Page 14

Pain catches low in my spine while I’m standing at the kitchen island with a bowl in one hand. My fingers open hard enough that the ceramic slips free and breaks against the floor, but the crash barely registers once the pressure starts climbing through my back and hips. My knees hit next, sending another jolt through me as every muscle along my spine locks. Across the table, Arlo’s chair scrapes back so fast it nearly tips.

“Orion?”

My Omega answers the pain first, slick already gathering between my thighs while the bear pushes the other direction beneath my skin. My shoulders pull tight, my jaw aches, and for a few ugly seconds I can’t tell whether I’m trying to shift, fight, or get on my knees and present. I know this feeling. I’ve heard men at Veltmoor name it through reinforced glass while somebody else screamed on the other side.

“It’s a Feral spike.”

Arlo stays several feet away, hands loose at his sides. “Feral?”

I nod and brace one hand against the cabinet while another cramp works through my back. Veltmoor called them spikes when the accelerated shifting started breaking other things with it: instincts crossing over each other, heats coming wrong, bodies trying to obey too many signals at once. Guards called them glitches when they were joking among themselves, then useful data the second a doctor walked into the room. Nobody ever cared what they felt like from inside the body doing it.

“What do you need?” Arlo asks.

Another cramp tears through my back and forces my hips forward. I grab the edge of the island until my fingers hurt, trying to breathe around pressure that won’t settle anywhere. At Veltmoor they left me alone with this until exhaustion won, or hurt me badly enough that my body finally picked one instinct over another. I know what my Omega wants now, though, and pretending otherwise isn’t going to make the slick between my thighs disappear.

“A knot.” My voice comes out rough, but Arlo hears me. His scent thickens immediately, Alpha answering Omega while he keeps his hands to himself. “I need enough pressure to make this stop.”

His jaw tightens. “Orion—”

“I want you.” I close the space myself and catch his wrist, dragging his hand between my thighs until his palm presses against wet skin. His breath punches out against my face as my hips roll into the contact, and I fist his shirt with my other hand to keep him close. “Not whatever Alpha happens to be standing here. You.”

Arlo’s eyes stay on mine. “You’ll tell me if that changes?”

“Yes.” I pull him down by the front of his shirt until his mouth is close enough to bite. “Now fucking touch me.”

His mouth hits mine hard enough that my teeth catch my lower lip. The sharp sting cuts through the cramp rolling up my spine, and I kiss him harder, getting both hands into his shirt and dragging him close until the edge of the island digs into my lower back. Arlo crowds in without making me hold him there, one hand sliding over my hip while the other closes around the back of my neck.

I shove into the grip. “Harder.”

His fingers tighten, and heat rips through me hard enough to make my knees weaken. Arlo catches my weight against his body and kisses down my jaw while I grind against his thigh, slick soaking through whatever fabric gets in the way. Another cramp twists low through my spine, but this time his hand is already on me, squeezing my hip while his teeth scrape over the side of my neck.

“Counter.”

Arlo turns me with him and my palms hit stone. His body comes in behind mine, chest against my back, cock hard against my ass while his hand slides between my legs. Two fingers push through the slick there and stroke over me, and I drop my head with a groan as the pressure finally gives my body somewhere to go. When I push back into his hand, he follows the movement instead of making me ask twice.

“Inside.”

His fingers push in slowly enough that I feel every inch, then curl hard enough to make my hips jerk back into his hand. I’m already open from the spike, slick running down the inside of my thighs, and the stretch burns just enough to give me something solid to hold on to. I rock into the next thrust of his fingers, chasing the pressure while his other hand stays firm at my hip.

“More.”

A second finger joins the first. Arlo works them deeper, his thumb dragging over me while I push back against every stroke, and the cramping finally starts losing ground to heat. By the time he pulls his hand away, I’m breathing hard enough to fog the dark window over the sink and reaching back for him before the loss of pressure can turn into frustration.

“Don’t stop.”

“Wasn’t planning to.” His mouth brushes my shoulder as he gets his pants open behind me.

I grab his thigh and pull him closer until the head of his cock presses slick against me. The first push stretches harder than his fingers did, enough that my hands flatten against the counter and my breath catches. Arlo keeps his body against mine while I take him a little at a time, and when the burn starts easing I shove my hips back and take the rest.

“Fuck.” His hand clamps around my waist. “Orion.”

“Move.”

The first thrust drives me into the counter hard enough to rattle something near the sink, and the second tears a sound out of me that I don’t bother swallowing. By the third I’m meeting him, pushing back whenever he drives forward because every hard stroke buries more of the cramp under heat. Pain still crawls beneath my skin, trying to drag claws through my fingers and fur across my shoulders, but Arlo is inside me and solid behind me, and each thrust shoves the shift farther back.

I reach back and catch his hair, pulling until his mouth comes down against my shoulder. “Harder.” He gives it to me, driving deeper until my hips knock the cabinet and his hand spreads over my stomach to hold me steady. The rough drag of him inside me builds fast, and I grind back for more until the cramp gets buried under the heat.

My fingers start to darken at the tips, nails thickening toward claws while another tremor runs through my shoulders. I bare my teeth against the counter and push back harder, refusing to let the shift take the rhythm away from me. Arlo’s hand comes up into my hair when I reach for him, and I force his fingers tighter against my scalp until the sting pulls my attention back where I want it.