Chapter 4: It Meant Nothing
1098 Words
Erica's POV
I woke up before the city did.
The morning light came through the curtains, for exactly four seconds I didn't know where I was.
Then the ache hit.
Right.
My whole body remembered last night in every detail. Every place his hands had been, the good ache I felt that reminded me that I'd been fully and completely spent.
I lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling, not moving.
His arm tightened was loose around my waist. His chest warm against my back rising and falling. His face while sleeping looked different than it had all night, he looked softer, younger.
I lifted his arm with both hands, careful not to wake him up and set it down on the sheets. He didn't wake, I sat up, swung my legs off the bed and just sat there at the edge of it for a second, nake, his marks on my body, my hair a mess.
I got up.
My dress was on the floor halfway across the room. My bag was wedged between the nightstand and the wall and I grabbed it and dressed up quietly, checking over my shoulder every few seconds even though he hadn't moved. I found my heels by the door and slipped them on in the hallway with the door already clicked shut behind me.
The cab smelled like air freshener and I sat in the back seat with my bag on my lap. My fingers found my throat before I could stop them.
The mark was right there below my jaw. I pressed two fingers against it and felt my pulse under them and told myself it was nothing.
It felt like something, said a voice in my chest.
It wasn't, I said back.
He was probably still asleep, probably wouldn't even register the cold space where I'd been. Probably did this in the regular, found a hot girl at a bar, smiled that devasting smile, said something low in her ear and disappeared into a hotel elevator. I just happened to be the one who was off suppressants last light.
Mila opened the door before I even knocked, looked at me up and down once and gasped.
"Oh," She stepped back. "Oh, wow."
"Don't start." I walked past her into the apartment.
"You smell like..." She followed me, sniffing and then she grabbed my arm and turned around. "Erica. That is strongly alpha musk. What the hell happened last night?"
"I need coffee first." I groaned.
"You need to talk first." She steered me to the couch, pushed me down into it and stood in front of me with her arms crosses. "Start talking, right now."
I look at her, then at the ceiling, then back at her
"I got knotted," I said.
The room went very quiet.
Mila blinked twice. "You got..."
"Knotted." I finished for her.
"To the guy from the club?" She asked.
"Yeah, to the stranger from the club." I confirmed.
"Erica.," She sat down hard on the coffee table directly in front of me. "Erica Savannah, you got knotted to a man whose name you don't know in a hotel room?"
"Yes." I said.
"Last night?"
"Yes, still correct." I inhaled. "Thanks for the recap."
She stared at me. "How was it?"
"Mila..."
"I need to know." She whined. "For my own peace of mind. On a scale of one to..."
"Eleven," I said, before I could stop myself.
Her eyes went wide. "Eleven."
"Don't make it weird." I groaned.
"It's already weird, you got knotted to a stranger!" She grabbed both my hands. "Okay but like are you okay? Doed me anything hurt? Did he...was he..."
"He was..." I stopped and pressed my lips together. "He was fine, more than fine and I'm fine."
"Erica." Her voice dropped. "You've been touching your throat since you walked in. That doesn't look fine."
I dropped my hand from my neck, I hadn't realize I'd done it again.
"It doesn't matter," I said. "I'm not going to see him again. He doesn't know my name and I don't know his. It was just one night."
She looked at me for awhile.
"Please tell me you used protection," she said finally.
"He had a condom." I said.
"He just had one..." She frowned. "Already?"
"In his jacket, yeah." I said.
"Who walks around with a condom?" She tilted her head. "What exactly was his plan for last night before he even met you?"
"I don't know and it doesn't matter."
"I'm just saying..." She said. "He could've been planning to pull that on anyone. You could've been anyone to him. He saw a pretty girl, pulled out his emergency condom..."
"Okay, I get it." My voice was sharp.
"You don't look like you do." She looked at me carefully. "He felt different, didn't he?"
"It doesn't matter how he felt," My voice was low. "He woke up to an empty bed, and moved on. Guys like that don't sit around, thinking about it. He just got what he was looking for and it's done and fine because I got what I was looking for too and now I have to go home and deal with my real life." I picked up my bag from the floor. "Which starts today."
Mila was quiet for a second. "You really think he's not thinking about you right now?"
"I think I was off suppressants, Mila and he responded to biology." I said. "Any omega off suppressants in that room last night would've gotten the same result."
"That's not..."
"It's fine," I stood up and squared my shoulders. "I'm fine. It was good, exactly what I needed before returning back, and now it's done."
She looked at me for a long moment.
"Okay," she said softly.
I went to shower. Twenty minutes later I was done, packed, standing in my bedroom doorway with a bag over my shoulder and the mark still on my throat that no amount of concealer was fully covering.
"How long are you actually going to be gone?" Mila asked.
"I really don't know, Mila." I looked up at her. "It could be a week. It could be never."
She came over and hugged me tight. "You text me," she said into my shoulder. "Every day. I don't care what time."
"I will."
I walked to the door, pulled out my phone and found my mother's number and stood there for a second, with my thumb over the call button then pressed call.
She picked up on the second ring. "Erica."
"I'm on my way,"
- Writer
