Chapter 36 Knox
The medical danger is over, but as the afternoon of the second day stretches into evening, the calm fractures.
The room is now thick with a heavy, suffocating haze of bourbon, chocolate, and the overwhelming, intoxicating scent of crushed oranges.
Her fever broke just after Crew knotted her yesterday, dropping her out of the danger zone where Dr. Avery would need to intervene. But the heat itself has settled into her bones, dragging her down into the deep, primal instinct of an omega who is desperate to be claimed.
She asked more than once. Each time my teeth ached with the need to mark her.
She crawls across the center of the nest we built as a pack, moving on her hands and knees.
She makes a low, continuous hissing noise from the back of her throat.
"She's hissing," Steele says quietly. He's standing by the door, his massive frame rigid, his hands gripping the wood of the doorframe hard enough to leave indentations.
"Dr. Avery said she would," Crew replies. He's sitting on the floor by the edge of the mattress, his forearms resting on his knees. "She said if Remi goes through the heat and doesn’t drop, the physical strain will manifest like that. It's the primal omega trying to find an outlet."
I stand by the window, watching her. Not only are my teeth aching, my jaw aches, and the pressure behind my eyes is a constant, rhythmic throb.
The alpha in me is clawing at the walls of my control, demanding I cross the room, pin her to the mattress, and take what she's so desperately offering. I’ve seen it before.
Never experienced it though, because I've spent my entire adult life mastering my instincts.
Not anymore.
She is mine.
And right now, I'm three seconds away from a full rut, and breaking her skin with my teeth.
Remi stops in the center of the blankets. She looks up through her lashes, her green eyes now dark emerald, blown wide with heat.
"Alphas," she whispers, the word breathy, yet demanding. "I need more."
Three times at least. I've lost count of how many times Steele and Crew have had her.
But she wants more.
My control snaps.
There is no decision. There is only movement. I cross the room. Steele and Crew are there, pulled by the same invisible, inescapable gravity.
I crawl onto my knees on the mattress, sliding my hands up her thighs. Her skin is slick with sweat, radiating a ferocious heat. I open her legs wide and slide inside her, hands braced either side of her head.
"Yes," she gasps, her nose buried in the crook of my neck, inhaling my scent like it's oxygen.
"Let yourself go, Omega." My voice doesn't even sound like mine. Gravel-thick, vibrating through my chest.
She moans against my skin, her hands sliding up into my hair, her nails biting into my scalp. The contact is like a shockwave skittered down my spine, triggering something vicious and possessive in my blood.
She's ours.
I roll us in one smooth motion, keeping myself buried deep inside her, so she ends up straddling my hips, knees sinking into the nest on either side of me.
Crew moves immediately, placing a pillow under the knee she hurt. She may not feel it right now. Tomorrow she might. He thinks of her, anyway.
The shift drives me deeper.
She cries out, head falling back, throat exposed. I shake off the need to claim her.
“I’m ready for a knot.”
She is. Her slick coats us both, running down my shaft, pooling where our bodies join. I grip her waist, guiding her over me in slow, punishing rolls.
Behind her, Steele moves without a word.
The mattress dips as he settles between my spread legs, his chest pressing to her back, one massive hand splayed across her stomach to hold her steady.
His other hand reaches between us, fingers sliding through the mess of her arousal where I'm stretching her open.
He coats himself generously in her slick. Her ass is already ready from earlier, primed and pliant. He still goes slow.
Remi shudders, a broken sound spilling from her lips. "Please—"
"Easy," Steele murmurs against her ear, voice low and rough. "I've got you, baby."
Her mouth opens as he pushes in inch by inch, using her own slick until he's seated fully. The pressure is obscene. I can feel him through the thin wall inside her, the stretch making her clamp down on me.
We both groan at the same time, and for a heartbeat we stay still, letting her adjust, letting her feel every inch of us claiming her at once.
Then we find a rhythm. Me thrusting up into her while Steele pulls back, then driving in as I withdraw.
In and out, counterpoint, relentless. She moans as her body rocks between us. Perfect.
Her nails rake down my chest, leaving red trails that later I'll wear like badges.
"Fuck," I growl, head thrown back against the pillows. "Feel that, Remi? Both of us inside you. Stretching you. Filling you. You were made for this. For us."
She can't answer.
Her eyes are glassy, lips parted, every thrust punching the air from her lungs. Steele's hand slides up to cup her throat, not choking, just holding as his thumb strokes over her racing pulse while his hips snap harder.
She gasps.
"Goddamn perfect," he rasps. "Taking us so well. So fucking deep."
The pressure builds too fast. My knot is already swelling at the base, thick and insistent, catching on every upstroke.
“Both knot me,” she begs through the haze. “Claim me.”
“No fucking way.”
Not when she's this full. Too much at once could tear her, even if she's begging for it.
"Steele," I snarl, voice shredded. "Out. Now."
He doesn't hesitate. Doesn't argue. He knows exactly why. With a low groan he slowly pulls out, leaving her trembling at the sudden loss.
