Page 6 of Empty Heat
“We can’t implement this plan without you. So yes, of course we’d stop the moment you told us to.”
I sat up straight and planted both my feet on the floor. “I will take you at your word. When I meet him, I’ll assess again. But for now, you have yourself a new temporary gardener.”
Kestor stood at the same time I did. “Thank you, Lev.”
“Oh, hell, don’t thank me quite yet.”
3
Callum –Natural Wonder
Rhodes was efficient and soft-spoken.
I hated being poked and prodded, but who didn’t?
I was the morning of day two, time for my physical examination.
Rhodes started with an ultrasound and ended using measuring tools on my insides. He was gentle and told me every step of the way what he was doing.
I didn’t like the cold, false slickness and the slow insertions of various devices. I didn’t like that I was made to bend over the edge of an exam surface with nothing on but a back-slit gown and kneeling on a little step. But I wasn’t ever panicked.
The exam room, located on the second floor of the main building, had fresh flowers on the counter. The walls were painted pale blue and had large art depicting sapphire seas and brilliant sunsets. The fancy table I lay on had a real cushiony spread and real pillows. Everything was calmly done in a relaxing setting that didn’t even smell like a real doctor’s office.
I hugged one of the pillows to my chest as the exam went on.
Rhodes said, “Are you nervous?”
“A little.”
“If you say stop, I will immediately cease what I am doing.”
He touched me inside with a gloved finger, asking, “Does this hurt? Or this?”
He was so professionally gentle about it all, and his touch so soft, that I never felt more than pressure or twinges. I could tell he was worried because of my trauma and panic disorder regarding that area.
“How are you doing?” He must have asked me ten times.
How could I explain that I was fine with this? He was an omega, not an alpha. This wasn’t sex. I felt no intimacy. The only vulnerability came from being looked at, but since his intentions weren’t sexual, and the rest of my body remained covered, I didn’t feel any apprehension.
As with anyone, I was relieved when the exam ended.
Rhodes didn’t prolong any discomfort for me. He gave me wipes to clean up and left the room so I could change.
* * *
As we walked backthrough the sunlit glades to my cabin, we got fruity drinks from a thatch-roofed bar that offered them to any passersby. Mine was a lemon-lime soda combined with strawberries. Real strawberries had also been impaled on the side of my cup. It was delicious.
Rhodes and I walked around the side of my cabin to the back.
“There’s a break in the trees across the lawn behind your house and you can see the ocean.”
“Really? I’d love to see it.” I followed him, breathing in the surrounding beauty with every pore of my body.
“All right.”
As we came around the corner to the back porch, a man with his hair pulled back into a clip, and wearing a white kimono, was busy trimming a bush while a few bees, moths and butterflies flew around him. A neat little pile of trimmings lay near his feet.
It was an alpha.
