by SM Olivier
“When we moved in with the Cavaliers, for a while it seemed to make them go away for good. I had a few episodes here and there, but I found that Tae Kwon Do and meditating helped. I went nearly four years without another incident. Then I had my miscarriage, lost my sister, best friend-slash-boyfriend, and it started again.
“I realized if I drank a lot, I didn’t run, but too many hangovers taught me it wasn’t an ideal solution. Than Sylvia slept with me most nights, and for the nights she couldn’t, I installed locks above my bedroom door and over my windows. I locked myself in at night. The problem with that, though, is that I feel no pain when I’m in that state. I vaguely realize it’s happening, but it’s like my mind doesn’t know my body’s hurting itself.”
I held up my knuckles, where I’d punched through the glass of my bedroom long ago. The thin white scars covered my entire right hand. I leaned forward and pushed up my shirt, indicating the scars on my back I had gotten from climbing out the window onto my fire escape.
“I woke up in the hospital with these. I even had to go through a slew of drug tests before they retained my records, proving I wasn’t on drugs… just stressed.”
“Do you always scream before you run?” he asked as he gently spread an ointment on my scratches.
I looked into his dark eyes and saw no judgment in them. He didn’t look like he thought I was crazy. I saw no pity. If anything, his eyes held understanding and even determination. It set me at ease. I nearly sighed in relief.
He proceeded to wrap my feet in gauze and then slid a pair of socks onto my feet. Next, he wrapped bandages on the areas with multiple lacerations. I looked like a mummy from my elbows, down to my shins.
“No,” I admitted. “I know when I do, because my throat hurts, like it does right now. I’ve been told I can get really loud. Other times I just run. Sometimes, I didn’t even know I was running. The only way I knew was because Trevor took off my shoes. I used to sleep with shoes on because I didn’t want to screw up my feet.”
“Is it always… him you dream of when you run?” he inquired.
I shook my head. “No.” At his skeptical look, I continued. “Tonight I dreamed of him, but sometimes it’s manifestations of other fears. Standing in front of over one thousand members of the student body, naked, as I had to give a speech. Hearing my mom call for me and running to find her so I can save her. The dreams aren’t always the same subject matter.”
He lifted me and began carrying me back to a room that looked like a break room. Like the bathroom, it seemed fairly nice and clean, considering that it wasn’t the largest of stores.
He sat me on a couch and grabbed a bottle of water, some ibuprofen, and handed them to me. I smiled my thanks at him before I took long pull of water. He sat on the edge of the couch next to my hip.
“If you’ll allow me to, I’d like to make sure one of my men, or me, is with you at night.” He picked up my hand, and I was surprised by his tender gesture. “You woke up screaming, and before I even knew what was happening, you were running out the door. Felix tried to stop you, but you elbowed him in the eye. A pack of infected was near the hotel, and you ran right past them. You drew them after you. Luckily, you decided to scale a fence, and it slowed them down some.”
With a look of contemplation, he gently traced my barely discernable scars on my knuckles. The touch of his long bronzed fingers was both soothing and nerve-wracking.
“I was able to reach you on time, Avery, but I’m not sure about next time. The world we used to live in was dangerous, but things have changed. We don’t just have to worry about the normal predators, ones like you thankfully survived, but the infected now, too.”
Now I felt further embarrassment. I’d hurt Felix? I could only imagine the chaos I had caused tonight. I never wanted to be a burden.
“I’ll ask BJ and Sylvia to watch over me until…” My voice trailed off. My episodes didn’t have an expiration date. There wasn’t any guarantee of getting better, ever.
“What about my men and me?” he asked softly as he traced his thumb on the inside of my palm. “We all carry demons as well and wouldn’t mind helping you with yours,” he continued as if he understood my self-conscious reservations.
I gulped. My mind was going back to the conversation I’d had with Sylvia. Was he asking me on the premise of watching over me, or was he asking me to enter an unusual arrangement with him, Corbin, Wyatt, and the rest of the Alpha Team?
