Chapter 12
“What?” I blink up at Camille, my face close enough to rest on her thigh from my beseeching, head fuzzy from her scent and my alpha demanding that we take care of our omega.
“I said okay,” she huffs, her pale cheeks splotching a deeper pink.
It’s so damn sexy. I know it’s wrong for me to get turned on by her frustration with me, but I’ll take frustration and impatience over anguish any day.
I nod, and pull back for a second to grab my phone out of my pocket, doing my best not to look away from the omega in front of me.
“Is now really the time to be texting someone?” Camille asks, a grimace twisting her face as another cramp hits.
I switch my phone to one hand and slide the other between her thighs to stroke her clit as I scan for any incoming messages. She gasps at the touch, but scowls at me.
“Sorry, I’m checking to make sure that Ambrose or Jackson aren’t seconds away from arriving. I know if they are, you’d want them to help you instead.”
Her agitated expression eases slightly, a flicker of sadness in the bond that I don’t know what to do with. Is she sad that they’re not here?
“I’m sorry,” I apologize again, confirming that their arrival isn’t imminent. I should text them to let them know what’s going on, but Camille moans and pain slices through the bond. I toss my phone to the side and bring my mouth to her cunt.
“Fuck,” I groan into her pussy the second her taste hits my tongue.
She moans at the same time, and I curse again as slick fills my mouth.
Camille’s pussy tastes like the best goddamn latte in the universe.
I doubt I’ll be able to drink coffee again, knowing how much it pales in comparison to my omega.
There’s no time to savor her. I can sense through the bond that the heat spike demands much more than my mouth. Still, I grip her plush thighs, anchoring myself in place as she threads a hand in my hair and whines, unwilling to leave this heaven so soon.
“River, please,” Camille gasps, the hand in my hair pulling tight enough to scatter pinpricks of pain across my scalp.
I know I should listen, but she’s not pulling me away, just holding me tighter, and I need more.
Besides, I’ve never been one to give in to demands in the bedroom, and my alpha growls as I bury my face deeper against her slick cunt, fucking my tongue inside her.
If this were any other situation, I might worry about my technique, since the last time I ate pussy was years ago. But what is there to worry about when my omega is burning up and I can feel every pulse of her desire through the bond?
We chase her orgasm together, her moans and the bond guiding me to give her exactly what she needs.
It’s one of the most erotic experiences of my life.
It’s a good thing the bond goes one way, because otherwise I’d ruin things with my surge of despair as I wonder if this will be the only time I’ll get to experience this.
All the therapy in the world won’t be able to fill the vast crater in my chest that tonight will leave behind.
The only thing to save me will be my pack, and I’m still not sure where we stand.
Camille cries out, loud enough that they might be able to hear her in the ballroom as she comes, slick gushing down onto my chin and suit jacket.
Thank fuck I had the forethought to put that there, because I’d have to burn this couch if it got any of her ambrosial slick on it.
No one deserves to experience even the remnants of her pleasure but her pack.
My knot throbs painfully as I resist the urge to come along with her.
As much as I want to linger and make her come on my tongue again, she needs more.
From what I know about heat spikes, she’ll need a knot to sate her.
The guilt I feel as I pull back and quickly release my cock from where it’s trapped against my fly is only slightly tempered by the desperate need gleaming in Camille’s eyes.
This is not at all how I pictured my first time having sex with Camille going.
And trust me, I’ve pictured it countless times since we met.
Yes, in the fantasy it was often a rush of a dam of desire breaking, frantic and rough, but it was always the start of something more.
A prelude to a lifetime of fucking and finding every way to unravel her, not a once-in-a-lifetime joining brought on by necessity.
There’s no small part of me that wants to stop.
To ease her with my fingers and tongue as best I can until Ambrose or Jackson show up, so she won’t resent and hate me even more when the heat of the moment subsides.
But my alpha instincts are stronger, telling me that if I don’t fuck Camille now and ease her pain, that would be even worse.
“Lie back,” I rasp, guiding Camille to recline on the couch.
As soon as she does and I move atop her to stare down into her warm hazel eyes, I realize my mistake.
I should’ve had her present for me. Taken her from behind, fast and hard, where she could imagine I was someone else.
Instead, I’ve forced her to stare at the person she thinks rejected her and ruined her life.
When I go to move off her, she grabs my neck and pulls me down, her mouth crashing against mine.
It’s all I need to shake away enough of my guilt and trepidation, my alpha overpowering what little control I have left.
Something rips, the sound of fabric tearing joining Camille’s breathy moans as I grip her thigh and part it wider so I can notch my throbbing cock at her entrance.
Neither of us cares. All that matters is the stretch of her cunt around my cock as I sheathe myself inside her in one earth-shattering thrust.
Shit, don’t come. Don’t you dare fucking come, asshole. Do something right for her for once in your goddamn life.
I doubt my therapist would condone this negative self-talk, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
Camille’s eyes flutter shut, allowing me a moment to soak in her beauty shamelessly.
I map every freckle dusting her skin, the plush pillow of her parted lips, the pink flush washing over her cheeks and nose, the fine lines on her brow that deepen as it furrows while she chases her pleasure, and the silky strands of ginger hair damp around her forehead and temples.
She’s so lovely, it hurts, but I can’t stop staring.
Her eyes flicker open again when I don’t move, catching me staring. “River…”
My name from her lips is inscrutable, and the roil of emotions through the bond tangling with my own are no help. Is it a plea for more? Is it an apology for how she’s going to destroy me when this impossible moment ends?
Our eyes stay locked as I force myself to move even as the grip of her hot, slick cunt threatens to undo me at any moment.
