Текст книги "Heat for sale"

Автор книги: Ursa Dox

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Adrien went on, his eyes cast toward the shadows of the room as though embarrassed by his next words, “For a lot of reasons, I was never close to other omegas until I came to university, and I never thought it would be polite to ask the omega friends I’ve made there what to expect. It was easier to pretend it wasn’t going to happen.”

Heath almost laughed. Polite? What was polite about heat? Nothing. It was the exact opposite of polite, and every omega had the right to know that going in. The bruise on his heart grew, tenderness swelling in his chest for this foolish boy who’d been too afraid of being impolite to get the information he needed.

Adrien went on a bit tiredly, “Obviously, I should have planned better.

My father always said I lived in a dream world too much. In the end, I needed the money to pay for my future.” He met Heath’s gaze, brows furrowed with worry. “I know the school vets you all before allowing you to participate in the auction. It’s just…I want to know more than you won’t kill me and you’re without disease, and—” He broke off and looked around the room, confusion darkening his eyes. “—and supposedly wealthy.”

Heath took a slow breath and let it out, trying to decide how much to share with Adrien given his own desire to keep a safe distance and not recklessly deepen the heat crush. “You can feel free to ask questions, but I’m also free to not answer them.”

Adrien swallowed another sip of water and looked around the room.

“This place is small. Given how much you paid for me, I expected something else.”

“This is my heat cabin. I bring omegas here when I want to breed them.”

Breeding only. Knotting and fucking during an omega’s heat was another matter. Before Nathan, he’d been young and randy, and taken on omegas in heat quite regularly. Usually the omega wasn’t a virgin, though, and usually he hadn’t handled first heats, deeming them too expensive and troublesome.

He’d only done it once before now; as a favor to his father’s steward, he’d taken on his omega son’s first heat. But after Nathan, Heath had been nearly abstinent, only indulging a few times but unable to tolerate the way he’d felt so close to falling for the omegas. Those interludes had taken place at one of his more remote vacation homes. This cabin was reserved for attempts at breeding. It was the place he’d been conceived, and it was the place he wanted his own child to be conceived.

“Do you do that often?” Adrien asked. “Breed omegas?”

“No, only twice before.”

“So you have children?”

“There was a miscarriage, and the other didn’t take from the start.” Heath grimaced. He didn’t like thinking about both failed attempts. One had been

taken on with the poorest of motivations, as revenge against one of Nathan’s betrayals—the bloody, awful miscarriage had seemed proper punishment for his pettiness. Luckily, the omega was still fertile and had delivered a healthy child to another alpha at his next heat. And the other breeding attempt had been instigated in his youth, a folly of infatuation with an omega he’d met just days before a heat. They’d both been lucky a child hadn’t ripened.

Good God, he was a romantic fool. His life was a series of passionate mistakes. This time, for once, he’d keep his heart out of it. Transactional.

He’d trade a soothing knot for the pain of growing a child and a pile of money for a piece of Nathan back in his arms.

Adrien drank more water and then whimpered, leaning back against the pillow and shuddering all over. Heath took the water glass from him and put it aside on the nightstand. It was clear Adrien had more questions, but the next heat wave was coming over him quickly.

“Don’t talk now. Save it for later. Rest and get ready.”

Adrien quivered and stared up at Heath with round, frightened eyes. “I don’t want it. It’s too much.”

Heath wrapped an arm around Adrien’s body, holding him in place, and then pushed down the blankets to expose his flushed body and already dripping cock. The scent of pre-cum floated up to Heath, and he licked his lips in anticipation.

“It only gets more intense from here on out,” Heath whispered. “Stop resisting, little one. Give in to the ride.”

Adrien cried out, his body jerking as he struggled against the rising tide of uncompromising lust. Heath kissed his throat, his cheek, his clavicles, and then sucked a nipple into his mouth.

Adrien squirmed and bucked, the understandable fear of an inexperienced omega trying to hold onto sanity during his first heat clearly gripping him.

