Page 13 of Knot Your Basic B*tch

Her scent was driving me wild. Pushing me to do something I’d regret. Something that could make us lose her forever.

But what could I say that would make her mine? Now when she was glaring at me. When it was clear that she wanted to run?

She belonged with us. To me and my pack.

But for some reason, I could see the unease clear across each of her features.

“It’s nothing personal,” Chloe said with a glare that suggested it was definitely personal, “but I don’t have time for a pack right now.”

She took a deep breath and something in my heart dropped.

Unbelievable. She was not going to just—

“I, Chloe Stryker, officially reject you as my scent match.”

Ah. So it took me approximately two minutes to annoy my scent match enough for her to want to reject us. Forget dying of a broken heart. My pack mates were going to kill me as soon as they found out.

Well, I’d managed to fuck everything up. Which was good. Since it was already fucked, I didn’t have to worry about fucking things up. It would either stay the same or miraculously get unfucked.

“No.” I sounded like a cocky asshole.

“What do you mean no?”

“I reject your rejection.”

“You can’t just reject a rejection. Why would you do that?”

“Why would you reject us without even giving us a reason?”

All of the alpha instincts within me were screaming at me to stay. Here. To protect my scent match, even if I had to protect her from my mate herself. Even if I had to haul her over my shoulder like a caveman. Run away with her and claim her. She was our omega.

I kind of wanted to pull some toxic shit, like growling at her. Tell her that we weren’t done… because she was mine. That I would personally castrate, eviscerate or maybe just emasculate any other man who came close. Who dared to even breathe too close to the girl who’s scent was my match.

Guys as hot as Titus could probably pull that off. Even though it was like… kinda misogynistic? More than a bit misogynistic. More like some of it was illegal. Like something that could end in criminal charges and a little bit of jail time if you weren’t sexy enough to get away with it…

Speaking of her family, her dads and most of her brothers were pretty built. Strong enough to kill everymember of my pack eight or nine times over if we hurt a single hair—no, not even—a single split-end on Chloe’s perfect little head.

I was her scent match… and currently just staring at her like I had a screw loose. More than that, like I was completely unhinged.

“I’m not asking for you to accept us, you don’t even know anything about us. All I’m asking is that you give us a chance.”

“Fine.” Chloe abruptly speared her waffle like it was threatening to come back to life and escape off her plate. “So here is how this is going to go. I am busy. I have a demanding academic course load on top of this stupid interviewing task for my brother…”

My scent match wanted to prove herself? Academically? I knew that they assigned homework at the Institute, but I’d never been under the impression that the teachers actually ever expected their omega charges to do all of it. Or any of it, really.

Shit. Focus. My scent match might be accepting my rejection of her rejection. I had to keep my head in the game.

“I will give your pack a chance… ” Chloe might have said the words begrudgingly, but a weight I hadn’t even noticed lifted off my heart, “but only as long as you aren’t fucking up my studies. As soon as you piss me off, we’re done. Do you understand me?”

I nodded. I would have agreed to anything, as long as it meant I still had a chance with her. To be perfectly honest, I had to have her. I wanted her. Now. To haul her back into our beds. To show her everything that I couldn’t quite put into words. How we would be so good together. That my body was made to please her.

All I had to do was seduce her around her rigorous academic course-load.

Wait…

I’d heard about the kind ofacademicsthat omegas worked on at the Institute.

Okay then. I held back a smirk that was not going to win me any favors.