Page 101 of Full Body Hit: Part 2
Even from himself.
***
There were a lot of great things about being mated. The closeness. The trust. The synchronicity. The sense of safety.
But there was one thing that fucking sucked, and it was other shithead Alphas in the league that were stuck fifteen years in the past, when hollering at an Omega about being ‘desperate for it’ was still somehow acceptable.
“Do I need to bench you?” Coach was staring at him from across the desk in his tiny office.
“No,” Auston grunted, flexing his hand. His knuckles had split open—again—after his third fight in two weeks.
Coach let out a gust of breath. It sounded eerily similar to his sister’s ‘I care about you, but you’re an idiot’ sigh. “I get that it’s hard to deal with the comments being thrown at Chase, but we didn’t bring you over to this team so you could be a goddamn enforcer. We need you out on the ice, not the fucking penalty box. You’re costing us points, Auston.”
Auston’s stomach curdled. “That’s…come on, Coach.”
“No, son, I’m not about to sugarcoat this for you. We’re losing the race for the wild card spot to the Tulsa Tornadoes, and your penalties are not fucking helping.”
He’s my mate, Auston wanted to argue. How the fuck was he supposed to keep his head on straight when Alphas were leering at Chase, commenting on his scent, how if he wanted a Daddy so bad the Alpha would have—
Auston was getting heated just thinking about it. About how Chase would shrink up and blush and grit his teeth, spark knocked out of his eyes.
It was fucking disgusting. Those guysdeservedto be beat.
The thing was, Chase wasn’t happy about it either.
“You gotta stop,” he said that night. “We have to start winning.Please.”
Auston had never thought of himself as a particularly impulsive person. He had discipline. Adhered to his diet during the season, didn’t drink much, kept to his training schedule even in the off-season.
But God was it fucking torture to keep it inside when anybody made a comment about Chase.
He managed it, though. Eventually. Coach put them on different lines, and there Auston was on the bench, staring atChase. He could sense the change in in his mate’s demeanour, the way his scent went sour. Even in the mess of all the other players, sweaty and pumped up with adrenalin, he could pick up his mate’s scent as if he were right beside him.
A few games ago, he would have pummelled the guy the first chance he could.
This time, he took a deep breath, held it in his chest, and vowed to win the fucking game so he could ruin that asshole’s day.
It worked. Chase noticed, too, sweet in the car after the game, kissing him softly with a, “Thank you, Daddy,” like Auston needed recognition for doing the fucking minimum, but he’d take it.
Sometimes, taking care of Chase was listening to him instead of his own instincts.
***
A 3-1 win against the Halifax Lynx. An overtime win against the Portland Orcas. And then, at home, a brutal 7-2 loss against the Tulsa Tornadoes, who they’d desperately needed to beat—they were the ones battling with them for the wild card spot.
It was fucking demoralising. It wasn’t as if Auston hadn’t gone through shit like that before—brutal pummellings, the types of disappointments that sat heavy in the stomach and made him sick for days. It’d been a long time since he felt this type of desperation, though, things slipping out of his control, Auston perpetually unable to do enough.
The shitty comments towards Chase weren’t frequent, but they were often enough that they just added pressure to the pot, cranking the heat up until it felt as if he were going to blow apart, an explosion of burning steam and shards of bone.
With Chase, that building pressure seemed to threaten animplosion instead. Instead of boiling his insides like it did Auston, Chase curved inwards, weight on his shoulders, his back, the nape of his neck.
The living room had transformed into another nest, where they spent most of their free time. Sex had turned into something raw, but Chase never slipped into anything like when he’d sat on Auston’s cock for a full day. There was always something tethering him to the real world, Chase unable to let go fully. Auston had done the adult thing—had asked Chase if anything was wrong apart from hockey. If there was something Auston could do.
All Chase did was shake his head and assure him that Auston was doing everything right.
Auston didn’t think Chase was lying, but he was missing something. There was a way to open the valve and let them breathe, but he couldn’t figure outwhat…
Until the night of the 7-2 loss. The game had been a midday one, crowd full of disappointed kids and parents booing them off the ice. It was almost 8pm by the time they’d cooled down and showered and were done with media, and all Auston wanted was to go home, grab a beer, and curl up with Chase in their nest.
