AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You’re sure you want to go home? You don’t want me to drop you off at your friend’s place? Charlie, or Sophia, maybe?
He remembered their names.I shook my head: Charlie would ask too many questions, would want to talk it out, and Sophia… she’d be wonderful and sweet, and her boyfriend would be hovering in the background, reminding me of everything I didn’t–couldn’t–have.
“I just want to be alone,” I said.
The air in the car became even more oppressive. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Madison–”
“Please, Lucas.”
His hands tightened on the wheel, reminding me of Gray, and I sat in silence until we pulled up outside my apartment building.
He said nothing as I gathered up my things and slipped my feet into the heels I had worn to a dinner I never got to have. I knew they looked ridiculous with Rian’s clothing. “Walk of shame” was right. Only as I slid down from the high passenger seat of the SUV did he speak.
“Madison… please, call if you need anything. Anything at all, and–and… good luck.” He paused, and I watched as his the muscles of his jaw twitched under his skin. “Any pack would be honored to have you.”
“Thanks,” I said. That was goodbye.
I trudged up the steps of my apartment, opened the door. The leftovers in the fridge were growing mold, so I made myself a piece of peanut butter toast, which I ate standing over the sink. I plugged in my phone and turned on the water in my shower, leaving Rian’s clothes on the floor of the bathroom as I stepped into my second scalding hot shower of the day, washing myself again with my own shampoo, my own drugstore body wash. I rinsed off, and shut off the water, the leaky faucet my landlord wouldn’t fix dripping water on me as I toweled off. I needed to do laundry–my towel was musty. I’d need to wash Rian’s clothes, too. He’d said he didn’t want them back, but… I didn’t think I wanted them, either. I could donate them, maybe.
I checked my phone as l crawled into bed, unsurprised to find hundreds of unread texts in the group chat Charlie, Sophia, and I shared, many of them featuring a lewd array of emojis:fire, peach, face with drool, eggplant eggplant eggplant.I didn’t feel up to responding, not right now. I just wanted to sleep.
And then I saw another text, received on Saturday night, timestamp: 11:45.What’s up, Mads?
Brent.
Don’t think about Brent.
What had I been doing Saturday night? Had I been eating strawberries from an alpha’s fingertips, or getting fucked by one? I couldn’t remember–I had been deep in my heat. Either way, wasn’t it better to remember your Saturday nights, even if it was lackluster, even if you ended up unsatisfied? I texted back before I could stop myself.
I’m so sorry, I was crazy busy this weekend. What are you up to?
CHAPTERTHIRTY-SIX
Rian
I went to bed early,not even waiting for Luc to get back from dropping Madison off or my sheets to finish their tumble dry cycle. My own bed was bare, and my feet took me, unbidden, to the nest room, where I collapsed into the pile of soft blankets and pillows that Luc and I had prepared days ago for Madison’s arrival. I crashed into unconsciousness nearly instantaneously.
The sun was high in the sky when I pulled back the curtains the next morning–or, afternoon, really. The blackout shades meant I hadn’t woken up with the sun, and I guess my body needed it. My brain was thankful for the respite, too–it had been sixteen hours during which I hadn’t thought about Madison, hadn’t replayed her wan face and the way she shrank from me as I approached her in my closet.
Now, though, I was awake, and she was all I could think about.
I forced myself to the office, to the dining room for dinner with Luc and Gray, to the den to stare at a basketball game I was positive none of us were watching, but at night…
My sheets were back on my bed, but I didn’t dare to go near it. I knew it would smell like her, despite the scent-stripping detergent I had used. Her perfume would linger in my pillows as well as in my memory. I showered in the guest bathroom and stumbled to the empty nest again.
Luc and Gray were struggling, too, I knew. I could feel their sadness through their bonds. It was natural, for an alpha to miss the omega they’d spent a heat with. It was an intimate thing, a precious gift. Lucas had been wary about taking her home to spend her post-heat alone–something about hormones, as usual, endorphins and adrenaline, I tuned him out–but had reminded all of us that it was Madison who was in control, Madison who had made that choice.Madison, Madison, Madison.I had nodded, like I was listening, and left the room.
In the early hours of the morning, when I would lay awake in the wide nest, waiting for sleep to come to me again, I would replay the moment when I had bitten down on her, when my teeth had clamped down onto her neck and I had felt, for an instant, like the four of us were one body, one undulating wave of pleasure and feeling and–
Love.
Had the bruise–which had looked viciously purple on Tuesday morning, her hair tied tight and my undershirt hanging from her hunched shoulders–faded? Was it gone, my mark? An alpha’s would have stayed, the permanent scar evidence of the bond between them, but mine was transitory, there and then gone, like a skinned knee or a papercut.
I came close to texting her a thousand times.Want to get coffee? Just us betas?I didn’t. It would hurt too much, and besides, she wasn’t a beta. We both knew it. I couldn’t be friends with her, not when I’d seen her staring up at me glassy-eyed, not when I’d felt her come on my cock, not when she’d fallen asleep in my arms.
Not when my alphas were being so careful not to jeopardize her independence.
Not when I’d bitten into her skin and felt my heart break, just a little.
