right as his fangs sank deep.

I didn’t know if I’d ever felt that complete before. I knew nothing that came after challenged it, because it wasn’t just my soul and Marcus’ bound together, it was all of ours. There was a sweetness so intense, tears ran down my cheeks as I felt them all rush in, some intangible yet whip strong cord that tied us tight. I heard a million different murmured bits of praise as I sank down into it, a low throbbing sense of them.

We didn’t emergefor days, and when we did, we wore marks all over our bodies. Marcus’ bite seemed to have started a whole wave of marking each other, every limb declaring who we belonged to, even if some of them wouldn’t last. It was in this state of dishevelment that James Chadwick met us. We’d received a message that a parcel had arrived for us in the front foyer.

James looked flushed and a little worried when we emerged. I got it, my alphas were still feeling the after effects of my heat, hands on my skin, arms holding me close when we came to a stop. He held a long cardboard tube under his arm, then smiled and said, “I wanted to touch base, see how you were a while ago, Cyn, but…artist problems. We get buried in an idea, and we can’t seem to extricate ourselves until it’s out. The session at my studio…” He blinked and stared at the floor for a second, as if he could still see it. “What I saw, I couldn’t let go of until I got it down. This is for you.”

I frowned slightly, forcing myself away from the guys and pulling the huge drawing out. Rendered in watercolour and colour pencil, there we were. Was this real? I wondered, reaching out and wanting to touch it but not allowing myself. Who would with such beauty? There we all were, our humanity blazed away by his artistic vision, casting us as young gods at war or at play, I couldn’t tell. There was tension and passion and need and desire and love. That would be harder for others to see, but it was what I saw the most. A love trying to find a way, persistent as water through cracks, finding its target, despite our best efforts to avoid it.

“Well done, mate,” Brendan said, stepping forward. “You got the payment fine?”

“Yes, thank you,” Chadwick replied, scraping his hair back from his face. “But you needn’t have. This one was always going to go to you. I couldn’t imagine it hanging on some corporate boardroom wall, ignored by all and sundry. Though…” Our eyes jerked up. “If you were open to sitting again, I’d appreciate it. I have an upcoming show I’m working on, and I really think there’s something in this the public needs to see.”

“Ah…I don’t know—”

“All of us,” I said definitely, then looked over my shoulder. “We need one with all of us. I want something to record that—us.”

Chadwick nodded, a small smile forming. “The desire to record the unrecordable, to put lightning in a bottle.” He let out a long sigh. “That’s an impulse I understand well.” And right then, I knew when James stared at us, we weren’t what he saw. Something, someone else perhaps? But he shook his head and said, “I’ll be in touch.”