by Addison Cain
Why she laughed, Brenya didn’t know.
Jules was gone by the time she found the energy to peel her body from the soaked floor. Padding barefoot across the hall, she went right back to her home in the Red Room.
Bernard Dome’s new Commodore returned at dark, stern as he asked her to take a seat across from him.
Glaring.
The very look of Jules Havel was so intriguing that she stared right back.
Tension did not exist between them, even though it was neigh an hour before he broke the silence. “Whatever training you received from Jacques Bernard is not a performance I expect from you.”
“What do you expect me to perform?” So far, the only thing he had ordered her to do was walk, and that had not gone well.
“The Queen of Greth Dome has asked my permission to exchange letters with you. She is a kind woman and someone I respect. The first arrived today, along with pictures of a painting she is creating as a gift. I believe it would be appropriate for you to create a gift in return.”
Sweat prickled Brenya’s brow at his tone, Brenya’s thoughts darting to the slick-soaked pants she had stuffed into a crevice in the bathroom.
Without missing a beat, Jules Havel continued, “You have a skill for clockwork, I understand. You dropped a cog in my ship.”
It was she who broke their extended eye contact, glancing to the side while scenarios flipped through her conscious. Make a clock? From random pieces? Not just take one apart and put it back together. “Yes, I would very much like to make the Queen of Greth Dome a clock.”
Very much!
Little tools and gears. Hours focused on the minutia. There would be so many glorious mistakes.
Twitching fingers were already working imaginary bits and bobs. Ships were relatively big. It could be as tall as Jules. No! A small clock would be more difficult to calibrate. More fun!
“Then it is settled. Everything you need to sketch out schematics will be waiting for you in the room across the hall. That will be your workspace. The fabrication department will queue your request behind daily necessities and emergency work.”
“Can I start now?”
“No.” A male who had glared so ferociously the moment before almost smirked. “I find myself at a place in life where I understand the need for balance between work and pleasure.” Jules said that last word as if he didn’t fully understand it.
Pleasure? Clearly, he was ready for her to perform, Brenya already sliding to her knees to pleasure the man as she had been taught.
Shooting to his feet, Jules roared, “Get up and sit back in your chair!”
None of it had been intentional, yet she had ruined her chance to make a clock. Sadness crashed, the wave breaking apart the brittle excitement she’d known.
“Hear me, woman!” Grabbing the glittering vase of flowers that came each day when the breakfast cart was outside the door, Jules Havel threw it to smash into a cascading shower of glittering crystal. The window he had aimed for solid as it had ever been. “You are not permitted to touch me unless you want to!”
Her eyes stung, but she refused to ruin this further by crying... or speaking. Rapid nods were offered instead.
The man actually ran his fingers through his hair, mussing the short ends in a very human gesture. “It’s not your fault.”
“Sometimes, I see things inside you that suggest something I felt constantly from Jacques. You don’t touch me, but you want to. I want to build a clock.”
“Do you want me to touch you?”
He knew the answer was no. The question had been a reminder that she slept deeper and deeper inside her circle of pillows.
From anger to hunger to longing, brief flashes of emotion each differing in their taste, and each fleeting. Vanishing from Jules Havel's mind as if they had never existed.
Their stare began again, only this time, the man seasoned it with words that she would never forget. “When you are ready, you will come to me, and though I promised once to hurt you, you have my word that I will not.”
Again, she was the one who broke their gaze, looking to the mess for something to do besides sit and grow warm.
When she moved to stand, he lifted a hand. “Don’t touch the glass. Your mind and body have enough to heal as it is.”
Three Alphas armed with a vacuum, floor wax, and a tray of simple food came and went in a blink.
Brenya ate gruel, smiling at the taste. The man drank something that stank of rotting tubing. And then they went to the separate ends of their bed.
In the dark, Brenya could have sworn Jacques touched her hair, shrieking as she roused from sleep to scrabble away before he might mount her.
The nest of pillows scattered, Brenya locking herself in the bathroom as if that trick might work.
She’d seen the man rip the door from his own lavatory. That didn’t stop her from bracing against the wood.
Jules’ voice came instead. “When you are ready to come out, there are matters we need to discuss.”
He did not sound angry. Glancing into the emptiness of him, the Beta was the same neutral calm as always. But Jacques, Jacques was scratching for attention just enough to bring gooseflesh on her body.
Minutes passed, and she felt more foolish. Jacques Bernard was not in the room. He hadn’t been any of the times she had jumped at shadows or thought she heard his purr.
Unlatching the door, she found the Beta rebuilding her nest. Shy, she went to help him, altering the placement of a few soft things for optimal structural support.
“When an Omega is parted from the person they share a pair-bond with, mental decline commences. Auditory hallucinations, physical reactions, nightmares.” The perfunctory way in which Jules said these things, it made it seem immaterial, manageable.
