Chapter 46
chapter
forty-six
It’s been a long time since I walked these hallways.
Not much has changed. The faded blue lockers and green-flecked linoleum are as familiar as the route to the library.
I don’t care.
I’m on a mission.
Bridget has brought my Alpha to the surface once again. She does that—tugging at the deepest parts of me without realizing it.
Because it isn’t the big smiles or exaggerated sassiness that pull me in. With Bridget, it’s the things she doesn’t want people to notice. The pink tingeing her cheeks, how her scent disappears when she’s sad, how her eyes drop in shame when perfume rises off her skin.
I purr deeper, shouldering our way into the library. Emptiness echoes back at us as we step over the threshold.
Bridget sees my pleasantly surprised expression and bites down on a small smile. “It’s Friday,” she peeps. “No one hangs around after the last bell. But the lights will shut off and the doors will lock automatically in ten minutes.”
That makes sense. The big clock on the wall above the checkout desk reads 3:50.
Fine by me. What I have in mind will take more than ten minutes anyway.
I start toward the stairs on the far side of the room. Bridget stammers and squirms, but I cradle her closer and flash a smile. “Humor me? We ran out of practice before I finished my cardio.”
She gives me that wary look we’ve all gotten used to. I remember it from high school—how she would peek around her locker any time I stopped to talk to her. Certain I had some sort of angle, I suppose.
I guess I did, if you count wanting to talk to a pretty girl as “having an angle.”
It never occurred to me before today; there was likely a reason she felt suspicious about a big alpha jock being nice to her.
Did any of my teammates bully her? How did I miss it?
Probably the same way we missed what this kid has been doing to her. She might have told Colt some anecdotes she thought would amuse him, passing her own harassment off as a joke . But it’s clear there’s a real problem here.
I hate that Bridget could possibly believe any of this wasn’t a big deal. Does she really think so little of herself? Doesn’t she realize how precious she is?
Has she ever?
I make it to the top of the stairs without breaking a sweat. Bridget blinks owlishly, glancing behind us like she can’t quite compute what just happened. Adorable .
I brush my lips over her quirked brow. “Remind me, which way to the stacks?”
“Left,” she replies, distracted. “Did you seriously just carry me up two flights of stairs? Why?”
“To get to the stacks.” I shrug. “Left, you said?”
But we’re already turning the last corner. Row upon row of forgotten books sit on the tallest shelves in the whole place. They make for individual dark alleys that dead-end in blank walls. I pick one in the middle.
“Jesse!” Bridget giggles. “What are we— oh !”
I turn and lift her, balancing her against a gap on one of the shelves. The space is just wide enough to accommodate Bee’s thick hips, and the perfect height to put her level with mine.
I reach back to grab a fistful of my Henley, peeling it off in one motion. “Remember how I promised I’d tell you next time I needed you?”
The diffused light between the stacks only makes Bridget’s eyes seem brighter. They glitter and glow, running over my features in a slow loop. “Yeah?”
I go for my fly, unbuttoning my jeans and rolling them down. “I need you now.”
It’s more that I know she needs me . My Alpha can sense it. And that edge to her scent? The bitter aftertaste that makes it just not quite “perfect”? He somehow believes this will fix it.
I know nothing will, because it doesn’t need “fixing.” That’s her scent. And I love it, because ? —
Because I love her.
I love her .
Emotion echoes through my chest the same way every sound we make reverberates through this large, vaulted room. Amplifying. Touching each corner, bouncing back at me. Until it’s all I hear. All I feel.
I love her.
I have for a long time.
Maybe even forever.
“You used to study up here,” I whisper, helping unfasten the tiny pearls holding her blouse closed. She shrugs it off, panting as her lips fall open in awe. Her chest heaves on shallow breaths while she listens.
“You would sneak up here and hide when you were supposed to be in gym class. Coach sent me looking for you once. I knew you loved this library because—” I swallow, hoarse. “Because I watched you. All the time.”
A quiet whimper catches in Bridget’s throat.
I wrap my fingers around her neck and smooth my thumb down the creamy column, remembering, “Your hair caught my eye whenever you came near me. The first time I ever struck out in a varsity game, it happened because I saw you in the stands. It was dusk, but your pretty hair still stood out. You were huddled next to your sister and your parents. Reading a library book.”
