Chapter 5

Victor lays Ariadne down on the bed, but the Omega is holding on tight, baby koala levels. The Alpha has to pry her fingers off. It’s painful to do so, both physically, and emotionally. Victor wants to stay, curl up in bed with Ariadne. But he can only imagine how the Omega would react upon waking up.

“You’d probably try to claw my eyes out,” Victor whispers to the slumbering woman.

The peaceful look on Ariadne’s face quickly evaporates. With every step Victor takes away from her, the Omega grows more agitated, a tempered look marring her stunning features.

Victor sighs, chest tight. He flips the switch off and proceeds to the guest bedroom. The Alpha takes a quick shower before he fits himself between the sheets. He finds that he isn’t comfortable no matter how he repositions. But he’s so tired that he doesn’t care. Within five minutes, he falls fast asleep.

He’s not sure how long he’s been out when he hears the first cry. Agonizing, fearful, lost. Victor’s eyes pop open. It’s coming from the master bedroom. Ariadne is in some sort of trouble. His Alpha brain screams at him to get up. Still muddled, and clumsy from sleep, Victor dashes over, stubbing his toes on various objects.

Ariadne is in trouble. There’s no time to think about keeping his toes safe.

When Victor finally makes his way to the suite, he realizes Ariadne is not in the envisioned perilous danger. The Omega is having a nightmare. Upon moving closer, Alpha Victor hears the words in between the desperate cries.

“Please,” Ariadne begs in her sleep, “Don’t hurt me anymore.”

That’s tragic. Victor's frantic. He can’t stand it. He’s not sure about the science of nightmares, but he decides to wake Ariadne up by gently shaking her.

“Hey,” Victor whispers, “Wake up, it’s-”

In an eye blink, Ariadne’s nails are crushing into Victor’s windpipe. Her gaze is wide with terror. Victor curses himself. The Omega is in a position to rip his throat out. How could he put himself in such a vulnerable state?

“-just a dream,” Victor chokes out.

It is an eternity in the five seconds it takes Ariadne to come to her senses. Her eyes flicker with recognition, and she lets Victor go.

“You’re supposed to let people sleep through their nightmares,” Ariadne groans, throwing a hand over her eyes.

Science, right.

“Sorry,” Victor manages to whisper. The Alpha slowly steps backward, “I’ll let you get back to sleep.”

Even in the darkness, Ariadne’s blue eyes are visible, luminous, and bright. Right now they shine with panic. “Wait.”

The Alpha in him stills as if waiting on orders.

“Can you-” Ariadne loses her nerve and looks away.

Victor stands like a stone statue, but it’s hard. Waves of emotion well up inside his body. His mind keeps thinking of increasingly dangerous things, images painted in heat, the sweet smell of mint, soft exhales of pleasure.

“Can I what?” Victor asks jaw clenched.

“Nothing,” Ariadne finally says. “Nevermind.”

Victor wants to press the issue, but it’s late at night, banking on early morning, and he doesn’t want to stress the Omega anymore. “Get some rest.”

The Alpha is at the door when he hears a broken, submissive cry. Every nerve in his body comes alive. Using wolf calls is outdated in modern life. The eloquence of language has basically made it obsolete. Alphas don’t need to use their call to get their pack to fall in line. They simply have to say, ‘Get the f*ck in line.’

“Damn,” Ariadne hisses.

Victor turns around. The Omega is covering her mouth, lest another sound escape. The Omega call is different from an Alpha’s. It isn’t used to get a pack in line or to exert control. The Omega call is a way to alert a pack of their extreme agitation, or distress, their need for comfort, if they are in danger, or if they want affection.

Ariadne seals her hand over her mouth, fighting her own body. Her call has degraded into soft whimpers. Why is she doing this? If she needs something, why doesn’t she just use her words?

“What’s wrong?” Victor asks softly, unable to move from the spot. He doesn’t have the strength, not with Ariadne like this.

Ariadne refuses to meet Victor’s eyes. Instead, she starts her counting again, trying to calm herself down. But at the number seven another call- more desperate and needy than the first- fights its way out of her mouth.

“F*ck, f*ck, f*ck,” Ariadne curses, tears streaming out of her eyes.

Victor takes a step back into the room, and towards the bed. Gradually, the calling stops, and quiet, tearful, cries take their place. It occurs to Victor that Ariadne is too proud to ask him to stay. But the Omega in her is beyond her control.

Victor wiggles into the empty portion of the bed, careful not to touch Ariadne who’s lying still on the other side.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Ariadne spits.

“Sleeping in my bed, in my house,” Victor answers casually.

“Get the f*ck out,” the Omega says sternly.

