Heat for sale

He relaxed. Okay, this was all right. Good, even. He took off his glasses and put them on the arm of the sofa. When he woke up, he’d be over whatever was happening, whatever nastiness was growing in his head. He’d go back to feeling that lovely peace and contentment he’d felt before.

But when he did wake, he felt no different. Plus, Heath was gone, and Michael was in Simon’s arms in the garden. He tightened his robe, wondering when he’d be able to fit in his old clothes, put on his glasses, and stepped outside. He frowned. The roses had started to fade over the last few days.

“Autumn’s coming on,” Simon said, answering his unspoken question.

“Won’t be long until the bushes are bare. But they come back new every year.” He kissed Michael’s little head and smiled at Adrien, his old eyes crinkling at the edges. “Heath left something in the refrigerator for you. He said you should have it right away.”

Adrien gritted his teeth. He did miss the taste of Heath’s cum. He missed

the feeling of him pumping it deep into his ass the most, but that particular orifice felt like it would never be the same again.

A new fear dug its claws in.

What if it was never the same? What if Heath didn’t want him anymore?

A spike of anger shot through him.

Heath had bought his heat, bred him, and pampered him. Told him he loved him. He’d let him believe that they could be happy together. What was wrong with Adrien to be so suspicious now? Why was he so upset?

“Drink what Heath left for you, lad,” Simon said kindly. “You’ll feel better for it.”

Adrien took Michael from him. “He needs to eat,” he said, though the baby usually fussed when he was hungry. He took him into the gazebo and sat on the bench, undoing his robe enough to feed him. He looked out over the garden with renewed interest. He hadn’t worn his glasses so often when he was pregnant, and everything looked crisper through the lenses.

What would winter look like from his nest? No green leafy trees in the forest outside his room. No red roses in the garden. No sweet scents slipping into his nose lulling him into peace. Winter would be gray and cold.

Different. Stark.

Adrien wondered if he’d stay to see it.

HEATH PACED HIS office.

Adrien wasn’t doing well at all since the birth. He’d called the doctor twice and been told both times that this behavior was normal. Almost all omegas experienced hormone drop after birth. He was instructed to feed him alpha cum as often as possible and wait it out.

But there was something wrong. Heath sensed it.

Or maybe it was the guilt in his gut turning over and over.

There was so much he had kept from Adrien, so much that he needed to tell him.

Not to mention, he had a child now—an alpha child at that—and thus an obligation to inform his brother, Lidell, and his nephew, Ned, that he had a new heir. That was going to be an ugly conversation. Not helped any by the last interaction he’d had with them, before Adrien had been close to birthing

Michael.

Ned had been caught in an orgy again. Not a big deal in the scheme of life, except for the fact that, in the basement where this orgy was held, an omega had been gagged, tied to the bed, beaten with whips, and fucked against his will.

That was rape, and while Ned swore that he’d had nothing to do with it, hadn’t even known it was happening, and that he’d been taking part with willing— happily willing, he’d insisted—omegas upstairs, the amount of work Heath had needed to put in to protect the family’s reputation, and Ned’s, was immense. Because, God help him, he believed his nephew was a lazy, lustful sod, but he wasn’t a rapist.

Still, he’d told Lidell off for not keeping a better leash on Ned, and, as usual, that’d led to all kinds of bad blood being brought to the surface. “So says the brother that I literally had to peel off omegas when he was in college.”

“I was a worthless pig, but that doesn’t mean Ned should be.”

“Then you took up with that trash!”

“Don’t talk about Nathan. He’s dead. Show some respect.”

“Respect? For the low-class user who wanted your money and nothing more? He fucked how many alphas behind your back? Probably in your own bed! He even let one breed him, for fuck’s sake. Thank all that’s holy the pregnancy didn’t take because you would have raised that bastard as your own and put him in as heir.”

“Shut your foul mouth,” Heath had shouted, his hand going around his brother’s throat. He’d shoved him against the wall and shaken him. It hadn’t been nice. It hadn’t been kind. It definitely hadn’t been pretty. It’d echoed all their interactions since childhood: Lidell needling him until he used the threat of violence to shut him up.

