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“Did you see him?”
“See who?” Zach muttered, sitting listlessly on a stool. What had he been doing? Oh yeah, taking off the decorative flowers from his hair. He’d stopped at some point, his mind shutting down.
“That handsome alpha who was eating you with his eyes! Duh.” Tate was putting on his shoes after another event, his eyes bright with excitement.
“Huh. Which one?”
“Of course you didn’t notice. Because you don’t care.” Tate rolled his eyes at him. “The only alpha that ever got your attention, even if he wasn’t there more than two minutes, was that Valerian. Plus, that was a week ago. He hasn’t come to the two events we did since. You did notice that, right?”
Yeah, Zach had noticed as much. His mind tracked Valerian’s presences and absences like clockwork. It was attuned to anything that had to do with Valerian, and sadly he still hadn’t been able to scramble that signal.
“You guys coming?” Sim said. “I have dance practice early tomorrow, and after tonight, I think I really can’t skip it.”
Sim was a nice omega, friend of Tate’s and Kai’s. He had danced with Tate today, while Zach had played the tambourine, keeping the tempo.
“Oh, come on, you weren’t that bad,” Tate muttered.
“That’s not a reassuring statement, my friend.” Sim shook his head, ginger locks tumbling about his face. He had a roguish appeal to him that Zach hoped would net him an alpha easily, hopefully a kind one.
That was what Zach also wanted. A kind man. With enough money to pay off Zach’s debt, sure, that was unfortunately his reality, but otherwise... he didn’t need much. Hell, he could work, if allowed, if his Lotus qualification could land him a job other than whoring himself. All he wanted was an alpha who really wanted him, who lov—
“Hey, Zach, you coming?” Eden, the omega who played the lute during the show, was giving Zach the stink-eye for falling behind their little group. “I’m starving. Move your ass.”
“Roger that.”
He had to keep moving. That was it. If he kept moving, he’d eventually go past the hurt, the absence of Valerian from his life, and be happy. He’d work harder at finding someone else, would pay attention to the alphas who obviously seemed interested in him and not sit like a zombie, lost inside his mind while his friends built their own future.
That was what he’d promised himself when he’d been selected to join Lotus academy: that he’d make his way, create a future where he’d be happy, where he’d have enough to eat and not worry about where to sleep, about whether he’d be woken up with blows and being dragged away by his hair to be dumped and locked up in a basement.
He shivered.
Glancing around him as they crossed the bar where they’d performed, hefting his tambourines in his hands, he tried to imagine which alpha had been eyeing him, as per Tate’s observations.
They all looked the same to him. Burly, oversexed, muscular bullies. Bland. Forgettable.
And who asked for your opinion, boy? he scolded himself. Who cares for it? you were given a chance in this academy, to make a home, have a family, live a comfortable life. Don’t squander it. You’ll take the alpha who decides to pay for you, no questions asked. Got it?
“Got it,” he grumbled, almost running into a table before correcting his course, the tambourines banging against the chairs of a pair of alphas who shot him curious looks.
“God, Zach!” Tate came and grabbed his elbow, steering him toward the exit. “This isn’t like you, to be so spacey and out of it. Snap out of it.”
“Okay, okay!” He tugged his arm free of Tate’s hold, stomping toward the minivan that would take them back to the academy. “I said I got it, damn it.”
“Right.”
“So leave me alone.”
“Sure thing. I mean, you didn’t even ask me if any alpha was interested in me!” Tate called out and threw his hands in the air. “Thank you, Zach. You’re such a good friend.”
He was a horrible, horrible friend. A horrible person. Zach ducked his head and kept going, reaching the minivan and throwing the tambourines inside. Head hanging, he stayed there for a few seconds, trying to calm his thoughts and the pounding of his heart.
Tate was right, this wasn’t like him. Maybe his heat was coming on. His heats were erratic, unlike those of some other omegas that came like clockwork with the moon, changeable, and never with the same duration or symptoms.
The academy nurse had said it could be a result of a rough childhood.
