Page 21

twenty-one

ASPEN

I woke up a handful of times over the next few hours.

As Enzo carried me out to his truck.

As Fletcher drove us back to the Lodge while the king cradled me in his arms.

As my Alpha slipped into the bathtub with me and carefully washed all of the dried blood off our skin.

As he helped me into a pair of my spandex shorts and one of his tanks.

As he pulled me into bed with him, his bare chest separated from mine with just a thin layer of fabric.

My wolf purred when I fell back asleep in his arms.

In his bed.

Our bed.

Hunger woke me the next day.

Enzo was already in the kitchen, cooking.

“Stop calling me,” he growled. “She’s fine. I can hear her heartbeat and her breathing. She’ll call you when she’s up.”

It seemed safe to assume he was on the phone.

I stretched, and my wolf yawned.

Her tail wagged at the scents coming from the kitchen.

Eggs.

Bacon.

Hash browns.

Toast.

Yum.

I was still a little tired, but I didn’t feel weak anymore. That seemed like a good sign.

“Princess?” he called out.

“I’m awake.” I didn’t raise my voice, but I knew he’d hear me.

“Your brother’s driving me insane. Can you call him and tell him you’re alive?”

“Yeah. Where’s my phone?”

“On the nightstand.”

Right.

Should’ve guessed that.

My cheeks warmed a little as I grabbed it, unplugging it and typing in my code. I took a second to scan the messages on the screen.

Nova

Are you okay?

They’re telling me you’re okay, but unconscious

I know that being trapped with these bastards is protecting me from my stalker and anyone else who might want to use me, but I want to stab this growly fucker in the eye

My lips curved slightly. I asked Enzo, “Did Hunter take Nova?”

“Yeah.”

“Is she here?”

“Yeah. He let her move into her own room, though.”

“Wow. He must have learned what not to do with a woman by watching you.”

I heard his scoff from the kitchen. “You’re alive and safe. I’m doing fine.”

Right.

Sure.

If fine was his word for abducting me and confusing the heck out of me while maintaining insanely possessive behavior, he was doing fine.

I ran a hand through my hair. It wasn’t tangled. He must’ve brushed it for me.

He was taking care of me on top of the abduction and possessiveness. Maybe that counted for something.

Or maybe it didn’t.

I didn’t have a clue, and I was tired of trying to figure it out.

I hit the button to call Fletcher, and lifted the phone to my ear. He answered instantly.

“I knew you were awake. That asshole has been lying to me,” he growled.

“Literally just woke up, Fletch. Good morning to you too.”

“It’s three in the afternoon.”

“Good afternoon, then.” I yawned. “Want to go for a run? I still haven’t checked that off my list of things to try now that I’m kind of free.”

“No, I don’t want to go for a run. Our forests are full of wolves who want to take you and force you to turn their human women. The only reason they haven’t attacked yet is because your mate is fucking terrifying, and threatened the whole city.”

“He’s technically not my mate yet.”

Enzo growled in the kitchen.

Fletcher growled on the phone.

“I said yet ,” I told both of them.

Would I ever be free of dominant, possessive men?

It seemed more unlikely by the day.

“You have to mate with him,” Fletch said. “The full moon is in a few days. If you don’t seal the bond, people are going to think he’s weak. They’re going to attack. A lot of them will die, but if enough people work together, they will beat him. Our pack is big, but not that big.”

“Relax. I know. I’m going to mate with him. I get it.”

Despite the shitshow that was apparently going on outside, I was relieved.

The truth was out.

There were no more secrets.

I had nothing left to hide.

And that felt incredibly freeing.

My fingers brushed the birds on my collarbone. Enzo hadn’t let anyone take me. He had threatened them. Fletcher was even on his side, and considered the Crimson Pack ours.

Everything was okay, at least for the moment.

Fletcher growled again anyway. “Is your wolf on board with the bond?”

I laughed softly. “My wolf has been in love with him since the moment she met him.”

I heard Enzo drop something in the kitchen.

That was weird.

He never dropped things.

He probably hadn’t gotten enough sleep, or eaten enough food. He seemed to do that often.

