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CHAPTER 1 - AloneHolmes had always liked being alone. It was no secret, really. Ever since he was a boy he had been better off alone. He was an odd alpha. He still is, he supposes. He could clearly see the way other people looked at him, mainly when he spoke, or deducted. Or when he was simply being himself, thinking out loud about his interests and his ambitions. The problem was crystal clear: it was him.He remembered being a child, how people would ignore him, even if he was right and able to help them. People often had the ability to stare through him, as if he was made of thin air, nonexistent. They had done so since he was able to walk and probably before then. So he forced them not to. People would always be mean, but now that he was grown, they were forced to accept his logic (which hadn't changed since he was a lad) and they were forced to see him. Forced to acknowledge him.He liked people. Sort of. In his own way. Actually, well, no... He didn't really like people, more like he liked solving the puzzle of people. Because in truth, he hated people. People were cruel and whispered nasty things behind your back, even when being helped. So full of secret intentions.Holmes remembers growing up with his brother and his cousins. He has too many boisterous, brainless cousins. His dog was easily the cleverest being, besides himself, in the room, when they caught him to play. He remembers being pushed to play with them by his parents, upset by the very prospect of sharing his air with them. Always wanting to play ridiculous games in which he didn't fit.But, truth be told he had wanted to fit.He had desperately wanted them to let him play like an equal, but they would always avoid passing the ball to him. He often felt like a contagious disease; something disposable like a wet piece of wood from a shipwreck. Funny enough, for some time, he thought that it was a rule that Sherlock should never be an active participant of a game even if he was a compulsory one.He was an observant child. But, of course, nobody paid attention to his observations."I tell you papa, it was uncle Reed!" Young William Sherlock Scott Holmes said to his father on a sunny evening. He was six years old and his word was therefore as valid as that of an old senile or mad man."William I will hear no more of your delusions! Go and apologize to your uncle this second!" Mr Holmes, the father, was a very civil man who very rarely raised his voice. But his son was trying his patience, since the moment he proclaimed his uncle as 'the true guilty party' while shouting at such a speed that one could scarcely make a word out of what he was saying, whereas he was trying to dismiss the butler, Mr Hughes, who he knew had stolen the silverware as well as other things."But papa, you must listen! It was not Hughes! It was not!" The child pulled at his curly hair, furiously trying to reign on his temper. It was frustrating not being taken seriously, unheard."And how do you know it, then?!" Mr Holmes the father asked him, exasperated. His face had assumed a new shade of red, as he waved his hands in front of the child. It was insufferable to try and discipline a child like his, that sometimes could make you feel incredibly stupid in the span of half a minute."Uncle Reeds, needs the money, he's been–" Sherlock tried to begin, waving his little hands just like his father himself had done just a few seconds before, his eyes wide with the need of being heard but the words drowning in his throat against the imposing, angry figure of his father."That's not what I asked you lad, and you very well know it. It's your uncle whom you are talking about, and if he needs the money that is no concern of yours." His father passed his hands by his face, massaging his temples with a deep sigh."But listen!–" Sherlock tried again, looking at his father with the widest eyes he could manage."Did you see him with your very own eyes? Did you hear him plan it out loud? Did he say to you that he was planning on doing that?" His father continued, without opening his eyes and still massaging his temples, knowing this kind interaction for long enough now to know as well how he was supposed to conduct it."I– er. No. But if you would just listen, I saw his shirt and–" Sherlock felt increasingly humiliated, ridiculous as he tried to speak and so the words finally died before they came out of his mouth. His father was a logic man, he was supposed to understand the ways behind a simple deduction, wasn't he? But didn’t. And he wouldn’t allow his child to keep going."Lad. Go apologize. Now! Or so help me God I'll–!" His child did not stay to hear the rest of his threat.Until he was he was fifteen and taller than his father not a word of what he said, no matter how true, how right, or fair it was, was taken into account. He had the gift of always saying the right thing, in the wrong way, to the wrong person. Such gift rewarded him during his school and college years by making him the target of many whispers and jests, turning his naturally untrusting nature into that of an hermit.Now, a grown man, Holmes found himself staring at the bullet drew VR in the wall and wondering why in the world was it now so unpleasant to be alone.
