Page 2 of Rejected Sold Mate (Crystal Creek Wolves #4)

“It’s nice to meet you, Jayce,” I said, raising my glass so I could clink it against his. “So, what are you doing out here?”

“Looking for a distraction.”

I leaned forward. “A distraction from what?”

He huffed a laugh. “Let’s just say…a distraction from work. How about you?”

“Running away to start a new life.” There was a kernel of truth in the statement, considering I’d joined a new pack to do just that, but Jayce didn’t catch on.

“Very mysterious,” he nodded, “What other mysteries are you hiding, Rhie?”

I smiled at him over the rim of my glass. “I guess you’ll just have to find out, won’t you?”

He took that as a challenge, just like I’d intended him to, and his attention on me became laser-focused.

I loved it. There was no other situation, no other opportunity that would ever allow me to become the center of an Alpha like Jayce’s attention, and I was basking in the glow of his interest. When he spoke, his words were light, the opposite of the cold energy that radiated off him.

Jayce was even more attractive when he was engaged, using his hands while speaking and laughing easily.

He had a reputation as a wild card and an unknown factor, and I’d been afraid of him without even really knowing who he was before.

That all changed when I was a stranger to him, and I pretended he was the same to me.

Was that the real Jayce, funny and attentive? Or was he playing a role, like I was, thirsty for another existence outside of the one he usually lived in?

Did it matter? It wasn’t like anything existed for the two of us together outside of that moment. When the sun came up, and we had to return to our respective packs, he wouldn’t ever see me again. And if he did in passing, what would he even think?

Again, did it matter?

I decided it didn’t, and when Jayce flirted, I flirted back.

He’d reach across the table to hand me a glass of water, and our fingers would brush for an extended amount of time.

It was clear he struggled to give me information about his life without revealing who he truly was, but he told me he was a mechanic, and I told him I was a painter without any concern that it would set off any familiarity bells in his head. I painted under a fake name, after all.

Jayce told me that he was new to the area, and I told him the same. That, at least, was the truth on both our parts. He told me that he’d come to the Broken Barrel looking for something, but he didn’t know exactly what.

“So did you find it?” I asked him as the bar started to empty, the hour having grown late.

“Find what?”

“What you were looking for.”

His eyelids lowered slightly, and his smile was predatory, more like a lion than a wolf. “I’m not sure. What are you doing for the rest of the night?”

“Nothing,” I told him honestly.

“Then come home with me.”

There it was. The question that we’d both been barreling towards since he bought me the first drink.

My body lit up with awareness, and my heartbeat kicked up a notch.

Was I brave enough? Normal Rhie wasn’t, that was for sure, but what about mysterious Rhie, who had caught an Alpha’s eye and kept his attention?

“Yes.”

His grin widened. “Did you drive here? I...” he paused. “Ran.”

On four feet, I bet, but neither of us had even spoken about being shifters, and apparently, he didn’t want to change that. “I did.”

“Give me your keys. I’ll drive.”

Secretive. It didn’t surprise me that he didn’t want to give me directions to his house, and if I weren’t so full of adrenaline, it might have been funny. He was really serious about hiding his identity, not even knowing I knew who he was from the jump.

I threw him my keys, and he caught them effortlessly. I followed Jayce out to the parking lot, but we didn’t even make it to the car before he was on me, lips crashing down on mine as he backed me against the brick wall of the bar’s exterior.

His mouth was hot and insistent, and he tasted like rye whiskey.

There was no teasing, just the swipe of his tongue against the seam of my lips, and I let him in eagerly.

There was a hunger in the way he kissed that had me buzzing with need, and when we broke apart, he rested his forehead against mine.

“Are you still sure?”

I couldn’t help the laugh that slipped out. “Are you kidding? If I wasn’t convinced before, that would have done it. Let’s go.”

The drive was longer than I expected, and Jayce switched back and forth between telling me how badly my car ran and letting his hand slide up my legs as he drove.

Despite the distance, the eagerness didn’t fade, and I didn’t even blink when he pulled into the dirt driveway of a small cabin deep in the woods.

“You live here?” I asked when he came to the passenger side and opened the door for me.

“Sometimes.”

I knew good and well an Alpha didn’t live in a one-room cabin with a wood-burning stove, but I wasn’t supposed to know he was an Alpha, so I kept my mouth shut and let him lead me inside.

Plus, maybe it wasn’t a total lie. Jayce might have lived at the cabin sometimes. How was I supposed to know otherwise?

Inside, it smelled like cedar and ash. The cabin was small but clean, and Jayce clicked on a tall lamp in the corner that filled the space with golden light.

The bed, barely big enough for the two of us, was covered with a red plaid comforter, and we were both looking at it before we looked back at each other.

“I know it’s not much—”

“I don’t care.”

He smiled again, but this time, instead of predatory, it was warm and hypnotic. I wanted to see him smile like that again, and again, and again.

“Good. Then come here, Rhie. I’ve waited long enough.”

I didn’t complain, but simply slid off my heels and approached him, looping my arms around his neck as he lowered his head to mine and captured my mouth in a much slower, more sensual kiss than before.

After all, we had all night. There was no need to rush, and as Jayce swept me into his arms and carried me to the bed, I had the distinct feeling he planned on taking his time.

