Chapter 56
FIFTY-SIX
Knox
THIS WAS HELL. I WAS living in hell. And the worst part was, I knew there were damn good reasons why I’d decided to pack my bags and move into the burning lake of fire... but at the moment, I couldn’t have articulated a single one.
I’d managed to survive the limo ride to the house with Jez—somehow. Sitting in the back seat, mirroring Jez’s position, pressed into opposite corners while both our scents screamed the truth at us. Then we’d arrived, and she’d fled to her nest before I could say a single word.
But what could I have said to her, anyway?
Heath’s accusing gaze pinned me, as though he suspected me of being responsible for her distress. Was I responsible for her distress?
“Knox,” Heath said. “What the hell?”
I had to keep my shit together.
“Like I told Gage over the phone, there was a misunderstanding.” I swallowed, not sure when my throat had gotten so dry. “I think Jez feels embarrassed about it, although she shouldn’t.”
Gray eyes blazing with territorial jealousy. Ragged fingernails digging into the edge of a cheap desk, to keep from digging into her perceived rival’s throat instead.
My dick twitched.
I prayed Heath wouldn’t notice.
“A misunderstanding,” he echoed, his tone deep with veiled skepticism.
“Yes,” I told him firmly. “A misunderstanding. Nothing to worry about.”
“Right...” He trailed off. “So, you’re sure you’re okay, then?”
“Of course I’m okay,” I said. “I’m fine. But... erm... it might be best if we get a private driving tutor to come out here for her. Less complicated.”
He stared at me, his hard green eyes unblinking. “You know I’ll get the full story one way or another.”
I suspected he would, and I wasn’t at all sure why the thought bothered me as much as it did.
“It would probably do her good to talk about things,” I replied, because that sounded like the sort of thing a rational person would say.
Heath’s wordless noise of incredulity in response to that platitude neatly summed up the entire exchange.
I shifted from foot to foot. “If you’ll excuse me, I have quite a bit more work to finish this afternoon. I’ll see you later, Heath.” And then, I fled with only marginally more dignity than Jez had managed.
I’d chosen the airy, open-plan space adjacent to the main floor library as my office shortly after purchasing this property. At the time, it had seemed like a serene place to get work done—not that I’d spent much time in this house since buying it a couple of years ago.
Now, I cursed myself for not choosing some cramped, remote closet space in far corner of the attic, and having it soundproofed to professional music studio standards.
First, I heard Heath conferring in low tones with Gage and Tony.
Then the elevator doors opened and closed, after which I could make out the sound of cables and pulleys as the car descended to the basement level.
Shortly afterward, the sound of a tentative door-knock filtered up from almost directly below me.
More voices, the exchange indistinct. The conversation rose and fell, Jez’s voice gaining volume until I clearly made out the words, “I already tried to kill him! Am I supposed to add sexual assault to the rap sheet now?” before growing too quiet to be intelligible.
I ground my teeth together and cursed alpha hearing... alpha smell... alpha possessiveness—
Basically, all things related to being an alpha.
Everything had seemed so simple before Jez came along.
It wasn’t so much that I didn’t desire things that I couldn’t have.
I wanted my sister back... but she was gone.
I wanted to take down the Vozzina gang, and all the other people like them.
.. but I couldn’t do that without legal proof that seemed impossible to obtain.
I wanted to save as many omegas as I could from the same fate that had claimed Maria.
.. but no matter how many we rescued, there were always more that we couldn’t help.
Now, though, the object of my desire was in a room directly below my feet, surrounded by the rest of my pack. Unattainable only because I’d decided she should be.
The conversation downstairs trailed off to silence. With a sigh of relief, I turned my focus to the very real pile of work that genuinely did need to get done. I opened the first email...
... and I was still staring blankly at it ten minutes later. I hadn’t even made it past the first sentence. It was so quiet downstairs. What were they doing?
I returned my fractured attention to the urgent message from my customs contact in Canada, trying not to picture Jez wrapped up in the others’ arms, seeking comfort from them inside her cozy nest.