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CHAPTER 2 - Evidence
The first time Holmes tried to commit suicide he was twelve years old. He was home from school for the summer and had no friends to bring home to spend the season. He had everything planned… except the maid, Gwen, entering his chamber the moment before the razor pierced his wrist. In his defence she was new and he hadn’t studied her schedules yet.
He supposed he didn't really have
a reason for
it. He was just tired. Tired of not being heard and tired of everyone and everything being so very dull. He was severely scolded afterwards,
obviously
. Enough not to try it again until the next summer, and a final time when he was fifteen, when he tried to drown himself in Sherrinford Hall's lake. He had been bored that afternoon, nothing to study, nothing to entertain himself with, no one interesting to talk to. Why not? Who would notice him slip?
So, he sneaked out of the house and jumped into the lake, not bothering to take of his clothes. It would be easier to sink into the water with the weight of his clothes, he reasoned. He was in the middle of dying of asphyxiation – or hypothermia,
he couldn’t be quite sure
– when the hand of his younger (but taller and bulkier) cousin pulled him out of the water.
The eyes of his cousin were wide, his expression extremely aggravated as he shook Sherlock by his shoulders.
“‘Lock! You absolute ratbag! What the bloody hell were you trying to do?!” lots of
sarcastic
comebacks came into his mind, like:
What?; How?; I think I now believe in the theory of spontaneous generation; where did you come from?!; How did you get here in such a short time?; Were you spying on me?
Instead,
only
brutal coughs came out.
He spent an ill summer, with many days in which he hoped he would perish. He did not.
Unfortunately.
He did not try to commit suicide after that, maybe because the punishments for his attempts left their mark on his back, literally. Maybe because by the next summer he was introduced to something that aided him in his quest to forget about the world and its dull inhabitants.
Which brings us back to his adult years, Holmes, alone in his flat in 221B Baker Street, about to inject himself with the 7% solution of cocaine of his preference.
His feet were comfortably resting on top of some cushions, the air thick with his anticipation, when he
was interrupted by
the dulled sound of Lestrade’s shoes. Almost instantly he started putting the 7% solution back in its box.
Finally!
“Come in!”
Holmes shouted before Lestrade could knock on the door.
The man opened the door without hesitation
and came in. He was slightly agitated, his shoes wet but not muddy. He walked today – should it be said tonight? – in a clean-ish zone.
“Holmes! Hello–how…!”
“Yes, yes. Everything's very fine, now out with it, how may I be of assistance?” Once the other alpha caught his breath he started talking about his business.
“There's been three murders last night. I think you might be interested in these ones.”
“How so?” He was already interested.
“They are all young men, one found in his house, one outside an opium den and the last one just outside Drury Lane.”
“And…?” Lestrade blinked at him, as of distracted by something he had just noticed, forgetting his tale for a moment. “Lestrade,” he said very slowly, as if talking to a very slow child “do go on.”
“Yes?”
“The murders, Lestrade,
the murders
!”
“Ah, yes! Yes. The thing with this ones is that they have all been shaved bald and found with their hair hidden in their pockets.”
“Hmm…” Lestrade looked at him eagerly once again. Finally, Holmes jumped from his chair. “Very interesting, I will take it, go pick up Dr. Watson.” And with that, he went to his chamber to look for a more appropriate clothing.
He was excited. He could almost see the blood running impatiently through his veins, as if trying to drag him to the puzzle. He couldn't wait for the intellectual stimulation that would soon come. This one was one of the good ones. He knew it.
