***

It was maddening. The friction. The occasional brush of Jun's cock against the rim of Damon's hole or against the underside of his own cock. Jun's breath against the back of his neck, Jun's hands around Damon's thigh and waist.

It was all...too, too much.

The bed shook with their movements, creating a gentle rattling as the edge of the bed knocked against the nightstand. The sheets under Damon's skin were smooth and cool, yet even the slightest touch against them was making Damon's skin light up, every nerve high strung on pleasure. He nestled his left cheek into the fabric and the pillows, hiding his burning face and wishing he was getting fucked like he was the one in heat instead of being made to simply take this teasing.

And that was all Damon could do. Take it.

At least Jun seemed to be having a good time. He mouthed at Damon's neck just under his ear and gripped Damon's thigh so tightly that his fingers made indents in the flesh there. And then, when he came up for air, that mouth did other nasty things.

"Your smell," he panted roughly, "has been getting sweeter. You're about to nest."

If Damon had the capacity for logical thought at that moment in time, he would have wondered about that. Damon couldn't recall anything about an omega's scent being 'sweeter' when they were about to nest. Then again, maybe it was one of those lesser-known things that wasn't really obvious to him because as an omega himself, he couldn't pick up on it. Either way, the observation made something in Damon's gut tighten and burn.

"I've imagined it a lot," Jun continued, oddly calm despite how clearly close to the edge he was. "Imagined you – building your nest in my bed."

Damon was going to do everything in his power to not overanalyze the fact that he came immediately upon hearing those words, sending a deluge of slick between his and Jun's bodies, which only really made things even more slippery and hot.

In his defense, it was quite a thing to admit to. Omegas built nests in places where they felt safe. Usually, it would be in their own room, or the room of someone they trusted and loved implicitly. Typically, only a mate received that honor. So, for Jun to imagine that kind of commitment meant he really cared about Damon.

And really, really wanted Damon to care about him. While it was overall a tender notion, it also came with a certain implied sexiness because nesting omegas were often quite horny, and would absolutely use the nearest available person or object to sate their desire. And because omegas rarely left their nests during very difficult nesting periods (which, again, were rather rare for most omegas, even more so for Damon), they essentially treated whoever they permitted to share their nest as a living sex doll.

The real kicker to Jun's wish was that nesting omegas tended to bond very easily with the person they shared their nesting space with, if they didn't already happen to be mates with that person. So basically Jun was saying he wanted Damon to build his nest in his bed so that he could, a) be reassured that Damon cared for and trusted him, b) fuck Damon stupid constantly, and c) make Damon obsessed with him.

There wasn't a single item on that list that Jun couldn't have without Damon being in nesting-mode, yet the thought of it was simply too much. Jun, spurned on by Damon's clear pleasure, thrusted harder between Damon's thighs, which burned despite all the lubrication. Damon imagined that when they were done the redness would take a while to fade.

After that, it didn't take long for Jun to follow Damon over the edge, spilling white over his skin. They fell asleep pressed together, after cleaning themselves as best they could, of course. And Damon probably wouldn't ever admit it, but Jun's objective of making Damon desperate for him was much farther along than he thought. It was a process that Damon knew had begun long before tonight. He just hadn't realized it.

Damon fell asleep surrounded by Jun's scent, a gentle warmth pulsing under his skin that warned of a fire on the horizon.

***

Damon woke up in the middle of the night to a hand on his forehead. He felt oddly...annoyed. Not at the hand. Just in general. He grunted and the hand withdrew. Not long after, Jun's shadowed face appeared hovering over him in the dark. He didn't say anything, but Damon knew what he was trying to communicate. He knew too well what that itch under his skin was. What that insistent banging at the back of his head telling him to get somewhere safe meant.

Oh yeah. He was nesting. He wouldn't in a million years be able to mistake this for something else. Jun knew that, just the way he always somehow knew. Maybe that 'sweeter' scent thing had some merit to it.

Soon enough, Damon wasn't able to hold his urges back. He shot up in bed, ignoring Jun's concerned stare from his right and started clawing at the blankets like an anxious cat. At first Jun moved toward him – maybe to stop him, maybe to help him – but then he came to his senses and simply backed off the bed, taking a couple huge steps back.

The distance calmed some of the itch in Damon. His brain was pinging off signals left and right, warning him that he was away from his nest and there was an alpha nearby. It didn't matter that he loved that alpha's scent so much he was purring and starting to roll around in the bedding, Jun was a threat to Damon's omega instincts right now. Only once Damon had finished perfecting his nest would he be able to quiet the screaming in his nerves long enough to allow Jun permission to come into the nest.

Nesting was weird that way. It was an animalistic trait; some long-buried instinct to protect one's young hurtling toward the surface at the worst possible times.

It was also worth noting that it was typically only omegas in the Ganymede pack that really had to deal with these instincts outside of actual pregnancy. Because Ganymede omegas no longer had heats, their biological clock was a little haywire. For omegas in other packs, the Season would come, they would mate, and a few months after would start to nest, if they happened to be pregnant. Some omegas could even have mild nesting symptoms, even when not pregnant, but that was very rare.

But omegas in the Ganymede pack didn't have those heat hormones telling their bodies what time of year it was. Typically nesting was triggered by pregnancy hormones – but without the initial heat hormones, the entire system was thrown off for Ganymede omegas. Thankfully, without the presence of pregnancy hormones, nesting was usually quite mild for most omegas.

Usually. And then sometimes they got a nesting period that was just an absolute bitch to handle. And Damon could tell, now, by the way he physically could not make himself stop purring and ripping the sheets off the bed corners, that he was in for a rough ride.