Chapter 5 Denied
Denied
Monte
That evening, I sat in my new room, staring out the window at the landscape blanketed in darkness. Twilight had been hours ago, so it must have been well into the night when we finally arrived at the Redrow pack house, so exhausted that nobody even bothered to speak.
It had been a long, draining day, but I welcomed the nonstop commitments. As long as we were hurrying from celebration to celebration, eating half a dozen different meals and visiting all of Redrow’s allies, there was no time left for me to think about how surreal this entire situation felt.
I didn’t even mind when I was paraded around as little more than a prop, assuring wary Alphas that the border disputes had finally been settled.
Felix barely even spoke to me all the while, but he’d constantly been at my side, his hand on my back as he guided me from one engagement to the next.
When my energy flagged, he was there to push me unfalteringly onward.
My own pack had been present at most of the celebrations, but most of them had been busy with the same negotiations as Felix, so they hadn’t had much time for me.
Nena tried to stand at my side at every given opportunity, and she didn’t back down when Felix raised a challenging eyebrow at her.
She only stood her ground and stared right back, with only the slightest of snarls on her face.
Maybe it was my imagination, but I could have sworn that I caught a faint smirk of amusement in Felix’s affronted huff as he turned away.
Regardless, the day was now over, and I had been led to my quarters at the Redrow pack house.
I sat alone, unsure if this room was supposed to be mine or ours.
I had decided to err on the side of caution and wear the customary sheer robe the SanGraals wore on their wedding nights.
If Felix did come expecting his marital rights, then I had to be ready for him.
My cheeks flushed once again when I recalled what my aunt had told me as she delivered the customary pre-wedding speech to the bride, speaking into the air around me while she showed me exactly how to tie the clinging, shimmery robe.
There had been nothing about mutual pleasure in her speech and everything of endurance, willpower, and survival.
In essence, as long as we managed to consummate the marriage, then the pack’s future would be truly secure.
When I asked her if that meant that I was supposed to bed Felix or wait for Hunter, she just blinked at me in pointed silence, as if the answer were obvious.
It did not take a genius to glean her meaning. Of course my family wanted me to snag an Alpha if at all possible, regardless of whether that would mean violating the letter of the marriage agreement.
Though to be fair, my aunt did provide me with a list of excuses and strategies with which I could avoid the marital bed after the consummation, so it wasn’t as if she were throwing me straight into the lion’s den.
More like she was just tossing me in there once and halfheartedly promising that it wouldn’t hurt that much as long as I grit my teeth and thought about the honor it would bring my family.
I fidgeted with the belt of the robe, anxiously ratcheting it tighter, as I rose and paced. It really was a nice room that they had given me, though I wasn’t sure if that was because they wanted to prove that they would respect the alliance, or because I would be sharing it with their Alpha.
As if summoned by my thoughts, the ornate door swung open, and Felix swept into the room.
The way his expression drew his stately features tight made his foul mood obvious as soon as he walked in, but that alarmed me less than it probably should have.
I was already getting used to his constant frowns.
I was much more concerned with the way my heart pounded when his hand raked across his shirt, ripping several buttons free of their slits. He’d already looked disheveled after the long day, but now he looked downright dangerous.
At first I thought he hadn’t noticed me, as he busied himself with inspecting the wardrobe, bathroom, and any area of the spacious suite but the bed. Then I realized he was pointedly not looking my way. If anything, he was trying very hard to ignore me.
“I spent the last hour poring over the contract and cross-checking the laws, but there’s no way around it.” He shot me an accusatory glare, as if this was somehow my fault, whatever this was.
I swallowed. “I… I don’t know what you’re talking about, Felix. There’s no way around what?”
The corner of his eye twitched when I said his name, before his face resettled itself into its requisite mask of stone. “The marriage contract is quite explicit. We are required to sleep together, even if I am only a surrogate husband for Hunter until he returns.”
I stared at him, struggling to make sense of his words. “Sleep together.” He couldn’t possibly mean…
Could he?
But then Felix stomped to the wardrobe, grabbed an armful of blankets, and tossed them into a messy nest on the floor, which painted a sharp contrast with the neat organization of the room.
“We aren’t consummating the marriage then,” I ventured, a statement and question at once, unsure if my voice betrayed my relief or disappointment more. I wasn’t sure which one I felt most strongly.