Once in the first crime scene he would visit that day, he received a note from Watson, who would not be able to come, because he was busy. There was once a time in which Watson would never be too busy to investigate a crime scene. But time does go by and…
“Tis not so sweet now as it was before…” Holmes mumbles to himself. How painfully accurate could the bard be sometimes.
Because now, Watson had a daughter to take care of. The last remains of Mary. Holmes loved baby Rosamund, but there's some sort of envy he can't help but feel. Maybe it's the envy the alpha in him feels at his closest friend having a child when he does not. Maybe it’s the time Watson does not have for him anymore. But he can think of it no more. It's time to forget anything and everything. It's time for Holmes to think of the only thing that will ever be there for him, for he has nothing else.
The room is lighted with the cold light of the morning that enters through the windows. Sargent
what's-his-name
is interviewing the landlord, who will not be of any use whatsoever in the investigation.
The dead man was found by his maid dead in his chair, shaved bald and with his hair in his pockets in the early morning, two hours ago. His hair, a dirty blond. 5’9 feet. Beta. Mid twenties. Lawyer. Asthmatic. The killer left no traces of his comings and going.
The second crime scene, the one outside the opium den sported a man with brownish hair, this time beta. 5’8 feet. Drinking problem. Almost no traces from the killer, except for a cap that is meant to be a bait as it is obviously not from the killer (it has been used by two very different persons: one for eight years, one for one night). It's something. Only... There was something that shouldn't be there.
A weird scent.
Not a bad one, no. Just, there. Slightly there. Omega. Female. Young. Something undiscernible. Perhaps it would be unnoticeable for another alpha, or another person without his specially sharpened sense of smell. But it was there, lingering, twirling around him, playing with him, trying to
entice
his senses into only noticing it. It annoyed him, it obviously was not from the killer the cap serving to at least confirm that. Was it a trap? Something meant to distract? But it didn’t make sense. Had it been meant as a means of distraction the scent would have been strong or would have to have been directed specifically to him, since he was the only one who could pick it up. This was not the most likely answer.
He decided that the scent had nothing to do with the crime and therefore was nothing of his interest. However, there was also something in it that drove him inhale deeply into it. He couldn’t help it. He couldn’t help but want to know what was it about that scent. He
had
to understand it. It seemed to envelope his lungs, fill them with something fresh and clean and sweet, it was stronger the longer he delved in it. Very
suddenly, as if a bucket of ice cold water had been dropped over him he realised that he should think of it no more.
Sometime while he was analysing the scene, an officer came to tell him that another body had been found and as it was closer than the Drury Lane crime scene, before he had even given command to his legs to move he was walking in quick steps towards the third crime scene, away from the second crime scene and the disturbing scent that had absorbed him for a moment
He didn’t took that much time observing that surroundings, he lied to himself a bit, reasoning that he knew the place very well. And he did, but that was not the way
he
was supposed to conduct an investigation. Like before, he went directly to the corpse, and started analysing the evidence in it. Beta, early thirties. 5’2 feet. Everything the same. He couldn’t quite focus. His mind pull3d at him for something else.
He was still thinking about the past crime scene. About the omega scent that was plastered to his nostrils. Hell and damnation.
The omega was not the killer nor was she involved in any way. It was quite simple to his mind to deduce that. But the reason why it firstly caught his attention is that she didn’t fit the puzzle of the crime. He could tell that she came upon the corpse by chance. Yes, probably from that street way. She must have walked a long way to come from there. Surprisingly, every time he recreated the crime scene in his mind palace he was sure that she had stayed a while there, as if instead of panicking, like any normal good lady would have, she observed it, studied it.
Someone in his normal mind would find it, at the very least, macabre.
But, to his own surprise, Holmes found it somewhat alluring.
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He couldn’t understand why was it that her scent was driving him mad.
Holmes fooled himself into catching a sniff of it everywhere.
