“They started pumping me full of drugs and hormones. It wasn’t long before they turned me into a surgical lab rat.” He spits the words, then his voice grows hoarse. “First thing they did was take my uterus. ‘You’re too manly to bear children,’ that monster told me.”
He lets out a bitter laugh, and I am unable to feel a thing. This revelation has frozen time around me, and I cannot process his words. The horror of them.
“This I never told anyone, not even Nyx, but if Mira hadn’t killed Ness when Jory commanded it, and if he hadn’t replaced Ness with Doctor Song when he had, they were coming for my genitals next. That bastard told me. They wanted to find out if they could give a male Alpha’s testicles, a knot.” A tear falls from his eye and rolls down his cheek. I automatically wipe it from his skin, and he turns to me, his eyes fierce. “I was resigned to it because I had no choice. When Doctor Song came about, I was relieved. I knew she was different, not that I knew who she was working for. But now…” His lips go flat, his brow tight. “After being with Nyx, I wonder… wonder what it would have been like if they succeeded.” His eyes shut tight, more tears fall. “I don’t fit any mold, not Omega, not Alpha. I can’t bear children, I can’t produce children, I can’t knot the Omega I love…” Zephyr chokes on his next words. “I want to give her everything she needs.”
I pull him into my arms, hold him tight, and let go of control. My mind melds with his, and my entire body is wracked by devastation, mourning, fear, until tears flow down my face as well.
He hugs me just as tight.
“Nyx loves you,” I say, knowing it’s the truth. “You already give her what she needs, Zephyr. You mean the world to her.”
“What if I mess up?” he nearly wails into my chest.
“What do you mean?”
He pulls away from me a bit, gripping the hem of my shirt in his fists as he sniffs. “I’ve spent so much of my life hating the world. Wanting to destroy it if I ever got the chance.” His eyes are wild when they meet mine, little flares of dark energy licking his irises. “I fight every day not to lose it. If I did, I could hurt everyone around me, including those I now love.”
I take a deep breath, let it out slow as I smooth his golden hair with my palms. “Does the evolution of your power frighten you?”
He shakes his head, no.
I smile at him. “Your love gives you strength. It will stop you from making errors that would hurt any of us.”
“How could you know that?”
I press my lips to his forehead. “I know what’s in here,” I say against his skin. Then I place my hand on his chest. “And in here.” I lean back and tilt my head. “All of us know you, Zephyr. We trust you and believe in you, even if you don’t.”
Erich
“And if Zephyr and Nyxeris agree—” Laurant shoots an afterthought look my way, “—and you, too, of course,” he gestures to his room with a sweep of his arm, “I’d very much love it if you’d all move into my room. We can order one of those special beds all the packs are apparently getting.” He turns to our Omegas and continues in a rush. “You two will have free rein to decorate however you wish. Trash all my things, if you want. Make this space your ideal nest.”
The silence his speech is met with almost makes me choke a laugh. He looks so worried for a guy who can supposedly feel their emotions. Even I comprehend the air of torture they’re exuding as Nyx and Zeph begin to whisper to each other comically back and forth like two troublemakers in cahoots.When they break off to take imaginary measurements with their arm spans, I can’t help but laugh now.
“Laurant is absolutely dying right now, you two,” I tell them, tone humorously warning.
Nyx breaks into a huge, toothy grin and rushes back to Laurant, leaping into his arms with enough speed to knock him off balance and send his back to the mattress. “Thank you, Andrew,” she says between kisses she plants on his face.
“We’d love to move in with you,” Zeph adds, coming up beside me and linking his arm through mine. “That is, if Erich doesn’t mind?” His raised eyebrow is cheeky as fuck, and I huff at him.
“Like I’ve got a choice here. But I’m good with it.”
Zeph jumps up and claps, then rushes to Nyx, pulling her off Laurant to whisper in her ear. Whatever he says makes her eyes go wide, then her upper lids fall seductively as she nods then bites her lip.
The muscles at the base of my cock clench at that look before Zephyr pulls his shirt off, revealing rippling muscles across his lean torso, making my breath catch. As he approaches me, I see behind him that Nyx is removing Laurant’s clothing, and anticipation rolls through my body.
I don’t move until Zeph’s lips are on mine. I grab his head with both hands and devour his mouth, shoving my tongue inside and claiming every part of him as he whines into me. We part only for me to remove my shirt and throw it, then our lips are locked once more, the wet sounds coming from my attack making my dick hard as a rock.
Zeph grabs my dick through my jeans, drawing a growl from me before he unzips my fly and pulls them to my ankles way too slow. But when he’s on his way down, I get a full view of Nyx as she aligns Laurant’s cock with her entrance in a reverse-cowboy stance, her knees bent, feet flat on the mattress. She whines and he hisses as she slides him into her wet heat with a cry. Just asshe rises and then plunges back down on him again, Zeph takes my dick into his hot, wet mouth, the backs of his teeth scraping the sides of my flesh deliciously, drawing my attention back to him, gripping his golden locks in my fist. My growl remains in my chest, but my purr joins it, that strange feeling behind my sternum like some other entity resides there, slithering and content.
Zeph rolls those pretty eyes up at me, sucking me down so nicely, I almost hate to mess with his rhythm.
Almost.
My lust takes control of me, and I shout incoherently as I start to fuck Zeph’s mouth, his thick lips maintaining that tight ring around my cock as I pummel him again and again, his whine rising in the air, making my body heat rise.
Before I lose all control, I force myself from his wet cavern, almost tripping over my feet on the way back. With ragged breath, I command him, “Get naked.”
He rises to his feet with a wild grin on his face that I don’t trust one bit, but he undoes his fly, pulls his pants off and kicks them away, letting his hard, sizable dick free. But instead of coming to me, he turns his back on me, swaying that rounded ass as he approaches Nyx and Laurant.
