Page 32 of For What It's Worth

His dominance radiated around me, growing stronger, sharpening his pine tree scent, and demanding my submission. But my body wouldn’t listen. The stronger his scent became, the more my body reacted in equal parts fear and arousal. His grip tightened until a whimper escaped my throat.

“Calm, Omega,” Enzo growled, his voice laced with an alpha tone I couldn’t deny. My body stopped trying to grind on him, stopped trying to get away from him. I just froze and handed over complete control. “Good girl, Orsetta.”

Even though I preened at the compliment, I wasn’t feeling truly subdued. I wanted a knot. I wanted Aidan. An omega’s secret weapon was their alpha’s desire to please them.

“You smell delicious, Koda.” He pulled my face closer to his. My heart jumped, anticipating feeling his lips on mine. Instead, I found my lips pressed against the space connecting his shoulder to his neck. When my body rose slightly, I realized it was Enzo inhaling deeply, scenting me. “How is this possible?”

I tried pushing away from the alpha, not sure if I was trying to answer him, go back to grinding on him, or reach for his lips now that I was closer than before. But his grip didn’t loosen. I tried again before giving up and contenting myself to lean against him, inhaling his pine forest scent.

“I don’t know,” Jen said, although I wasn’t sure to what. “Sebastian said he would need her to agree to give samples of her blood. But as far as he’s learned, this hasn’t happened before. He did warn that her body might have more beta influences than just her scent.”

I growled at the mention of a male not in my pack. My brain struggled to understand the full implications of Jenson’s words, but Enzo stiffened under me. Disliking the change in the alpha, I nipped at his neck, not to draw blood, but enough to get his attention and leave a small red mark. Liking the mark, no matter how temporary, I set my lips around it and sucked until I was sure the mark was bigger.

The purring told me Enzo liked my actions. Despite the pleasant vibrations being sent to the space between my legs, my body suddenly felt low on energy, so I contended myself to giving soft kisses around the dark red mark on his neck and zoned out the alphas’ conversation, letting their words act like a kind of lullaby.

I must have fallen asleep, because the sound of a slamming door had me on high alert and a growl releasing before I could check myself. The amused look from Jenson told me I wasn’t as scary as I thought, but I didn’t pay much attention to him because the hurt look on Aidan’s face made me regret the defensive action.

The cab of the car quickly filled with the aroma of tacos. Meat, spices, and—I sniffed the air again to double check—grilled vegetables. Not wanting to seem ungrateful (and fully intending to pull off any vegetables that had ruined my taco before I ate it) I ignored that particular scent.

Enzo easily lifted me off his lap, but instead of returning me to my previous seat, he set me down directly next to him.

“She can’t sit there,” Aidan said, my usually joyful alpha sounding grumpy.

Already reaching over me to buckle my seatbelt, Enzo stopped, turning his head over his shoulder to look at Aidan. “Why not?”

“Middle seat is too dangerous.”

Jenson turned around too, before nodding in agreement with Aidan. Enzo pushed me over back to my original seat, buckled me in, and sat in the middle seat himself.

“I thought the middle was dangerous?” I directed my question to Aidan since he seemed to have the most knowledge on car seating placements and safety.

“The safest place for you is behind the driver.”

“But Enzo is in the middle seat.”

“That’s safer for you too,” Jenson said.

I wanted to argue some more, but it would’ve taken too much energy to focus my thoughts and then get those thoughts to my tongue, so I didn’t bother. Leaning against Enzo as Jen started the drive home, only the smell of tacos managed to keep me awake. Until even then, I was lulled to sleep by the cruising rhythm of the car.

Chapter Eighteen

A beautiful accent tried convincing me to wake up, saying, “Come on, Orsetta. We have to get some food into you.”

I moved to roll away, to hide from the voice and fall back asleep, but the bed was more like a cocoon, holding me in place. I didn’t like it.

“Why don’t we just let her sleep?” a different voice asked, whispering to keep his voice quiet.

“She needs to eat, or she’ll feel like shit tomorrow,” a third voice said. “Little bear, if you don’t wake up soon, your tacos will go cold.”

The reminder of tacos shot enough adrenaline into my body for me to open one eye. Only inches from my face was Jenson, squatting down so he was at my eye level and running a hand along my hair. There was definitely amusement in his scent, but it was mostly overshadowed by the sternness on his face.

I wiggled my toes and fingers, rolled my shoulders, but the amount of energy it took to actually sit up was too much. Exhaustion threatened to pull me back down, and I wasn’t strong enough to fight it. Cold tacos weren’t too bad, right?

“Fine, if you’re not going to eat your tacos, Koda bear, I will.”

That got me up. I shot into a sitting position, my sight going dark at the edges and my whole body swaying slightly. Lots of hands reached out to steady me, two on my hips holding on from behind me, and two on my cheeks as Jenson tried steadying my head. It took a couple deep breaths and lots of blinking, but my body finally returned to normal.

The first thing able to penetrate the fog that was my thoughts, was that I wanted my tacos. Immediately after thinking that, my body became aware that two males were touching me. If I leaned forward, I would’ve been able to capture Jenson’s lips with my own and taste my alpha. I could encourage him to finally sate the hunger that had temporarily tempered off but that I knew I could rise with the simple action of meeting his lips. If I leaned backward, I could wrap my fingers around the back of Enzo’s head and—

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