“I knew that, didn’t I?” I said, feeling my eyes ache with unshed tears. “That’s why I really dreamed of you. You were there, always there, no matter what, hour after hour, day after day. It didn’t matter how long I needed you for, you were there. So in the sanctity of my own head, you were the natural choice for me to fantasise about. I imagined you taking care of me…” —I swallowed hard— “sexually, like you did everything else.”
Colt reached over, pressing my forehead to his, speaking fast, like the words needed to come out before he thought better of it.
“The others were that fucking jealous of what we had. There were more than a few punch ups over it, but I treasured every bloody moment of it, love. That bond, that trust, the way you felt.” He darted forward, pressing his mouth to mine but pulling back before I could respond. “It was heaven. Pure fucking heaven.”
“And I ripped it all away.”
I pulled back then, just trying to sit with all the revelations, when the doors opened again and a train of waiters brought in the food. It was all deposited across the table with a smile before they disappeared again.
“Eat, Riley,” Haze said, rubbing a hand up and down my spine. “None of this shit is gonna get any easier, and starving yourself won’t help.”
“Is feeding me a big part of this whole” —I gestured vaguely— “thing you guys have going as well?”
Haze smiled down at the table, then shot me a sidelong look.
“Starting to put two and two together, babe? Thinking about all those lunches we made you eat?” Colt let out a low growl, but it wasn’t a threatening thing, more a primitive response to the topic. Haze picked up a spring roll expertly between his chopsticks and then held it out to me. “You wanted to know more about the bond? Feeding our mate is something that satisfies a very deep, very primal part of an alpha. The part that wants to provide you with every damn thing you need when you become ours.”
My eyes went wide as I crunched into the spring roll, his smile becoming one of complete masculine satisfaction.
“Now try this,” Colt said, offering me something else to eat.
Chapter 14
“Spill, bitch!” Candy said, plopping down in the chair opposite my desk.
I’d floated out of the boys’ car and back into my office without being really conscious of doing any of it, and my friend had appeared some time afterwards.
“I just got hand fed Thai food by two men I spent my teenage years fantasising about, who made it clear they’ll do absolutely anything to make me happy if I’ll just agree to be their mate,” I said, staring at my desk, unable to do anything else, because my brain was still chasing its tail.
“What? I take that back. No, you take those words back. Unsay that shit because… Fuck, seriously?” I nodded blankly. “Well, then help a sister out. Where do I get myself a harem of smoking hot, studly alphas that want to cater to my every need because damn…Damn…” Candy shook her head ruefully. “I’m over here dealing with unsolicited dick pics and guys wanting to send me money for photos of my feet and you’re…what? An omega who’s not an omega?”
I’d forgotten about that crucial detail in all that heat today at lunch, but so many crucial details were slipping past me because ofthem. I rubbed at my forehead, feeling like my head was way too full, trying to find that place of cool, analytical calm that I usually looked out onto the world with.
“Nothing’s changed,” I said, and as I did, those words seemed to settle me. “I’m still Riley. I’ve always had history with those guys. It’s just all of a sudden come to the fore, but I can’t let that get in the way of what I need to do. In this place, I’m a scientist first.”
“So don’t fucking kill me, but…” Candy sat back in her chair and just watched me, carefully, quietly, and that was when I knew I was in the shit. “There’s an obvious impediment to you maintaining your objectivity here. You have a relationship with these guys. You had one before and now?” She shook her head. “The flowers, the lunch date—”
“I can nip all that in the bud,” I said with a wave of my hand.
“Don’t.”
“What?” I frowned and leaned forward, peering at her quizzically.
“Don’t nip it in the bud, not if this is a chance at happiness. I can’t claim to understand the dynamic. I think I’m just having trouble getting my head past a beta having the opportunity to get her hands on all that dick. Like, girl, this is beta spank bank material for days. Five big, muscly dudes who are packing serious fucking heat?” She eyed me for confirmation, then smiled slowly when I flushed. “And they’re all obsessed with you and only you? If I were offered half of that, I’d be out the damn door so fast, throwing Windsor my resignation letter and swipe card as I went.”
She shook her head slowly, as if giving time for all of this to sink in.
“Don’t throw your potential happiness away for a damn job. Trust me, my parents did that, wedded themselves to science rather than each other…or me.” Her lips pursed then, and I blinked, seeing a side to my friend I hadn’t even known was there. “Gideon fucking Crowe won’t be there at your deathbed, congratulating you for your contribution to science. We do good work here and have the potential to do even greater, but that should never,everreplace having a life, a family, if that’s what you want.”
What did I want? My eyes dropped down to my desk surface, absently tracing the shapes of the artificial grain printed on the laminate. I never was able to answer that question, not fully because… Because everyone had stood in the way of the one thing I knew I did want, and then when I’d tried for something else…
I remembered Fen and poor bloody Clayton, the guy being beaten bloody for the cardinal sin of wanting to look at my tits. My jaw flexed, and I shook my head. What had happened at lunch, it blew my mind, got under my skin, made me think and feel things…but the truth still remained—I was a beta, and they needed an omega.
“I can’t throw away a study that could make or break my career,” I said. “And for what? I’ll never be able to give them what they need. They’re just responding to some small part of me, some genetic flaw.”
Candy let out a long whistling sigh, shaking her head.
“Look, how about we come at it this way. What’s going on between the six of you? That’s study worthy. You are study worthy. To get it past the ethics committee, we’ll have to have your subject status as anonymous and hope the fuck they never work out your role in this, but…” Her jaw firmed then, her eyes flashing. “Girl, you need to know. C’mon, you know your scientific method. You’ve been told about what you can and cannot have, what alphas are, what you are. Accepting unproven opinion is not what we do. We identify a problem and create a hypothesis—”