Chapter Twenty-Eight
Max brought Michael to his room, a little disconcerted to notice another alpha’s scent lingering on him. Still, Parker had said Jordan wasn’t a threat, and Max knew him well enough to take him at his word.
Nuzzling the back of Michael’s neck, he reached for the omega’s shirt and started drawing it upward.
“How about a shower?”
Michael’s smothered laugh suggested he knew just what was bothering Max but he didn’t complain as Max helped him shed his clothes before pulling off his own. The shower wasn’t quite big enough for two but they squeezed in together, Max taking his time running his hands over his mate’s skin.
“Gorgeous,” he told him. “So beautiful.” He ran a hand over Michael’s bump. “Especially this.”
Michael’s hand pressed against his, lacing their fingers together.
They didn’t linger under the water, getting out and drying off, unable to keep their hands off each other, little touches that turned into caresses.
Guiding Michael to their bed, he helped the omega lie down. Michael grabbed a pillow and rolled onto his side, using it to support his bump.
“Like this,” he said simply, glancing over his shoulder at Max.
Grinning, Max settled down behind him, resuming his attentions to Michael’s neck. The omega gave a low moan, grinding his hips back against him.
“Are you sure you’re up for this?” Max teased, one hand wrapped possessively around Michael’s hip.
“You know I love it when you’re jealous,” Michael teased back.
Max took it slow, running his hand down the length of Michael’s body, along his side, caressing the curve of his hip and down his thigh, searching out every sensitive spot. He knew his mate’s body almost as well as his own, brushing his fingers along Michael’s inner thigh, drawing a low moan from the omega.
“You like that, huh?”
“You know I do,” Michael hummed. “I love everything you do.”
Words turned to moans as Max moved his attentions elsewhere, fingers deftly working the omega open.
“More, Max,” his mate demanded. “I need more.”
Easing Michael’s knee forward, he pushed slowly inside the omega. Wrapping an arm around his waist, he started a slow rhythm of thrusts. It felt intense, more so than normal. Maybe it was where they were, surrounded by familiarity or maybe just how he was feeling. There was a possessiveness in his every move, his alpha side keen to prove that Michael was his.
He picked up the pace, rocking them both as Michael fisted the sheets, crying out. He wasn’t worried about being overheard and clearly, Michael wasn’t either, the omega making no attempt to silence himself. As he came close to climax, he wrapped his hand around Michael’s cock, easing it along his shaft to coax the omega along with him.
“Max, yes,” his mate called. “Yes.”
Michael came hard, Max a split second after him. As soon as the orgasm hit him, he knew something was different, the pressure growing instead of releasing. His omega noticed too, roused from his post-orgasm haze.
“Max, what’s—” the omega’s question turned into a low moan before Michael recovered enough to answer it with another. “Is that… a knot?”
“Yeah,” he croaked out, groaning at the intense feeling of the two of them physically bound together.
“I always wondered what that would feel like.”
“How does it feel?” he wanted to know, easing a hand over the omega’s hip.
“So much,” Michael murmured. “Big, intense. How… how long will we be like this?”
“Um…” He tried to pull his thoughts together. “I’ve never… knotted anyone before. But not long, I don’t think. Minutes, maybe an hour. Are you comfortable?”
He kissed Michael’s shoulder.
“Maybe on my other side?” the omega suggested, wiggling his hips a bit. Even that little movement had them both gasping, an intense pleasure bordering on pain thrumming through him.
“Nice and easy,” he said to the omega, wrapping his arms and legs securely around his mate before easing them slowly so he was lying on his back and Michael was laying with his back against Max’s chest. He stopped there, both of them catching their breaths, their eyes on the ceiling.
“Oh,” Michael said, staring up. “It’s beautiful.”
The ceiling was a sea of stars as if they were looking up at the night’s sky.
“I used to have trouble sleeping indoors. They… they helped.”
“I want to do this again someday,” Michael said. “Under the real stars.”
Max grinned, kissing the back of the omega’s neck. “I’ll put it on the list.”
Moving again, he lowered them both onto their left sides, the friction of their bodies pulling another moan from both of them. He was taken by surprise when Michael rolled his hips a moment later, the movement small but its effect intense.
“Michael?”
“Feels good,” the omega contended. “Doesn’t it?” He did it again and wow, that was something different.
They rocked against each other, Max pressing hot kisses to Michael’s neck and shoulders as the omega’s cries of pleasure grew in intensity. The heat built up between them until wave after wave of pleasure crashed over him, and he bit down gently on the soft skin of Michael’s shoulder. The omega panted through his own release, his hands clutching tight to Max’s arms.
More time passed in a haze before they were finally able to break apart. Even then, all Michael did was squirm around until they were face-to-face before cuddling against him, his bump pressed against Max’s abdomen.
“Every time,” the omega murmured. “You surprise me. Something new, something different.”
“I want to give you everything,” he promised. “Everything you want, everything you deserve.”