Heath rolled on top of Adrien, firmly gripping his wrists and holding them above his head.

“Give in,” Heath barked. “Ride it. If you fight, it will only become monstrous.”

Adrien started to sob, tears running down his face, as he tried to escape the inevitability of what was to come. “Help me,” he whispered between gasping breaths. “Please. Make it stop.”

“It’s not going to stop,” Heath said firmly, using his own hips to push

Adrien’s slick-wet thighs apart. “Accept it. It won’t stop.”

Adrien shoved and kicked, trying to get away, but Heath knew it was really the heat he fought against.

Heath released one arm, enduring pummels as he pried the plug from Adrien’s ass and then positioned himself to shove inside. But before he did, he paused and said, “I’m ready to help you, little one, but you have to tell me you want my help.”

“Yes, please. Help me.”

“That means I fuck you. Understand? I fuck and knot you, and it helps.”

“Please,” Adrien begged, tears running down his face. “Just make it stop.”

“I can’t.” Heath tried again, finding it hard to reach the boy in his fear-soaked panic. “But I can make it better.”

“Make it better. Fuck me, please.”

Heath thrust inside, aiming to hit Adrien’s prostate, and was gratified by the immediate orgasm that shook Adrien’s body and spurted wetly between them.

“That’s the only way this gets better,” Heath said again, fucking into Adrien with long, hard strokes. “Submit to it. Learn to love it.” He growled with pleasure and added, “You’re an omega. It’s your lot in life.”

Adrien shuddered and came again, his eyes shining with tears and lust, the heat taking him over, body and soul.

“That’s a good boy.”

Chapter Six

ADRIEN CLIMAXED FOR what felt like the hundredth time. He shook with exhaustion as the bliss of orgasm fizzled out again. He was relieved to feel Heath’s knot growing inside him and relaxed as the bulbous bulge locked them together and stilled the thrusts against his prostate.

He shuddered and gulped in breaths, tears still sliding down his cheeks, as he finally calmed on Heath’s knot. It was almost peaceful, save for the soft orgasms that continued to wring him out as the knot pressed relentlessly against his prostate.

Heath murmured soft words of praise and hushed him. Adrien’s mind gelled slowly, coming back from the shattered space of lust and firing nerves that encompassed the rounds of heat.

Heath kissed Adrien’s neck and cheek, holding him still as their bodies subsided from the relentless drive. “You’re doing wonderfully,” he whispered. “Has anyone ever told you how handsome you are? How delicious?”

“I’ve never done any of this before,” Adrien reminded him, feeling pulpy, broken open, and vulnerable as all hell.

“I’m honored to be the first to see your pleasure and hold your pain.”

Heath sounded a little awed, and Adrien didn’t know what to make of that.

Moreover, he didn’t understand why heats had to be like this—so much pleasure that it bled into pain, and so much pain that it turned to pleasure—

but he knew that going through it with Heath wasn’t as bad as he’d secretly feared. For that, he was grateful.

“You’re handsome, too,” Adrien admitted, softly. “Strong. Firm.

Commanding.” Remembering how Heath had ordered him to ride the heat, to submit, sent a shiver through him that quickly became another orgasm.

“We’ll create a strong, well-made child together,” Heath declared.

His weight on Adrien’s was a calming balm; it locked him down in place, held him to the bed, and kept him from vanishing into the heat itself.

Heath twitched his hips, and Adrien dug his nails into Heath’s shoulders,

groaning as the movement shattered him again. He felt so raw, so exposed, and Heath’s eyes didn’t leave his face for a minute, gobbling up every expression and nuance of feeling. Adrien had never been so seen in his life.

“Your pleasure is beautiful,” Heath said, and it seemed like the words almost hurt him. He rested his head on the pillow beside to Adrien, his breath puffing against Adrien’s ear.

“Why did you choose me?” Adrien asked, finally, after they’d lain together for a few minutes in silent calm.

Heath hummed a non-answer.