An hour passed, as I doggedly worked my way through the backlog of important communications piling up in my inbox.
The silence in the house stretched. Had they fallen asleep?
It was still afternoon—but Gage and Tony were recovering from serious injuries, and Jez might have crashed pretty hard after her earlier adrenaline dump.
“Nngh...”
The wordless moan teased the edges of my hearing, and my fingers stilled on my keyboard. Was someone having a nightmare?
“Ah... ah... ah!”
More moaning. Not Jez. Tony? The anguished sounds grew louder, before being promptly muffled. Silence fell again, only to be broken by more low conversation that I couldn’t make out.
A louder cry punctuated the indistinct muttering—sharp and startled. That was definitely Tony, and if I was working on the assumption that no one here would actually torture our resident beta, that really only left one other possibility.
My cock, which had spent my entire adult life not giving a flying fuck that other people around me were having sex, jumped to full hardness so fast that it left me lightheaded.
A second, different cry pierced the walls—this one in a higher register. It, too, was quickly cut off; but the damage had been done.
MATE.
The word echoed through my body like a clarion call, dragging me up and out of my chair without prior approval from my brain. I didn’t remember deciding to leave the office. I didn’t remember choosing to walk down the winding central staircase to the basement level.
I did remember the feeling of slamming face first into the invisible wall of Jez’s sex-soaked pheromones. Except this time, there was no convenient dampener shot waiting for me. Only espresso and burnt sugar, the odor of a desperate omega silently begging for a knot.
My dick throbbed painfully against my trousers; the sensation multiplied a hundredfold compared to how bad things had been in the back of the limo. My feet carried me down the darkened hallway to the half-open door that was the source of both the sounds and the pheromone cocktail.
Wet, gagging noises came from inside, interspersed with Tony mumbling things like, “More!” and “Please!” while sounding like he had marbles in his mouth.
Then came Jez’s muffled scream, and I was in the doorway, staring shamelessly at the sight of Jez convulsing in ecstasy on Heath’s lap while Tony jerked his own cock with frantic movements as Gage fucked his face.
Heath froze abruptly. Gage looked up, meeting my gaze without surprise.
“You gonna come inside, Knox... or just skulk in the doorway?” he asked. “Because I get the impression Jez is happy to invite you into her nest. We probably ought to have a quick word about some other things, though.”
Abruptly, every eye in the room was on me.
Or, rather, every eye except Tony’s, since Gage was still holding his head down, choking Tony on his cock.
The sound of Tony coming broke the sudden silence.
He sobbed, his hips jerking as he spurted jizz onto the cushions below him as though he might never stop.
“Looks like you’ve got Tony’s seal of approval to be here, too.
” Gage’s voice had gone hoarse. He eased Tony’s mouth off his jutting erection with a murmured apology.
Tony collapsed against the edge of the couch, panting hard and looking like all his bones had dissolved.
Gage murmured soothing nonsense and stroked his thick, dark hair.
“Jez,” Heath said, sounding cautious. “Would you like Knox to come inside and join us?”
“Yes,” Jez whispered, her eyes huge and dark with the same lust that spiked her scent. She slid off of Heth’s lap and crawled toward me.
A feral growl ripped free of my chest. In three strides, I was in front of her, dropping to my knees and rolling her unresisting form into the piles of pillows surrounding us.
She whimpered and settled on her back, her shirt riding up to show the pale skin of her vulnerable belly.
Her jeans were undone, the waistband low on her hips.
A hint of pale-blond curly hair was visible in the V of the open zipper.
Instinct drew my hand down to frame the graceful line of her throat, and her entire body went soft and pliant as she arched her neck, baring her most vulnerable places to me. Her intoxicating perfume rose around me like a cloud, promising all sorts of delicious and forbidden things.
“Knox,” Gage said. “We should—”
I straightened from my crouch, snarling at him. His jaw snapped shut, his eyes going wide with shock. Jez shuddered, her scent growing even sharper. She scrambled onto her hands and knees, practically shoving her gorgeous ass at me.
