Chapter 92: The Enigma’s Omega -1

Lian stepped into the crowded hall twenty minutes late and already regretting every decision that had brought him here.

The air hung thick with Alpha pheromones, sharp and demanding, and his suppressants felt thinner than usual under the weight of them.

A Beta coworker from the logistics floor caught his arm near the entrance and offered a thin smile.

"You’re quieter than usual tonight," the man said.

"Everything all right?"

"Fine," Lian answered. His voice stayed even only because he forced it.

"Just a long week."

He moved past before the conversation could stretch. His eyes found Kael almost at once.

The Enigma stood near the far windows with a cluster of high-ranking Alphas, tall enough that the light caught the hard line of his shoulders and the way his dark shirt pulled across his chest when he shifted.

Lian’s gaze tracked the slow rise and fall of that chest, the controlled set of Kael’s mouth, the low rumble of his voice that carried even across the noise of the room. An unwanted and immediat heat licked low in Lian’s belly.

He had watched Kael for years from safe distances, cataloguing every detail in private, but tonight the distance felt paper-thin.

Kael turned his head. For two full seconds his eyes locked on Lian across the space.

The contact landed like a physical blow. Lian’s pulse slammed against his throat. His skin flushed hot.

Slick gathered between his legs with humiliating speed, and his carefully maintained mask of Beta calm cracked. Early heat roared through him, sudden and vicious, triggered by nothing more than that look and the years of buried hunger that looked back.

He turned away at once and started for the side exit. A nearby Alpha stepped into his path, nostrils flaring.

"You all right?" the Alpha asked, voice already lower.

"Something smells off."

"Stress," Lian said. The word came out shaky.

"Just stress. I need air."

The Alpha did not move. Lian pushed past him anyway and slipped into the narrower corridor that ran behind the main hall.

The door swung shut behind him and the relative quiet only made the heat louder in his own body.

Slick soaked the front of his trousers. His cock strained hard against the fabric. He pressed his back to the wall, one hand already shoving past his waistband, fingers wrapping around himself with desperate, clumsy urgency.

"Stop," he whispered to the empty corridor.

"Not here. Not now."

His hand moved anyway. He stroked fast, thumb dragging over the head on every upward pull, chasing any relief that might dull the sharp edge of the heat.

More slick slid down the insides of his thighs. The scent of his own arousal thickened in the confined space.

He bit his lower lip hard enough to taste copper and kept working himself, hips rocking into his fist.

"Kael," he breathed, the name slipping out before he could catch it.

The sound of it only fed the fire. He imagined those broad shoulders pinning him in place, the weight of that controlled body, the low voice saying things Lian had never allowed himself to hear out loud.

His strokes turned frantic. Precome slicked his fingers. His free hand braced against the wall while his legs trembled.

The orgasm built fast and ugly, driven by years of quiet obsession finally given room to burn.

He came with a choked sound, spilling over his own knuckles, body locking tight as another wave of heat rolled through him.

The release brought no real relief. His cock stayed half-hard in his grip. Fresh slick coated his thighs.

The corridor now reeked of Omega in heat, which is impossible to miss, impossible to hide. And with a hall filled with horny alphas just closeby and not enough omegas to go round, that was a problem.

He could hear slow and deliberate footsteps just behind him. Then an Alpha’s voice cut the silence, rough with recognition.

"Omega."

The Alpha’s hand closed around Lian’s upper arm and hauled him out of the corridor before he could wipe his fingers or straighten his clothes.

The main hall doors swung open and the full force of the gathering hit him at once. Dozens of Alphas turned. The first sharp inhale of his uncovered scent rolled through the room like a wave.

"Fuck, is that...?"

"Omega. Fresh heat."

"Unclaimed. Look at him."

Lian stumbled as the first Alpha shoved him farther into the open space. His back hit hard on the nearest wall. Slick had already soaked through the fabric of his trousers and now ran warm down the inside of his thigh in a visible line.

Another surge of heat punched through him. His knees weakened. He tried to speak and the words fractured.

"I’m not... I take suppressants. This is a mistake."

A second Alpha stepped in close, nostrils flaring. "Mistake my ass. You reek of it."

A third voice overlapped, lower and hungrier. "I claim first right. I caught the scent."

"Bullshit. He’s standing in my section of the floor."

Growls rose. Bodies pressed nearer. Lian’s pulse hammered in his throat. He pressed both hands flat against the wall behind him and tried to keep his hips still, but the heat twisted deeper and his body betrayed him.

His spine arched without permission. His thighs parted a fraction. The presenting posture locked in before he could stop it.

"Please don’t," he whispered. The plea came out broken and soft. "Please."

One Alpha reached for his wrist. Another knocked the hand aside with a sharp snarl.

The first Alpha who had dragged him from the corridor leaned in until his mouth nearly brushed Lian’s ear.

"You were jerking off to the idea of us, weren’t you? Filthy little thing."

A second Alpha dropped to one knee without warning and dragged two fingers up the wet streak on Lian’s thigh.

The touch slid through the slick and pressed higher, rubbing deliberately against the soaked fabric between Lian’s legs.

Lian’s breath punched out of him in a short, helpless sound.

"Listen to that," the kneeling Alpha said.

"He’s dripping for it already."

The first Alpha gripped Lian’s jaw and forced his face upward so the whole room could see the flush across his cheeks and the glassy heat in his eyes.

"An unclaimed Omega in full heat is good for one thing. Spreading those legs and taking every knot we give him until he can’t walk. You ready for that?"

Lian tried to shake his head. The motion only made the Alpha’s grip tighten. Another wave of heat crashed through him. Fresh slick spilled down both thighs.

His cock twitched hard inside his trousers. The Alpha’s fingers on his jaw forced his mouth open slightly, and a low, involuntary moan escaped before he could swallow it.

"That’s it," the kneeling Alpha murmured, rubbing more firmly between Lian’s legs.

"Feel how wet you are. You were hiding this from us the whole time. Betas don’t soak their pants like this."

Lian’s hips jerked forward against the pressure of those fingers. Shame flooded him, he couldn’t believe his body would betray him like this. He whispered again, voice cracking,

"Please don’t. I can’t... I don’t want..."

The words dissolved into another broken sound when the fingers pressed harder. The Alpha standing over him laughed low and filthy.

"Your mouth says one thing. Your body is already begging. Look at you presenting for a room full of Alphas. You’re going to take the first knot right here so everyone knows what you are."

More voices layered over each other - claims, counters, crude offers about who would knot him first and who would hold him open for the rest.

Lian’s knees trembled. His free hand fumbled at the wall, searching for any leverage that might let him push away, but the heat kept rolling through him in heavy pulses.

His body stayed arched, thighs open, scent pouring off him stronger with every second.

The Alpha’s fingers slid higher, finding the edge of his waistband and slipping underneath.

Slick coated the intruding touch at once. Lian’s head tipped back against the wall. A raw moan tore out of him even as he tried to form the word no.

The air in the room changed without warning.

Every Alpha went still. Conversations died mid-sentence. The fingers between Lian’s legs froze. The hand on his jaw loosened by a fraction. The heavy silence that followed felt absolute.

Kael’s voice cut through it, low and absolute, carrying to every corner of the hall.

"He is Mine."