It was a side of himself he didn’t like. A side of himself that Nathan had only seen once. During that very episode Lidell had the nerve to bring up.

The baby hadn’t lingered in Nathan’s womb; it was true. But it wasn’t because of Heath. Lidell told it true. Heath would have raised it as his own if it meant that Nathan would stay. But instead, Nathan had gone off alone for a week and come back saying it had been taken care of, and that, strangely enough, had hurt Heath almost more than the infidelity that had brought the baby into their lives.

He sat down at his desk, rubbing his face with his hand. He hadn’t shaved since Michael was born. He hadn’t intended to let his beard come back in, but it was, relentless and dark.

Like him, he supposed.

He picked up the phone to make the call. Now was as good a time as ever.

Might as well bring at least a few secrets into the light.

Chapter Twenty

FOR THE FIRST time in a long time, Adrien remembered he had a cell phone.

He plugged it into the wall and let it charge, surprised when a number of texts came through and a lot of missed-call notifications. He sca

He used the phone to take a picture of himself with Michael and sent it to Lance and the others with a short message.

A

Then he sent another message just to Lance.

Sorry I missed your calls and texts. I forgot to charge my phone for a few months.

Pregnancy hormones will do that to a guy. Thanks for trying to keep in touch. I’ll do better.

A short time later his phone rang. And for the first time since he’d arrived at Heath’s house, he spoke to someone outside of his nest.

“So what’s his place like? Amazing?”

“I’ve stayed in the nest most of the time.”

“The nest?”

“Yeah, these really comfortable rooms and a garden that he had made for me.” It wasn’t true that they’d been made for him, but he’d pretended long enough that it felt true, and it made him feel special to say so. Lance didn’t know the difference. “I actually haven’t ever left it.”

“Wow. So you have no clue what the rest of his pad is like?”

“It’s a castle,” Adrien said, laughing softly. “I saw some of it when I first arrived. It was imposing.”

“You’re living in a castle, but you haven’t gone exploring? Are you even

allowed to or is this some Bluebeard kind of shit?”

“Bluebeard…?”Adrien didn’t get the reference.

“Right. I forgot about your weird religious background. It’s an old fairytale about an older alpha who breeds a young omega. They’re happy. In love. But he tells the omega the one thing he must never do is look inside this one room.”

Adrien felt a weird chill go up his back. He thought irrationally of the photo album with Nathan’s name on it. “And?”

“So of course the omega looked in the room one day.”

“And?” God, why was Lance making him work for this? He already felt sick to his stomach as it was. Probably from the hormone letdown, but…

but…there was something else, too.

“It was full of the bones of all the dead omegas he’d bred before him.

He’d killed them. The babies, too. Supposedly for daring to look in the room?

Or maybe it was because he was insane?”

“Because killing people for looking in a room isn’t insane?”

“Maybe they died in childbirth. I don’t know. But in the end of the version my omega parent told me, the omega ran for his life and never looked back. But I read a version here at university where he was caught looking in the room, and his alpha killed him and his baby, too.”

Adrien shuddered, holding baby Michael closer. “Good story, friend,” he said, mimicking the way Lance always talked to him. “Hilarious.”

“I’m not saying your man’s go

“I am allowed. I just haven’t.”

“Why?”

“Wait until you’re knocked up. Then you’ll understand.”

“The nudity thing?” Lance said, scoffing. “Please. I have no shame. I’ll be naked as a jaybird everywhere and anywhere I want in my alpha’s house.

Everyone can just deal with it. My youngest step-omega parent was always naked. He just gave up clothes eventually. My father liked it that way.”

“I bet he did.” Adrien sighed. He almost regretted talking to Lance now.

He already missed the blissful bubble he’d lived in while growing Michael so much, and with every word, Lance was destroying it even more.

At that moment, Michael started to fuss, which gave Adrien the perfect excuse to disco

earth again. He opened his robe, grateful that his skin was no longer so sensitive that even the silk felt harsh, and placed Michael onto his nipple.

The sharp pain of Michael latching on reminded him of Heath’s pinching fingers when they’d fucked, and he felt a strong, overwhelming loss at the memory. He shoved that thought out of his mind.