Page 24 of Hangman's Knot
Julius looks ready to brawl, his cock still glistening from where it had been inside of her. A fight between those two was the lastfucking thing they needed, especially with Luke just out of the hole.
Tenor needed to calm this down quick before the two of them got physical, which looked like it could happen way too easily given how hopped up both of them were on protective alpha hormones, aggression pouring from both sides through the bond.
"She's been having heat spikes," he explains quickly. "We're just looking after her, like you said."
Luke's eyes snap to the shivering omega in his bed as Tenor's words sink into his pack brother's thick skill. The big bastard pauses for a moment, then averts his eyes when he sees she's naked. He softens his voice, directing the question to her. "Is that true, ma'am?"
"Y-yes," she says, her voice quavering, still looking as if she's about to get her ass spanked.
With a heaving sigh, Luke relaxes and enters the cell, dropping his kit onto the top bunk of the bed they'd just been fucking her on.
"Well, fuck me, then. Wasn't expecting that."
Chapter Eight
Eden
???
She had only met Luke for two minutes before now, but they were two minutes that changed her life. They were two minutes in which he saved her life. They were two minutes that brought her to this pack. They were two minutes when she stopped being alone and started being a part of them.
She hates that she suddenly feels exposed and awkward with his return. Hadn't she worried about him every night? But hadn't she also been having sex with his packmates in his bed every night? And now he was back. And he smelled as warm and safe as the others did, even under the harsh fragrance of the de-scenters they used.
Luke respectfully averted his eyes when Tenor crouched in front of her to redress her in her beige jumpsuit. When the three of them walked to the mess hall for breakfast, they surrounded her with Julius taking point and Luke and Tenor crowding behind her from the rear.
It felt like a well-rehearsed dance they'd done a million times before, like the four of them just fit together.
And she couldn't deny that it felt strangely safe and whole,something she hadn't expected when dealing with any alpha, let alone one who she had seen literally break a full-grown man's bones with his bare hands.
"You still got the same work detail?" Julius grunts to Luke as he shovels food in his mouth.
Eden has to avert her eyes at his enthusiasm. The way they ate tended to roll her stomach. It always tended to remind her of the shows on National Geographic with the lions tearing apart a gazelle carcass.
Luke just grunts in response, which Eden assumes must be assent. He's too busy inhaling his own plate to respond with words apparently.
"Eden's with us," Julius returns.
Luke grunts again. And that seems to be the end of the conversation.
She briefly wonders whether the pack speaks another language that she just doesn't understand, like some sort of pidgin clicking language, or maybe they used the bond? She'd heard it could be used to communicate feelings. She had no idea though, obviously, never having had a bond herself. Even if she'd suddenly become interested in the idea recently.
???
She supposes, given the upheaval in their routine and the anxiety from the morning, she should've expected another heat spike.
Luke's eyes can't seem to stop straying to her nest in the metal shop, like it's a beautiful exotic bird that hopped into their prison workshop.
She's tucked in the corner of it with one of Tenor's books, tryingto concentrate, but she finds her eyes straying to him too. He's so big, bigger even than Tenor and Julius, and she finds his presence comforting as much as she finds it nerve-wracking.
Her scent grows so slowly she doesn't realize what's happening until the spike is on her like a fist closing around her lungs.
Julius notices at the same time as she does. He's across the room in seconds, crouching in front of her and intending just to scent her and investigate what she needs, but when the power of her spike pheromones hits him, he groans.
"I've got you," he rumbles.
Then Luke is there too. "She smells like–" he takes a deep inhale. "She smells like fucking heaven. Holy fuck, how does she smell that good? Like sweet pomegranates. Fuck, I love me a good pomegranate."
Without asking, without warning, he reaches out and catches her by the hair, his big hand tangling through the golden strands and cupping her head as he leans in close for another whiff. The movement is so possessive, so dominant, she cannot stop the whine that escapes from her throat in response.