When he woke and Morpheus had barely left his eyelids, he fancied he smelled her in his bed linens, enveloping him. When he went to play so that he could clear his head he found her scent in the case of his violin. When he locked himself in the laboratory hoping that the thrill of a new discoverment would chase away the ghost haunting him he found it in his equipment, in his desk, in the very walls. When he went downstairs to eat, the dining room seemed to be just as drenched in her scent as anything else. The books he had not touched for years and had slept soundly in their shells in the library of his study smelt of her.
It was madness.
In little moments of weakness he allowed himself to fall into panic.
What is happening to me?
He would ask himself.
Nothing
, he would answer back, because he knew that logically nothing was happening. He tried to repeat himself that any sort of tale related to him being an alpha was nothing but that, so that he could remember the explanations that came to his mind for his situation were nothing but chit-chatter.
What will become of me?
He asked himself when he felt especially panicky.
Nothing, nothing can become of me other than what has already become of me.
Again and again, he was unable to prevent his mind from asking the other questions, the ones that threatened to terminate the balance of his mind palace. How could he continue to live the life as he knew it to be? He didn’t, kno—. He would. How could he stop it? He didn’t know– Was he having a phantosmia? Stupid, he very obviously was.
Long after the case in which he came upon her scent had been solved (Young man, many enemies, projecting frustration about his own lack of hair,
very original
), he was still fixated on it. It had become such an ample part of his routine that he had come to accept the fact that he breathed in that (
entrancing, distracting, enticing
) scent everywhere, and so, surrendered his attempts to ignore it and gave into the need to analyse it.
He had recreated in his mind from the moment he smelled her to the moment in which he stopped doing so for days. He had gotten a few conclusions after trying to deduce everything he could about it over and over again in his head.
The girl was clearly a doctor's daughter (which would explain her smelling clean –ergo not from the streets– but not rich as the lack of lavish perfume indicated, as well as her scent not being tainted by any sort of panic after having encountered a dead man as she had, to late to have been there before or during the crime), she had stayed a long enough time in the crime scene for her scent to stick to it but short enough for it to be faint, she had studied it for a little but was in a rush not to spend too much time (which makes sense being that it had been very late for any decent woman to be in the street), part of the scent that he had found undistinguishable at first was curiosity, she had been studying the corpse. Taking into account that with the evidence of her precedence it was safe to deduce that she was escaping her house to study something very much related with her father’s practice.
That was all he had, he had no clue to her height, weight, hair colour, or any other way through which he would be able to identify her.
Whenever he was outside of Baker Street, the phantosmia faded into a near non-existence, bombarded as his sense of smell was every time he went to the street. Sometimes it was strong enough that it covered everything else, but most of the time it didn't.
He was a detective, he knew the difference between a remembered scent and the actual scent. But sometimes he asked himself if maybe it was possible for him to confuse them, for day after day burned away and still he could not catch a whiff of the actual scent, only the one that he remembered. Often, he wondered with how much precision he remembered her scent, was the phantosmia he was haunted by the same as it had been when he first encountered it? What if he didn’t actually remember her true scent and all his attempts at being aware in case he ever came across her scent again were in vain?
Until one early morning, it came to him. Fresher, somehow stronger, and he knew, he knew that it was her. He was walking towards Regent's park and she was there. He knew it. She was there.
What would he do when he met her? Would he talk to her? Would he stop being obsessed with her scent? He didn't know. Still, he walked as hastily as a gentleman could towards her, the world seemed flurry, almost dizzy, the air thick with the scent he was trailing.
He hadn't been that close to Regent's Park, and he had counted five minutes and fourty six seconds since catching her scent, but there he was.
How would she look? Would the scent that invaded the air make it impossible to distinguish her from the rest of the people there? Again, he didn't know, and he really didn't like not knowing. He played deaf to the questions of his head and followed his nose.
He didn’t do that too often (
in fact he didn't at all).
However, Sherlock was feeling quite overwhelmed
and not quite himself what
with everything that was happening. Her scent
felt (was)
addictive,
so
enticing.