“I heard you tonight,” Axel finally admitted raspily.
“Uh… okay?” I asked in confusion. Which time? I thought. I’d said a lot tonight.
“With Sylvia,” he added, releasing my hand.
My eyes widened for a moment, and he looked at me with intense scrutiny.
“It’s true,” he said. “We’ve shared women in the past. The boys more so than me, but I need to find release at times, too.” He sighed and clasped his hands together, looking down at them, then back at me. “The last woman we shared didn't work out. Sylvia’s right. We value trust and honesty above all else.” He stopped as if he was gauging my reaction.
What was my reaction? I should feel… offended, possibly disgusted. Instead, I was curious.
“Is it all the time?” I inquired. “Only when you're deployed? Do you return home and then become, I don’t know, monogamous?”
He smiled ruefully. It wasn’t a huge smile, but it was the closest I’d ever seen him smiling fully. He really was a handsome man. I sat up and impulsively pushed a lock of his hair off his face. He typically kept it in a low ponytail, but it was free right now.
My action seemed to surprise him. He seemed to tense at first, then visibly relaxed. “About five years ago, the female on our team pitched the idea to us. She fit in well with us. As you know, we are with each other all the time. We kind of slipped into this open relationship that worked well for all of us. It was a convenient arrangement. Being a thousand miles away from home without the usual conveniences of meeting people can affect you emotionally and psychologically. We found comfort in it, and surprisingly enough, we became a better team. A stronger team.
“When we got home,” he continued, “she went out to blow off some steam and met another man. She let us know she thought it was going somewhere, so she broke it off with us. We tried various arrangements since. It’s been a trial and error of sorts. We had two women that fit in… well, with our group, but then one started getting jealous because they felt the other one was getting too much attention and vice versa.
“Eventually, we found what worked best for us, once we realized we needed to set up ground rules. We ask our girl to have no favorites or at least not so that we can tell. No engaging in sexual activities with anyone but us. We know we’re clean. We know we would never put each other in harm's way.”
I knew I was clean and their choice to get tested reassured me. I was also on birth control—I wanted to control when I got pregnant the next time.
“Have they always left you, the women?” I found myself asking.
He grimaced and shook his head. “No, there were some that started dissension in the group, so we asked them to leave. My team members are more than coworkers. We’re family. Very few people can understand the demands of being with us. We can be called up at a moment's notice. You can’t depend on us to make all the birthdays and the holidays, we can’t make promises, and we’re always running towards danger, instead of away from it. In order to make sure my men and I return home safely, we have to be a family, and anyone that wants to tear us apart can’t be with them or me. We all understand that. We’ve lived by that creed for the last six years, since our inception.”
I finally gathered enough courage to ask what was in the back of my mind. “Are you telling me this because… you want me to enter in an arrangement like this with your…team?”
Again, another crooked smile that made me melt. He really needed to smile more.
He nodded. “I know Corbin and Wyatt have cared about you for years. I
knew they put your happiness and Trevor’s above their own. The moment they found out that he had cheated on you with your sister, they nearly put our whole team in jeopardy a few times. They haven’t been themselves since last June.”
My eyes widened. That was when I’d lost everything, nearly everyone.
“Until recently, I never even knew they liked me,” I admitted quietly.
He laughed. He actually laughed, and it—and him!—was so beautiful.
“I’ve come to the realization, Avery, that you have no clue who you are or the effect you have on others.”
I laughed, too. “What does that even mean? I know exactly who I am. I think it’s you who is blind.”
He shook his head again. “I’m not. Corbin and Wyatt aren’t, and I’m pretty sure King and East are more than intrigued with you.”
“How?” I asked, mystified. “I mean, Chad told me that they’d seen some videos of me competing, but that’s not real life.”