“I’m not worth what you paid. There has to be another reason.”

Heath gripped Adrien harder, thrust into him a bit more, and, once Adrien had come back down from the resulting sharp-edged orgasm, he chuckled when Adrien accused him of distraction from the question.

“Why did you choose me?” Adrien insisted, still panting and sweating from the last catapult into bliss. “Tell me. Lie if you have to, but I deserve an answer.”

“Lies are a waste of everyone’s time,” Heath said darkly. “I chose you for personal reasons, and that’s all you need to know about that.”

Adrien would have liked to argue, but his skin started prickling and burning again. He went very still, fighting it.

“What did I tell you before?” Heath muttered.

“Don’t fight it.”

“That’s right.”

“But your knot’s not even down yet,” Adrien whined, squeezing around it in hopes that another orgasm might delay the oncoming round of heat. He shuddered and ached, but didn’t get relief. “How can it be here so soon?”

Heath grunted. “You’re going to have to trust me on this, but get on top so you can clench on my knot more easily.”

He rolled them until Adrien was on top, straddling his thighs, his knot still holding them tied together. “Squeeze and rock,” Heath said, as Adrien’s chest flushed and his cheeks glowed with renewed need. “Don’t fight it.

Welcome it. Make it your own.”

Adrien tipped his head back and groaned as he tried to do as Heath instructed. The rising heat didn’t seem so demanding this time, and he hoped it would stay manageable. Otherwise, he’d be a mess, pinned on Heath’s knotted cock and unable to reach satisfaction. He rocked on Heath, rotating

his hips and gasping as the knot massaged his prostate.

Heath’s hand wrapped around Adrien’s dick, and he moaned, whimpering as Heath began to jerk him off at a steady, regular rate. The first orgasm was a kitten, purring and sharp-nailed, but the next one was a full-on tiger, and he roared when he convulsed on Heath’s knot, digging his fingers into Heath’s shoulders.

“That’s it,” Heath said with a bright avidness. “Do that again.”

Adrien closed his eyes, riding Heath’s knot as best as he could and shooting tiny cum loads onto Heath’s belly every few minutes. The heat stayed relatively reasonable and he was able to manipulate his pleasure to keep sane. He eventually collapsed on Heath, his body worn out as the minor heat wave faded.

“That was a ripple,” Heath said. “They don’t happen often. Your body hasn’t figured out how heats work yet. It’s natural. You probably need more food.” His knot was softening, and Adrien hoped it would release soon. His stomach did ache with hunger, but he was more tired than anything else.

When Heath finally pulled out, his cock left what felt like a huge vacancy behind. Adrien moaned and Heath soothed him again as he slipped the plug back in and kissed Adrien’s temple. “Rest. I’ll be back in a few minutes with more stew.”

Adrien slipped into a dream almost immediately. He was back at school with a big belly trying to sort through a huge stack of notes he’d made on Hontu fabric dyes, but the words all seemed to be written in gibberish. He couldn’t understand a word of it. Worse, the baby inside was going to come out very soon, and Lance was there asking, “How can you have him without the alpha that made him? How can you have him alone?”

“Shh, wake up.” Heath’s voice cut through and woke him. Adrien opened his eyes to find Heath leaning over the bed with another steaming bowl of stew. “You were having a bad dream.”

Adrien rubbed at his face, his stomach growling. “How did you know?”

“You were making frightened noises.” He sat down on the edge of the bed. “Sit up and eat. The next round will be here soon enough. You’ll need your strength.” Heath pushed the bowl into Adrien’s hands.

“Do you have peanut butter?” Adrien asked, feeding himself a steaming spoonful. He wasn’t so shaky this time. “And jelly? A sandwich would go great with this. Reminds me of when I was a kid and I was sick. Father

always made a hearty stew and PB&J then.”

Adrien spooned more of the savory warmth into his mouth, and chewed the chunks blissfully. He glanced around the room. Having grown accustomed to the dim lighting, he could now see the pictures on the walls—

all woodland scenes—and a photograph on a table. He squinted toward it, trying to make it out. Two men together, but that was all he could distinguish.