Being truthful, even though he had been waiting anxiously for this to happen he had come to believe that it might never happen again and if it did happen, he hadn't considered that it would be so soon.
The scent was such a part of the background of his life that smelling it in such a strong way was a little too similar to those bittersweet dreams where he found her through her scent just to have her slip from his fingers like sand and then wake up covered in the ghost of his treacherous guide. Convinced as he was that he was not dreaming, the similarities brought a certain air of doom to his efforts and Holmes didn’t know exactly what to do either if he did or did not find her.
She had to be near the lake. On the other side of the park. He entered into one of the walking paths but decided it was too much of a waste of time so he ser for a more direct course, willing himself not to run. Gentlemen don’t run, Holmes. Gentlemen don’t run. Ten, twenty, a hundred, a hundred and fifty, two hundred, three hundred seconds, six hundred seconds. He wasn’t quiet there yet but he was out of breath. It was too early yet, there were no people around (nobody to see him bent over himself and grasping his knees while trying to regain his breath) and he wondered if he wasn’t being deceived by his own mind.
The course wasn’t new for him: he had been to Regents Park various times before. But he was not following his lead rationally enough to keep an actual track of it, he couldn’t even perceive if she had moved from the position he had first smelt. He found himself walking (too fast, he scolded himself gentlemen don’t run) by the grass. At one point, he could sense by his knowledge over the mapping of the park, that the center garden was near enough. Lake, center garden. He could do it.
He could feel his shoes growing wet and muddy, so it had rained the night before. But the thought just brushed through his mind, and he didn’t care enough to save the fact in his mind palace, he could not bring himself to think twice about the aspects regarding his shoes. His new shoes. His very fashionable, very expensive new pair of shoes. What was that omega doing to him?
He spotted the lake. He stopped walking. His heart was drumming too hard in his chest. He felt a bit dizzy with excitement, she was really there, he could smell the sweet presence of her. Sharp but sweet, somehow coppery without reminding him of blood other than by association. And woman. He willed his breath calm, straightened his coat and prayed to deities he didn’t believe in for his shoes not to be ruined. That would be a bad impression.
He walked towards the lake looking as calmly as he ever had. He was not surprised when he found no one on sight there. He scented the air just to be sure it was not her phantosmia. It smelled of old processed cellulose and her scent was over it, she was reading a book. She was there. Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. She was an omega with a medical interest, reading a book too early for it to be decent that she was outside of her house and in a park no less. She must have climbed a tree. He started looking up, careful not to let his top hat fall. Ah, there she was. Holmes tried to look the part of a calm man just watching the birds and surprised to see a woman among the branches of one of the trees.
He took a deep breath and kept looking up, until he took a few steps forward, a little bit more decided. “And here I thought this tree only gave apples.” The omega looked down very suddenly, her scent turned acidly panicky, lost balance and fell from the branch directly above his head.
In about three seconds and a half, the omega had fallen right in Holmes’ arms, her medical journal and her heavy blankets had not been so lucky, for they fell right into the mud. Her middle section was very warm, her scent threatening to overwhelm him. He took a deep breath of her. What a glorious warm weight he had in his arms! Smelled so good. She hadn't spent the night there, she had only been there two hours, she smelled good.
The omega blushed all the way to the tips of her ears and hadn't she been covered by her dress Holmes was certain the blush would continue down her neck and to her chest. Her hands nervously wrapped around the his neck trying to ascertain herself that she was not falling anymore but somewhere in the middle of her understanding that she was not falling morphed into her taking in his scent. Her pupils widened while she observed his face. Dear god,
his face
! Was written in her features. Her hands became sweaty, as she held herself against him. Her breathing quicker. It was so easy to see she wanted to sniff him very badly, he arched his neck in order to make it easier for her to do so. Her mother would probably faint if she knew she was even thinking this way. What a transparent creature! So easy to see through her, she wanted to lean ahead and take his scent in.
