Viola
“I need to find a mate,”I whimpered. My body feeling like it was melting and boiling in turns. “They want me to find a mate. Frederick Gale… He will become the Viscount… political… They say it is the right thing to do. That I should forget you. You rejected me. You wrote that horrible letter.”
Syon froze. I could see him restrain himself, restrain the violent feral alpha that did not like the idea of Gale touching me. A small comfort, even if he did not want me. I didn’t want Gale touching me either.
“You don’t need to do anything while I am here,” he purred. I twisted into him, trying to bury myself in him as I might in my nest. Nuzzle through the layers of fabric that kept me from his skin where his scent would be strongest. As long as I could, I wanted to keep him with me. “You are mine.”
The air was too heavy with our scents, and I fought for sanity. Yet for the first time in my life, I revelled in my slick. Syon would smell it. Know what it meant and then he would stretch me. It would sting, but my slick would ease his way. It was natural and right. I needed him and his knot. I craved and I demanded his body, as was my right. I shook my head, trying to clear it. There was something wrong with that. He was not mine. He had repudiated me. Rejected me. He had written that horrible letter. I mewled, distressed and confused.
“Syon, please.”
“What, little one? Tell me, omega. What do you need?”
“Kiss me,” I begged.
“You don’t need to ask.” His kiss consumed me, forceful and demanding entry. When I was too slow, he nipped at my bottom lip. On my gasp, he moved in. Our first kiss had tasted of him, but now there was the bitter hint of that uniquely alpha saliva that when he bit my mating gland would cause it to scar, change me, and make me his in every way. He was going into rut. That heaviness in an alpha’s scent rising even as mine became sweeter.
“Mine,” he purred against my lips.
It left no room for argument. In this moment, I was his. I could not hold on to that. Yet each time I came close to surrendering completely to him, the uncertainty would rush back freezing me.
“Wait. Syon, this is a mistake,” I pulled back. Horrified that I had let it come to this. Stealing kisses from an alpha I’d lied to.
“There is no mistake. There is nothing but us. As decreed by nature,” he said between sinful, sipping kisses. His hands flexed at my waist and his face buried into my hair. He groaned and pulled me into him. His erection pressing between us. I arched trying to get more contact.
“Viola,” he growled. “You can’t go into heat here.”
“Heat?” I asked, confused. “No, I can’t be going into heat. I’m... I had a heat… No…” I remembered what my aunt and Mrs Markham had said. My heat had been a false heat. My body craved him, his knot. I needed Syon to rut me through my heat or I would not find satisfaction. I moaned. My body flushing and the slick beginning to gather.
“I must take you somewhere—“
“Yes,” I whispered. I couldn’t recognise myself or the need building. “I’m too hot. I—”
“We’ll find Iris. You need to be…. Not here. I meant to do this properly. I will approach your uncle since your mother isn’t returned from France.”
His lips wandered down my neck to the lace at the edge of my gown. I wanted to laugh, he would not leave me. I would not let him. “We’ll get you somewhere safe. I’ll not let something happen to you. I want to do this right, properly. I will declare myself in front of all. But not like this.”
My skin flushed hot, ordering my body to claim this alpha.
“Ahhh!” I crumpled as the cramps washed over me and caused my knees to buckle.
“Viola, Viola, I need to get you somewhere,” he purred for me. I nodded weakly. “My duchess’ nest is close.”
Nest. The word snapped me out of the lust filled fog. My nest was empty and lonely. Cold because he had abandoned me.
“No, I can make it home. You said things were over between us. That letter… You can’t want me. Not after what you wrote. Syon, why are my thoughts so muddled?”
“Damn what I wrote. I need to take care of you,” he snapped. I moaned as another cramp shuddered through my body, but this was a sweet cramp that sent more slick rushing from my body.
“Syon, I need…” What I needed was his knot, damn the consequences to my heart.
He scooped me up into his arms. “Your dresses always get in my way.“
“No! It hurts, Syon. Syon, it hurts so bad.” The cramps that came with my heats had never left me so weak.
“I know, my darling. Shh…” his purr rumbled, and I buried my face into his neck, seeking out where his scent was strongest. “I’m taking you home. You’ll need to walk for a little bit. I’ll get you out of your gown as soon as possible but not here where others might see you.”
Syon dropped me to my feet and only his vice-like grip on my waist held me upright. It was a blur, but I heard people calling his name and perhaps mine. All I knew was the warm body next to mine had me itching to remove every scrap of clothing from both of us.