AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I mean…no pressure, obviously.”
“I…” Ishir was stumped. Would that really work? Wouldn’t Ishir’s Alpha smell be off-putting?
Still, there was only one answer Ishir could give.
“Yeah. That’s—I can do that.”
Zee’s face cleared. “Yeah? You wanna?”
Ishir nodded, words stuck in his throat. He’d never even imagined he could want something like that.
Zee smiled, pulling him close.
Ishir settled against him, mind whirling, but it didn’t take long for the exhaustion of his body to overtake him, plunging him into sleep.
CHAPTER TEN
Ishir tried not to obsess about it.
There were a lot of things he could worry about. What if Zee realised that this was a bad idea? What if he found an Omega he wanted to spend it with instead, and he had to break it to Ishir, gently but firmly, and Ishir had to go off somewhere, humiliated and broken-hearted? What if, when Zee’s rut started, Ishir’s Alpha scent was too much?
What if they spent it together and Ishir was a disappointment? Ruts were instinctual. What if Ishir wasn’t enough?
The days passed, and Zee gave no sign that he was second-guessing his decision, however. Ishir could tell Zee had stopped taking his stabilisers, the air around Zee thickening until the smell of him was everywhere, hanging heavy in their home, in the car, in the locker room, on the ice.
It was inescapable—the best fucking thing to ever hit Ishir’s nose. He’d gulp it down at night, alone in his bed, so hard it was all he could think about, barely able to get to sleep from how insane it made him.
“You’re allowed to come during my rut, right?” Zee asked him the morning of their last game heading into the break.
“Yeah.” It’d be impossible not to, and he didn’t want to set himself up for failure.
Zee grinned, his expression feral. “Good.”
Ishir’s heart pounded in his chest, so loud he’d have been surprised if Zee couldn’t hear it.
It wasn’t just Zee’s scent that changed in the days leading up to the rut. Zee himself became omnipresent, shadowing Ishir’s every move. He’d press against him on the couch, sit beside him on the plane, during outings with the team. Even in the locker room, barely anybody else could get close to Ishir, Zee a wall between him and the rest of the world.
Ishir loved it. It was wrong, maybe, but he fed off the way Zee would glare if Bergy got too close, how he rumbled with displeasure if any of the guys touched him, even if it was to slap his back after a good game.
Ishir wasn’t scoring goals, but fuck if he wasn’t raking in the points. ‘The ultimate playmaker’, the media called him. He felt invigorated, as if he were showing off for his Alpha, as dumb as that was.
It was as if Zee knew it, too. “That’s my boy,” he’d growl after each win, throwing an arm over his shoulders and keeping him close.
Zee became obsessive about feeding Ishir, too. Would insist on paying for their meals, and almost threw a tantrum the one time Ishir brought some groceries home.
“What even is that?” Zee snapped, pointing at the bags.
“Just some snacks and stuff. Oranges…shit to make smoothies. Got some of that protein powder we like.”
“I could have gotten them,” Zee argued, sounding genuinely annoyed. “You just left the apartment without even telling me—I was in the shower for like five minutes.”
“Okay, I didn’t know I had to inform you of my every move.”
Zee opened his mouth, eyebrows slanting angrily, and then snapped it shut again—probably because he was being ridiculous and he knew it. “Just sit down. I’ll put these away. And tell me next time you need something.Ican get it.”
Ishir threw his hands in the air. “Fine.”
Honestly, he should have expected Zee to get insanely protective—it was just a heightening of their usual dynamic.
