“Home sweet home,” Alec proclaimed, holding open his arms and grinning. He barely contained his good mood, bouncing in place, his cheeks still glowing rosy from their quickie before departing their suite in L’Oiseau. JT hadn’t washed out his mouth. Alec coated his tongue; his savory cum flavoring his mouth, and probably his beard too. He had gone wild as usual when JT had gotten on his knees before him.

“Aren’t you going to carry me over the threshold?”

JT hauled him off his feet, dragging Alec up his body, not exactly in a bridal position, but he liked the feel of the omega’s cock against his tensing abs as he carried him inside. Even after all their sex, Alec continued to hunger for him. JT was both impressed and amused, especially when Alec began humping his chest. He bounced in his arms, his mouth locking over JT’s throat, teeth grazing over his frenetic pulse.

“Easy,” JT warned, his chiding only prompting Alec to roll his hips and sink his teeth in a bit deeper at his throat. JT grunted, his cock jerking from Alec’s teasing. He moved them toward the stairs once he kicked the front door closed. At the top of the stairs, Isolde met them.

She backed up, making room for them.

JT lowered Alec to his feet, and Alec, in turn, ran a hand through his disheveled black hair, his sexy smile dimming now into concern. “Mom?” he said, stepping into the embrace she offered. He fidgeted in place after that, his embarrassment palpable. “What are you doing up?”

“Did you just come in?” she said, answering his question with a question.

Alec frowned. “Uh, yeah. Were you waiting for us?”

“No.” She smiled at JT now. He stood straighter at her regard, suddenly wondering what the matriarch thought of him. “Since I missed the ceremony yesterday, I just wanted to welcome our new family member officially.” She opened her arms to JT, and he awkwardly moved in for a quick hug.

She didn’t release his hands though, his big mitts clasped between her pale dainty ones. “We’ll have to have dinner again sometime soon.”

“Sure,” JT said, unclear of how else to respond to that vague invite.

Isolde bobbed her head, not quite upsetting her black netted face veil. “Wonderful. I’ll leave you both to settle in then.” She left them in a whirl of long black skirt, her mourning garb more than unsettling.

Remembering his curiosity, JT followed Alec to his bedroom and he asked, “Is she sick?”

Alec swung around on him, his eyes narrowed, brows knitted together. “No,” he said, a bit too vehemently to assuage JT’s interest in his mother-in-law. They might have faked a relationship, but their marriage was very real…on paper, and in the bedroom. His off-the-charts chemistry with Alec alone had JT reconsidering ending their relationship.

But now Alec wasn’t staring at him like he’d die if JT didn’t touch him. He looked repulsed.

“Why are you asking?” He threw back the question, the barb laid out all over in his tone. It warned that if JT made one wrong move, this bliss of theirs would once again be as rocky as it was last night…before JT apologized to Alec by taking him again and again, pumping the omega full of his seed so there’d be no question when his belly grew taut and round with their first child.

First?

JT’s cock stiffened, his thigh soaked with his pre-cum. Shit. That thought alone drove him wild with need. Perhaps if he moved their stand-off to the bed, Alec would return to his playful self once more. After all, JT had seen what his omega could be like once he stuffed him full of dick.

Alec blasted that dirty thought to smithereens when he snapped, “Hey. I asked you a question.”

“She’s always wearing black. At least, most of the time,” JT said, hating how stupid he sounded. He rolled his big shoulders, suddenly feeling smaller than Alec under that fierce glare.

“Is that a crime?” Alec retorted.

“No.” JT moved to the bed, needing off his feet. Alec remained by the window, his arms crossing over his chest, legs spaced apart in challenge. Needing him off the defensive immediately, JT said, “Sorry. Clearly she’s a touchy subject.”

“And clearly you’re a big jerk.”

JT held up his palms. “I deserve that.”

“Uh huh,” Alec said. “You also deserve to be kicked out of my room. I do believe you have yours. Oh, and by the way, the house doesn’t belong to me. My mom has the deed for this place. And she’s generous enough to let you stay here.”