He ate in the quiet of the room while Heath watched without answering his questions about a sandwich.

“There,” Heath said, putting the empty bowl aside on the nightstand.

“We’re ready for the next round. I’ll make you a sandwich next time.”

“Are you eating?” Adrien asked, suddenly concerned. “You need your strength, too.”

Heath smiled gently. “I took a bowl while you napped. You looked too peaceful to wake at first. But then…” He shook his head. “Try to sleep some more. We don’t know how long the reprieve will be for you.”

Adrien tried to close his eyes, but he couldn’t fall into dreams. Questions crowded his mind. So, with his eyes still shut, he asked a few. “Is this hard for you? Servicing my heat?”

Heath hesitated, and when he spoke, there was a strange timbre to his voice, something Adrien couldn’t quite read, and yet he seemed to speak the truth. “The pleasure I take in you is beyond description. It’s an honor to be here with you for it. Hopefully our joining will produce a child to enrich my life going onward, too.”

“Honor…” Adrien hummed thoughtfully. He closed his eyes and drifted in exhausted calm, enjoying the softness of Heath’s mattress. It felt much more luxurious than his hard, dorm-room pallet bed. So good on his tired back.

“Yes, an honor. And perhaps it is even a blessing to share this with you.”

Again with the odd tone.

Adrien opened his eyes to examine Heath. He could see him fairly clearly this close up even without his glasses. His dark beard shone glossily in the dim light, and his gray eyes were troubled. He seemed to be confused by something, but Adrien couldn’t begin to guess what. His mind came back to the question of blessings, and he recalled his father calling up blessings every morning and night. Heath hadn’t prayed in front of Adrien that he could recall. He asked, “Are you very religious, then?”

“Not in the least. But the word still works for nonbelievers, too. I still welcome an undeserved gift from the universe, a surprise joy to be grateful for. Gratitude isn’t only for the religious among us.”

“So…” Adrien cocked his head, considering. “Is every omega’s heat a blessing?”

“I’d like to think so,” Heath said. But the he grimaced. “Who can say?

Let’s leave it that I’m more grateful for this heat with you than I had anticipated.”

This made no sense to Adrien. Heath had paid so much for him, more than was reasonable by any measure. What made this different for Heath? He seemed experienced; why was this heat not what he’d expected? “Because you want to breed me?”

Heath stiffened. “Because of personal reasons that I don’t intend to share.”

“You keep saying that. Why?” Adrien asked, raising up on his elbows, gazing steadily at Heath despite his exhaustion making that feel like a great effort.

Heath’s mouth twitched, a repressed laugh. “Perhaps I like the idea of keeping some mystery.”

“That’s not it.”

“No, it’s not,” Heath conceded, his voice so soft and somehow forgiving that it felt like a caress on Adrien’s skin. “Now rest. No more questions, little one.” He smoothed his fingers over Adrien’s forehead, and tingles broke out over Adrien’s body.

Deciding to obey rather than push, Adrien drowsed, his mind supplying him with lust-soaked pseudo-dreams that kept him from falling asleep entirely. Bright memories of what he’d done with Heath kept bursting into his consciousness, along with sleepy images of things they hadn’t done yet but about which Adrien had always fantasized.

Turning onto his side, the plug feeling almost natural inside of him now, he sighed heavily.

“If you can’t sleep, just relax. Your body needs the rest.”

Adrien opened his mouth and then closed it again.

“Yes?” Heath asked. Adrien wondered if the man would sleep at all during the heat or simply stare at him with those vigilant eyes for the whole duration.

“Will you…” Adrien blushed, not sure where the request was even coming from, only that his half-conscious mind had supplied him with the image and now he wanted to know more about it.

“Speak.”

“Will you lick…” Adrien covered his face with a hand. “I can’t say it.”

