Heat for sale

“Absolutely. I put the auction live last night after our conversation with a write-up about you. Alphas are always looking for an intelligent omega to breed, you know. It’s not just about looks. They don’t want stupid offspring who won’t bring any glory to the family name. So your GPA alone was enough to get some takers.”

“But I thought we weren’t going to offer breeding just yet?”

“We haven’t!” Ron waved Adrien’s concern away. “I made sure to mention that you wanted to be a professor. When the early-bidding alphas saw you were ambitious as well as intelligent, they started out with higher bids than usual, rightly assuming that you’d be offering up breeding in the end. The wealthier alphas especially want to make sure their children have some drive to take over their businesses or fortunes once they’re retired or passed on.” Ron gri

Adrien noted for the first time that Ron’s teeth were crooked. He couldn’t tell if Ron was a beta or an omega himself, but he knew he definitely wasn’t an alpha.

“How high have the bids gone?” Adrien asked, his heart pounding harder.

“Don’t you fret about numbers yet,” Ron said. “After I post the pictures, the bids will shoot way up. Because, yes, intelligence matters, but alphas are ignited by a sexy body and a pretty face. You’re going to make them cream their pants just imagining having the first go at you. And when you offer breeding after a few days’ time, oh, the fight will be on. Bids will absolutely skyrocket.”

Heat pooled in Adrien’s stomach. A weird sense of pride at the idea of potentially commanding a high price warred with the inherent disgust that swamped him whenever he thought of selling his body in this way. He focused on his earlier question, the one Ron had waved off. “Why are the alphas who want to breed bidding on me when I haven’t offered it yet? What makes them so sure?”

“Oh, they know the name of the game,” Ron said cheekily. “They figure even if you don’t offer it, they can probably convince you in the throes of heat to take on a breeding for less than the price you’d demand if you were putting it on the table right now.”

A rancid bile rose in Adrien’s throat. “That’s not fair, though. Omegas don’t think clearly in heat.”

Ron raised a thin brow. “And that’s exactly what they’re counting on.

Let’s put it this way: the world ain’t fair, pretty pauper. But you won’t have to worry about that because you’re going to offer the breeding beforehand.

Now, let’s get your glasses and clothes off and take those pictures.”

The process of being photographed was humiliating. As Adrien walked back to his dorm, evading the eyes of his fellow students, he wondered how

many of them had gone through the same ordeal. It was hard to tell an omega from a beta, since those sexes appeared so outwardly similar and were only inwardly different. Alphas, however, were easy to pick out. They had a certain swagger and were typically larger than betas and omegas. Adrien could identify them at a distance.

As he hustled down the busy sidewalks, he found himself trying to guess at the sex of each person he passed. He wondered if those he suspected of being omegas had already had their first heat and how they’d dealt with it all.

The alphas didn’t make eye contact with him, which was nothing new, but he found himself darting glances their way, curious about whether any of them had handled an omega in heat before.

He grimaced as an alpha with a thickly muscled neck lifted a brow when he caught Adrien looking. He ducked his head and hurried onward, not wanting to invite attention. Still, he had so many questions. What was a heat like for an alpha? He knew it was profoundly pleasurable—that was why they were willing to bid on omegas so steeply—but he also knew they didn’t feel as out of control as an omega, keeping their head for the majority of the heat.

But he sometimes wondered if handling a heat changed how alphas viewed all omegas afterward.

Seeing a man so undone, so out of control and lost in his lust, taking care of him, and catering to his urgent and overpowering needs…did some alphas stop considering an omega to be fully human after that experience? Is that what led so many of them to resist the changes in omega voting rights and professional certificates?

And what about the omegas who went through these heats? A heat like he was going to be in very soon? Adrien swallowed hard, pushing down the surge of fear. How humiliating would it be to go so entirely feral, to be needy beyond measure, and to be broken down like that in front of an alpha who knew nothing else about him?

Adrien wiped a hand over his upper lip. How was he ever going to get through a heat with a stranger? He’d been so embarrassed to have Ron take pictures of his asshole. It’d been horrifying. His eyes pricked and burned.

Would the shame of bending over and spreading his cheeks for Ron—squat and smoking as he bent over with his camera—pale in comparison to what he was about to face? He didn’t see how it wouldn’t. He’d have to do so much more with whatever alpha won him for his first season.