After he picked his jaw up off the floor, JT flared his nostrils and he clapped his hands down on his knees, his elbows at ninety degrees, and both his legs bouncing from the excessive energy. He locked his jaw, struggling to suffocate the angry words building up and threatening to strike back at Alec’s defensive hostility.

“You’re angry,” was all he said after a lengthy, tension-filled pause.

“I am. What gave it away?” Alec dropped his arms from his chest, gesturing at the door before he turned to face the window.

Staring hard at his back, JT pushed off the edge of Alec’s bed and stalked behind him. If he sensed him, Alec didn’t turn. JT wrapped his hands around his hips and brought him back against his cock, his chin resting on the top of his head. If Alec wanted to butt him off, make him literally bite into his tongue, then JT would risk it.

He just wanted to stop fighting.

With Parrot, he thrived on it as of late. But it turned him around when it was Alec. If he left the room now, like this, he wouldn’t be able to spend the rest of his day not thinking about anything else. He’d be completely unproductive. And it wasn’t even close to noon.

“Sorry,” he said again, his voice rough with several emotions. Fatigue won out, and he sighed heavily, watching Alec’s hair flutter, his body tense even more in his arms. “It doesn’t matter what she wears. And it isn’t any of my business to bring her up.”

“No, it isn’t.” As snippy as that response was, Alec’s bite had cooled.

Knowing he couldn’t do anything more, JT dropped his hands from Alec’s hips and he backed away from him, each step a Herculean task. He made it to the door, turning around to grip the handle. Still, Alec didn’t call him back, take him into his arms, and lead him to his bed.

Outside, JT closed the bedroom door closed after him and he glanced down the hall toward his own room. The house was still. Too damn silent. He’d never get peace this way. He needed to head out. He needed to clear his head, absorb this significant change in his life.

This marriage thing—it wasn’t what it was cracked up to be after all. He could almost understand why his parents were such jerks, to each other, to him and everyone else. Whatever romance and lust that brought them together ebbed long before he was born, it felt like. They had been arguing from the first day he grew cognizant of it.

Eighteen years later, and he’d fled it. Sick and tired with their hollering and hooting about absolutely fucking nothing.

He hoped to God it wouldn’t be like that with Alec. Fake relationship or not, this marriage was real as hell, and he didn’t want it biting him in the ass. He touched the cool white gold ring on his finger. Drawing it off, he studied the etching inside.

A.E. ❤ J.T.

Their initials side by side, and that heart symbolizing their love. But all that had driven them was their strong sexual hunger for each other. Forcing the ring back on his finger, JT shoved off Alec’s door and headed downstairs, taking the stairs quickly. He walked out, barely acknowledging the overnight bags he’d tossed by the door in their hurry inside.

The white stretch Hummer that had dropped them off had long gone.

JT called a cab, and directed the driver to the condo building, anticipating Parrot would be at work at this early morning hour. Once there, JT headed into the parking garage, the nippy weather following him indoors. It clung to his suit, and he regretted not grabbing his leather jacket from the guest room.

He forgot all that once he straddled his bike. Sure enough, the forest green pickup was gone. Parrot was at work. His bagger sat alone in its rented parking space. JT started his engine, and once he backed up, he aligned his ride for the exit and leaned forward full throttle. He shot out of the garage, squealing onto the street and heading who-knows-where.

Driving out of the city on the interstate, he moved off the freeway and found himself in the boonies. When he passed by a park, he turned inside and guided his bike up the steep inclines of the valleys. JT ended up turning onto one of the many lookouts, following the government park signage to a lonely parking lot.

There he killed his engine and swung his legs off the bike. JT moved to the railing, resting his arms, and gauging the long, perilous distance down the rocky, green cliff side with one wrong move.

Not that he had any mind to jump.

No. All he could think was how Alec would have likely been thrilled by this view.