A shrill ring sounded through the room. At first, she thought it was a phone, but then she realised it was echoing all around her. An alarm.
“I d-don’t know,” she stuttered, as Niko’s eyes flashed with unease, his grip on her tightening to the point of pain. “What’s that alarm? I’ve never heard it before.”
“What alarm?” he asked, as the sound dwindled into something softer, almost like a twinkle.
He released her wrists and her hands immediately tunnelled into her shirt, her fingertips coming away wet with blood.
“It’s embedded itself into my skin,” she breathed out unsteadily. “But it’s … finished. I think.”
She gripped Niko’s forearm, using him to keep herself upright as a small whine of pain slipped from between her lips. The chain felt alive again, like it had been resting up and healing right alongside her these past few weeks, but now it desperately wanted to be a part of her again.
Niko pulled her out of the ring without warning, tugging her in the direction of the bathroom. “Let’s get you cleaned up.” The statement was tight-lipped, his voice rigid with restraint.
As soon as they passed through the door, he suddenly changed, his touch gentling, his eyes sparking with frantic energy.
“It’s glowing,” he hissed, pushing her up against the counter, his body tight behind hers.
They both stared into the mirror at the subtle light peeking through her shirt, and she pulled down the neckline with shaking fingers, staring at the links nestled into her cleavage.
It was thinner than before, the most delicate gold chain spouting little beads of blood that had smudged against her skin. She leaned forward, entranced, the pain falling away as that tinkling sound turned into a warm, happy hum before fading away into nothing. She could make out the tiny links arching from the chain to the skin on either side: little metallic hooks to secure the jewellery in place.
The brighter it glowed, the less it hurt, until the wounds from those little hooks were completely healed. Niko was breathing hard against the top of her head, his hands braced either side of her, gripping the counter tightly.
“Are you okay?” she asked him, watching his face warily.
He twitched, his gaze sweeping up to hers in the mirror.
His energy was off.
His usual warm and inviting whiskey scent was curdling, bubbling, and boiling until he smelled more like gasoline, the green sinking out of his eyes until the more dusky, tawny hue took over, darkening his entire expression.
“Dammit.” The word was spoken through his teeth, more a hiss than anything else. “Give me a minute, Sigma.” His voice sounded completely different.
A sense of danger skittered across her skin, his power suddenly swelling into the room like an ominous cloud, closing in against her mind like a metal compress. Her breath turned shallow, her thoughts tripping over themselves. It was eerily similar to what had happened to Sato in the hotel room in Nevada, and just like that time, her mind snapped back to her father.
To when he would lose control.
Sato hadn’t acted like her father, but faced with that dangerous roll of influence again, Isobel’s mind was suddenly blank, filled with the trauma of her childhood. There was no room for her to kneel on the ground, to stretch out her back for her father’s belt, to turn her head to the side against the ground where the carpet fibres would tickle her nostrils.
And she was too scared to reach for her phone, to call Reed.
She let out a low sound of distress, turning around with her shirt still tugged down to show him that she was fine. She wasn’t bleeding any more. It was instinctual, and it seemed to work. Niko’s eyes narrowed in on her pale skin. His hands switched from the counter to her hips, drawing her up onto her toes. It didn’t seem to be enough because he pulled her up further, higher and higher.
She scrambled to draw her legs up, needing to feel something beneath her, and he sat her on the counter, her legs tucked beneath her. It put her a little higher than him, his face level with her chest. Niko was wearing a completely alien expression, like the real him had stepped out for a while, allowing some kind of Alpha predator to take his place. It terrified her, but he was the last person who would hurt her—outside the wrestling ring—and she repeated that fact inside her head. Niko stood up for her. He was doing all of this so she could protect herself. And he had helped her through a panic attack with all the patience and kindness of a person who was used to caring for victims of violence—not like he was a perpetrator of it himself.
It didn’t matter that there was a dangerous rattle emanating from his chest.
His strong hands drifted up her sides, uncaring that her shirt was still damp with sweat, his focus narrowing in on the few spots of blood showing through the material. She watched warily, both of them ignoring the trembling of her body as his hands drifted back down, gathering the hem of her shirt and pulling it up.
His eyes flicked up to hers once, his Alpha ring so swollen it almost seemed to be merging with his pupil, the black and gold meld of colour turning him into a stranger for a brief moment, and then he was ducking, his warm breath scattered low across her belly. He pressed his face against her skin, breathing deeply, like he was trying to regain control of himself, but his attention was dragged up higher, past her belly button, to the bottom of the chain. He pushed her shirt up further, and a low growl vibrated out of his mouth, teasing along her skin.
He flattened his tongue to the base of the chain, causing Isobel to jump in shock, but he didn’t stop there. He dragged his tongue up the length of the chain, pushing her shirt higher and higher, until the material was at her chin, bunched there, blocking his path. He buried his face in her shirt, his whole body vibrating, and she hesitantly tunnelled her fingers into his hair, feeling the sweep of panicked violence that emanated off him.
She tried to focus all of her energy on him—to ignore the fluttering in her stomach, the coolness of his saliva striking a line all the way up her sternum. His quiet rumbles were making her squirm and she fought back the insane urge to pull her shirt the rest of the way off and see where else he licked.
Christ.
Maybe she should have been spending a little more time with her surrogates.
Or any time with her surrogates.
Niko suddenly pulled back from her with a shudder, releasing her shirt. “How did you know what to do?” he demanded in a roughened tone. “Why the fuck does it feel like you’ve had experience with this?”
She couldn’t make sense of his tone, or the muddled press of emotions battering against her chest.
Fury, possession, disquiet.
“With Alphas?” she dared to ask, the words barely more than a squeak. “My father is an Alpha.”
“He’s one Alpha.” Niko’s perfect brows pulled down, his lips pressing tightly together as he frowned. “And he lived outside the settlements. He’s practically human.”
She chewed on her lip, wondering if they were even talking about the same thing.
“How did you know what to do?” he asked again. He wasn’t moving back or releasing her, but at least his eyes were only focussed on her face and her shirt had mostly fallen back into place.
“My father has rages. My mother taught me to always submit when he’s angry.”