Page 26 of Pack’s Pledge

* * *

She smelled like Conall.

I’d run into her in the kitchen, late at night, getting a glass of water, half-dressed and hair mussed, and want pin her up against the refrigerator. Or in the morning, on my way out the door to work, she’d be lounging in Conall’s pajamas on the couch with him, the two of them curled into each other in a way I’d never seen from him before.

The worst part was that I had fooled myself into thinking I’d been catching her looking at me. Smiling when she saw me, and laughing at my jokes. Fluttering her lashes, or whatever.Flirting.I couldn’t help the way I felt about her—she was beautiful, and funny, and smart, and she practically lived in my goddamn apartment, and she smelled like my packmates, like home and safe, like I wanted to touch her all over and kiss my own scent into her mouth—

It was torture. My only solace was that Beau was suffering, too. Not that I wanted him to suffer, of course, but at least we could be miserable and horny together.

“I’m going to take a shower,” I muttered to him on a Saturday afternoon, having stared greedily at Britt as she left for her shift at Ardor. Or, rather, for her apartment, where she’d scrub the scent of Conall from her skin and hair before reporting to work. She’d be here again, late tonight, and he’d cover her in his scent again. “Want to—”

“Yeah,” he said unhesitatingly, and followed me to the bathroom, swatting my ass on our way down the hallway.

“Fuck,” Beau moaned, as I pressed him up against the still-cold wall of the shower. The hot water had warmed the room, steam filling the air and muffling his whimper as I shoved my tongue into his mouth, kissing him with little warning and less finesse. We were almost the same height, and I reached down between us to fist both of our cocks.

“You’re wet,” I said, neutral, and he scoffed, looking around us at the shower enclosure.

“You know what I mean. You want me to get you off like this, baby, or do you want me to fuck you?”

“Youknowwhat I want, A,” he said, as I slicked my hand up and down our cocks, squeezing tight.

“Yeah, I do, greedy bastard,” I said.

“Mmm,” he groaned, and rolled his hips, fucking his cock against my own.

“A pretty beta,” I whispered, “name of Britt?”

“Fuck, yes,” he said, and I continued.

“You want your cock in her mouth?” I crooned. “You want to have him tasting your come on her tongue when he kisses her?”

He was close, his knees growing weak enough that he brought his hands up to brace himself on my shoulders. I was close, too—the throb at the base of my cock growing more insistent as my balls drew up tight underneath.

“Or do you want to fuck her pretty ass while Conall knots her, baby?” I asked. I knewmyanswer. My hips jerked as Beau’s eyes rolled back.Just a little more.“You want to get her real slick for me and watch your alphas—”

Beau gasped, his hands tightening hard on my shoulders as he came, the profusion of slick, clear liquid coating our cocks and his stomach and chest, and I ground harder against him as the friction disappeared, chasing my own release with a murmuredyes, baby—

The toe-curling pleasure rolled over me and I slammed my mouth against Beau’s in one last bruising kiss.

Then, afterward, came the shame.

* * *

She smelled like Conall.

“No, it’s not that,” Beau said, drinking coffee again, on another morning, after the two of them had left. Getting brunch. I wasn’t jealous. Iwasn’t.“I think it’s because she smells like… like pack.”

“What?” I said, blunt.

“You know I’m not, like, one ofthoseomegas,” Beau said, and I nodded.

“A woman.”

“No,” he shook his head. “I mean, one of those touchy-feely omegas. That’s not an exclusively female trait,” he added, looking at me meaningfully. I sighed. He was right, of course.

“Sure. Your point?”

“But she… Shefeelsright.”

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