He let out a long sigh, and there was a rasping sound made me think he was scratching at his stubble or something.
“Because those he loves, they’re not actually a part of him, it just feels like it. Because he cares about them in the same way, as if they were, as if they were more than that, and Tristan? Never met a bloke more alpha than him. I dunno if he even knows where he ends and you begin. You want this Chadwick fella? You better make sure he wants two omegas, not one, because your boy, he ain’t taking no for an answer. He’s been cooling his heels, trying to work out where he fits in the world from the confines of that fucking academy, and it’s only been some doubt about who he is and what he is that’s held him back. You better watch out, princess. He’s coming for you. Me? I’ve got no expectations for how things will go down between us all. I know what I want…”
His voice trailed away for a second, but I could hear the real pain there.
“But what I need, but what I can’t walk away from, is seeing your Tristan claim what he is.”
“You can’t.” My voice went all quivery and weak, and I hated it. “You can’t let him do this. Keep him safe, Len, please. I’ll…” I swallowed hard. “I’ll do whatever the hell you want if you do that.”
A low, dirty chuckle had me burrowing deeper under the blankets on my bed, an instinctual nesting response in the face of an alpha.
“Shouldn’t promise things like that. You seem to think I’m some defanged beast who’ll claim your boy, bite him, knot him, make him mine, and then he can use me as some kind of a wall against a world that doesn’t totally understand him. I intend to do all of that, but it wasn’t just him that drew me into the room that day. It was the both of you.”
A rough huff of breath, then he continued, dragging me under his spell.
“I’ve been dreaming of a pretty little princess who’ll come floating into my lif
e for a long time, and right now, my beast is damn sure that’s you. When you put me between the two of you, you showed me just what you’re like together, so why the hell would you think I’d be satisfied with just half of you? That’s all I’d get—one broken half. Maybe when you go and meet this Chadwick bloke, that’s something you should be asking him. Is he prepared to settle? Because that’s all he’d be doing, locking you up in some pretty little cage until your broken heart kills you.”
His growl, when it came, was low, deep, and felt like it rolled all the way over my skin, stroking me tangibly.
“I don’t do that. I break cages, not make them. But you might just get your wish. Tris and me, we’ve got common ground now, more than just two aching cocks. Liberating you, yeah, that’ll bring us together, all right.” There was a low grunt of satisfaction, then he shifted gears quickly. “You gonna be able to sleep tonight, omega?”
A little cry escaped me, full of misery and frustration and need and desire.
“I’ll take that as a no. Snuggle down, princess, bury your head into your pillow and breathe deep.” I did as he said, capable of ignoring his words, but not wanting to. “Now, imagine my hand, big and heavy and kinda rough. It’s on your shoulder.” A little whistle of air escaped my lips, and he chuckled. “That’s it, big breath out. Now that hand, it’s sliding down your spine, mapping every little notch, going down, down, until I reach your tailbone, then it comes up again…”
He talked me through a chill-out sequence, calming me, centering me with that purr of a voice, until finally, I dropped off to sleep.
Chapter 18
I was trying very hard to hate James Chadwick, but I was struggling with it.
First, he’d arrived on my doorstep, a massive bunch of flowers in hand. That wasn’t in itself a big deal, but it hadn’t happened a lot of times before, and when it did, it had usually been some stuffed shirt with a ubiquitous dozen roses, to impress Dad more than anyone. Tris had so little money, I never wanted him to spend it on me, so I hadn’t received many that I gave even a second look at, then there were Len’s blooms. But the complex arrangement James gave me, full of sculptural elements like lotus pods and heliconia, philodendron leaves and green zinnias, was as delightful as it was unusual, and his pleasure that came from watching me accept then explore the bunch, touching the flowers carefully, was clear.
“Touch them,” he prompted. “You can’t hurt it. Or I guess you could.” He moved slowly, covering my hand with his and then gently closing my fingers around one of the pods, the strange rubbery texture and the bumps for seeds prompting a little O of surprise from me. “I’ll just buy another and another if you do. Crush all the lotus pods you like.”
Any time an alpha had tried this before, I’d jerked my hand free, away from him, but that wasn’t my life anymore. What Len had said over the phone, his disembodied dark presence, had lulled me to sleep, but I was awake now. I looked up through my lashes at the hot alpha, one my family approved of, and caught the moment he paused, taking in my every reaction with a pleased grin that was just infectious, and I let myself be infected. This was always going to be my fate, so moving towards it briskly was the only way to go.
“I don’t think the flowers deserve crushing. Surely I can learn their shape and texture without mauling them.”
He just stared, watching my fingers trace over the shapes of the decorative ginger stems. God, it’d been so long since I’d had to practise the flirting techniques I’d learned at school, but the slight innuendo seeming to have been heard loud and clear, James snorting in response and shaking his head.
“Bloody hell, I knew you weren’t the same as other omegas but… C’mon, let’s go and get some breakfast before I do something entirely too alpha.”
He turned and held out a hand, ready to escort me out of the house to freedom. It was what I wanted, but a devil had me asking one last question, one my teachers wouldn’t have approved of at all.
“Such as?”
His eyes darkened perceptibly as he considered his answer, his tongue flicking out to swipe across his bottom lip. I knew what he was thinking, what he was seeing, but he told me anyway.
“You against that beautifully wallpapered wall, my thumb resting above your pulse so I can feel it skitter as I slide my hand up the skirts of that pretty little sundress.”
Oh fuck, his voice, his enunciation, was perfectly crisp, like he was telling me about the nuances of the Pre-Raphaelite school versus Art Nouveau, not how he’d finger me in the main hall of Greyson Manor. His eyes darkened as he heard me gasp.
“I’d pull your underwear to one side and trace the achingly soft length of your seam with one fingertip, just the once, enough to coat my finger with your slick. Then I’d breathe your scent deep as I sucked every trace of you from my hand, like a child with his hand in the honeypot.”
Just as I was pinned to the spot, wondering where the fuck the Chadwick scion had gone and how he’d gotten replaced by this dirty talking fiend, I swallowed and broke the spell.