“If you can’t say it, then I can’t do it,” Heath said brusquely. “Rest, I said.”

“Will you lick my asshole? I’ve never had it done, and I’d like to experience it.”

Heath smiled, a white slash of teeth in his darkly stubbled face. Adrien shivered under the sharpness of it and simultaneously wanted to see it again as soon as possible. He felt praised by it. As though he’d earned a piece of Heath not usually shared.

“You want my tongue in your ass?”

Adrien squirmed, a low fire banking in his groin. His cock fattened up, and his hole squeezed around the plug. “I’ve never… I’ve heard that it feels…” The embarrassment crept higher and higher, burning his ears and cheeks.

“Another honor,” Heath declared, looming up over him.

“Should I…turn over?”

“Yes.”

Adrien scrambled to get on his belly. Humiliated and excited, he buried his face in the pillow.

Heath shoved Adrien’s knees apart to kneel between his thighs. Adrien groaned as Heath massaged his ass cheeks and then bent low, pressing hot, open-mouth kisses to his lower back.

As Heath spread Adrien open, he slipped out his tongue and traced it wetly down Adrien’s crack. The sensation was almost ticklish, but more erotic than not, and Adrien held his breath in anticipation. As soon as Heath’s tongue came to the place where the plug stoppered him, he pulled back and removed the piece.

Adrien felt the gape of his hole, and shame hit him. He didn’t want to look loose and used, and he wondered if Heath would back out now.

“Beautiful,” Heath growled, leaning down to tongue the rim of Adrien’s gaping anus.

Adrien bucked, startled by the slick, sweet pleasure, so intense he bit

down on the pillow, stifling his urge to cry out.

When Heath pressed his tongue inside, pushing against his rim and delving into his most secret place, Adrien groaned. He clung to his pillow and sobbed as Heath took the time to tongue-fuck him, slowly and with a firm deliberateness that could not be denied.

Adrien felt the next round of heat rising up in him. He lifted his head enough to grunt, “Here it comes, sir.” The honorific gliding from his lips unbidden.

And then it was on him.

The world dissolved into a golden-hued need to get fucked and come.

He must have begged, because when Heath shoved into him, he leaned low over Adrien’s back and whispered, “Don’t beg, little one. I’m here.”

And was he ever.

Adrien felt full to the brim, but he needed to be so much fuller. Only Heath’s knot would do. He arched frantically into the fuck, reaching behind to claw at Heath’s shoulders, whining high in his throat.

“Calm down,” Heath ordered. “Let me take care of you.”

Adrien moaned, his body surrendering to the violence of Heath’s thrusts.

He quaked through orgasms, shouted his pleasure and fear, and let himself go deep into heat-thrall. Awash in lust and need, riding Heath’s plunging cock and cresting into ecstasy, Adrien only calmed again when Heath bellowed his own climax and his knot began to swell.

As Heath crooned softly to him, Adrien rocked himself to sleep against the massive pressure in his ass.

HEATH HELD ADRIEN as he slept, his knot tying them together. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep, too, but the damn heat crush tore at his peacefulness.

He mentally reviewed all the heats he’d ever handled in his life, purposely skipping over the memories of Nathan’s because they’d always been fraught.

Yes, with every heat his heart softened toward the omega, sometimes uncomfortably so, and after Nathan’s death that terrible tendency had led to him walking away from taking on omega’s heats. But never had his heart felt quite like this.

He wasn’t sure what to make of it. He felt affectionate, yes, and what

alpha wouldn’t when Adrien had submitted so beautifully, and, after a fearful start, given in to his body’s needs so enthusiastically? He could place the blame for the additional draw he felt toward Adrien at the feet of his resemblance to Nathan, but that didn’t fully encompass it either.

Each moment with Adrien felt entirely different from the heats he’d handled with Nathan. Those had always been infused with a terror and hurt, a submission to Nathan’s whims and needs that Heath had hardly understood.