***

Hours later, the eastern edge of the sky had just started to go from black to silver, and I was in the cabin bathroom, splashing cold water over my face as my legs shook like a newborn foal.

Jayce had given me everything I wanted and then some, and it hadn’t taken long for him to have me a panting mess beneath him. He was every bit the incredible lover I had expected him to be, but what I hadn’t expected was how intensely it affected me.

Each time he brought me to the peak, I felt a rush of emotion totally out of place for a random hookup. I wrapped myself around him until we were as close as we could possibly be, and still, it felt like I needed more. It wasn’t pleasure—he gave me plenty of that—but something unnamable.

At the end, he chanted my name into my ear as he spilled himself inside of me, and it felt like I was near tears at the thought of it all being over.

What in the world was wrong with me?

“Rhie,” Jayce called from the bed, and I rubbed my hands over my face one more time before returning to him. The water hadn’t helped. I was still feeling desperate, thinking that our time together was over, and I was having a hard time accepting it.

Maybe it didn’t have to be, though. As mixed up as Jayce had me feeling, I still felt free of the tension I’d been looking to forget about. Besides the thread of anxiety involving the hookup being over, I felt better than I had in at least a week.

Being with Jayce had been the perfect outlet, and he still didn’t know who I was.

Maybe we could work something out, midnight meetings where we gave each other what we needed and nothing more.

Jayce never needed to know my real identity.

We could be…friends with benefits, I guess.

It seemed too silly a term for the intensity of my feelings, but that’s what I needed from him, wasn’t it?

Heck, not even friends. Mysterious strangers with benefits.

“Rhie,” he murmured again when I climbed under the blanket with him, letting Jayce wrap me in his strong arms, humming in contentment as I ran my hands over the muscles of his chest and stomach for what must have been the hundredth time that night.

He was impossibly handsome, like he was carved out of stone, but his skin was soft and warm, and when he kissed me, there was nothing cold about it. “I don’t want you to go yet.”

I felt a pang in my chest, and that connection reared its head again. “I don’t want to, either. But I was, um, thinking…”

His mouth had found the sensitive juncture of my neck again, and it was hard to speak. “Yeah?”

“Thinking that we could do this again…maybe…”

Jayce stopped kissing me then and raised himself up on one elbow to look at me. “Rhie, this was a great fucking surprise, but how—”

“Before you keep going, let me explain. I don’t have expectations. I don’t even need to know your last name. But I really enjoyed myself, and this was such a perfect outlet for how twisted up I was feeling—”

“An outlet?”

He didn’t seem thrilled, so I tried to explain.

“I’ve been under a lot of stress, and you made me feel so much better, and I don’t know if you feel the same, but I swear the chemistry I’m feeling is so good and like…

what if we just continued like this? Like, every Friday we met at the bar and came back here before going on with the rest of our lives. ”

A series of emotions played over his face, and when he laughed, it was sad. “You have no idea who I am, or how out of character this is for me, and I have no interest in just being an outlet for someone’s negative emotions, no matter how good the chemistry is.”

“Oh.” My heart sank. How stupid was I willing to be to have another chance at being with him like this? “What if I did know who you are? Would that change things?”

Jayce narrowed his eyes, and his hand came up to drag his knuckles across my cheekbone, “Who do you think I am, Rhie?”

I knew I was in danger, but I also knew I’d made the mistake of showing my hand, and he wasn’t going to let me take it back. “You’re…you’re the Blacktide Alpha.”

Jayce froze, and then he laughed again, humorlessly.

While he still remained in the bed next to me, I could already feel him pulling away in every other sense but physical.

“And here I thought you wanted me for something other than my title. I have to admit, it takes guts to use an Alpha for an ‘outlet’, as you said. I hope you’re proud of yourself. ”

Dammit, I’d ruined everything. I was reeling, trying to find the right thing to say to fix what I’d done.

“That’s not what this was! Yeah, I knew who you were, and it scared me until you treated me so sweetly, and then it didn’t matter that you were an Alpha!

I would have never gone home with you if you’d treated me like… well…like most other wolves treat me.”

“And how is that?”

I couldn’t meet his eyes anymore, and I looked away. “My pack’s Alpha tolerates me, the Lunas are my friends, but everyone else treats me like garbage—”

“The Lunas are your friends?” His voice was incredulous. “Whose wolf are you, Rhie? Am I about to fuck my place in the alliance up because I slept with you?”

“No! No, Scott basically forgets I exist most of the time, and—”

“ Scott?” Jayce was out of bed before I could even reach for him, and he was gathering his clothes with angry motions. “So, you lied when you said you were new to the area, too, then?”

I shook my head, a lump forming in my throat that made it hard to speak. Jayce froze and looked me over again, like he was racking his brain to try to identify me. Then, a look of horror crossed his face. “You’re that outcast Omega Scott accepted into his pack a few months ago, aren’t you?”

Anger rose to war with the misery that had grown inside of me. “Oh, and that would change things, right? If you knew I was an Omega, you’d never have touched me?”

Jayce sneered. “Rhie, you don’t want me to answer that.”

I could feel hot tears rolling down my cheeks, but I ignored them, pulling the sheet up to cover my chest. “Yes, I do. Say it. If we’re going to be all honest now, might as well tell me everything.”

It was bravado speaking, and as soon as I’d made the demand, I wished I could take it back. But it was too late, and Jayce was about to show me who he really was.