Pucked by the Alpha

Elara

The city of Crestwood smelled of pine needles and impending snow, a clean, sharp scent that did little to mask the cloying aroma of desperation clinging to my own clothes. Hope, I’d learned, was a luxury commodity, and my account was overdrawn.

I was an Omega.

In this world, that was a diagnosis. It meant a life dictated by biology, a monthly cycle of hormonally-induced madness called a Heat that rendered you a whimpering, mindless creature desperate for an Alpha’s knot. It meant a society that saw you as either a precious, fragile broodmare to be protected or a temptation to be controlled. It meant a life on suppressants, a chemical cage to lock away the part of myself that the world deemed too dangerous, too distracting.

I was also a damn good physiotherapy student, top of my class at Crestwood University. But good grades didn’t pay the rent for the shoebox apartment I shared with my best friend, Sasha, nor did they cover the escalating costs of my mother’s care. So, I hid my designation and worked as a trainee at a high-end sports therapy clinic, my hands learning the topography of muscle and sinew, my nose filled with the bland, neutral scent of Betas and other medicated Omegas.

“You’re a miracle worker, Elara,” my supervisor, a kindly Beta named Alistair, had said last week. “But your student visa doesn’t allow for more hours, and I can’t legally pay you more.”

Which is why I was standing in front of his desk today, my heart a trapped bird against my ribs.

“The client is…high-profile,” Alistair said, avoiding my gaze. “Extremely high-stress. An Alpha. His team’s medical staff is at a loss. He’s suffering from severe muscle tension, agitation…symptoms of intense professional pressure exacerbating his pre-Rut symptoms.” He slid a nondisclosure agreement across the desk. “They specifically requested an Omega therapist. An unregistered one.”

My blood ran cold. An unregistered Omega meant they wanted the real thing. They wanted pheromones. My pheromones. For an Alpha. It was a line I had sworn I would never cross. It was dangerous. It was degrading.

“The pay is five thousand dollars a session,” Alistair said quietly.

Five thousand. A session. That was more than I made in three months. It was my mother’s medication for a year. It was the difference between drowning and breathing.

“They believe an Omega’s natural pheromones can have a significant calming effect on an agitated Alpha, more effective than any medication,” he continued, still not looking at me. “It would require you to…lower your suppressant dosage before each session.”

He was asking me to walk into a lion’s den, dangle a piece of meat, and hope it didn’t decide to eat me whole.

“Who is it?” I asked, my voice a dry whisper.

Alistair finally met my eyes, his own filled with pity. “I can’t tell you. The NDA is absolute. But he’s one of the biggest names in the NHL. And he’s desperate.”

Desperate Alphas were the most dangerous kind.

I stared at the contract. My mind screamed no. It screamed run. But the image of my mother’s tired smile, the stack of overdue bills on my desk…they screamed louder.

I picked up the pen, my hand trembling. “Where do I sign?”

The dare was a stupid, vodka-fueled mistake a week prior. Sasha had dared me to slide into the DMs of my ultimate celebrity crush, Kaelan ‘Kas’ Thorne, the terrifyingly talented star forward for the Crestwood Wolves. The Alpha of Alphas. His pheromonal signature was legendary—said to smell of glacier ice and pine, so potent it could bring a lesser Alpha to his knees.

“Your scent profile must be devastating. Heard you smell like a blizzard. I’d like to get snowed in,” I’d typed, mortified, before Sasha hit send.

He’d never even seen it. The message was buried in a mountain of others. Thank God.

Now, standing outside the penthouse suite of the city’s most expensive hotel, I had a sinking feeling my stupid, drunken boast was about to come back to haunt me in the most spectacularly ironic way possible.