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When Steve’s heat finally hits, he’s been anticipating it for so long that he’s not sure what to do.
For months, he and Eddie have been talking about trying to get pregnant. They’re bonded, they have a spare bedroom for a nursery, their loved ones are there to support them and spoil the hell out of their baby. Steve’s off his birth control. They’re ready. Really. All they need is one good heat.
But now Steve’s pacing the length of their bathroom before dawn, burning with fever but wracked with chills, pressing the heels of his hands into his aching eyes, feeling utterly terrified.
This isn’t just some abstract plan for the future anymore. Here and now, they’re taking responsibility for a living, breathing human being that they’re going to create together. It’s everything Steve has ever wanted. It’s his worst nightmare. His heart is racing with the need to have his alpha close, to be taken care of and knotted until he’s thoroughly pupped, but his hands won’t stop shaking and he thinks he might be sick.
Steve sits on the cold tile, the bathmat shoved aside so he can feel the comforting chill on his bare legs. The porcelain of the bathtub behind him has a similar effect along his back and shoulders. When he tilts his head back, the tub is the perfect height to rest his skull on the ledge next to their toiletries.
It has to be nerves, right? He still wants this so badly his hands twitch at the thought. A baby, their baby, with that powdery clean scent and Eddie’s big brown eyes, maybe Steve’s nose. A whole little person to watch over and teach and love until he takes his final breath. A family of their own. God, he can’t think of anything he wants more.
That soothes something in Steve’s gut, makes him feel like his chest isn’t about to collapse in on itself. Maybe what he thought was anxiety is really just excitement. Maybe it’s just a natural fear of change, even if the change is a good thing.
Steve gets to his feet. Enough freaking out. He splashes some cold water on his face, which doesn’t do much for the feverish pink spots high on his cheeks but makes him feel calmer. He’s gonna go back out there, call in his heat leave, and wake up his mate so they can make a baby.
Eddie promptly derails that plan by scaring the hell out of Steve, who wasn’t expecting him to be standing right outside the bathroom door.
“Sorry!” Eddie exclaims, his own eyes wide with surprise. “Just, you weren’t in bed when I woke up and your scent was—”
“My heat is starting.”
They blink at each other for a moment before Eddie breaks the stunned silence. “Oh my god,” he says softly, covering his mouth with both hands. Then he laughs and throws his arms out and shouts excitedly, “Oh my god!”
His enthusiasm is contagious. Steve smiles as Eddie pulls him into a clumsy kiss, their teeth clacking and noses bumping, hugging tightly enough to bruise.
“Really?” Eddie asks, pulling away to hold Steve’s face between his hands like he can tell whether he’s in heat just by looking at him. Actually, he probably can tell by the feverish flush across Steve’s cheeks and the warmth of his skin, but he still asks.
“Yes, really,” Steve confirms.
Eddie kisses him again, then he starts herding Steve toward the bed like he’s some kind of sheepdog. “Okay, you get comfy. I’ll call the school and tell them you’ll be out for the week.”
“Will you call Robin, too? She’ll get the word out so nobody worries if we don’t answer the phone.”
“Of course. Be back in a jiffy.”
Eddie practically runs out of the room and all Steve can think is: That man’s gonna be the father of my children .
It sends a wave of want through him. Eddie will be here in less than five minutes, then he’ll fuck Steve and put a baby in him, just like they planned. A shiver runs up his spine, feverish and excited. He should be ready for Eddie when he comes back.
Steve steps out of his boxers and climbs into bed, settling himself on Eddie’s pillow. He inhales the scent of smoke and amber, dark and warm, and thinks about smelling it straight from the source. In just a few minutes, he’ll be nipping at the bonding mark on Eddie’s neck and breathing him in to his heart’s content.
Just thinking about it makes Steve squeeze his thighs together against the ache he feels. He’s so empty , and Eddie’s the only one who can fix it. Even as he slips two fingers, then three, inside himself, Steve imagines more: the perfect fullness of Eddie’s cock, the delicious stretch of his knot. The way his belly will swell after Eddie knocks him up.
“Couldn’t wait for me?” Eddie asks from the doorway.
Steve lets out a whine at the prospect of having his mate so near but not being touched by him yet. His own hand is a poor substitute for Eddie’s, missing his calluses and the coolness of his poor circulation and the way he knows how to play Steve just like his beloved guitar. It’s not enough.
“Hey, it’s okay.” Eddie’s voice is suddenly coming from right next to him, perched on the edge of the bed. His hand on Steve’s face is a relief, like a cold glass of water. “I’ve got you.”
“Want it,” Steve tells him, pleads with him as he gropes for any bare skin he can reach, desperate to feel Eddie, real and solid beside him.
Eddie gently grasps Steve’s wrist, pulling his hand from between his legs with a slick squelch. “Do you need more prep first or are you—?”
“Just your cock,” Steve huffs, shifting impatiently. He doesn’t think he’s ever been so affected by a heat before. Probably something to do with stopping his birth control, he guesses, but the cause doesn’t matter much when he’s being hollowed out and burned alive by the overwhelming want that’s flooding through him.