He shrugged. “Maybe not how you see it, but it’s ours. We tend to know what we want and just go after it. After all,” he smirked at me, “you miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take.”
A surprised laugh burst from me, and I covered my mouth. I shook my head, not knowing if I should be perturbed that he had eavesdropped long enough to have heard my words from earlier.
Soon, humor was replaced with thoughts of doubt. “The world has changed, like you said. You guys don’t have to run off at a moment's notice anymore,” I said softly. “Maybe with time, you’ll want to settle down and be normal. And isn’t it presumptuous to think the guys would want to enter into an arrangement like that with me?”
“Once the boys find out you’re sleep running, they’re going to insist on you sleeping near us,” he said firmly. “I’m going to ask you to sleep near at least one of us at all times. If anything were to happen to you, I know Corbin and Wyatt would go berserk. I saw how they were when they thought you were emotionally hurt, and it wasn’t pretty.” He grimaced. “My team wouldn’t be able to go through that, and we’ve been through a lot worse.”
He turned further towards me and braced his elbows on his knees. I knew he was weighing his next words.
“I want no lies between us and the team. I’m not going to glamorize what we have, because it still takes work to make it work, but when it is working, it can be more than satisfying. I want you to understand, Avery, the situation you’re in now. Soon as Wyatt and Corbin see you again, I know they’ll no longer hold back.”
He smirked then, and it almost looked…cocky. “They’ll be pursuing you with everything they’ve got. If you want me to protect you from them, from me, let me know now. Otherwise, Joe and his team can watch over you, and they know better than to mess with you. Hell, I’m pretty sure Chad has already decided he’s half in love with Sylvia, and he’s already your unappointed big brother.”
I stared at him in stunned silence. A million questions ran through my mind, but only one came to mind right now. “Why would I need protection from you or them?”
He leaned forward so that his mouth was inches away from mine. His eyes were so dark, the black nearly taking over. “Because,” he nuzzled my cheek, “once you give us the green light, Avery, nothing will stop us from wanting to get between your shapely thighs, gripping that tight ass, and then driving our hard cocks into you.”
My mouth had gone dry at his words, my skin tingling with everywhere he touched. He didn’t strike me as a man who talked dirty. It just went to show me, yet again, that he was a complex man with many layers.
“Most of us have different vices… fetishes even,” he went on. “Wyatt and Corbin like to take girls together most of the time. They like to see who can make the girl come the most in one night.” He nuzzled my neck some more. “The twins like their individualism but don’t mind sharing, every now and then. King is an exhibitionist. He loves the thrill of taking a girl in somewhat public places. He gets a rush from having to concentrate on staying quiet, yet doing everything that makes a girl want to scream.”
He nuzzled the back of my ear and ran a hand along my bare arm. “East is our romantic. He has no… odd proclivities and seems to know when our girl just needs a cuddle and a sweet fuck.”
I felt the wetness between my thighs, finding it hard to breathe. Axel’s words fed fuel to my imagination. I never had two men at once, but I could see how Corbin and Wyatt would make it an experience I would always remember. I hadn’t even met the twins yet, and I was intrigued.
Could I enter a relationship with a group of men so quickly? A year ago, I was pregnant and engaged to one man. Today, the world was collapsing around us, and I was entertaining the idea of letting five men take care of me.
“What about you?” my voice came out husky, whether it was from a raw throat or arousal, I couldn’t tell.
His mouth hovered above my own. “I’ll show you once you decide whether or not you will be with my whole team and me. There’s no rush, though. If you say yes now, I’ll give you a small taste. If you accept us all, I will show you, apocalypse or not. I’ll make sure you’ll have my undivided attention all night long.”
“How will you show me now?” I whimpered.
How had our conversation shifted so quickly? How had it gone from revealing my disorder, to having five men take care of me, in every sense of the word, in less than sixty seconds?
