Chapter 16 #2
Rett’s eyebrow arches in clear disbelief. “You don’t remember,” he repeats, his tone making it clear he doesn’t believe me for a second.
“Nope,” I say, popping the ‘p’ with forced nonchalance. “Totally gone. Brain’s wiped clean. Tabula rasa. Nothing to see here.”
“Nothing except the fact that you came so hard you screamed,” Tristan murmurs, his dimple deepening as he fails to suppress his grin.
If it were possible to spontaneously combust from embarrassment, I would be a pile of ashes right now.
“Tristan!” Diego hisses.
“What? We’re all thinking it,” Tristan still has that shit eating grin. “I’m just saying what everyone already knows.”
“Out,” Rett commands suddenly, his alpha voice making the single word vibrate with authority. “All of you. Now.”
For a moment, I think he means me too, and I’m about to point out that this is my room, at least temporarily. But then I realize he’s talking to his brothers, who look as surprised as I feel.
“Rett—” Diego begins, but Rett cuts him off with a sharp gesture.
“Out,” he repeats, not taking his eyes off me. “Give her some space.”
Tristan takes a step toward the door, then stops abruptly. His hands clench at his sides, and I can see the tension in his shoulders as if he is fighting against some invisible force.
“I can’t,” he says through gritted teeth, his voice strained. “Fuck, I can’t leave.”
Diego moves toward the door next, but the same thing happens. He gets three steps before his entire body goes rigid, like he’s hit an invisible wall.
“Neither can I,” he admits, and the words sound like they were dragged over gravel. “My alpha won’t let me.”
Dane hasn’t even attempted to move. He just shakes his head.
Rett’s eyes narrow, his gaze sweeping over his immobilized brothers. A muscle jumps in his jaw. He doesn’t believe it. He’s the pack alpha; his will is law.
“Fine,” he says, his voice a low growl. “I’ll show you.”
He turns on his heel, his movements sharp and decisive, and strides toward the door. He makes it all the way to the threshold. His hand is on the frame. And then he stops.
His entire body goes rigid. His knuckles are white where he grips the doorframe, his shoulders bunched so tight I think his shirt might rip.
He lets out a harsh, ragged breath, like he’s just run a marathon.
He tries to take another step, into the hallway, but he can’t. He’s physically incapable of it.
Then, all at once, the fight seems to go out of him. His shoulders, which had been ramrod straight, slump forward.
“The bond,” Dane says quietly into the charged silence. “It’s too new. Too raw. Her scream triggered a threat response. Now, none of us can leave her.”
Rett leans his forehead against the doorframe, his back still to us, and I hear him mutter a single, defeated word. “Fuck.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I protest, even as my own body seems to confirm his words. The thought of them leaving the room makes something deep in my chest clench with panic. “You can’t just... claim you’re physically unable to leave.”
“It’s not a claim,” Rett says, his voice rough. “It’s biology. The claiming bond is still settling. You screamed. Our alphas panicked. We panicked. Now they won’t let us go far from you.”
“How far is far?” I ask, dreading the answer.
“Right now?” Tristan runs a hand through his hair, looking as frustrated as I feel. “Maybe the living room. If we’re lucky.”
“The living room,” I repeat. “Okay, that’s... that’s reasonable. You can sleep on the couches.”
But even as I say it, I can see them all tense up. Diego actually takes a step back toward me, like the mere suggestion of distance is painful.
“Too far,” Dane confirms. “We need to stay close.”
“Define close.”
“This room,” Rett says bluntly. “We need to stay in this room.”
I stare at them, my mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. “All night?”
“All night,” he confirms.
“That’s...” I struggle for words. “That’s completely insane.”
“Welcome to claiming bonds,” Tristan says. “They don’t exactly come with an instruction manual.”
I sink down into the bed, partially hiding under the covers. “So you’re telling me that all four of you have to sleep in here. With me.”
“Unless you want us to pace the hallway like caged animals,” Diego says gently. “Which we will do if you insist, but none of us will actually rest.”
The thought of them suffering because of me sends an unexpected pang through my chest. Which is ridiculous, because this entire situation is their fault to begin with.
I study them for a moment.
“Alright,” I say finally. “But you’re sleeping on the floor.”
Tristan’s face lights up like I’ve just offered him the keys to the kingdom. “Really?”
“On the floor,” I emphasize before he gets any ideas. “As far from the bed as possible.”
“There’s bedding in the closet,” Rett says, already moving toward the adjoining door. “Extra pillows and blankets.”
Within minutes, they’ve transformed my temporary sanctuary into what looks like the world’s most expensive slumber party. Thick comforters spread across the floor, pillows, each of them claiming a section of space that somehow still manages to form a protective circle around the bed.
I watch this process with a mixture of fascination and mounting dread. They move like they’ve done this before, though I suppose they haven’t. None of us has any idea what we’re doing.
“There,” Diego says, settling onto his makeshift bed with a satisfied sigh. “Much better.”
“Better for who?” I mutter, pulling the covers up to my chin like they might protect me from the surreal reality of my life.
“All of us,” Tristan says from his spot near the window. “You can feel it too, can’t you? How wrong it felt when we tried to leave?”
He’s right, though I don’t want to admit it. The moment they’d started moving toward the door, something in my chest had clenched with panic. Like a part of me was being torn away.
“This is temporary, right?” I ask, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice. “This whole... inability to be apart thing?”
“Should be,” Rett says, though he doesn’t sound entirely certain. “The bond should settle within a few days. Maybe a week.”
“A week,” I repeat faintly.
“Could be longer,” Tristan adds helpfully. When my gaze snaps to his, he shrugs. “I’m just being honest.”
“Oh my God,” I whisper, pressing my forehead against the cool wood of the headboard. “Oh my God.”
I need to call Leah. I need to scream into a pillow. I need to crawl into a hole and never come out again.
Instead, I collapse back onto the bed, burying my face in my hands.
They know. They all know I had a sex dream about them. A dream so intense it made me climax in my sleep. And now I have to face them in the morning, over breakfast, like nothing happened. Assuming we ever make it out of this room.
I groan into my palms, torn between mortification and a persistent, inappropriate arousal that refuses to die down. The claiming marks on my neck still throb, and as a matter of fact, they feel like they’re pulsing now.
One thing’s for certain: there’s no way in hell I’m going back to sleep tonight. Not if it means risking another dream like that. Not with the four of them spread across my floor, ready to hear every sound I make.
I grab my phone from the nightstand, squinting at the bright screen. It’s 3:17 AM. Too early to call Leah, too late to escape to another room, and definitely too awkward to pretend any of this is normal.
I’m trapped in this room until morning, with nothing but my embarrassment and the lingering echoes of that dream to keep me company. And four very alert alphas.
I risk a peek over the edge of my fortress of blankets.
They’ve all settled down, but none of them is asleep.
Rett is leaning against the wall, arms crossed, his gaze fixed on the door.
Tristan is staring up at the ceiling, a thoughtful frown on his face.
Diego is on his side, watching me with an expression of such gentle, unwavering care it makes my chest ache.
And Dane... Dane is sitting with his back against the foot of my bed, his head tilted back to rest against the mattress.
An hour passes in complete, charged silence. I’m just starting to think they might have actually drifted off when a low, quiet voice cuts through the darkness.
It’s Dane.
“You were calling for Rett,” he says, not to me, but to the ceiling. “In your dream.”
My blood turns to ice.
From across the room, I hear a sharp, indrawn breath. It’s Rett.
Dane doesn’t say another word. He doesn’t have to. The damage is done. The silence that follows is a thousand times louder and more intimate than the scream that started it all.