Page 22 of Broken Heat
“I think you’ve been through a lot. You lost your mate whom you loved and that’s a trauma both mentally and physically. Your heats stopped. The only unusual thing about that is that they have been gone for so long.”
“I agreed with Coah at the time about not having children, but now I’m thirty and I want them.”
I got up and came to sit beside him on the couch, my empathy in full swing. “I will do everything I can for you to get your heats back. I promise.”
“I know. But I don’t even know how that might be. Do you really think touch and sex would change my body enough?”
“No. It’s a lot of things. What we’re doing right now, in fact. Coming to a better understanding of your emotional and mental state.”
“I get that, but I still feel like something’s missing from this whole thing.”
“Do you trust me?”
He looked at me with big eyes that seemed to contain his entire soul. “I trust you.”
“Good. Then we can start tonight.”
“Start?”
“With what you want. What you asked. I now think you’re ready.”
“For the surrogacy part? The actual hands-on?”
I nodded.
He flushed beautifully and glanced down. “Good. Because I wasn’t looking forward to another sleepless night.”
“It might be somewhat sleepless.” I had the urge to reach out and take his hand but held back.
He laughed. “Did you just make a joke?”
I raised my eyebrows in mock innocence.
“I meant it when I said it. I’m ready.” Elon bit down on his lower lip.
* * *
Elonand I walked into the dining hall and were seated by the large windows overlooking the sparkling lagoon.
“Dolphins! I see dolphins.” He pointed past the table.
“They often come at sunset.” I’d seen them hundreds of times, jumping, leaping, playing, yet I never tired of them. They always brought their joy everywhere they went. My face stretched from smiling so hard.
“How many are there?”
Dusk had started to settle against the sky and sea, but it was still quite light out. I looked for their shadows beneath the rippling blue. Two leapt in tandem. Then three. But there were more underwater behind them I could not quite make out, at least two.
“Maybe five tonight,” I replied. “I’ve seen as many as seven altogether. Sometimes there are only two.”
We sat side by side at the table facing the window, which offered us both the best view of the lagoon, and were served shrimp cocktails and fresh sea bass with garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus. Everything tasted fresh, zinging with flavor.
I knew Elon was a little nervous, though he gave no outward sign.
My body felt right, like it was preparing for a journey it had been waiting for. Which was odd for me to feel when on a case.
My therapy for the past month had been fantastic. Of course we had the best therapists here. I got to talk with Jon, who was an exuberant thirty-five-year-old omega with lots of ideas swimming around in his head.
I remembered him saying, “You can knot a friend as a favor. You can spend several heats with them and keep things casual. It happens all the time. But if you repeat it enough, and I’ve seen this happen before so many times, a connection does form. More than friendship, Mykel. Omegas have a reputation for feeling more romantic and cuddly after receiving a knot. But that’s a biased belief. Alphas feel it just as much when they give a knot. Both parties cannot deny some intimate connection even if it’s a casual affair. Certainly not all alphas feel it. And not all omegas, either. But both are vulnerable.”