“I am so… so sorry!” She whispered, wanting to prolong the moment for as long as she could.
Sherlock didn’t answer immediately. He simply stood there, too aroused and too hypnotized to even move a muscle. He simply kept holding her against him, looking into her eyes, observing the small translucent freckles over her nose. He wanted to take her whole frame in. Even the smallest details.
“It's no problem, miss…?” He said, his voice huskier than it should.
“Hooper, Miss Hooper.”
“Miss Hooper.” He said, tasting the name of the omega that had haunted him for so long, still showing not a sign of being about to release her. “Sherlock Holmes, at your-” he was not able to finish the sentence. He just had to take a deep breath or he would drop her and take her against the tree. Smelled so good. So very good. He could picture her head fallen to the side, occasionally bumping against the tree with the force of his thrusts, her eyes closed in pleasure, his teeth piercing skin to mark her, her legs wrapped around his waist. He cleared his throat and said, “service” his voice an actual octave lower than before.
She very obviously noticed it. Her chest was heavy, and despite the cold of the morning her clothes suddenly seemed too warm for her to be wearing them, burning itchy against her skin. Her mind was increasingly cloudy, in the early morning with the guarantee that no one decent would be there for a couple of hours it was easy to feel that they were alone, that nothing mattered more than the feel of his chest against hers. She just kept staring at him with her hands firmly wrapped around his neck and her thumb stroking softly -without even noticing it- the sensible skin at the nape of his neck.
“You are very… Very kind, Sir.” She tried, biting her lower lip as she wondered if he was just still holding her because she hadn’t motioned for him to let her go.
“It wasn’t a problem.” He tries to settle her on the floor, but it’s impossible to let her go. His throat is dry. What was happening to him? How was it possible? He had spent many years mocking the alphas that suddenly fell in love with a random omega and bonded shortly after. He had mocked the people who just blindly trusted their pheromones and hormones and let their so called biologies overtake their reason. He had laughed, oh but how could he laugh now! He certainly couldn’t, not now that the only thing he could think about was roughly opening the front of her dress, press her against that tree, and thrust his hands in to feel her breasts.
Her cheeks were cherry red and she was about to say something, she opened her little pink lips to let air morph into words but he couldn't take that. She could tell him to step away, she could ask him why was he still clinging to her. She should. He could not allow her.
She tasted of strong tea and something sweet that resembled her scent. Her inexperienced tongue pressed against his and tried to follow his rhythm. He cradled her face in his hands, half trying to prevent her from going away and half trying to be tender. She was pressed so sweetly against him, he thought deliriously, she was so warm, so warm.
“What's your name?” he panted for air, starting to trail kisses down her neck, searching for that delicious bit of flesh that would carry her haunting scent, but she became rigid in his arms.
Her name
, she heard, and it was as if it suddenly pulled her tumbling thoughts from the distant spot where she had buried them.
She was Margaret, Molly, Anne Hooper, she was the daughter of Consuela Hooper and Marcus Jacob Hooper and they would both despise her were they to know what she was doing.
“I can’t! I can't! I can't!” she answered and he felt cold all of a sudden. Why could she not? He stopped all motion, who was she? Had she a betrothed? She certainly wasn't married, there was no bonding mark in her white neck. He stilled, his posture had shaped into something menacing in the span of a second.
“Why ever can you not?” Was his voice as threatening as it sounded in his head? He didn't want it to be threatening or dark, but he didn't want it to show how much it hurt.
“Because, because! This, this is wrong! I have to go, I- ah, I shouldn’t have.” Holmes could notice it, could notice the tremble of guilt in her voice. She was not betrothed, no rings in her dainty fingers. She had been raised by someone very deeply religious, even if she very obviously wasn't one herself. She was going to run and hide from her desire, it was, after all, indecorous for her to feel it.