There was so much he couldn’t give the omega right then that what he could give him never felt like enough.
“What about what you want?” Michael asked sleepily. “Balance, remember? Not me or you, it has to be us.”
“I remember,” Max said, kissing the omega’s cheek before hugging him closer. “I have everything I want, right here.”
Before breakfast the next day, Tristan commandeered Michael to show him a video of a previous acrobatics performance. While he was being kept busy, Max went in search of Parker, finding him already in his office.
“Morning,” Parker said with a smile. “I trust you slept well.”
Max bit back a laugh at the alpha’s knowing expression. “We did, thanks.”
“Sit down.” Parker gestured to a seat. “Want some coffee?”
“No, thanks.” He hesitated, unsure how to broach what he wanted to talk about.
“What’s on your mind, Max?”
“A lot,” he admitted.
“I’ll bet. A mate, a new pack, baby on the way. Your life has done a complete one-eighty. But I don’t think that’s what you’re here to talk about, is it?”
Max had forgotten how well Parker could read him.
“I… I don’t want to be the kind of father my dad was.”
There, he’d said it. Fears he hadn’t been able to share with Michael, not wanting to worry the omega who had so many other burdens to carry.
“You won’t be the kind of father he was,” Parker said simply, “because you are not the kind of shifter he was.”
“But I am his son.”
“You are more your mother’s son than you ever were his. You share her temperament, not his. You don’t have his temper, his lack of control, his resentment. When things go wrong, you don’t take it out on others.” Parker paused, before adding, “And you’ve always been good with kids. Patient. Kind.”
Parker’s steady assurances helped ease some of his fears. He had always been more like his mother. Their similarity was one of the things that had set his father off. And Max had never been quick to anger or good at holding grudges. He was hardest on himself, not anyone else.
“You should talk to Michael, let him know your worries.”
“I don’t want to burden him. He shouldn’t have to worry about me around our baby.”
“Well, it won’t help him if you’re too scared of yourself to hold your own child, will it?” Parker said evenly.
“No, I guess it won’t.”
“So, talk to him. I think you’ll find he’s not worried about this the way you are. He trusts you, Max, just like I do. You need to learn to trust yourself.”
Easier said than done but he could try.
Max met Michael on the way back to his room. “Hey, could we talk for a minute, before we head down for breakfast?”
“Sure,” Michael said, letting Max guide him into the room. “Is something wrong?”
Max stumbled a little through his explanation, doing his best to express his fears. When he reached the end, he waited for his mate’s response.
Michael took his hands in his, squeezing gently.
“Even when you couldn’t remember me or much of anything, you were so careful, so gentle. That’s your nature, that’s how you’ll be with our kids. I’m not worried and you shouldn’t be either.” He leaned in and pressed a kiss to Max’s lips. “Thank you for confiding in me. I guess I have Parker to thank for that.”
Max pulled Michael into his arms. “We have a lot to thank him for.”
Michael’s stomach growled, and Max laughed. “Breakfast?”
“Yep. I’m eating for two, remember?”
Max stole another kiss. “How could I forget?”
At breakfast, there were a few knowing looks and smiles aimed in their direction. Word of the previous night had gotten around. Michael was blushing from the attention, but Max wasn’t fazed, meeting everyone’s eyes, daring them to comment.
“It’s good you’re enjoying being home,” Bobby said. “That you’re both feeling at home here. Are you planning to stay or—”
Michael flushed a deeper red, and Max slung an arm around his shoulders.
“We’re heading back with Tristan and Quinn,” he told him.
“But you’ll be back?”
“Um… I’m not sure what our plans are, exactly. But I know Michael wants to be near his family right now so that’s what’s important.”
“Well, don’t be strangers,” Bobby insisted. “This is your home, too. I know we’re not family but we’re pack, more or less.”
They were the closest thing Max had to a pack since he’d been a kid.
“I haven’t forgotten,” he promised. Well, he had, but he’d remembered and that was the important thing. “And I’ll never turn my back on this place but Michael comes first.”
“As it should be,” Parker said, joining in the conversation. “This pack has always been a home for some and a way station for others heading elsewhere. Most people don’t know when they arrive if they’ll stay or if they’ll move on, but either way, we’re here for them if they need us.”
“And I’m grateful for that,” Max told him. “We both are.”
Michael nodded, one arm around his belly. “You helped us when we needed it most. We won’t forget that.”
“I suspect it won’t be the last time our pack and Briar Wood work together. When I look at what we’ve achieved already, I have hope for the future.”
Max liked the sentiment in Parker’s voice, even if he didn’t share it. He found it hard to see the bigger picture, the one he knew Griffin and Parker saw, the one that meant their decisions sometimes made no sense to him. He preferred to focus on what he could see in front of him, on the things that were tangible and real. Like the feel of Michael’s hand in his and the rhythmic thump of their baby’s heartbeat in his mate’s belly.