“You’re way too calm right now,” Fletcher finally said. “People want to force you to turn more humans, at your own detriment. There are more than sixty thousand wolves here. At least twenty-thousand humans. Maybe more. At three days of recovery a pop, do you know how many years it would take you to turn all of them, without taking any breaks?”

“No. Something tells me you do, though.”

“One-hundred-sixty-four. And a third. Assuming you don’t keel over before that.”

“That’s a lot of years,” I said.

“Of course it’s a lot of fucking years. And if the other forty-thousand wolves suddenly decide they want human mates, which they will, we’ll have to triple that. That would be almost five hundred years, Aspen. Do you think Enzo is going to stay sane while watching you suffer repeatedly for five hundred years? Do you think I will, either?”

“No. But technically, there are three of us who can turn women.”

“Assuming Nova and Sydney have the same ability and can survive using it.”

“Why wouldn’t they? It’s not that much different from creating life by giving birth. Although it takes a lot less time. And energy, probably.”

“Aspen. Listen.” Fletcher’s voice lowered. “We didn’t know if you were going to recover. Things were looking bad before Enzo climbed into bed with you. Whatever is between you guys, your wolf recognized it, or your body recognized it. He’s the only reason you’re as healthy as you are right now.”

Oh.

I looked at the kitchen, but couldn’t see Enzo from where I was.

“You’re calling him by his name now,” I said.

“I’ve reluctantly decided I like him.”

My lips curved, slightly. “That makes one of us.”

“Don’t lie to yourself. He’s a fucking bastard, but he’s your fucking bastard.”

“Maybe.”

Enzo strode out of the kitchen with two plates in his hands. His jaw was set. He didn’t look happy, but he was bringing me food. Tons of it.

“Do you think the mate bond will make it easier for me to change people?” I asked both men, the phone still to my ear.

“I don’t know. I don’t think you should change anyone, ever again,” Fletcher said.

“We’ll see. I’ve gotta go, Fletch. I’ll get dressed and head out to find you soon. Love you.”

“Love you too. Don’t go easy on him, but… go easy on him.”

I rolled my eyes and hung up the phone.

Enzo sat next to me on the bed, but didn’t hand me my plate. He set it next to him instead, and cut the fried eggs.

When I reached for it, he swatted my hand away.

My forehead creased.

He filled the fork and lifted it to my mouth.

“I can feed myself, Enzo.”

“Open.” He lifted the bite to my lips, and I reluctantly let him feed it to me. “I talked to my brothers about the touch thing. Hunter thinks he remembers our father holding our mother when he needed her to recover faster after he beat the shit out of her once.”

My stomach tightened. “If that works, I could turn people more often. Whittle down that hundred-and-sixty years.”

One-hundred-sixty sounded better than five-hundred, so I was going to lean on that number rather than the other one.

“If.”

“Yes, if. All of this is unprecedented. But if I can do it without killing myself, I can fix things. Stop people from going rogue. Turn their mates. Nova could help, maybe. If she wants. Hunter could help her through it, if they?—”

“Hunter doesn’t want a mate. He’s not willing to play house to appease his wolf. He’s protecting her to satisfy the beast, and his wolf is laid-back enough to accept that.”

Oh.

Well, that was okay.

“I’ll just have to do it myself.”

Enzo growled, lifting another bite of breakfast to my lips.

When I swallowed, I asked, “Is that what you and I are doing? Playing house?”

“I don’t know.”

“It didn’t feel like that in the bar’s bathroom.”

His eyes blazed gold.

His wolf was at the surface.

He kept feeding me.

I didn’t bring it up again.

Obviously, he didn’t want to discuss it.

I let him feed me until the plate was empty, then slipped into the bathroom when he picked up his own food. He tried to give me some of it, too, but he needed the calories. I doubted he had eaten at all while I was unconscious.

I wasn’t really dirty, but I wanted to feel truly clean, so I started the shower and slid beneath the water. My eyes closed as it rained over my head, washing away some of my exhaustion and stress.

Everything was okay.

I’d saved Sydney’s life.