Bridget’s lower lip starts to quiver. I nuzzle my nose against hers as I go on, “So that day, when Coach sent me after you, I knew you’d be up here.
I looked for your red braids. Or a ponytail with a ribbon.
And when I found you hiding between these shelves, you looked so happy.
Reading and doodling in your notebook. Drawing sunflowers and bumblebees.
I didn’t have the heart to drag you out. ”
How clueless was I? Even back then, something about her called to me on an elemental level. I barely knew her, had only spoken to her in passing as Alicia’s little sister; but I saw her peace and wanted to protect it.
Bridget tries to absorb what I’m saying. Her mouth moves more deliberately, forming a word without sound. “Bumblebees?”
I nod, tracing my thumb along her rounded chin. “Where did you think I got your nickname from?”
Bridget smiles shyly—my favorite expression in the whole world. “I figured because I used to buzz around the parties Alicia would throw for the players and the cheerleaders.”
My grin blooms. “You did do that. It was fucking adorable.”
A faint giggle tumbles out of her. “I thought you were just too polite to call me ‘gnat’ like my sister did.”
The throb behind my heart swells and burns. I cup my hand around her cheek, relishing how the rounded curve perfectly fills my palm. “I should have paid more attention to the way she treated you, bumblebee. I let you down back then. I’m sorry.”
Bridget shifts closer, pressing her panty-covered core to the spot between my growing knot and my navel. Wet heat kisses the trail of dark blond hair there. My lungs suck in bright lemon sweetness as she touches my face, trailing her fingertips to my jaw.
“It wasn’t your fault,” she murmurs. “And it wasn’t your job to protect me.”
A fierce, possessive urge roars to life. “I wanted it to be my job. I still do.”
Breathless anticipation stretches taut between us. My eyes flick to the clock hanging halfway between the first floor and the second. Watching for the exact second…
Finally.
Click .
I hear the doors downstairs lock at the same second the overhead lights flicker off. Cloudy sunlight continues streaming into the first-floor windows, casting a gray glow up to the second story. The summer-blue irises staring back at me get thinner, reacting to the shadows.
Or maybe for another reason entirely.
Bridget’s scent becomes so intoxicatingly bright , my head swims. Need pulses in my canines and my cock. Sweet slick douses the triangle of fabric between her pussy and my skin, the thick sheen glossing the top of my knot.
I groan, diving for her unmarked throat and opening my jaw to bite. Bridget squeals at the scrape of my teeth along her thin, pale flesh. Her core contracts hard enough for me to feel her pussy quiver and her abdominals tighten.
A feminine keen floats into the high ceiling, filling the whole library. Fuck. I love that.
Just like the locker room, there’s something about publicly laying claim to her that appeals to the beast inside me. And this is perfect —public enough for my Alpha to make his point, but, at the moment, completely private and safe for Bridget.
“Need you,” I gasp, reaching for her center and finding out just how soaked she is. “Right here. Please, Bee.”
She nods hard enough to send loose auburn hair tumbling over her breasts. Gorgeous, with luminous strands layered over her light-yellow bra. I feel myself harden when her nipples peak, poking at the thin lace.
Fucking beautiful. Almost decadent . A glorious bounty.
I could wrap both hands around one of her tits and still have enough to suck into my mouth.
I thumb at her through the gossamer material, biting my lip while I glide my other forefinger through her slick slit. Goddamn it . Her clit is so swollen and ready for me. When I trace around the edge, she chokes on an inhale. Her opening flutters against my fingertips.
I groan as her scent hits my tongue, the sweet sharpness lighting every pleasure receptor in my brain. They pulse in time with the ache filling my balls and pumping my knot fuller.
Shit . “I want to lock us together, but I can’t do it here, so I’m going to shove as deep inside you as I can get. Tease you with it.”
Bridget mewls, her head falling back. Thrusting her pretty tits at me. I nip at one through the lace, then smooth my tongue over the cup. Tasting her warm skin through the textured fabric, sucking marks along the top curve where everyone will see them.
“Jesse!” she cries, rolling her hips to get my fingers back on her clit. “Please?”
