Page 19 of Labor of Love

“It’s me,” Zenith said from the other side of the door. “Just thought I’d leave some breakfast. That’s all. Sorry if I scared you.”

He knocked lightly on the door, and his footsteps drifted off.

Emre waited for Zenith’s door to close, for his footsteps to wander through his own apartment and settle. When he heard no one else outside his door, he scurried over and hurriedlyunlocked it, nudging Buttwheel out of the way so he could ease the door open.

A fancy paper bag hung from his doorknob. Emre brought it in and quickly locked the door, before peeking inside.

A large cup stood in one corner of the bag—hot chocolate, the label said. It was accompanied by a breakfast croissant with cheese, egg, and ham, three chocolate chip cookies, and two blueberry muffins.

Emre gaped at the sheer amount of food. “Y-you didn’t have to...”

“I was getting breakfast for myself, anyway. It wasn’t a bother,” came Zenith’s reply from the next apartment over.

Well, Emre wasn’tstupid.He wasn’t about to refuse food when he had two babies to feed. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Enjoy.”

He brought the bag to his bed, laying out its contents on the corner of his mattress to admire it all. Emre sipped some hot chocolate and moaned softly at the whipped cream. Then he took a bite of the croissant, and moaned again. He hadn’t had this much good food in... a long time. In fact, he wasn’t sure he’d ever had such a luxurious spread.

“It’s so good,” he whimpered.

Two doors down, Zenith let out a long, harsh breath.

Was he... frustrated?

Emre listened as the shower came on in the alpha’s apartment. He bit off the sugar-crusted top of the blueberry muffin and moaned, then sipped on hot chocolate. More sounds fell out of his mouth. The food was all sosinful.

After a while, there came a deep groan. Emre paused. And he heard some wet, rhythmic sounds that had him dropping everything to cover Abbie’s ears.

Was that... Zenith? Touching himself?

He definitely recognized the voice cursing lowly.

Oh, gods. Emre blushed all over.This can’t be happening.Except it was, the slick sounds growing faster, the heavy breathing going deeper. He could just imagine those thick fingers wrapped around that bulge in Zenith’s shorts.

He should cover his ears, except he had no available hands.

Emre ended up listening to every sinful second, trying not to feel guilty. Especially because he was committing it all to memory.

When it was finally over, he went back to his food, trembling. He ate more of his breakfast croissant and moaned helplessly. How was the food so good?

“Gods, fuck,” Zenith hissed.

Emre wisely decided not to ask him what was wrong, because he didn’t want to admit that he’d overheard everything else.

He saved the leftovers for the rest of the day. He fed Abbie and let her scamper around as a wolf pup, waiting until she’d exhausted herself and fallen asleep.

Then he ducked into the shower and relived Zenith’s sounds, slipping his fingers into himself.

He had to add the fingers from his other hand; four of his own were nowhere near the size of Zenith’s cock. It still wasn’t good enough—he could never quite get the right angle. At least it was enough to make him come. His sounds punched out of him, and he hurried to clean up the mess.

Then he hoped like hell Zenith hadn’t heard any of that.

The rest of the day, Emre spent poring through the newspapers he’d scrounged from the trash can downstairs. He found a listing for a cashier position on the other side of Cartfalls. He had to try applying for that; he didn’t have much of a skill set.

Except Abbie was still young, and she wouldn’t appreciate being cooped up in a baby sling as a wolf cub.

He tried to think of what he could do for Zenith in return for all the food, too, but he came up blank. He had precious little cash, all of which he was saving for Abbie.

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