Ostensibly, he’d always been the alpha—the one to care for, nurture, and knot Nathan—but he’d never felt like the alpha. He’d felt like a supplicant, begging for Nathan’s approval, for his affection, for his love.

With Adrien, despite his superficial likeness to Nathan, the experience was entirely different. He was the alpha and felt it in his bones: dominant, commanding, and in control. He felt strong, passionate, and protective. He felt all the things he’d always wanted to be for Nathan, but had never been allowed to display. Even with the other omegas he’d handled, including the two he’d bred, he’d always been at their mercy, determined to protect their interests. His omega parent had been a fierce proponent of omega rights, and Heath had internalized those messages: allow omegas to set the standards for the heat, follow their guidelines and let them take the lead.

There hadn’t been any such discussion beforehand with Adrien, what with Heath having been determined to keep the relationship transactional and Adrien being too innocent to know that he should, or even could, draw lines and boundaries, make demands of what the alpha could and couldn’t do, to the extent of making Heath gain consent before every position change.

No, Adrien had come to the heat cabin blindly, and Heath had allowed him to do that because he hadn’t wanted to cede control this time. He’d ignorantly thought that by taking command he could control his heart, and thus had been shocked by the heat crush when it began, and was swamped by it now that the heat was in full swing.

Adrien’s surrender was so complete that Heath couldn’t help but fall in love with it, even if his feelings for the boy—no, the man—himself were unexplored and untested, unknowable while they churned and fucked in the throes of heat. But that surrender? That was something he could fall for, and he had. Oh, how he had fallen for it.

If this were Nathan he was fucking, he’d think it was a trick. But Adrien was guileless and didn’t seem to understand the way an alpha responded to a

beautiful omega in full submission, the way it made them want to beat their chest and roar, or claim the flesh displayed with abandon as their own, or fuck it full of babies to raise together in a safe, private home, far away from the meddling world.

His head rushed, blue and black dots flickered before his eyes, and he realized he’d been holding his breath. He let it out slowly, held tighter to Adrien, and tried to calm the traitorous beat of his soft, open heart. He wanted to close it off again, to protect himself from the potential pain of loving…but he couldn’t just yet. Once the heat crush was over, he could harden himself again.

And if there ended up being a pregnancy to get through together then he’d have to find another way to keep his distance and his heart intact. If there was one thing Nathan had taught him, it was that loving was never safe.

Chapter Seven

THE DAYS PASSED by in the tight-handed grip of pleasure, punctuated by a few hours of sleep and Heath supplying water and stew. Adrien felt lost to the heaving cycles of heat, thinking of nothing else, his mind a canvas painted over in the colors of erotic sensation only.

Eventually, the lulls between the cycles grew longer again, the hours of sleep deeper, and finally his appetite returned full force. Waking to a dim room, and with no sense of what time or day it was, Adrien sat up straight in bed and proclaimed, “I’m hungry.”

Heath stretched and sat up beside him. “You must be ravenous. You were so demanding in your needs that it became hard to keep you nourished.”

Adrien’s embarrassment forced him to look away, though he was secretly incredibly impressed by Heath’s darkly furred chest.

“Never be ashamed of your natural inclinations.” Heath gripped Adrien’s chin, gazing down into his eyes. “You were a perfect omega, and your surrender was beautiful to witness.” He kissed Adrien’s mouth softly and then pulled back as though he’d surprised himself. “Wait here. I’ll be right back with something to eat, and then we’ll see if you’re steady enough to make it to the shower.”

Adrien watched as Heath climbed out of bed, naked skin on display as it had been for the last several days, and he shivered as he took in for the first time how thickly muscled Heath’s thighs and arms were, and his chest and shoulders, too. How had he missed that while being fucked by the man? Heat was a mesmerizing thing.

“Here,” Heath said, striding back in the room.

“No more stew,” Adrien murmured, rubbing at his eyes in order to avoid being confronted with Heath’s full-frontal nudity and his swinging dick. It was ridiculous to be so reticent now. He’d had the man inside of him, begged for his knot, and was currently plugged up with the semen from their last bout. And yet…

Heath climbed into the bed beside him. “Fruit. Fresh strawberries. Melon.