The slap of my hips against her thick ass and thighs as I build up a slow rhythm echoes against the tile walls, punctuated each time with a gasp of pleasure from the omega beneath me.
Her breasts jiggle as I fuck her into the couch, and I release my grip on her thigh to yank the neckline of her dress down, needing them bare to me. Her eyes go wide, but I only see that shocked expression for a moment before I descend to capture one of the peaked pink nipples between my lips.
Camille’s skin tastes like caramelized sugar, heat radiating off of her like a furnace. The sound she makes as I scrape my teeth against her nipple has my hips snapping harder.
“Yes, oh god,” she gasps, her cunt fluttering around my cock as she comes undone.
My alpha purrs in triumph as she squeezes the life out of me, and I grit my teeth hard enough to risk cracking a tooth to stop from falling over the edge with her.
“Not yet,” I rasp, speaking the words aloud unintentionally.
“W-what?” Camille gasps, her pleasure-blown pupils boring into mine.
“I’m not done. I need more.” I grab her ankles and place them onto my shoulders, folding over her as I pump even deeper into her gripping cunt. Camille cries out as my knot bumps against her clit at this new angle, and I fuse my mouth to hers, greedy to taste those pleasured sounds.
Her nails dig into my arms, gripping me tight as I work my cock inside her. When she pulls back to suck in a gasping breath, I drop my lips to the spot on her shoulder where my bite mark is hidden underneath concealer, sucking hard against the tender skin.
It’s too intimate for what this moment is, but I don’t fucking care.
“Don’t make me stop,” I beg against her skin as she shudders and comes again in convulsing waves, and my orgasm approaches like a freight train.
“Please, angel. I don’t ever want to stop,” I groan desperately, tears welling in my eyes from resisting the pleasure and knowing it’s going to be over soon.
“It’s okay,” Camille gasps. I know she’s talking about me knotting her, but my chest clenches with the painful hope that it’s more than that. That she’s willing to try to look past all my wrongdoings and give me another chance. That, despite what she said, this does mean something.
Because it means everything to me.
With one final thrust, my knot pops inside her.
I try to keep going, but she clamps so hard around me as she comes that I can’t do anything but surrender as my knot throbs and expands, heat sizzling down my spine as I erupt inside her for what feels like an eternity.
Yet when my cock gives one last pulse and I’ve emptied everything I have into her, it feels like not nearly long enough.
The flames inside her start to sputter out, her heat spike satisfied for now. I brace myself for the moment she goes cold and the reality of what we’ve done sets in, cursing the way we’re locked together because it means there will be no way to escape it.
“Are you okay?”
Camille’s gentle words startle me, and I look up from where I’ve buried my face in her neck, realizing I’m crying as I blink to unblur my vision. She reaches up and wipes a tear away as it slides down my cheek, making my chest constrict with longing.
I know I should be strong for her. She’s the one who had to endure me fucking her to help with her heat. She’s the one who deserves to be upset.
But I can’t do it. I’m split open and so tired of pretending that I’m strong all the time. It’s never done me any good, anyway.
“Not really,” I croak.
A husky laugh rumbles out of the woman pinned beneath me. “Me either,” she says with a lopsided smile. She sounds almost…happy? Which makes no sense. It must be all the hormones from the heat spike making her feel good.
I fight against a frown, trying not to let my guard slam back into place like it would’ve in the past. “Sorry, I’ll get off as soon as I can.” I keep my voice soft, but there’s an edge of sadness to it I can’t contain.
Camille laughs harder, and this time I can’t hold back my concern and confusion. “Are you delirious?” I press a hand to her forehead to check her temperature, but she smacks it away.
“You already got off,” she snorts, ignoring my question.
I groan at the terrible joke. My brain can’t process why she’s not shutting herself away. Why she’s teasing me. Maybe I’m the one that’s delirious.
“So did you.”
The smile that curves across her lips is lazy and indulgent. The smile of someone well-fucked. My alpha purrs at that before I can keep it in, and Camille places a hand on my chest.
“Don’t let it go to your head. I think anyone with a knot would’ve worked with how horny I was.”
A flash of hurt makes my purr falter, and Camille’s smile fades. She gazes up at me, her eyes searching my face for something, and I hold still, heart threatening to beat out of my chest as I wait for whatever her assessment of me is.
“I’m glad it wasn’t a random alpha.”
You’d think she told me that she loved me from how my stomach flips and my purr revs back up.
I should be quiet and accept this strange post-coital relaxation. Accept that she’s not pushing me away and let that be that.
Of course, I don’t.
“Camille, I’m sorry,” I murmur.
Through the bond, I sense her walls coming up, but on the edges of that, there’s shame and hope.
“I…” She swallows hard. Time stops as I await my fate.
A loud banging on the door jars us out of the moment, and I hiss in pain as Camille tries to scramble up from under me and cover herself, yanking on my knot still firmly lodged inside her.
“Camille? Are you in there? Sweetheart, please let me in.” Ambrose calls from the other side of the door, sounding frantic.
His voice has her bond lighting up with longing, mirroring my own reaction to my mate’s voice.
“I’m, uh, I’m okay,” Camille calls back. “I can’t unlock the door, though. I’m stuck.”
“Stuck?”
“Hold on a moment,” I call out, looping Camille’s arms around my neck and sitting her up carefully. “Wrap your legs around my waist,” I say to the omega stuck on my knot.
“River??” Ambrose’s shock startles a laugh out of me, and Camille giggles. She gasps as I haul her up into my arms, and carry her over to the door. My back is going to be incredibly pissed at me later, but it’s worth it for the look on Ambrose’s face as I slide the lock open and crack the door.
“About time you got here,” I deadpan.