It felt no different than a supervisor outlining her duties for the day.
Handing her the last pillow to place wherever she wanted, he met her eye and took the fresh calm of the moment away. “Jacques Bernard has been under a medically induced coma, a feeding tube ensuring he receives optimal nutrition. However, this situation is unsustainable. It is clear to me that it would be in your best interest to have Jacques functioning.”
That was why the Alpha’s psyche had withdrawn like low tide. He was there, but he was quiet, and the idea of him crashing back in left Brenya shaking her head. “No.”
Jules Havel explained further, emotionless and unresponsive to her refusal. “There will be times you will be required to tolerate his presence. How often those moments arrive will depend on your reaction to his absence.”
Shaking her head more firmly, she clutched the last pillow to her chest. “No.”
“He will be assigned to tend Lucia through her pregnancy.”
Brenya didn’t know what that meant, and she didn’t care. “Please don’t give me back to Jacques Bernard!”
It looked like the Beta considered reaching out to touch her, wielding a firm voice instead of a soft touch. “You share a pair-bond with the Alpha. He will be an unavoidable nuisance for the rest of your life. But do not imagine that I would ever let him fuck you. You will never kneel again to take him in your mouth.”
When he gestured for her to climb into her nest, she did, retreating under the covers as if the whole night might go away.
Jules underestimated Jacques’ obsession if he imagined the Alpha would leave her alone.
A warm purr came from the Beta climbing into his side of the bed. An auditory caress that was so different than the purrs she experienced in the past.
Yet it worked the same; her eyes grew heavy, and the knot in her stomach loosened. A strange hum fell from her lips, Brenya floating on the cusp of sleep.
When the phantom touch came again, she didn’t scream.
She slept.
She woke, she dressed, she looked through the information the Queen of Greth Dome had organized for her. The final note was from Jules, informing her where she might find a space set up for her work.
&nb
sp; Upon preparing for her day, her heel found a single missed shard of crystal. It burrowed in, cutting her foot as she padded dazed across the floor to the room she had discovered the day before. Tiny droplets of blood were left behind to soak into the wood.
She would not think of Jacques. She would think only of gears and what might be done with them.
Under the fresco, bathed in great light, simple supplies had been prepared for her. A drafting desk, paper, pencils, the tools of the trade for the life she had once lived.
Hours later, Jules pulled the shard from her heel, Brenya ignoring him as her pencil flew over a tilted desk.
Standing over her shoulder, near enough she could feel the heat of him, already saturated in the subtle scent of him, Brenya explained what he had not asked. How this clock would work.
She talked for ages, flipping through the pages she had drafted, her hair wild, her voice alive.
Everything was wonderful, until she felt his lips brush her hair.
The unnamable wave that had followed confused her.
Unsure if she even felt what she thought she had felt, the tickle on her scalp no different than any breeze, Brenya dropped her pencil. The sound it made as it rolled from her tilted desk to the floor was deafening.
“You were saying?”
“This part...” Had she really just called it a part? An integral piece of machinery was so much more than so rudimentary a title.
Male arms braced against the desk as he leaned forward to look. The heat of Jules' body seeped into her as if they actually touched. “Yes?”
“I read the letter from Greth’s Queen. She sent me pictures of things I’ll need you to explain to me if you want me to understand the context enough to reply.”
She refused to lift her eyes from her draft but could swear the Beta was smiling. “Such as?”
“Jules… I am—” Brenya swallowed, working to keep her breath even. “—not sure this clock will be an equivalent to her painting.”
The man’s right hand lifted from the table, the edge of his fingertips running along her throat until they lightly traced the bite mark on her neck.
It was the growing tightness of her nipples that awakened her to the sound she had made. Snapping her head straight, she stood, her back hitting his chest, so she might circle the desk and move an appropriate distance away.
Her first thoughts were so random, so wrong, that she hated almost telling him to file a request for a mental hygiene visit. That after requisitions approved, she would have the formal paperwork stamped and he could have sex with her just as she had done with George.
Her second thoughts were of embarrassment—because, of course, she had imagined the touch. It had been nothing more than another hallucination.
And her third?
Her third was that she wished it had been real. That she wished he would order her to her knees.
“Brenya.”
Already growing limber, she leaned closer. “Yes?”
“I cannot join you for dinner tonight.”
“Oh.” She took a step away, unsure why she kept touching her hair. “Um.”
“It’s going to be a spectacular clock. Promise me you won’t stay up too late working on it.”
There was no way she was going to be able to work on it until this strange sensation had passed.
He left her.
Alone, the door barred from her side, her back to the floor and her eyes on the ceiling, Brenya looked upon the beautiful fresco of Red Consumption and let her hands stray where they would.
Left nipple pinched between her fingers, labia glistening as her hand touched a part of her that no longer hurt, she came.
The Gods had seen it all. Even the smile on her face.