I would figure out a way to make things work.

Even if Enzo wasn’t willing to help me recover every time, I could pull through. Maybe it would take longer, but my body could probably adjust to the cost of changing someone, and learn to do it more effectively.

I nodded.

My wolf rumbled her agreement. She thought we needed more female wolves, too.

And even if Nova and Sydney weren’t interested in helping me turn other women, someone would be. I could start with changing people who agreed to help me turn others. If there were a handful of us, and more followed, we could whittle down that hundred and sixty years pretty quickly.

Or at least semi-quickly.

I was basically immortal, so I could sacrifice a decade or two to prevent more men from going rogue. No one deserved to be in the position Sydney had been in when I found her.

The final outcome would be worth it.

I washed my hair. The lightly-scented conditioner I’d won off Jake was gone from the shower, replaced with something new. I sniffed it, and found it pleasantly unscented.

Enzo would’ve been behind that.

I opened the bottle, but before I could squeeze it into my hand, a large fist stole it from me.

I sighed. “Enzo…”

“What’s the best way to use this? I might’ve done it wrong in the bathtub.”

I tried to take the bottle back, but Enzo squirted it into his hand and set it down where it belonged.

“You just run it through your hair, then untangle it with a comb or your fingers. I don’t put it on my roots. That makes my hair greasy. Just start around here.” I reached back and showed him.

He grunted agreement, and carefully put it on the strands.

His fingers moved through the lengths.

My eyes closed as he untangled it slowly.

Unhurried.

Like he had nothing else he was supposed to be doing. I knew that wasn’t the case, but didn’t stop him.

I pressed my hands to the wall of the shower to hold myself upright.

“We need to talk, Princess,” he said, still combing my hair with his fingers.

“You want to break up?” I mumbled. It was supposed to be playful, but didn’t come out that way. He obviously wasn’t going to break up with me.

His chest rumbled. “No. I’ve been doing things wrong.”

I blinked.

“I don’t know anything about having a mate.”

I blinked again.

“When you told me it bothered you not to know where I was, I should’ve communicated mentally with you, or added you to the enforcer chat. I realize that now.” His voice was gruff.

He didn’t like admitting he’d done something wrong.

It wasn’t something he did often. I didn’t know why he was doing it at all.

“You don’t owe me that,” I said. “We’re just friends. Barely friends.”

“That’s bullshit. We’re going to be mates. Mates are more than friends. I want to fuck you in bar bathrooms.”

I sputtered a laugh. “That’s not going to happen, Enzo.”

“Not just in bar bathrooms.” He stumbled over the words. “I don’t want us to only be together during heat.”

“You want us to have casual sex?”

“Not casual . Neither of us will ever be able to screw anyone else. Even my dad couldn’t stomach that much betrayal. The most twisted people still have boundaries.”

Enzo wasn’t one of the most twisted.

Not even a little.

“I don’t know how you expect us to have regular, not-casual sex without developing feelings for each other,” I said. “Sex is innately emotional. Maybe some people can do that, but I’m not one of them.”

“Would it be that bad to develop feelings?”

My eyes widened.

“What are you actually trying to say?”

“I want you to fall in love with me,” he growled.

I blinked.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

A moment passed.

“You what ?” I finally asked.

His chest rumbled. “I want you to love me.”

“A one-sided relationship where I love you and you’re always gone doesn’t exactly sound like something I would enjoy.”

“I would love you too. I want us to be mates. Real mates.”

Holy shit.

Holy shit .

“You said you were going to give me freedom. That was the whole point, remember? I’m not going to agree to anything that will lead to me being trapped like your princess in a tower any longer. I want to make my own decisions. I want?—”

“I made a plan. To help you turn the females,” he said abruptly.

I blinked yet again.

“You lied to Fletcher when you told him you weren’t going to do it again. I’ve come up with an effective way to make it happen. I won’t go through with it until you agree, though. I’d rather you not do it again. But I didn’t think you’d agree to stop.”

“What’s the plan?”

His chest rumbled a little.

He rubbed at it.

