“With less subtle terms.”Etienne was grim.
She snorted.“Yeah, that’s his favourite move.”
“Will it work on me again?”
“No.Why?”
He slumped.“I believed it.I believed it until you said the word convincer.That, mixed with what I have learned in the past few days, snapped the image I had in my head.”
He crouched and reached for her, but she flinched.“I am sorry, Dex.Why the flinch?”
“You just told me that you had believed I had fucked my way through the ballet company.I really don’t want you touching me right now.”
He grimaced.“Not the ballet.The donor society.”
“Oh, that is so much worse.Most of those guys are over fifty.”
“It isn’t unheard of.”
“At the time John shared that tidbit, I was eighteen or nineteen.Tell me that doesn’t make you flinch a little.”
He winced.“Said like that, it does seem ridiculous that I would believe you had been making the rounds for a decade.”
Her eyes bugged out.“Oh, wow.He really wanted you away from me.”
Tosh asked, “When was your last relationship?”
“I haven’t had any.The slightest hint and I would be on the way to the hospital.”She looked at Tosh.“If you are concerned, Dr.Oriel has the confirmation.”She bit her lip.“Can you stand me up and help me get to bed?I think the handoff popped one of my stitches.”
Tosh rose to his feet and waited until she grabbed the pole.He moved her carefully to the bed and set her down.He eased her gown up and nodded.“Yup.Two of them are bleeding.”
Etienne growled and then paused.“Growling doesn’t freak you out?”
“No, why would it?Attacks are silent.They are hands reaching and a sudden impact and pain blooming.”
Tosh reached out and pressed the call button.
She waited, and less than three minutes later, a nurse came in.Dex said, “I moved wrong and blew two stitches.”
The nurse came in and nodded.“I will just take a look.”
The gown went up, and she tutted.“I will have someone come in and fix those.Can’t have a pretty thing like you scarring.”
She got another lollipop.
Dex smiled and then looked at Etienne the moment the nurse was gone.“What the hell is going on?No one treats me like a defeated toddler.What’s going on?”
He smiled slightly.“This is how omegas are treated in high-stress moments.They are kept happy and calm, and that—in turn—keeps their alphas happy and calm.All for the price of a lollipop.”
She looked at the red lolly and put it down.“Bleah.”
Tosh smirked.“Don’t you like it?”
She rubbed a hand over her face.“I hate the red ones.”
Tosh and Etienne laughed.
She looked at the wounds with the tiny stitches.“I have had wounds before.These stitches are teeny.What gives?”