Calling his childhood rough was like calling a tsunami a ripple.
Anyways... He had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach today and it might be a heat coming on or a bout of indigestion, it didn’t matter. He was behaving like an asshole with his friends and he had to change that, pronto.
He vowed he’d apologize to Tate and everyone the next morning, after a good night’s sleep. When he didn’t feel like he’d break apart just from a word or a look.
That was the plan.
***
But plans are tricky things, relying on stability, and although Zach’s life had stabilized a hell of a lot since coming to the academy as a child all those years ago, his life was apparently still not his own.
“We have to discuss your virginity auction,” the Dean said, leaning back in his leather chair behind his massive desk, making it creak and regarding Zach with a narrow gaze.
“What?”
“Your virginity auction,” the Dean said with exaggerated patience. “Remember? Since no alpha has Claimed you yet, we need to take action so you can start paying back your debts to the academy.”
“Shit. When?”
“The sooner the better.”
Holy shit.
His panic made no sense. He’d known all along it would probably come to this. With no more Courting gifts from Valerian, the academy was taking things in its own hands. After all, Zach had debts to pay. Without an alpha seemingly interested in Claiming him and paying them off, an auction was the way to go.
And so what? It was only one night—with an unknown alpha who might or might not be careful and kind. Zach hadn’t been raised on feather beds with a silver spoon in his mouth. He’d heard of alphas being violent and cruel on First Nights, after winning a Lotus Boy’s auction, but it wasn’t the norm or anything. It—
“Zach. Are you listening?”
“Yes, Dean, sir.”
“We’ll spread the news along our network of people and they’ll make sure every alpha in the area and further hears about it. Pray they bid high for you, Zach. You have accumulated quite the debt. You’ve been here for a long time. We practically raised you.”
No, they hadn’t. Still, he couldn’t complain. Cold and strict and mercenary as they were, the academy people had still been much kinder to him than his own family.
Though he didn’t trust the Dean further than he could throw him, and since the Dean had at least ninety pounds on him, that wasn’t very far at all.
“I really hope that the auction will raise enough money,” the Dean muttered. “It will lower your debt, and at the same time raise your value, making you more desirable to unattached alphas. Quite honestly, Zachary, I’d hoped you’d have a suitor by now. You’re a pretty boy, very spirited. Maybe that’s what’s keeping alphas away? Tone it down, will you?”
“Tone... it down?” Zach whispered, bewildered. “Tone what down?”
“Your character, boy! That naughtiness that always gets you into trouble. Talking back. Making jokes. Be quiet and let your betters decide for you, got it?”
“But I...”
“Enough, boy!”
Shit. So not only he’d sell his body to the highest bidder, he was supposed to... become someone else? Someone quiet as a mouse, someone who stood back and let things happen, someone... submissive?
Maybe it would be easier that way, he thought. Pretend to be someone else, someone whose value was only measured by how aroused he made an alpha and how meekly he accepted his fate. After all, his defiance, his hopes, hadn’t made any difference.
“Go practice your dance moves, and your sex techniques, and make yourself pretty. You want to look your best when the interested alphas start arriving for a look.”
Oh, goody. He’d also be on display.
Of course he was. This was an auction. He was the item for sale. A pleasure slave, a virgin slave to be taken by the richest one. By an alpha who wouldn’t be Valerian.
Yeah, it was time to pull his head out of his ass and face reality. Face the music, even if its tempo led him toward a cliff he didn’t know how to come back from.
***
“Zach. What happened?” Tate trailed him through the academy hallways as he blindly made his way back to the Lotus Boys’ dormitories, not knowing how he was getting there, only that he had to lock himself up in his room and hide. “Zach!”
“Nothing.”
“Come on... You look like someone kicked you in the nuts.”
It sure felt that way. Zach walked faster. He couldn’t bear to talk about it right now. How stupid, right? Tate’s steps receded behind him, and though he felt like a heel for running away from his best friend, he just couldn’t face him right now.
A virginity auction.
It had sounded better when it had happened to others. He’d heard of such auctions over the years.