Orange slices.”

Adrien’s mouth watered, and he scooted close, taking the proffered bowl from Heath’s hands. The sweet and tart flavors spangled over his tongue as he scarfed down the contents of the bowl. “Thank you. This is so good.”

“Do you need more?”

Nodding, Adrien waited as Heath took off back to the kitchen and returned with another bowl of fruit. After eating that second helping just as quickly, he was finally satisfied. He smiled up at Heath hopefully. “Now what?”

“Let’s shower,” Heath said, taking the empty bowl from him. “Then you’ll want to see daylight. It’s been almost a week.”

Adrien nodded, letting Heath lead him to the bathroom by the hand. A brief flash of modesty struck him, a memory of his father telling him to always cover up, but he ignored it. There was a shimmering, shy sense of rightness in being naked for Heath now. Especially when Heath turned to smile at him as he cranked on the water in the plain, white-tiled room.

“You’re steady?”

“Yes.” Adrien’s stomach fluttered, a flock of butterflies rising in response to the brightness of Heath’s teeth in his dark beard.

“You did wonderfully,” Heath said, sitting on the edge of the tub, tenderness in his tone that tugged at Adrien’s spent balls. If he could get hard again after the days of constant sexual activity, that quality in Heath’s voice would do it for him. Heath tested the water with one hand before shaking the excess from his fingers and reaching toward Adrien. “I’m proud of you. Such a strong, beautiful, sexy man.”

Adrien swallowed hard, his cock thickening almost painfully. Heath’s smile broadened, and he took Adrien’s hardness in hand, then bent to kiss the tip gently. “You are deliciously responsive.” He looked up at Adrien then, as though assessing something important. “You do everything I ask of you and more.”

“It felt right to please you. It still does.”

Heath’s jaw worked a moment and then he replied huskily, “You deserve a final reward.”

Adrien was about to ask about the word ‘final’ when Heath opened up and sucked him in deep. He moaned. His flesh was sensitive all over, a nervous, exhausted feeling, but his cock in Heath’s mouth felt wonderful.

Bathed by Heath’s tongue and stoked by the soft inside of his cheeks as he sucked, Adrien gave in to the surprising pleasure.

He closed his eyes, gripped Heath’s hair, and then sobbed as an orgasm fluttered through him, like a shadow of the intense orgasms of heat. He whimpered and gazed in glassy-eyed wonder as Heath swallowed the small load he’d produced and kissed the head of his dick again.

“Sweet,” Heath said softly. “Like the rest of you.”

The water was warm and steaming up the room. Heath guided Adrien beneath the stream before following him into the shower. “You’re wobbly after everything,” Heath murmured softly. “It’s my job to keep you safe.”

Adrien surrendered to Heath’s touch, letting him wash him with a cloth and soap, and then suds up his hair, too. The plug stayed tight inside, improving the chance of conception, and Heath washed around it, too. By the time the shower was over, Adrien was both rejuvenated and drained, and all he wanted to do was find a quiet place to sit where he could see the sky and breathe. Maybe eat again, too. Something heartier than fruit this time.

His stomach growled in agreement.

HEATH WAS LOATHE to admit it even to himself, but he couldn’t deny he was sorry Adrien’s heat had come to an end. And not just because he wasn’t sure if he would ever again have the privilege to witness the beguiling way Adrien’s throat arched when he cried out with pleasure, or the fragile vulnerability of his innocence, or the wide-eyed faith he demonstrated as he clung to Heath while they rode the heat cycles together. It was because when Heath was in Adrien’s presence he felt himself complete: an alpha, a man, a lover. He thrived on what Adrien gave him effortlessly, a priceless thing that he handed over like it was as simple as breathing. A gift Nathan had never expressed: trust. Complete and utter, boundless, unrestrained, and unreasonable trust.