His wolf was bugging him. Worried about how the conversation was going, maybe. It definitely wasn’t going well. I didn’t know why he would’ve expected it to, though.

“We’ll close our borders and make an application. Run background checks. Only those who are already identified as groupies and mates will be allowed to fill it out. Mates will come first. Oldest ones at the front of the line. They’ll have to agree to stay with my pack until their bonds are sealed, so we can make sure heat doesn’t screw anything up. We’ll start with anyone who has unstable medical conditions. Having wolves should heal them.”

My throat swelled.

He continued to detail the plan and how it would work. Not just with the wolves, but with the government. The media. The businesses in the city, even.

When he started going into potential issues with the humans and how he would resolve them, I finally interrupted him.

“Enzo,” I said, carefully. “I appreciate that you made a plan and considered everything. I really do. But that’s a separate issue from what we were talking about.”

He let out a harsh breath. “I don’t know how to make love happen.”

“You can’t make love happen.”

“I know. That’s why I’m making plans.”

“Because you can control plans?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know how to make love happen either. I don’t really think I’m ready for that.”

He jerked his head in a nod, but his jaw was clenched.

He thought I was rejecting him.

Maybe I was.

“I’m not saying no to you wanting us to be real mates. I can see that happening eventually. But it’s going to take time, if it does. I don’t really trust you. As the Alpha, yes, but not as my mate.”

“Time. That’s… doable.”

I bit back a laugh at the stiffness in his voice.

Enzo wasn’t patient.

A guy like him didn’t really have to be. Not very often, at least.

“We could treat it like we’re dating,” I said. “Like the guys do with groupies.”

He grunted and rubbed the center of his chest again, with his knuckles.

His wolf didn’t like the idea of dating.

“Do you have any other idea?” I prodded.

He considered it. My eyes closed as he ran his hands through my hair.

“Engaged,” he said. “It’s better than dating.”

“Okay. What would it mean for us?”

“I don’t know.”

Lovely.

His hand left my hair, and both of his palms landed on my shoulders. I bit back a groan when his thumbs pressed into the tight muscles there, massaging them slowly.

“We would need to get to know each other,” I said.

“Alright.”

“You’d have to tell me things. Not just things about the books you like to read. Deeper things. Your past. Your feelings.”

“And you would tell me those things, too.”

“Yes.”

He already knew some of mine, though. A lot more than I knew of his.

“We could have sex when we want to. But not in a bar.” The last word was breathy as he found a knot in my upper back and put pressure on it. “Ordering me to strip in a public bathroom isn’t cool.”

“I could’ve handled it better.” I could tell it was difficult for him to get the words out. “In my defense, I hadn’t slept much, and I wasn’t warned.”

“In my defense, my guards checked in with your brothers, and neither of them thought the tattoo thing was a big deal.”

“I like tattoos.”

“I can tell.”

“You could’ve contacted me with the mental link.”

“I didn’t want to, and I know it hurts you. Everyone knows we have to go through your brothers for it.”

“Not you . I like talking to you, and it didn’t cause me pain the first time.”

“How would I know that? You never said anything.”

There was a beat of silence. “I guess I should’ve clarified.”

“You guess?”

“Don’t sass me.” He dragged a hand down my back and squeezed my ass lightly. Playfully. Then returned his hand back to my shoulders, resuming the massage. “I want you in my head. When I was running, I imagined it a few times. You, reaching out to me to tell me how your day was going just because you wanted to talk to me.”

My throat swelled again.

That was sweet.

Really sweet.

“I didn’t think you cared.”

“Of course I cared. I fucking hated being away from you for that long. Fantasized about the way your body feels against mine at night. The way you felt during heat. The way you fed me grilled cheese.”

“Technically, you fed it to yourself.”

“Enough with the technicalities, woman. You’re mine. I’m yours. I fed you. You fed me. We’re equals, even if my protectiveness drives you mad.”

My chest warmed. “It is annoying.”

“I’m aware.”

“But it was hot when you made me strip in that bathroom,” I said, a little reluctantly.

“Damn straight.” There was no complaint in his voice, then. “Are you getting more tattoos?”