Just thinking of Ron’s contented sigh when he’d spotted Adrien’s hairless scrotum and bare hole made him feel cold inside. And the way Ron had praised him, saying, “That’s a delicious little pucker. The alphas will want to eat you up,” had Adrien’s small omega-testicles trying to climb up into his body.

“Hey, Adrien!”

Adrien groaned and quickened his step on the sidewalk. Maybe he could pretend not to have heard. Lance was the last person he wanted to see right now. And he didn’t see him, actually. The crowd around them was thick, and his eyes were on the sidewalk. He had plausible deniability.

Not only was Lance his research assistant in the art history department, and thus his underling, but he was also a happy-go-lucky omega with another year and a half at least before he’d have to face his first season. Wealthy and co

“Wait up!” Lance’s voice called out, but Adrien hurried on, pretending obliviousness.

The idea of telling Lance what he’d just been through with Ron and the necessary photographs filled him with boiling, frothy shame. He wondered if there was any way to keep all of this to himself for as long as possible.

Maybe, when the time came, he could just tell Lance and the others in the department that he was taking a vacation, instead of confessing to everyone that he was off to have his heat handled.

In a stroke of luck, a crowd of students burst out of his dormitory building just as he reached it, separating him from Lance’s long-legged advance.

Adrien ducked inside and took the empty stairwell rather than risking crossing the busy lobby to take the elevator up to his hall. He didn’t want to run into anyone he knew and field an awkward conversation, nor did he want to give Lance the opportunity to catch up with him.

He just wanted to be alone to process.

Safe inside his dorm room, he sat down, shaky and sick, in front of his computer. He had to see the truth for himself. He had to know. With clammy hands, he typed in the address of the university’s omega auction site and sat back in his seat, fingers pressed over his mouth.

There on the front page under the heading NEW AND FRESH was his listing.

He stared at the photos that Ron must have loaded as soon as he’d left the office. His asshole was there on the internet for the whole world to see. His own white hands held his ass cheeks apart and revealed it like a secret he’d kept and never wanted exposed.

His entire body flashed hot and then cold, before going so hot again that he felt sweat slipping down the side of his face. He stared at the photo of his face. In it, his eyes glimmered with unshed tears, and his cheeks flushed with his embarrassment. His full mouth was slightly open and looked obscenely red.

Creamy, pink skin! read one of Ron’s captions. These sweet buns are worth grabbing! read another. Adrien shuddered. Apparently, this was what being an omega really meant: being nothing more than a product to sell.

The rest of the write-up was similar:

Adrien is an intelligent omega with a beautiful body, a focused mind, and a pleasant personality. An excellent student with a near-perfect GPA, his goal is to become a professor here at our very own university. Needless to say, a good return on his first heat would go a long way toward making that possible for him.

Adrien’s is a special kind of beauty. Notice the fine hairs on his buttocks.

Though blond, they shimmer beautifully in the light. His fleshy ass begs to be gripped and one can easily imagine how nicely it will bounce with an alpha’s deep thrusts. His skin is pale, yes, but will flush attractively in the throes of heat.

“Painting a picture, creating a fantasy is an important aspect of my work,”

Ron had said while he took picture after picture. “And I know just what I’ll say about you.”

Adrien tucked his lower lip into his mouth, chewing it anxiously, and read on. His eyes flew wide at the next words.

Adrien is untouched. A virgin in every way. Oh, lucky alpha, you’ll be wi

How had Ron known that? Did he have access to Adrien’s health files?

He must. The only person Adrien had confessed his virginity to was the nurse he’d seen for his regular checkup, and only because it was part of the questio

Shaking, he allowed himself to scroll down, heart in his throat and fingers trembling. The number at the bottom indicated the current highest bid was greater than he’d feared but far less than he’d hoped. What if he did this and didn’t even get enough to pay for his school, much less the government’s fee to become a certified professor? He buried his head in his hands.

He shouldn’t have looked.

After a few long minutes, he lifted his head, noted the highest bid had gone up, but just barely, and closed down the site. Then he clicked open his research files on Hontu dyes and fabrics instead. He had work to do and continuing to fret about something he couldn’t control wasn’t going to change that.