And that was it. I was done.
I ripped my fly open and shoved my trousers down to my hips. Then I dragged Jez’s jeans and panties down until they caught around her thighs. Grabbing her by the hips, I slammed home.
It was like sinking into hot molasses. She took me and took me and took me, sucking me into her body until I was completely buried in her scalding heat. The noise she made was strangled and desperate, as though she was biting her lip in a doomed attempt to stay silent.
“No,” I growled, sliding one hand up the length of her spine and using it to press her upper body flat to the floor. I pinned her there, my fingers tight around her nape, gasping as the new angle squeezed her walls tighter around me. “I want to hear you scream like you mean it.”
Still pinning her, I pulled almost all the way out and shoved back in, harder than before. She rewarded me with a high-pitched cry, and the fluttering of her inner muscles as they tried to keep me from pulling out.
“That’s it,” I hissed. “You’re mine now. Sing for me, my little murderer.”
I pulled back again, and this time she slammed backward, meeting me halfway with a wavering wail that sounded like it was half rage, half rapture. All control lost, we descended into a frenzy of wild fucking.
I was only vaguely aware of Heath and Gage groaning... of Heath growling, “Fuck... Tony... I can feel them. Can I—?”
Time was meaningless. Beyond the red haze across my vision, I caught glimpses of Tony once more on the floor with his head over Gage’s lap, Heath fucking between his thighs and shoving Gage’s cock into his throat with every thrust.
Jez went wild, clawing and biting at the pillows beneath her as her body shuddered under me. My entire world narrowed down to the sensation of her passage clamping around my length, sending white-hot streamers of pleasure careening up and down my spine.
She screamed. I roared. The heat flooding through me circled tighter and tighter, gathering at the base of my spine and exploding outward as I spurted into her welcoming depths.
Mine... mine... mine, I chanted silently, shoving deeper just to feel my release jetting as far into her body as I could get it.
Heath cried out as well, followed a moment later by Gage’s, “Fuck, yes! Fuck! Ow, yes, no, don’t stop... goddamn broken ribs, fuck!”
The base of my cock swelled, caught fast in Jez’s unforgiving embrace.
What felt like twenty years’ worth of stress drained out of my muscles like water, leaving me weak and shaky in its wake.
Gracelessly, I dragged Jez into a barely controlled sideways roll; more of a collapse, really.
We ended up spooned together on our sides, breathing hard.
A few feet away, Heath and Tony had collapsed in a similar manner, with their legs tangled together. Only Gage was still upright, and that was just because he was sitting on the couch.
The sharp neediness of Jez’s scent mellowed into sweet, drugged satisfaction.
My nose was buried in her hair, but I sniffed down the side of her neck to where it was strongest. Her gland was right there, beneath my lips.
I ran my tongue over it, drawing a shudder from her as I traced the indents from two sets of teeth.
Two sets of teeth that weren’t mine. My incisors scraped temptingly over the scars.
“Knox.” Gage’s voice was soft. “Not like this.”
Saliva flooded my mouth. I wavered... but then I remembered the shock of finding out that Heath had bitten her when they were both out of their minds with heat drugs. I pressed my lips tightly together and rested my forehead against her soft hair instead.
“Not like this,” I agreed, my voice a dry rasp.
“Good.” Relief colored Gage’s voice. “Tony, you okay down there, cub?”
“Uh-huh,” Tony mumbled blearily, sounding like he was phoning it in from somewhere beyond Pluto’s orbit.
“Kitten, how about you?”
Jez stretched like a cat, humming as the movement sent shockwaves through us both. “Mm-hmm. Could’ve bitten me, though. I wouldn’t mind.”
My mouth started watering again. I swallowed rapidly.
“Not till we’ve talked,” Gage said. “But at this point, I think you’re gonna get your wish one way or another. Ain’t that right, Knox?”
I licked my lips, trying once more to remember all the reasons this couldn’t work.
“Maybe so,” I said.