The bucket of ice cold reality hit him very harshly, they were out in the open, she was showing all the signs of being about of entering into a heat from the scent of her, were she to go home with that scent at this time in the morning with his own scent plastered all over her. She’d be ruined. Even if she married him, she would be talked about, she would be criticised and if he was correct I'm assuming she was interested in academic pursuits, and by the looks of the book at his feet she was, she could not afford any sort of scandal.
The problem was, he couldn't just let her go, he had just found her, and if the pull he felt on his chest was any indicative, he wouldn't stop feeling it until he had bonded her. Dear gods it was madness. How could he want to bond her? A perfect stranger except for what little he knew about her, it made no sense, was his primal body so desperate to procreate that it was literally forcing this nonsensical attachment?
“I, ah, I- of course. I, I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. I swear. Let me, let me escort you to your house.” She looked at him with suspicion. It was the stupidest thing he could ever say, hadn't he just realised that he'd ruin her? But he wanted to know where she lived, so that maybe… he could, he could court her. He hated being alone, it was very very boring these days.
“You really shouldn’t.”
Right of course, what are you Holmes? Where's your brilliance Mr No-Common-Sense?
“but, as you must realise, I'm currently in a rather... precarious situation.”
“I realize, yes. Maybe there's a backdoor I could help you to?”
“Indeed there is, thank you.” Her cheeks were still cherry red, and she just smelt and looked better by the second, all the more tempting with her dilated pupils, but he endured. He had a very strong self-control, had trained it for years.
He accompanied her home, trying to keep his distance, tipped his hat at her when she waved her hand at him as nicely as she could with a heat-pained face.
He would have been the very picture of civility were his trousers less tight on his groin.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Sometimes, Molly hated herself. She had arrived home smelling of alpha, heat, acid panic and bitter shame. Breathing was hard, her clothes were itchy and her thoughts were spiralling out of any cognitive control. Still she tried to force control upon them. It was not the first time she had had to do that, she was early enough in the heat that she could do it.With all the sloppiness an omega in heat could be forgiven for, Molly prepared herself a bath. There, she scrubbed every inch of herself, cleaning the soothing scent of alpha from her skin. Afterwards she washed her clothes. By the time she finished it was eight in the morning. The servants must have heard and smell at least the half of it, but they would not betray her movements, her impropriety, they loved her too much, they pitied her too much.She went to her bed and awaited her maid, trying to still her trembling legs and her racing heart. She would not allow herself to think of the gentleman she had encountered. If she did, she would commit a whole new level of impropriety. Heavy beads of sweat fell from her forehead, her insides burned and tensed her emptiness, why had she to endure this? Why? She thought, trying to struggle with the mindlessness of her heat. Her vision was blurry but she tried to focus on the mint coloured roof. It was the colour the parents of every omega painted the roof. It was meant to remind her of freshness, so that her heated mind could cool down and then think of more civilised thoughts than that of what she needed. It was supposed to clear her head from the longing for fullness that was viscerally painful. It was supposed to remind her of control. To give herself control to reign over the animalesque impulses that invaded her. She had to control it, it was her duty to resist the temptation. Molly hated how weak she felt when in heat. She hated having to be strong too. It was not fair, she didn’t know how the other omegas managed it, but she was not them and it was not fair that she had to be subjected to the same criteria of omegas with a much higher resistance that she had. She was always on the verge of falling. Sometimes she wondered if the other omegas pretended to be strong just as she did. Molly started crying, because it hurt so much. Everything ached and burned and she was so ashamed. She wanted it to stop. She knew she could dim it, even if only a little bit. But she was not her own and one cannot touch what one doesn’t own without permission. She despised with an overwhelming passion whoever had stated that rule. She hoped whoever it was had had a very painful death, that someone spit in his or her tomb, she hoped that person would never know paradise. But she knew that the one that would not know paradise was her, because the weak one was her, after all, the one whose body was cursed with this burning temptation was her.