Page 48 of Alpha Awakened
Ice tiredly blinked his eyes open. He rolled his head on the pillow to look at the clock on the nightstand. The glowing red numbers read two o’clock A.M. Ice groaned and rubbed his temples. Thanks to the pounding in his head, he couldn’t sleep. He’d taken more aspirin before going to bed, but it did nothing to ease the throbbing pain of yet another headache.
He threw the covers off and got out of bed. He was probably dehydrated. The team had spent the day running drills and he must not have drunk enough water to recover from the exertion and the moisture he’d lost from sweating.
After pulling on his balaclava, he quietly opened his bedroom door and went out to the kitchen. He left the light off, relying on his night vision and then the light from the fridge as he got a glass and poured a drink of cold water from the pitcher. Deciding to stay in the common area, he took the water over to the couch and sat down. He’d just taken his first sip when another door opened.
Hazard came out of his room looking sleepy and rumpled. Ice’s gaze slid from the top of Hazard’s head all the way down to his toes, lingering to take in everything in between. His dark hair was too short to be mussed but his jaw was shadowed with overnight beard growth. He was dressed in a pair of black pajama pants and gray T-shirt. And his feet were bare. Seeing those bare feet, nails neatly clipped, seemed almost too intimate in the quiet, late-night hour when it was just the two of them.
“What are you doing up?” Ice quietly asked.
“Woke up for some reason and couldn’t fall back asleep,” Hazard whispered back. “What are you doing sitting out here in the dark?”
“I have a headache. Thought a glass of water might help.”
“Hmmm,” Hazard sleepily hummed, slowly scratching low across his stomach. “It’s not from that beating I gave you during our sparring match is it?” he teasingly asked.
Ice’s eyes were drawn to the movement of Hazard’s hand. The hem of the sleep shirt rucked up a few inches, teasing him with a sliver of skin on Hazard’s belly before the shirt shifted back into place. He dragged his gaze back up to answer. “I’d hardly call that match you giving me a beating. Besides, that was three days ago.”
Hazard huffed a quiet laugh. “I’ll sit with you until you’re feeling better.”
Ice was surprised at the offer but he didn’t turn it down. “Thanks.”
Hazard came over and joined him on the couch. He sat with one leg pulled up so he could turn sideways to face him.
Ice noted that there were sleep creases on his face. Like his bare feet, they too were almost too intimate to witness. As Hazard got comfortable, Ice breathed in the scent of apples, softened on bed-warmed skin.
“Do you get headaches a lot?” Hazard asked in a low voice husky from sleep.
“I used to when I was a teenager. But I haven’t for a long time. Don’t know why they’ve decided to come back all of a sudden.”
Hazard looked at him with concern. “Do you think you should get checked out by medical? Maybe you took a knock on the head during one of our missions.”
He stretched his arm out along the back of the couch. His wrist landed near where Ice sat, bringing his scent closer.
“No need for medical. I’ll be fine.”
Hazard shook his head. “Typical alpha. Promise me you’ll go to medical if they continue.”
“Why do you care?” Ice answered his own question before Hazard could. “Never mind. Care taking is part of being an omega.”
Hazard looked at him for a long moment before he lowered his lashes. “Yep, that’s why.”
They sat there in silence for a few moments before Ice spoke again.
“Your scent is apples.”
Hazard looked up and his lips curled in a mischievous grin. “It is.”
“Why didn’t you point that out when you saw me eating apples like I was Johnny Appleseed?”
“I thought it was best not to. I suspected I was the reason for your new craving but I wasn’t one hundred percent sure. If I was wrong I would have embarrassed myself and pissed you off. Of course, if you’d scented me you wouldn’t have had to resort to eating all those apples. But you got some nutritional value out of your stubbornness so it’s not a total loss,” he teased with a low chuckle.
Ice had to smile himself at the situation. “Why do you put so much value in scenting?” he asked in genuine curiosity. Since his Instinct seemed to be returning full force, he might as well learn how it functioned. Ortiz and Jax seemed to think scenting was important too. Although maybe not as much as Hazard since they’d never brought it up before his arrival.
Hazard tilted his head to the side, the gently amused smile still on his face. “It’s important to who we are as shifters. For starters, we can read emotions from them.”
“I know that. But blockers and learning to suppress your scent can prevent people from reading your emotions that way.”
“True. But not everyone uses blockers or deliberately suppresses their scent. Outside the military, most shifters don’t. Besides, plenty of non-shifters learn to control their facial expressions, but reading facial cues is still something all humans instinctively rely on.”