“So you’d be comfortable with another woman taking samples from you?” I asked coolly, seeing his face fall. “Or a man? If we needed to gauge your responses to different sexual stimuli—”
“You,” he corrected. “You can study whatever you like, Riley.”
I let out a frustrated little hiss, because this was going to look bad, like I was using my friendship with them to completely dominate the study, pushing everyone out. There were plenty of type A personalities in science, but blatantly coming across as one, particularly in a low-level researcher like myself, was not desirable. We had to maintain the illusion that we all worked together as a team, even if we didn’t actually.
“All right, come up and talk to Candy and me, and let’s get the finer details sorted,” I said.
When we got in the elevator, that feeling of déjà vu started again. It was a small space, and they were so big… Having their bodies pressed against mine, it was all too familiar, and yet, it wasn’t. My eyes slid down Blake’s spine, taking in the broad flare of his lats, then the way his body narrowed down around his hips, remembering just how he’d felt this morning. He turned around slowly, as did the others, their nostrils flaring, low growls filling the lift, right up until the door slid open. Another person waiting for the elevator stood there and blinked, then instinctively took a big step backwards to let us out.
“Hey, Janet,” I said as we came inside the foyer. “Does Candy have the boardroom booked?”
She took a moment to respond, just staring at the guys before nodding furiously.
“I set up some drinks in there. Tea, coffee. Just let me know if you need anything else.”
“We’ve got everything we need right here,” Fen said, wrapping his arm around my shoulders and steering us out again and into the hallway.
I pulled free with an irritated look at him and then said, “Down this way.”
I directed us to the boardroom, opening the door to where Candy sat on her phone, kicking her heels, but she was on her feet as soon as we walked in. She just stared, then started fanning herself slowly.
“Damn, Riley, you’ve gotta be the luckiest bitch alive.”
Chapter 21
“So basically, in terms of the scientific community, what you’re offering is a godsend,” I said, trying for cool and clinical. “From what you’ve told me, all the emotional difficulties betas experience in relationships aren’t a factor between an omega and his or her alphas, so we get few willing to let us test them. Most of our awareness of alpha or omega physiology comes from where there’s an issue—a difficulty bearing multiple children, someone getting cancer, etcetera. Even getting access to alpha or omega cadavers has been difficult, with few willing to donate them to science.”
“We have to go back to the earth,” Fen replied, serious now. “It’s not like we’re trying to hold out on you, but wherever a pack settles, the ancestors that died on that land are tied to that place.”
I glanced at Candy, and she frowned slightly.
“That’s the kind of stuff the sociologists would study, but I don’t think we’re going to go that broad. We could potentially have the department heads of every university in the state banging down our doors. Gideon is going to have to insist on radio silence for this study.”
“I’m sure Windsor will push hard for that,” I replied before turning to them. “What we’re trying to work out is how far we can go. What are you comfortable with? Where are your limits? Usually, we set them out in a study and then invite betas to volunteer, but this is different.”
“We have no limits when it comes to you, Riley,” Fen replied.
“Holy co-dependent bullshit, Batman,” Candy said to me. “Girl, you need to be careful. Maybe we need Windsor in on this as a supervisor, to stop shit from going too far.” Then she faced the pack down. “You need to put boundaries on what you’re offering, otherwise they’ll keep you locked up in this place for years, studying you through a microscope. Blood samples, hair samples, skin samples, urine, faeces—”
“Why would you need a sample of our shit?” Haze asked with a frown.
“The gut-brain axis has shown us that a hell of a lot of what we assume is in the heart or the brain is actually determined in the gut,” Candy replied. “Now you’re around my girl, you might find that there’s a whole cascade of changes going on in you. Raised serotonin, flushes of dopamine whenever you’re close to her, your bodies pumping out oxytocin to help you to bond. Pregnant women have elevated levels of relaxin, a hormone to help their bodies adjust to having a baby grow inside them. It’s often been theorised that omegas might have much higher levels of relaxin in their blood to allow them the physical flexibility to take a knot.”
“And if we participate in this study, will you look at Riley’s levels too?” Colt asked.
I looked at Candy, and she looked at me, both of us wincing at the implications of that.
“In our field, messing with the line between subject and scientist isn’t a great idea. Some people have famously done it. Our understanding of how stomach ulcers are caused was revolutionised by a guy who tested infecting himself with a bacteria to prove its cause was a completely different thing than we thought, but…”
She sighed then and stared up at me.
“Riley, I think this is the focus of the study. We can offer to collect samples for other departments where it doesn’t become onerous, but…what’s happening here, between you six, that’s what we need to focus on. I dunno if we tell Windsor about the relationship—”
“No,” I said firmly, already able to see the look in his eyes. “I’m not doing that. That would destroy my reputation.”
Her breath whistled through her teeth, because she knew what I knew—not declaring my own involvement in this study would potentially discredit it. It was accepted that we all brought our own crap to the table, our prejudices, our upbringings, our worldviews. The only way around that was to declare any potential conflicts of interest so anyone reading our papers could then account for that when they examined our data.
“It could destroy it if you don’t,” she replied much more gently.