“Miss Molly, it’s–” as soon as her beta maid entered the room, the smell of her heat pierced the air and maid inhaled deeply of it. “Anna, please fetch my mother.” Molly said, focusing on the roof, her voice raspy and drowned.“Yes, ma’am.” Her mother brought two beta footmen and observed sternly as they tied her to the bed in order to aid her weakness. “You’re not your own, Molly. You have to be strong, this will pass soon. You will endure.” She said as the footmen secured her ropes. After her limbs were secured, she was left to deal with her wickedness alone. Anna was the only one allowed to enter her room and only to bring her food and help her eat it three times a day. She was otherwise left alone, mindless enough not to think of the shame it brought her. Only then did she allow herself to think of Mr. Holmes. Of his large warm hands, and the strong alpha scent of him, musky and woody-ish, of his lips and his pants and his want for her name. She pictured him in a million wicked images and tried uselessly to generate any sort of friction where she needed it. Later she would feel guilty for doing it, but she would excuse herself in her heat. After all, she was an omega. She was weak and she was allowed a certain degree of weakness.The thoughts and memories she now carried in her mind were enough for her heat to spike. The thought of his thick hair, and his lips against her skin. The thought of how proper he had tried to behave despite the situation, how he had been on the edge of losing control over himself. A thin layer of sweat coated her forehead and cheeks, and she knew it was only a matter of time before it covered her whole body.She had tried to pray. She really did. Tried to pry just like her mother had taught her once. To offer the Lord her afflictions and wait on him for compassion. But it was futile. There was no compassion to be found for an omega. Her mind soon raced into a tough battle, on one side her good manners and the protocol that was expected from a well mannered lady such as herself; and on the other, the lustful mess of her creativity. His voice was seared into her ears. If she concentrated enough, she could almost listen to his unbearably sensual low baritone, whispering nasty things into her fevered ear.Molly tried to remember how her other heats had been, of they had felt as this one did. She remembered the pain, and the emptiness. But now, after Mr. Holmes, it suddenly felt worse. How could it be worse? Why was it worse? Her body grew impatient, it needed release, but it was unseemly for her to even wish for it. She was tired, the pain and the whole of it were very much energy-consuming. She was exhausted of her mother's religious convictions, of the societal rules about how her heat was, deep down, her own fault. How she couldn't even be allowed to touch her own skin. How she didn't belong to herself.Why had she to belong to someone she hadn't even met yet? How could she want to belong to someone if she didn't even belong to herself to start with? How did it work? Why did it work that way? Who had make it thus?Once she was so deep in the heat that she could not move with the tension of her body, she mastered the force of mind to think somewhat clearly again. Not absolutely clearly, she was still half fantasizing with alpha scent and something to fill the empty ache of her womb, but clearly enough, freely enough, to despise whatever had caged omegas the way they had.Were they so different? They had heats, yes, betas did not, but alphas had ruts and they were nearly as mad with need as she was, if not more. Still they practically controlled everything, so what had they against omegas? Why wasn't she her own master, while betas and alphas could?Somewhere deep and shut inside her, Molly did not believe that she deserved her lot in life. She didn't deserve this torture, this horrible, horrible days of need and pain without any sort of relief. She had never wished evil upon no one -no one alive for the matter-, but she believed that who ever had instituted the rule that pledged her to this insufferable heats did wish evil on all omegas. It was three days later that Holmes mastered the courage to call upon her. By then it had been four days since she spiked. She would be over her heat.She was not.It was very unusual for a heat to last more than three days. But she was clearly very much still in heat. And by God did she smell amazing. Even stronger than he remembered. He was not even inside the house, hadn't even knocked. But his body reacted all the same.Something primal in him, something that did not understand of rules or society norms, wanted to make way into her room and knot her for all he was worth. The civil man he was revolted at his own beastliness.He inhaled deeply for a while, then he started to retreat. It wouldn't make sense to continue to be there if he couldn't actually call.He just needed a moment more, then he'd go back to Baker Street.