Chapter 24
M y alphas were everywhere . Their scents wove into me, threads tying around the core of my being. Clarity returned in bits and pieces.
Maverick finally had a scent, with his balsam fir and juniper berries. It reminded me of home, but not my home. More so the concept.
Ryder, too. He was the quiet forest after a fresh snowfall, when sound was hushed and it was only you and the trees.
Peace.
Safety.
But the snow from him wasn’t enough to drive back the heat trying to shred me apart from the inside out. I held on as tight as I could. Ryder held me like he loved me and fucked me like he wanted to brand my cunt with the feeling of him.
My high-pitched whine was a constant ringing in the background until I stopped hearing it altogether. I felt it in my throat, and it kept Ryder driving into me until I fell apart.
Unrelenting was the only word my brain could supply for how he moved. Orgasms danced through my body like sparks, never enough to push back the inferno, but enough to give me hope that I wouldn’t come out the other side of this completely incinerated.
When his knot swelled inside me, I lost all my faculties. My vision blinked out; my brain flicked off, only my senses of touch and smell remaining.
The pack surrounded me. Touching, cradling, whispering their desires into my skin. They were everything I loved about the forest, every breath feeling like I was inhaling home itself. What choice did I have but to surrender when they offered me such a soft place to land?
The knot soothed my instincts, though it was a long way from satisfying my cunt. Mouths and fingertips teased me, driving me endlessly to the edge and pushing me over, only to catch me before I hit the ground and begin the ascent again.
Vague memories of my first heat flickered through my head. Then, my nerves had colored the experience in every way, but these alphas had already proven they would protect me. I couldn’t even remember the scents of my first alphas now. They were buried under a storm of cedar and woodsmoke, spruce resin and beeswax, pine needles and fresh snow, balsam fir and juniper berries.
I shivered, arching into their questing touch.
One was traded for another in time, then another. No moment was alone. I was filled and fucked at all hours, held and treasured each second I was with them.
The heat held me under, like I was drowning, but they kept reaching down for me and dragging me to the surface for a precious gasp of air before I was pulled below once more.
I begged in whines and whimpers and they answered, as if it were some ancient forgotten language we somehow all understood.
A cock glided over my tongue. I opened wide to take it, tilting my head so they could more easily overwhelm me. Cedar and woodsmoke saturated the air around me, the scent lingering on his skin.
Bear.
My savior.
I dug my nails into his hips to pull him closer. I needed more of him. I needed them to fuck me until my brain melted, and spill inside me to brand me from the inside out.
I struggled against the desire to be worshiped and ruined at the same time. My whole self needed to shatter. I could rebuild myself from the broken pieces into someone who no longer feared alphas. These men had shown me that wasn’t my fate. It was possible to feel like I had a home, a place to be safe and nurtured.
Every muscle snared tight as pleasure crashed over me in a wave that swept me away.
Pliable. I’d never used that word to describe myself before, but it certainly fit the bill now. They rearranged me among themselves, manipulating my body to new peaks, all while supporting the bits of me too exhausted to continue.
When Bear pulled away after pouring down my throat, I turned, latching my teeth onto the flesh of his inner thigh. I needed him. His weight dropped down around me, hands landing heavily on either side of my hips, a pitiful groan falling from his lips.
“No,” Kit ordered. “You can’t bite her back.”
Yes.
Bite.
I couldn’t demand the way I wanted to with my teeth in him, but I also wasn’t capable of letting go. He would know. He had to. What other meaning could there possibly be to all my instincts screaming that I claim him?
No bite came, no matter how much I bucked or pawed at them. Salt streaked down my cheeks, my omega instincts still refusing to release my claim on Bear.
Someone pried my mouth free despite my protests, rearranging me so I was propped between Ryder and—I breathed in balsam and juniper—Maverick.
“You’re okay, sweetheart.”
I whimpered again, teeth burning. The only cure for that was putting my claim on one of them. Maverick cradled my throat so I couldn’t do that. Eager fingers teased me like they were trying to distract me from my goal.
It worked.
I came for them until I was a mass of incoherent sobbing, so drunk on them I couldn’t tell up from down anymore.
My alphas pushed me to the limits and then kept going, showing me how much more I was capable of. Was there no end to it? Could I bend to every pleasure-drenched whim and still survive coming out the other side of this?
I hadn’t a clue, but my instincts were sure as fuck driving me to find out.
My pussy was empty for one brief miserable moment before they rolled me, lifting my hips for someone new to fuck in. I pressed my cheek to a soft thigh, instantly turning to sink my teeth into them.
Bear, again. Cedar and woodsmoke flared around me, my cunt clenching over the strangled sound he made. He stroked my hair softly while someone else rode me into oblivion.
At least now my teeth had stopped aching, even if it did stir up the visceral need for someone to bite me in return.
Didn’t they want me?
Didn’t they feel the same drive to keep me?
I growled, clinging tighter to Bear.
Bite, goddamnit.
Claim me .
A hand prodded at me, trying to loosen my jaw. All that succeeded in doing was making me let go of Bear and I snapped my jaws closed on them instead. Spruce resin and beeswax erupted.
Kit.
He had been the first to give me new experiences.
He would claim me.
But he fucking didn’t .
He curled around my head, holding me carefully, his lips pressed to my hair while he muttered a string of curses. My growl didn’t prompt him into action the way I wanted it to.
“Little fox.”
I melted at the name.
“We can’t .”
Melt gone.
Fuck this.
I released my bite only to snare higher up, getting the fleshy part of his forearm. His scent burst again, bathing me in a cloud of spruce and beeswax. I wanted to roll around in it, to coat myself in every single one of their scents so I could carry them around and out into the world with me. Nothing could hurt me then.
Why didn’t they want me to be safe? If I were theirs, I would be.
More tears slipped free, the salt burning my cheeks. Kit kissed them away, his honeyed sweetness in my nose. But a kiss wasn’t a claim.
“Angel, breathe.” Bear’s harsh whisper was warm against my ear.
How was I supposed to breathe? If someone would just bite me, my lungs could expand, filled up with them.
They took me in body, but not soul. Nobody cared about that part. Everyone was always happy to take advantage of my body through my labor, through my time, through a fulfillment of their desires, but my soul? Did they see that? I felt the brush of theirs when my teeth were in them. Didn’t they feel mine reaching out?
They forced my mouth open as pleasure swept me away again, the heat dragging me down.