Page 24 of Torment Me Knot
Holding still costs muscle and breath and the inside of my cheek where I bite down hard enough to taste blood. I’ve forced myself under control before. It never felt like this, like I’m dragging against something huge and desperate inside myself.
Stay. Don’t move. Hold.
How am I going to take care of them if I can’t touch them?
Kev's jaw is tight. “They're ours. Both of them. We figure it out.”
Four alphas, none of us scent-linked to each other. Two omegas bound to each other and to different alphas. What the hell kind of pack is that? What is biology even doing?
We're going to have to figure it out together. The alternative is walking away from our mates. None of us can do that. I study the male alphas properly then. Men caught in the same impossible gravity.
Kev stands rigid, jaw clenched hard, hands shoved into his pockets like he doesn’t trust them free. Lex breathes carefully through his mouth, controlled in the way people breathe through pain. Ezra can’t stop wiping his palms on his thighs, every line of his body angled toward the omegas.
Espie's scent is doing this to them. Gardenia and clover, sharp with distress but still mate. Every alpha instinct they have is screaming at them to go to her, just like mine is. Yeah. I know exactly how that feels. Aubrey's chamomile has wrapped itself around my brain and squeezed.
Underneath Espie's gardenia, underneath Aubrey's cedar, the three male alphas are bleeding into the room too. Oakwood and whiskey. Earl Grey going smoky at the edges with want. Fresh linen gone acrid with grief. Four alpha scents in an enclosed space, all of us locked down, the air gone dense and pressurized with everything none of us are doing. Tension grinds through my jaw hard enough to hurt. The whole room feels stretched to breaking.
Adrian pulls out his phone and murmurs into it.
A nurse appears in the doorway. “Mr. Blackwood? You wanted—” More nurses in blue scrubs crowd in behind her.
They take one look at the omegas, move toward them and Espie screams. It hits me in the sternum, every instinct lurching toward her. Aubrey wrenches her against him, his whole frame curled over hers. Their purrs stutter out. Both of them shake hard enough that I feel it in my own chest.
Kev makes a wounded sound. Ezra's face crumples. Lex clenches his fists. Their mates are screaming and they can't move. The guards who never moved away, tense and ready themselves to launch at us.
“Don't separate them,” I say. “Whatever happens, don't.”
The nurses look to Adrian, who nods.
“Is there somewhere else we can take them?” Ezra asks. “Somewhere calmer? A nesting room, maybe?”
Nesting room. Yes. Soft blankets, amber lighting, everything calibrated to signalsafeto a frightened omega. That might work, except the blanket I brought Espie that day—
Adrian nods to a nurse. “Give them nesting room three. It's the quietest. Let's get them settled and then we can run some basic checks.”
“I'll do it.” I step forward. “Espie knows me. She might—” I stop.Mightis doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence. She might not scream. She might let me close. She might — “She's less likely to scream for me.”
Kev's jaw clenches, but he nods. “Go ahead.”
I crouch down three feet from where they're huddled. Shoulders in. Chin down. Less height, less threat. Instinct knows how to do this even when the rest of me doesn't. “Espie.” I keep my voice soft. The fact that it comes out the same now is either professional discipline or the saddest thing about me. “Espie, it's Sera. We need to move you somewhere that isn't here.”
Her face is still buried in Aubrey's chest.
“I'm not going to separate you. I promise. You can hold onto him the whole time. But we need to get you off this floor.”
Aubrey's arms tighten around her. His eyes are open now, fixed on me. Awareness. Suspicion. My mate. Right there. Watching me the way people watch dogs they aren't sure of, not aggression, not submission, the careful motionless calculation of someone who has learned that the wrong move costs everything.
“Aubrey.” I say his name and his whole body curls tighter around Espie. “I'm not going to hurt her. I'm not going to hurt either of you. But this floor is in the open and you're both shaking and we need to get you somewhere more private.”
Just those hazel-green eyes watching me like I'm a predator moving closer.
“Please.” The word scrapes out of me. “Please let me help you.”
Espie lifts her head from Aubrey's chest. Her violet eyes find mine.
“Sera?” Her voice is barely a whisper.
“Yeah, sweetheart. It's me. Can you stand up? Can you try for me? We need to get you out of here.”