Victor doesn’t respond, he simply rubs at his scent glands with his palms, quickening the diffusion process. Ariadne flushes, even in the darkness, Victor can tell she’s taken aback.

“W-What are you doing?” Ariadne stutters.

“Aren’t Omega’s supposed to find Alpha scents calming?” Victor says neutrally. “So like, take a f*cking breath, and calm the f*ck down.”

Ariadne frowns, her breathing suddenly becoming shallow. “Get out.”

Victor continues to rub his glands. He can’t smell it himself, but he knows there must be a strong aroma now. It overwhelms the mint in the room, nullifying it.

“Stop that,” Ariadne hisses.

“I’m gonna stay,” Victor says easily. “You can’t expect me to leave after that call.”

Ariadne flushes bright pink. It’s getting light out, and her eyes are turning grayish as they catch the morning hues.

“W-what call?” Ariadne pretends.

“That distress call,” Victor clarifies as Ariadne reddens even more. “You want me here. Just say so. God, is it that hard?”

“I don’t want you here,” Ariadne replies, eyes shaking. “I want you to leave.”

Victor stares at her hard. Then he sighs, crawls off the bed, makes his way towards the door. He hears it again, Ariadne calling for him.

“Damn it,” Ariadne curses, tears streaming again. “Why is this f*cking happening? Why are you doing this to me?”

Victor is frustrated but he is more worried than agitated by Ariadne’s mixed signals, “I can stay. It doesn’t mean anything. I won’t- I would never touch you unless you wanted me to.”

Ariadne searches Victor’s face for something. At the same time, she seems to be calculating again. Finally, with a resigned sigh, “Okay. Okay, just for tonight.”

It’s almost dawn now. The night has already passed. But Victor doesn’t want to argue anymore. He just wants to sleep for a few more hours, before he has to hit the Head Quatres. The Alpha shuffles back into the bed and closes his eyes.

Ariadne's scent grows ever sweeter as she calms down and falls asleep. Victor realizes that there are two sides to Ariadne. There is the proud, arrogant portion of her, that fights against her appointed biology and lot in life. There is also the soft, wanting Omega in her that wants to be protected and loved. Victor has only known Ariadne for two days. But he’s already falling hard, for both sides of this beautiful woman.

And it f*cking hurts.

It hurts because Ariadne is hurting. Victor has never allowed such a vulnerability near him. He knows he is small for an Alpha, dainty, not the archetype. He has built himself a pack on removing any softness he might feel. Ariadne is destroying that unknowingly. In the past two days, Victor has felt more than he has in the last two years.

It’s frightening.

When Victor wakes up, golden yellow light is blaring into the room. It’s probably late morning by now. He turns to check on Ariadne only to find that the Omega is gone. Ariadne is gone. Where she was sleeping before is now empty. she’s gone. His Omega is gone.

“Ariadne,” Victor shouts, panicked. The man tears out of bed and thunders down the stairs. “Where are you?”

What if she left? What if Victor never sees her-

Ariadne is in the kitchen. She looks to be making breakfast. After the panic wears off, Victor starts to smell something burning.

“What are you doing in here?” Victor asks, fully aware of how crazy he looks in the morning. His hair probably looks like a poorly constructed bird’s nest. Ariadne, on the other hand, is already dressed and looking like she belongs on the front page of the magazine cover.

“Making this peace offering,” Ariadne says with a slight smirk. It’s just the corner really, the left one pulling upward. It’s aggravating and charming at the same time.

Ariadne shoves a plate at the Alpha.

It’s a charred bagel with a smear of cream cheese on it.

“A peace offering?” Victor asks.

Ariadne frowns just a little now, and a warm salmon starts to coat her cheeks. “For ruining your first edition comic. And for what happened last night. It’s a thank you, don’t be a f*cking prick about it okay?”

“Your thank you is accepted,” the Alpha says finally. He takes a bite of the bagel. It’s not edible. But since Ariadne made it for him, it is edible. He takes another mouthful, willing himself not to grimace.

“Look, I just figured I’d rile you up,” Ariadne explains, “see how angry you can get, how bad it’ll be if I stay here. Worst-case scenario, you would have roughed me up and kicked me out.”

Victor would have never laid a single finger on Ariadne. His stomach is turning at the thought, or maybe it’s the bagel.

“So, did I pass your fucked up test?” Victor asks after a beat. “For the record, I may be a scumbag, but I have standards. I’m not going to hit someone I invited into my house as a guest. Do you really want to leave that bad? Well then, just go. No one is stopping you.”

For the real record, that is a bluff. Victor would definitely be hard-pressed if Ariadne decided to leave.

“You did pass,” Ariadne answers, “and I don’t want to leave anymore. I’m starting to think this Stockholm business is real.”