Nobody had told him how devastating it was. Maybe others didn’t feel that way?
Maybe others didn’t have a specific alpha haunting their minds night and day. Maybe—
Someone blocked his way, and he stumbled to a halt.
Jimson. The asshole. “What do you want?” Zach muttered, annoyed that he couldn’t just push the omega out of the way and stomp on to his room. Jimson had his usual entourage—a group of three or four boys who followed him like puppies and were now surrounding Zach.
“Me?” Jimson shrugged, a deceptively innocent expression on his face. “Nothing.”
“Let me pass.”
“You look... upset.” Jimson tapped his lower lip with a forefinger. “Why might that be?”
“Leave me alone.”
“What would be the fun in that? Besides... I think I know what happened.” Jimson snickered. “Aw, they gonna sell your tight little hole to the highest bidder? That make you sad?”
Zach flinched. “How do you know about the auction?”
“A little bird told me.”
“You mean you were eavesdropping outside the Dean’s office.”
“Now why do you sound so shocked? I never took you for the saintly kind, Zachary.”
“This auction was none of your business.”
“That what you think?” Jimson sneered.
“Yeah.”
“But it is.”
“Why would it be?” Zach really couldn’t care less.
“Because you keep thinking you’re better than the rest of us, you and your friends.” Jimson snapped. “Think that the alpha who’s gonna give you your first fuck will be the one to keep and hold forever, huh? Newsflash, dimwit: it will be a random, stinking alpha who will hurt you and use you and then leave you hanging. So stop acting like you own the world.”
Zach couldn’t remember ever acting like he owned anything at all and frankly didn’t need this hazing. “Get off my case, Jimson.”
“Oh, sure.” Jimson gave a mocking bow. “At your orders. Please, don’t let me delay your entrance into the celebrated Lotus Boys dormitories.”
“Just because you haven’t made Lotus Boy yet is no reason for you to torment him,” Tate hissed at the group, surprising Zach.
When had timid, quiet Tate become Zach’s defender? When had their roles become reversed?
Also, when had he followed and caught up with Zach?
Besides, Jimson was right. So many other Lotus Boys went through this year after year. Probably more had a V-card auction than those Claimed by an alpha just as they graduated from the academy. Why should he think he was any better, that he deserved better?
“Come on,” Tate said quietly, taking him by the elbow. “Let’s leave these idiots to stew in their own stupid jokes.”
“Yeah...” He let Tate drag him along toward to the dormitories. They took the elevator up, got out, and then Tate stopped.
“So that’s what the Dean wanted to talk to you about, huh?” he whispered.
Zach shrugged. “He hasn’t talked to you about anything like that, has he?”
Tate shook his head.
“Why is he in a hurry about me? We only just graduated. I need a little more time...”
To talk to Valerian? Convince him that Zach would be good for him? To do anything, anything at all to get him back, have him be his first? Throw himself at Valerian’s feet, use all the things he’d ever learned in class to seduce him, to beg him to at least be the one to take his V-card.
After all the sex classes, he never thought he’d be so terrified of an alpha being inside him.
Maybe because in class he’d had control, he’d been by himself even as he’d used the silicon dildos the academy provided for their learning. He’d been shown techniques and had applied them, and there had been pleasure, but he’d managed the discomfort—with lubricant, with the way he’d moved. He could have stopped at any moment.
And despite the teachers’ reassurances, his friend Kai had confided in him that real-life alpha cocks were a lot bigger and harder than the dildos.
The fear returned, churning in his stomach.
“Oh, come on, Zach.” Tate patted his arm. “Don’t look so glum. Jimson is an asshole, and you know it. Don’t pay attention to him.”
It wasn’t Jimson that concerned Zach, but the damn auction.
“Speaking of assholes,” Tate said, “where is Evren? I haven’t seen him in a while.”
Good question.
One that Zach was content for the time being to leave unanswered, with everything else going on, even as he knew deep in his gut that sooner or later the answer would come back to bite him in the ass.