“Yeah. Nova’s designing a sleeve for me.”

His chest rumbled. “It’ll be fucking sexy.”

My lips curved upward.

“I want to be the first to see it, outside of you two.”

“Okay.”

His hands slid down from my shoulders. They moved over the curve of my waist, and down to my hips. Then lingered. “I’ve never taken you like this before.”

“In the shower? Standing up?”

“That too.” His hands moved down to my legs, widening my stance a little. “I meant from behind. Like wolves.”

Oh.

Damn.

My wolf purred loudly enough that we both heard it. Enzo’s rumbled in response.

His hand slipped between my thighs. “I’m never going to be much of a gentleman when it comes to sex. Or your body. It’s not my nature. I could try, but?—”

“You don’t need to try,” I whispered.

He dragged his thumb over my clit just right, and my head fell backward.

My hands were flat on the tiled wall, holding me up.

“You like it rough?” His lips brushed my ear. His voice was nowhere near smooth.

“You know the answer to that.”

He chuckled against my back as he filled me with two of his fingers, still working my clit.

“You would’ve come on my cock in a matter of seconds in that bathroom, Princess.”

“I know,” I breathed.

“Everyone in that bar would’ve known how thoroughly you belonged to me. I can’t stop thinking about it. It took every ounce of control I had to walk out of there.”

“You were so hard against my ass.”

“I was still hard running through that damn forest. If you’d climbed on my lap, I never would’ve been able to leave that truck.”

“It was a good call not to, then,” I breathed.

“I guess.” Enzo hooked his fingers against my g-spot, grinding my clit hard with the side of his thumb. “No one else will ever touch you again.”

“No one will touch you again, either.”

“Only you, Princess.” He slid his fingers out of my channel and hooked one of my legs around the back of his thigh. He lifted his hand to my lips, and slid his fingers into my mouth. “Taste how much your body needs me.”

I licked the saltiness of my pleasure off his skin with a soft moan.

“You’re going to take me now. No knots, this time.”

I made a noise of agreement, and he lined the head of his cock up with my entrance.

With one slow, confident motion, he filled me.

I gasped around his fingers, and he pulled them out, dragging them down to my breast and teasing my nipple.

He drove into me slowly, but not carefully.

Deep, but unhurried.

He felt just as good as he had during heat—so I guess it wasn’t just the pheromones.

It was him.

I didn’t need his knot to drive me wild. Not when he felt the way he did.

He didn’t stop when I shattered on his cock.

He kept fucking me.

Teasing my clit.

He sucked and nipped at the base of my throat, too. “You’ll wear my mark here permanently, as soon as the full moon rises.”

“Yeah.” My chest rose and fell rapidly.

He was so insanely big.

And so insanely good at making me lose control.

He pinched my clit, and I swore.

He gave me a dark, rumbly laugh, and did it again.

My hips jerked.

My need swelled.

He kept going until finally, we both shattered.

My scream tore through the air, my body rocking as he slammed into me, growling his own release as he bit down on my shoulder.

His fangs pierced my skin, but it barely hurt.

And it made me come so much harder.

I was panting when he pulled out and released my hips.

Momentary confusion was quickly replaced when he kneeled between my thighs, pulling my ass toward him and burying his face there.

His mind brushed mine, the feeling much more intimate than I expected. “We taste so fucking good together.”

Ohh.

“I’m so wiped out, I don’t know if I can come again,” I panted, palms still pinned to the wall.

“That’s fine, Princess. No pressure. I just need you on my mouth.”

My knees shook.

He took more of my weight.

“I need to talk to Nova,” I breathed.

“After I’m done with you.”

“And Sydney.”

“They’ll wait.”

“And—”

“If another man’s name leaves your mouth while I’m eating you out, I’m going to put you on your hands and knees in this shower and fuck you until you can’t remember him.” The threat was dark, and matter-of-fact.

Oh.

Wow.

Yes, please.

“Silas,” I said.

He snarled against me, swept me off my feet, and lowered me carefully to my hands and knees.

And fucked me.

Until I really couldn’t remember who I needed to talk to.