And he must have missed Eddie moving again, because he’s startled by the sensation of Eddie’s cock sliding through his folds. Kneeling between Steve’s spread thighs, Eddie doesn’t thrust inside yet, just nudges the head of his cock against Steve’s and smears his wetness around with every slow roll of his hips. He knows how badly Steve needs him and he’s still toying with him.
It’s starting to hurt now, the way his cunt clenches around nothing while his mate is right there . “Please, Alpha, please,” he begs, arching his back and reaching for Eddie’s hips to try to guide him inside.
Eddie catches both of his wrists in one giant hand and presses them into the pillows above Steve’s head. He leans down, their bodies pressed together from hips to shoulders, and buries his face in the crook of Steve’s neck, right over his mating bite.
The scrape of Eddie’s teeth is a silent reminder of their bond, thrumming through Steve like a plucked string. Telling Steve not to worry, asking for his trust, promising that he’ll be taken care of. Steve relaxes at his alpha’s reassurance. He’s still needy, still heat-drunk and aching for Eddie’s knot, but no longer frantic with it.
“So good for me,” Eddie murmurs, releasing Steve’s wrists. With his newly freed hand, Eddie takes hold of his cock, right at the base where his knot is already starting to swell, and slowly feeds it into Steve’s cunt.
Steve doesn’t think he could speak if he tried. Eddie is so hot and thick inside him, it’s like he’s pushing all the air out of Steve’s lungs so he can’t make a sound. All he can do is cling to him, fingers tangling in Eddie’s hair where his arms are locked around his neck, and let his mouth hang open as he gasps for breath.
“There you go, sweetheart,” Eddie sighs as he bottoms out. His first thrusts are tentative, gentle rocks in and out that glide smoothly through Steve’s slick. “That’s what you needed, huh? My cock filling you up?”
“ Eddie .” His name feels so good in Steve’s mouth, as good as Eddie’s cock stuffing his pussy to the brim. They fit together like they were made to, so easy that Steve doesn’t have to think. He can just focus on the hot drag of each stroke, the way Eddie can get so deep with just a twitch of his hips, carving out a space inside Steve that nobody else will ever be able to fill.
“You’re so fucking beautiful. I swear, it’s like you’re already glowing.”
He believes it, can practically feel it radiating from his skin, soaking into the sheets beneath him. It makes him smile, then chuckle when Eddie beams back at him. God, he doesn’t think he’s ever felt this way. Joy and pleasure just keep bubbling up in his chest, lighter than air, like he’s a helium balloon, bobbing as they rock together.
Then Eddie pauses to adjust the position of Steve’s knee, and the next thrust takes Steve’s breath away when Eddie’s cock hits him just right.
“Fuck,” he moans, rolls his hips into the next one to relish the way he feels even fuller at this angle. “More, please, I need—”
“Shhh, I’ve got you.” Speeding up his pace, Eddie drives in even deeper, the slap of his hips obscenely loud each time they meet the slick-smeared skin between Steve’s thighs. “I’m gonna give you everything you need, baby, don’t you worry.”
The promise pounds in Steve’s ears in time with his heartbeat. Eddie will take care of him. Eddie will fuck him better than anyone else ever could, will empty himself inside Steve and then knot him for good measure, again and again until Steve’s heat breaks. Until he’s bred , full with as many pups as Eddie can give him.
He must’ve been thinking out loud, because Eddie cups his cheek tenderly and murmurs, “That’s right, honey, all the puppies you want. Gonna be such a good mama.”
“Want it,” Steve agrees, nuzzling into Eddie’s touch. Warm and safe here in their nest, with his Alpha’s knot starting to catch at his hole, he knows without a shadow of a doubt that he’s coming out of this heat pregnant. It feels too right to fail. He hums his satisfaction against Eddie’s hand.
“Getting close for me?” Eddie slows his hips, returning to the slow grinds that make Steve’s toes curl. “Wanna come on my cock like a good Omega? Squeeze every last drop out of my knot so you can have my baby—”
Steve goes silent when he comes, unable to catch his breath or put together a coherent thought. His pussy spasms around Eddie’s cock until his Alpha can’t pull away, can only rock into the wet clutch of him as his knot pops past Steve’s rim.
“Oh, fuck, Stevie,” Eddie pants. He muffles his groan in the crook of Steve’s neck, mouthing at his mating bite as he spills inside of him.
If he hadn’t still been riding out his first orgasm, the sensation would be enough to make Steve come again. He’s acutely aware of each jerk of Eddie’s cock, each hot spurt filling him, his Alpha’s knot swelling further to lock them together. It settles him in a way he didn’t know he needed, sates him so completely that he goes limp in Eddie’s arms.
He can hear Eddie speaking to him, though he sounds far away. “So good for me,” he soothes, trailing kisses along Steve’s jaw and raking sweat-damp hair away from his forehead. “My beautiful mate. I love you so much.”
Steve ducks his head to capture Eddie’s lips with his, gasping when the movement makes Eddie’s knot twitch. “Love you, too, Alpha. Took such good care of me,” he croons. He laces his fingers with Eddie’s and tugs their joined hands to rest over his lower belly, still flat but full of promise. “Of us.”
“Always,” Eddie vows, sealing it with another soft kiss. “Now get some rest before the next wave hits.”
“Then you can make sure it takes,” Steve grins.
...It does.