I shifted slightly, liking the feel of his knot as I did so, feeling more of those aftershocks of pleasure, something that had him groaning.
“So what do we do now, mate?”
I wanted to be wicked and wanton, making a salacious query after so much pleasure, but my tone failed me, containing a small, uncertain waver within it.
“Now?” His hand slid down over my stomach, and just as he’d said before, he waited a moment, for when it didn’t hurt my soul to allow it, when I interpreted the caress as one of reflected pleasure, of possessiveness. “Now you’re going to sit here, caught on the end of my knot, my cum locked down tight inside you, filling you up. I’m going to tease this little clit.” His fingers moved to do just that, and I let out a breathy sigh in anticipation. Whatever tide had swelled inside me, it wasn’t ready to go completely out. “Make you come and keep on coming until neither of us can anymore and my knot finally slides free.”
A much gentler kiss was pressed to my neck, reawakening the sweet pain of his bite, which seemed to only add to the pleasure.
“Then I’ll want to fill you again and again. I’m half out of my mind with you in my arms. My mate. My love.”
My eyes flicked open for a second at that last label, but then his hands covered my breasts covetously, like he wanted to hide them away from the world, but he needn’t have. At some point, his brothers had left the room, no longer acting as an audience. He plucked at my nipples, tugging them hard enough to make me squirm, then groaning as I clamped down tight on him. Over and over, he’d promised, and he delivered, exposing me to pleasures of the like I’d never even dreamed of, let alone experienced.
Finally, at some point in the night, he lowered me back onto the bed and settled down beside me before pulling the covers over us. I was exhausted, sticky, and so, so very satisfied.
“Messy…” I grumbled, making a half-hearted effort to find a T-shirt to clean up with.
“Leave it.” Max thrust his fingers between my legs, playing absently in the wet mess on my thighs. “Feel me seeping out of you all night, right before I” —he thrust his fingers into me, just once, my cry half pleasure, half exhaustion right now— “fuck more into you. If I have my way, you won’t go anywhere without feeling my seed seeping free of you.”
I let out a little murmur of protest as his hand was removed, but it was replaced by his body cradling me tight against him.
“This is the start of something amazing. You’ll see.”
It wasthe start of something, that was for sure. I changed my life’s trajectory on this night. Still, it’s only when we started something new that we could feel such optimistic certainty, because once you actually went down that track, you saw the pitfalls.
I discovered the first one the next morning, woken by the sound of the shower in the en suite and the persistent chirp of my phone. I went to grab it, then forced myself to move more slowly, every muscle protesting when I did so.
“Hello?”
That was my first mistake. Like most people, I screened my calls, checking the caller ID before answering them, because there were people in my life that I just couldn’t bear talking to sometimes.
“Sage?”
“Yes.” My voice was raspy and ragged from moaning and screaming half the night.
“It’s your mother.” She snapped that detail out, as if I should’ve known that somehow, but that wasn’t the sole source of her irritation. “Why am I looking at the paper and seeing your face splashed all over it?”
42
“You’re embarrassing me, Sage.” My mother’s voice came down the phone line, but I heard all the other bloody times she’d said this to me reverberating around in my head. Apparently, I had started embarrassing her as a tiny baby. “But most of all, you’re embarrassing yourself.”
I suppressed a groan and rubbed at my forehead.
“There’s photos of you and those…men, splashed all across the gossip pages, and in Sydney of all places! You didn’t tell me you were in Sydney!”
I don’t tell you anything unless I have to, I thought, because of just this reason.
“And what were you doing out on the town with this…pack? You’re not an omega. You’re not the kind of girl these types of men spend time with, and look at the dress you’re wearing! Tits out like a common whore, and, Sage…”
She was winding herself up tighter and tighter, so I closed my eyes, bracing myself for the kick I knew was coming.
“Your hair is a mess. I keep telling you something sleek and well-groomed would look so much better on you. If you’re going to wear a dress, then you need proper support, something to suck you in. Instead, your gut is hanging out for all to see, and then there’s your thighs…”
Thankfully, her voice faded away a little, the sound of my breath growing louder and louder as my heart began to race. I set the phone down on the bed, knowing what I had to do and not wanting to do it, but I needed to. She was in fine form, if the tinny sounds I was getting from the phone were anything to go by, but I just yanked on a pair of sleep pants and my old tee and then picked up the phone, putting it to my ear as I walked down the stairs.
“…and what do these men want from you? That’s what I want to know, Sage. It can’t be anything good. You’re not the kind of girl men like that are looking for. Are you working as an escort? Is that what you’re doing now?”
Up and up, my mother’s fears spiralled, giving her carte blanche, in her mind, to spew out all of this vitriol.