“Of course not,” Felix snapped. “You belong to my brother. I’ll hand you over to Hunter when he returns.
I’d been planning on sleeping in my study, since you have my quarters now, but my Beta thoughtfully reminded me to check with the marriage contract to ensure just how strict it was.
So now I have no choice but to sleep here, with you. ”
I blinked. So this was Felix’s room. I didn’t know how to feel about that or why he’d offer it to me. Maybe that was the way of things among the Redrows, but I couldn’t help but feel I’d inconvenienced him yet again. First with the marriage, and now this.
I looked from the bed to the floor, wondering if he would bite my head off if I pointed out that it was big enough for the both of us to share without necessarily touching each other, if that was what he was concerned about. But before I could make up my mind, Felix decided for me.
“I’ll sleep on the floor, you take the bed, and that’s the end of it,” he said, in a voice authoritative enough to shut down any argument before it started.
Before I could form a word of protest, he was stripping out of his shirt and letting it fall to the floor.
His tailored pants followed, sliding down over legs sculpted by long hours of punishing workouts.
His thighs flexed as he stepped out of them, muscles shifting under taut skin. My eyes roamed higher. To his cock.
Fuck.
Those briefs did nothing to hide the heavy outline straining against the fabric. My throat clamped shut as heat crawled down my spine and pooled between my legs.
He didn’t seem to notice me staring—or maybe he didn’t care—as he dropped to his knees, gathering the mound of blankets and burrowing into them.
My brain short-circuited between the shock of what I had just witnessed and utter disbelief.
I still couldn’t decide whether I was more relieved he wasn’t coming to bed with me or disappointed, so I got to enjoy the unpleasant combination of them both.
I didn’t really want him to invade the bed and force me, but for whatever reason, I couldn’t shake the only-somewhat-unfounded notion that even if he did come to my bed, he would never truly hurt me.
Something tickled at the edge of my thoughts. It took me a moment to figure out what it was. Felix hadn’t been meeting my gaze at all since he came into the room, or at least as little as possible. In fact, he’d been looking at anything he could that wasn’t me.
It wasn’t until I followed his line of avoidance and looked down at the near-transparent robe I was wearing.
Seriously. It couldn’t be because of that, could it?
The possibility flitted across my mind, almost too preposterous to consider.
Could Felix have appreciated the effect of the robe on me?
Had he appreciated the effect so much that he’d had to look away before he’d done something he’d have regretted?
It sounded absurd when I thought it, and yet it fit perfectly into the mental image I was slowly constructing of my temporary husband.
He was a wolf who was predictable to a fault.
When faced with any risk of vulnerability, he always growled and feigned indifference.
The thought was some comfort, though small and probably outright wrong. In all likelihood, Felix thought of me as nothing more than duty, a task to be tolerated until he could be rid of me.
All that I could do was ride this wave, and hope I didn’t drown.
With a sigh, I switched off the lamps and padded to the bed and laid down.
If the marriage had gone as planned, I certainly I wouldn't be sleeping alone. I shuddered to imagine how things would have played out with Hunter. Even though I didn’t know much about mating, I knew enough to fear my intended husband.
A night with him would be just like his unbearable sealing kiss, but infinitely worse.
Maybe my current circumstances weren’t that bad.
As Felix’s breathing slowed and steadied, I found the sound oddly comforting.
Closing my eyes, I whispered a prayer to the Goddess.
It hadn’t worked out so well when I’d asked her to stop my marriage to Hunter from happening, but there was no harm in making another appeal.
Then again, I had somehow successfully avoided marriage to Hunter, at least for now, so perhaps my plea hadn’t been quite as ineffective as I’d thought.
I couldn’t suppress the snorting laugh that escaped my throat.
It was absurd to pray for this joyless state to continue, yet what else could I ask for?
I could not hope for salvation, I could not dare hope for a husband who loved and cherished me, but at least I could ask that Hunter took a long, long time to return from his hedonistic adventures.
With any drop of luck, maybe he would forget about me and never come back.
I let out a mangled laugh into the dark at my own wishful thinking.
From across the bed, Felix’s annoyed growl rumbled through the room, and I froze. But he didn’t bark at me to shut up, or rise to shut me up himself. He rolled over and burrowed deeper into his den of blankets.
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
If the Alpha heard me, then he showed no sign of it. I stared off into space for a long time before sleep eventually found me.