Chapter 4: The Afternoon Dose
Rowan’s fingers trembled slightly as he adjusted the strap of his bag. The sunroom that morning had been a reprieve, his pencils and papers a familiar shield against the enormity of his situation. Soren had been true to his word; a silent, efficient woman had delivered a box of Rowan’s supplies from his apartment by ten. He’d spent hours lost in the veins of a Monstera leaf, the city a silent panorama below. The peace was so profound it felt like a trap.
The summons came at four-fifteen. A text direct to the new phone Soren had given him. Vance Tower. My office. 5 PM. Driver is downstairs.
No explanation.
The drive was a silent blur of gleaming steel and glass. The elevator to the top floor was a cylinder of polished brass, his own pale reflection looking back at him, wide-eyed. The reception area was desert-quiet, all cool marble and abstract art. Soren’s assistant, a Beta with a perfectly blank expression, merely nodded toward a giant slab of mahogany that served as a door.
“You can go in, Mr. Hart.”
Rowan pushed the door open. The office was vast, a testament to cold power. The evening sun, low and heavy, slanted through the floor-to-ceiling windows, laying bars of fiery gold across the immense desk and the Persian rug. Soren stood by the window, his silhouette cut sharp against the molten sky. He held a sheaf of papers.
“Close it,” he said, without turning.
The click of the latch was definitive, sealing them in. The hum of the city was a distant whisper.
Soren turned. He was in his element here, encased in a suit that probably cost more than Rowan’s yearly rent. His silver eyes were like shards of flint. “We have forms to sign. For the specialist. Updated hormonal tracking consent.”
His voice was all business. Rowan’s shoulders dropped a fraction. This was a transaction. He could handle a transaction. “Okay.”
He approached the desk. Soren laid the papers down on the leather blotter, a Montblanc pen beside them. Rowan leaned over to scan the dense legal text. He caught the scent then—not just cedar and clean linen, but the underlying, coppery-sharp edge of Alpha agitation. Of distress.
Before he could process it, Soren’s hand closed around his bicep. The grip was iron.
“The specialist called an hour ago,” Soren said, his voice dropping, losing its boardroom polish. It was gravel and tension. “Your serum levels. They’re dropping. Not drastically, but enough. The morning session wasn’t sufficient.”
Rowan’s heart stuttered. “What does that—”
“It means we need an extra session. Now.” The words were clipped, final. The hand on his arm moved, sliding around to the small of his back, then lower, gripping the soft swell of his ass through his thin cotton trousers. “The pup’s viability is borderline. We cannot wait for tonight.”
“Soren, wait—” Panic, sharp and acrid, rose in his throat.
“No waiting.” In one brutal, efficient motion, Soren swept the papers and the pen to the floor. They scattered like leaves. He hoisted Rowan up, seating him on the edge of the cold, polished mahogany. His hands went to Rowan’s belt.
“This isn’t—not here—” Rowan flailed, his hands pushing weakly at Soren’s chest.
Soren caught his wrists in one hand, pinning them against Rowan’s own stomach. His other hand yanked Rowan’s trousers and underwear down to his knees, baring him to the conditioned air. “It is exactly here. You think I give a single fuck about location when it comes to this?” He manhandled Rowan, turning him, bending him forward over the desk until his cheek was pressed against the cool leather. The city sprawled, dizzyingly, below him.
Rowan heard the rustle of clothing, the unmistakable sound of a zipper. Soren’s knees nudged his thighs wider apart. A thumb, harsh and unyielding, pressed against his hole, testing. He was still sore from the morning, still loosely open. A slick, warm trickle of his own traitorous readiness met Soren’s touch.
Soren spat. A crude, wet sound, and the moisture landed directly on his exposed center. Before Rowan could even gasp, Soren was pressing forward, the thick, flared head of his cock demanding entrance. There was no gentle breach. He shoved in, a brutal, unforgiving invasion that stole the breath from Rowan’s lungs.
“Fuck!” Rowan choked out, his fingers scrambling for purchase on the slick desk.