He growled in the back of his throat as he shifted against me, his erection pressing against my leg. “I don’t kiss, and I don’t go down on a woman. It’s far too intimate an act for me. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I did or even wanted to,” he husked in my ear. “But if you say yes and if you will let me… I need to taste you. I want to bury my tongue between those strong thighs and drink from your petals. I want you to ride my face until I taste your sweet honey.”
His lips moved against my mouth with a kiss that belied his words. If he didn’t kiss, then he must never need any practice, because it was the best-closed mouth kiss I’d ever received.
I didn’t think I could get any wetter. I didn’t even know if I could think straight. He hadn’t even touched me yet, and I felt dangerously close to having an orgasm right there.
He nipped at my bottom lip, and I gasped. His tongue dipped into my mouth, and I sucked him in. I wanted to touch him. I needed to feel him.
He groaned against me as I sat up and straddled his lap. With one hand, I weaved my fingers through his long, soft black hair, and with the other, I explored his body.
I had wanted to touch him earlier, but I didn’t want to embarrass myself if the feelings weren’t going to be reciprocated. Now that I knew he desired me as much as I did him, I freely touched him. I felt his erection and moved my heat towards it, rocking against him. I gasped, both at the feel of his long thick member against my clit and because of his sheer size.
“Fuck,” he muttered before he pulled back from my lips. He bent his head and grasped my braless breasts, siezing one and lifting it to bite my nipple.
I wasn’t expecting it, so I cried out, but the pain was soon followed by pleasure. I moaned and rocked my hips in earnest against him. “Again,” I begged him.
He cursed once more before he suddenly pushed me from his lap, stood up, and began pacing. I could see his erection pressing against his cargo pants. His breathing was ragged as he looked at me. I leaned back, confused by his actions as he bit the pad of his thumb, his nostrils flaring.
I said nothing, feeling like he was having an inner battle with himself.
“Say yes so I can reward you,” he finally commanded. His pacing stopped.
“Yes,” I said with zero hesitation. I lifted his borrowed shirt in one fluid movement and opened my thighs, allowing Axel the chance to take the boxers off of me.
I couldn’t remember feeling so alive, nor being so close to an orgasm so quickly. I knew I overthought things when it came to sex. With Trevor, I had been the problem over half the time. There were some nights I
couldn’t get out of my head long enough to orgasm, no matter how hard he had tried.
Right now, with Axel, I was in this moment with him.
He growled out once more before he was down on his knees in front of me, stripping the boxers off in one movement. Groaning, he looked down at my naked thighs. He dipped his long digits between my lips, slipping a finger over my slit.
“You’re dripping down your thighs. You’re so wet for me,” he murmured, his eyes full of desire. He growled once more before he buried his head towards my core.
There was no teasing. Axel went straight to business. His words replayed in my head. He might not have gone down on a lot of women, but he was beyond a master at it. He seemed to know exactly what my body wanted as he alternated between licking my slit, circling my clit with his tongue, lightly nipping, and flicking his tongue against it.
“Axel,” I cried out as I buried my hands in his hair. “You’re gonna make me come,” I mewled, thrusting my hips against his mouth. He placed my ass in his warm palms and began to help me work my core closer to his mouth.
I cried out his name once more. I thought it already felt amazing, but the way he was manhandling me was a major turn on.
He groaned in satisfaction before he lifted his gaze to mine. “Then come for me,” he rumbled against my mound, sliding two fingers into my wet opening and latching onto my clit.
He pumped his fingers into me, stretching me, making me gasp. His thumb circled my swollen, sensitive clit. After a few short movements, I saw black behind my eyelids before the bright lights exploded. The tension that had been building between my thighs burst in my stomach, and I could’ve sworn my whole body went paralyzed for a few seconds as I cried out his name.
“Good girl,” he murmured against me before he cleaned up my juices with his tongue. “I have never tasted anything better,” he growled.
When his tongue accidentally grazed my clit, I made a noise and tried to get him away from my oversensitive area.