I bite down on her softness, growling. “Please, what? Please fill this sweet pussy? Please plunge my cock in you so deep, you almost feel my knot pop into place? Rut you from behind so I can get as far inside you as possible when I come?”
Bridget cries out again. Loud enough to have my balls tingling and my Alpha snarling. He doesn’t want anyone else to hear our omega.
With all the adrenaline and need coursing through me, I barely have time to form the thought before I’ve flipped Bridget over and rucked up her dress. The buttery skirt pools around her waist, leaving the dimpled curves of her ass on full display.
I pull her thong aside, mouth watering, and keep the frilly strap around her hips so I can admire the way it looks while I pound into her from behind. It also makes a decent handle—I fist my left hand around the waistband and use my right to grasp the shiny red hair at her nape.
My eyes rove over her, landing on the quivering holes exposed for the taking. Need beats in my blood. My mind spins and blurs.
Fucking—
“ Ah! ” she cries out as I slide my rigid dick into her pussy. Squelching heat engulfs me, the wet walls slipping against every vein throbbing up my shaft. Slick pours from her, coating my knot and balls within seconds.
Ah, God .
She’s so perfect, I have to grit my teeth to stop from spilling immediately. Focusing on the way her body takes mine—and how it begs for more .
Her back hole twitches when I angle my hips, pounding into the rough, sensitive patch along her front wall. Bridget gasps and moans, her fingers scrabbling at the bookshelf in front of us. I tug her hair a bit more, arching her back. Knowing it will make her breasts bounce on my next plunge.
“Jesse!” she pleads. “You’re so— oh! —deep.”
With my knot aching at the base of my cock, I have so much more to give her. When I start pushing the thick swell past her outer muscles, Bridget’s keens turn into whimpers. Her knuckles blanch. “ Alpha! ”
Yes. Take it. More .
I repeat my Alpha’s growled commands, thrusting faster, working my knot halfway in before ruthlessly popping it back out.
It’s the best kind of torture. Feeling her stretch and squeeze—a moment of blinding pressure when her pussy clutches me at its narrowest point—then a rush of cool nothing when I pull out.
Bridget begs wordlessly, her moans devolving into sobs. Her body squirms and flutters, both of her pretty holes winking at me each time I rip myself out of her glorious pussy. Tempting me.
I slide my grasp on her thong from the waistband to the thin strap I shoved aside, gripping it in my fingers as I skim my thumb along the cleft of her ass.
She tenses for a moment, whipping her head to the side. I keep my touch light and teasing, strumming slowly. Waiting for her to tell me to stop.
But she only opens her mouth and cuts herself off. Her eyes gloss—and I think I might have made a misstep, until her perfume explodes.
“P-please,” she whispers, pushing back into my touch, pressing her spread pussy lips around my knot. “I—I’ve done it alone, but… I’ve always wanted to try it like this.”
I picture her pleasuring herself with a toy in her ass and nearly lose my shit. A growled groan rips from my lungs. “ Jesus , Bee. You’re so f ucking hot .”
Literally and figuratively. Because as I work my thumb into her ass, scorching snugness greets me. Her inner muscles squeeze in tandem. Clenching and gushing, cinching and rubbing. Pulling at my knot and my thumb.
I pump into her harder. My balls swing forward, tapping her wet, swollen clit on every drive. Bridget screams—and the echo of that beautiful, needy sound finally sends me over the edge.
My cock sprays inside her, knot expanding to rub all the way from the back of her slit to the top of her throbbing nub. When she sobs a moan and pushes back into the sensation, my thumb slips deeper into her ass.
“ Yes . Bee . Fuck, your body is so damn good . Coming so hard .”
I feel every wrenching pulse of the climax ravaging her. Electricity bolts up my spine, pleasure snapping through every nerve in rolling bursts. My balls keep tingling, emptying themselves in long, intense spurts that leave me hunched over her back, fighting to fill my lungs.
Bridget straightens just far enough to turn her head for a kiss. It’s sloppy, both of us greedily sucking in each other’s scents, trying to remember how to breathe. Sweat dots my upper lip, and bite marks emboss hers.
Our mouths brush and cling. And everything I was floats away.
Until I’m just… hers .
I’m starting to suspect that’s all I’ve ever really wanted to be.