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Chapter Twenty-One

Emma

A warm body blanketed me as I roused from my heat.

I was a crusted, knotty mess, and I ached everywhere, but especially there . I shifted, groaning, and instantly, Ryder was steadying me.

“Take your time, baby. Let me help you.”

I didn’t have the energy to refuse. Knotty hair was brushed back from my face before he lifted me so that I was sitting across his lap.

He presented me with a water bottle. “Drink a little, Em,” he said. “You’re going to be dehydrated.”

I hissed at him, actually hissed and, finding a reserve of energy, sank my teeth into his throat. Blood pooled into my mouth, and I bit harder still.

“Fuck, you’re a little savage,” he said. “Didn’t you mark your mate enough?”

He knew exactly what I was thinking, how my jealousy had exploded as I realized why he would know I was dehydrated. He’d been with other omegas before me, and I couldn’t stand it.

His fingers rubbing soothingly at my nape helped to bring me down, along with the sweet rumble of his purr.

“Only you, baby. You know there’s only you.”

I knew it. Somewhere underneath this feral need to mark and claim, I knew all that he felt. The bond, the sacred connection between an alpha and an omega, blazed with it.

Feeling his cock rise in response to my possessive fit, my teeth eased their lock. I had to be hurting him, but he showed none of it. Pride. His pride blazed like a beacon.

This wasn’t the first mark I’d made. I’d spent the duration of my heat sinking blunt teeth and blunt nails into his flesh. The distant, formerly beta part of me wanted to be horrified. The newly awakened omega was trying to find a new place to sink my teeth.

“Are you ready for some water now, baby?”

I took the bottle from him. Well, I tried to. He kept hold of the bottom, which was a fair precaution, given my hands were shaking like a leaf.

I drained it.

“Are you hungry?”

I shook my head. “No, I think the blood made me feel a little queasy.”

He chuckled and handed me a candy bar. “You should probably try and eat something. It’s not great, but some sugar will help.”

I ate it slowly, and all the while, I felt his satisfaction through the bond.

He liked this, liked providing for me, caring for me.

He wanted to do better, to give me more, but most of all, he was deeply, wholly, unwaveringly enamored with his new mate—me.

There was no room for confusion. The bond did not lie.

“Will it always be like this?” My eyes searched his stormy blue ones, only now they looked different, like I could see and feel into his soul with that one look.

He took the empty wrapper from me and put it on the floor. “Yeah, it will.” His lips tugged up. “And no, I don’t have any experience to go on, only what I feel and what I’ve seen with other bonded alphas and their mates.” His face softened. “You are so fucking perfect.”

I felt those words as much as I heard them.

They ought to be cloying.

They weren’t.

“What will happen now?”

“Now, I’m going to get you cleaned up. Then I’m going to take you back to Desparion with me. The rest, we’ll take a day at a time. That sound okay with you?”

It did. I could be near Sloane and the baby when it came. I huffed out a breath. “I’ve just spent three years studying to be a designer. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do? What if I’m pregnant? I don’t know anything about being pregnant or babies. I’m going to be a disaster.”

His purr cut through my manic words, and calm flooded my mind.

“You’re not going to be a disaster,” he said, hands tightening on me.

“And in case you’re confused, there are two of us and we will work it out together.

If you want to be a designer, baby, you’re never going to be short of work.

Do you have any idea how hard it is getting designers in the zone?

Fucking nightmare. Jace has a whole section he wants to rework at the club.

It’s not all like the strip, you know. Sure there are rough parts, but there’s also some swanky places.

Most betas would be surprised. They see the strip, but that’s not the half of it. ”

“How much more is there?” I asked.

He smiled. “I’ll show you, baby. Just as soon as we get back.”

We washed up in the shower room, slowly, because I could barely hold my weight and Ryder had to do most of the work.

Then he opened up the door.

Clothes arrived, along with a takeout coffee that I practically inhaled. Once I felt alive enough to emerge, he carried me out.

I didn’t remember much of the place, but I remembered the workshop. Jace, Dane, and other men I didn’t recognize were waiting for us, ready to load up into a blacked out SUV.

“Is that… Is that Derek’s car?” I asked in a hushed whisper, seeing the sleek, black BMW changing to midnight blue at the far end of the garage.

“Don’t mind it,” Ryder said. “Compensation for our stay.” He put his hand on the back of my head as he ducked into the car.

“Sloane’s chewing my ear out,” Jace grumbled from the front passenger seat.

“Is she okay?” I asked, snuggling close to Ryder, not even caring that I was nestled on his lap in the back. Judging from the tightness of his hold and his low rumbly purr, he wanted me right there too.

“Anxious,” Jace said honestly. “But she’ll be better once we’re back.”

Dane lowered his window, then called out to the men in the shop. The big roller doors rattled open, and we drove out into the dark, wet night.

“How are we going to get in?” I asked.

“The same way we got out,” Dane said from the driver’s seat.

A few blocks later, a ramp took us down into an underground garage. Only it wasn’t an underground garage, it was a tunnel.

“Gun it,” Jace said. “Time to go home.”

* * *

Thanks for reading Ryder. I hope you enjoyed the story!