Soren sank to the hilt in one deep, devastating stroke and stilled, buried to the root. He leaned over, his torso a hot, suffocating weight on Rowan’s back, his mouth at Rowan’s ear. His breath was ragged. “You feel that? That’s the only thing that’s going to stabilize you. The only thing that’s going to keep our pup alive in your belly. My cock. My seed. Nothing else.”
He withdrew almost all the way, then slammed back in. The rhythm he set was frantic, punitive, a far cry from the measured pace of the morning. This was pure, unvarnished need. Each drive punched the air from Rowan’s lungs, sending shocks of pain-tinged pleasure radiating from his core. The desk rocked with their violence.
“Your pretty little body betrays you,” Soren grunted, his hips a relentless piston. “Dropping levels… fucking threatening what’s mine…” He punctuated each phrase with a sharp, deep thrust. “I won’t allow it. You hear me? I will fuck you full, fuck you stable, fuck you until every cell in your body remembers it belongs to me and is growing something of mine.”
The obscene, wet slap of skin on skin echoed off the hard surfaces. Rowan tried to stifle his sounds, biting into the leather, but a broken moan escaped as Soren’s angle shifted, striking that devastating spot inside him with unerring accuracy.
“There. That’s it. Take it. Grip my cock like the desperate little Omega you are.” Soren’s hand left his hip, fisting in his hair, yanking his head back. The panoramic view of the city blurred through Rowan’s tears. “Come on. I want to feel you come all over this desk. Do it. Now.”
The command, laced with Alpha dominance and sheer biological imperative, was a circuit completed. Rowan’s resistance shattered. A hot, sharp climax ripped through him, brutal in its intensity. He cried out, a raw, unfiltered sound as his cock spasmed, painting the dark mahogany with streaks of white.
Soren grunted, his rhythm faltering. He drove in one last, deep time, and held. Rowan felt the sickening, profound stretch as his knot began to swell, locking them together, a painful, inseparable anchor. Soren’s whole body shuddered, and the hot, pulsing flood of his release filled Rowan, a searing claim that felt like it would never end.
For long moments, the only sounds were their ragged breaths and the faint hum of the building. Soren remained slumped over him, his weight driving Rowan harder into the desk, his forehead resting between Rowan’s shoulder blades. His grip in Rowan’s hair softened to something resembling a caress.
When he spoke, his voice was wrecked, stripped of all its earlier fury. It was just a tired, rough whisper against Rowan’s sweat-damp skin. “The levels… they have to rise.”
It wasn’t an apology. It was a confession. A stark, terrifying glimpse of the fear driving the cruelty.
Slowly, the knot subsided. Soren pulled out, and a rush of fluid followed, trickling down Rowan’s trembling thighs. He gently, almost awkwardly, tugged Rowan’s trousers back up over his hips. He righted his own clothes with quick, precise movements.
Rowan pushed himself up, his limbs watery. He turned, leaning back against the desk for support. Soren stood before him, his suit immaculate again except for a slight sheen of sweat on his temple. His expression was closed, the vulnerability gone, replaced by a hollow sternness. But his eyes, those mercury eyes, dropped to Rowan’s stomach for a fleeting second.
He bent and began to gather the scattered papers from the floor. He picked up the Montblanc, examined it, and placed it back on the blotter. He laid the crumpled forms neatly before Rowan.
“Sign them,” he said, his voice quiet but firm. “The driver will take you home. I’ll be there at nine.”
Rowan looked from the forms to Soren’s impassive face. The phantom feeling of being brutally filled still lingered, a raw warmth inside him. But so did the echo of that shattered whisper. The levels have to rise.
He picked up the pen. His hand was steady now. He signed his name on each line indicated, the script loopy and organic against the stark print. It felt less like surrender now, and more like a strange, silent pact.
He left without a word. As the mahogany door closed behind him, he heard no movement from inside. Just the overwhelming, silent weight of the tower, and the warm, aching proof of Soren’s fear still seeping slowly into his underwear.