On the other side of the door, a man groaned. As if he had been pressed against the wood listening to her touch herself.
As if he had shared her climax.
Gathering herself from the floor, cheeks flushed from more than just release, Brenya reached for the latch, only to shriek when a knock shook the wood before she might open the door.
An Alpha guard spoke through the wood. “Mrs. Havel. There has been an incident regarding Jacques Bernard. We are to return you to the Red Room and follow security procedure level five.”
The Red Room was less than ten meters away, but she had been rushed there as if her workspace across the hall were up in flames. When the door closed, it was barred.
It was an hour before Jules came. So much for their dinner apart. He said nothing as they ate plain fare, watching her.
She still felt strange, like he was waiting for her to acknowledge why it seemed so warm in the room. It wasn't until a gasp left her lips and legs involuntarily parted under the table that Brenya went from cautious to frightened.
A knot was blooming, dumping wretched filth.
Shooting out from her chair, staring down at her lap, she found there was nothing there.
Just a small pool of slick she had not even realized had grown between her legs.
“Jacques is awake and, at my explicit order, currently knotting Lucia,” Jules began, watching her as she groaned from another unwelcome sensation. “A pregnant Omega who has lost or has been separated from her mate requires tending, or her child will abort. He cannot have you. Lucia has no one. It is the solution that benefits all parties… to a point… and will keep the Alpha distracted until he learns control.”
Jacques was coming again, Brenya catching her weight on the back of her chair, eyes rolling into her skull.
Whining as if the shrill noise might bring her relief, Brenya squeezed her thighs shut, hoping it would stop the waves of sensation and the churning gush of slick.
Jules sounded almost sorry. “He is your mate, Brenya. The pair-bond cannot be undone. For your own wellbeing, there will be times you must spend in his presence. Is it not better if he is sexually exhausted beforehand?”
“This is because of what I did today?” How she had touched her own body for relief.
“He did not respond well to your pleasure. Even partially sedated, he killed two of the medical team assigned with monitoring him before he could be restrained.” Standing from his chair, Jules Havel circled the table and came to her. “But, Brenya, it is your body, and you can do what you want with it. Jacques must learn this and perhaps find a purpose serving an Omega in need.”
A conflicting mess ate her up between climaxes, yet one emotion stood out against all others.
Betrayal.
He had touched her over the table. That had been real!
Jules had known Jacques was awake… that all of this would happen as a result.
Those eyes that saw everything, that burned like the heart of the hottest blue flame, held no remorse.
Reaching out a hand, a man who had been very decent with her, became anything but. Voice pure hunger, Jules Havel purred, “It’s time, Brenya. Invite me into your nest.”
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BRANDED
Wren’s Song, Book One
“Accept my seed, Omega.”
The breath wafting over her cheek was rancid, but it was the last thing Wren might take stock of when that thing was cracking her pelvis in half. She had done as she’d been instructed. Remained docile when the man had yanked her legs embarrassingly wide over his thighs. She had even ignored the thick thatch of coarse salt and pepper hair on his chest scratching her back when he hoisted her up.
He’d growled as her mother told her he would, and torn through her barrier with one impatient yank of
her hips. Unable to scream, Wren had only arched her spine, head thrown back on his shoulder. The Alpha, either oblivious or uncaring for her comfort, grasped her hips, bobbing her up and down his veined cock three times. With the fourth rude shunt, he’d clawed at her softer places and driven her down until her ass cheeks slapped against his lap. Immediately something ballooned inside her aching guts. It pressed her bladder to the point Wren was certain she’d dribbled more than a little piss on her buyer, continuing to expand until squished bowels, organs, and jangled nerves all screamed for relief.
“Damn you, Omega. Take my seed!”
Take what where? She didn’t understand what she was supposed to do now.
At her back, the stranger panted, shifting beneath her as if he too were extremely uncomfortable. When she failed to perform, his irritation quickly translated into anger. The stink invaded Wren’s nostrils, it made her skin buzz.
Angry Alphas killed.
Angry Alphas must always be appeased.
Staring forward across the dimly lit, yet finely appointed space, Wren inhaled and exhaled on the count of three. There was nothing to be done about the stinging stretch where her legs were hooked over the man’s spread thighs. He had not offered to take her to a bed or even asked to see her build a nest. No, the couch in his fine house’s receiving room had suited his purpose well enough.
Examine and test the stock.
Fuck the virgin with her father on the other side of the cracked door.
The man who’d brought her to sell listening to this. To the Alpha’s strained breaths, to his grunts and wheezing.
Her father was listening to her failure.
Wren forced herself to look down. She had not seen the Alpha’s cock before he’d shunted it unexpectedly into her, or even had a good look at the male. Her eyes had been downcast when they arrived, lest her father strike her for insolence. She had disrobed for inspection. She had moved as commanded and not resisted when the Alpha yanked her to the nearest seat.