“Please,” she whimpers, hips jerking down harder onto me as if she's chasing the fullness.
“Don’t be a brat, Remi,” I growl.
"Knot me!" she cries out.
I flip my grip, hands clamping on her hips, and drive up into her one last time. Deep. Claiming.
The knot snaps into place. My vision whites as the knot swells thicker, locking us together. I come with a roar, hips grinding up in short, helpless jerks while she milks me dry.
"Oh God!" she cries out. Her body spasms around the knot, rhythmic contractions that pull every drop from me, eyes rolling back, mouth open in a silent scream of pleasure so intense it looks like pain.
I hold her through it with my face buried in her neck, breathing her in while she shakes and sobs and comes apart on my knot.
Wave after wave. Body locked to mine. Every pulse echoing between us.
Steele stays close, chest still pressed to her back, one hand stroking down her spine, murmuring low praise against her shoulder.
Crew watches from the side, eyes dark, hand stroking himself slowly, waiting his turn when the knot eases.
Mine.
Ours.
The knot holds as her body still flutters around me in aftershocks. After twenty minutes, the swell begins to ease and I soften inside her. When I slip free, a fresh gush of slick and my release follows, dripping between us.
She whimpers at the emptiness, hips shifting restlessly.
Remi turns her head slowly, dazed eyes finding Steele. Her voice is wrecked, hoarse from screaming, but the want in it is unmistakable.
"Steele," she breathes, reaching back for him, fingers curling around his forearm. "I want to feel you and Crew together. Both of you, inside me, at the same time."
Steele's gaze snaps to Crew's. A long, silent beat passes between them. Their bond is heavy with understanding, as if they have an unspoken agreement that has grown between them. Crew gives the smallest nod, lips curving in that quiet, knowing way of his.
Steele rushes to the bathroom, and cleans himself. When he returns he lies on his back in the center of the nest, pulling Remi over him. She straddles his hips, sinking down onto his thick length in one slow glide, both of them groaning.
Crew shifts behind her, chest to her back, one hand steadying her hip while the other guides his dick to where Steele’s is.
"Deep breath, Remi," Crew murmurs against her ear. "We've got you."
He presses in slowly, nudging alongside Steele, stretching her impossibly wider. Remi's head falls forward onto Steele's shoulder, a trembling moan spilling out as her body yields, taking them both at once. Her thighs shake with the effort of holding herself up.
"So tight, baby," Steele grits, hands clasped to her waist. "But look at you taking us both like this."
She groans.
Crew starts to move first with shallow thrusts that rock her forward onto Steele, then Steele picks up the counter-rhythm, driving up as Crew pulls back.
They find a fast, seamless rhythm. Taking her together in long, measured strokes that make her moan with every pass.
Her eyes roll. Her body trembles between them, overwhelmed yet chasing more.
"Look at her," I rasp from the side, voice still rough from my own release. "Our omega, stuffed full, taking everything we give her. Don't knot her."
Remi's cries turn desperate, hips grinding down to meet them, chasing the friction, the stretch, the impossible fullness.
Steele and Crew move harder, faster.
She comes first, shattering around them with a broken scream.
“Fuck!” Steele and Crew growl together.
“Omega.” Steele follows seconds later, hips snapping up.
“Jesus, Remi,” Crew groans, lasting only a few more thrusts after Steele before he buries himself to the hilt and with a low, guttural sound, his snap over and over until he stills.
Packmates.
They stay locked inside her a long moment after, breathing hard, holding her between them while she trembles through the aftershocks.
When they finally ease out, she collapses forward onto Steele's chest, boneless, the heat temporarily quieted under the weight of their combined claim.
I move closer, brushing sweat-soaked hair from her face, pressing a kiss to her temple.
"Rest, Omega," I murmur. "We're not done with you yet."
But for now, she's held, full, and ours.
The next hours are a blur of intense, unrelenting friction. The gentle pacing of yesterday is gone.
This is survival. Instinct.
It is rougher than yesterday, rougher than this morning, but it is beautiful.
Steele takes her from behind, his massive chest pressed against her back, his deep voice praising her with every thrust. Crew is at her front, his hands mapping her body, keeping her grounded while the pleasure threatens to tear her apart.
I'm everywhere else.
Tasting the salt on her skin. Feeling the frantic flutter of her pulse beneath my mouth. The air is so thick with bourbon, chocolate, and orange. It’s all ours, all hers, the overwhelming convergence of a pack finally complete.
She arches off the bed, a scream tearing from her throat. "Alphas.”
"We're right here," Crew pants, his own control fraying. "We're inside you. We're not leaving."
"I'm yours," she cries, her body trembling violently under our hands. "Please knot me."
Steele growls, loud enough to be earth-shaking, as his knot swells and locks. Remi screams, her back arching like a bowstring.
I slide up her body, taking my weight on my forearms, hovering over her face. She looks at me, exhausted, ruined, perfect.
My teeth ache. The base of my gums throbs with the desperate, biological need to sink my fangs into her scent gland and leave a permanent mark on her skin and on her soul.
My tongue swipes over my teeth.
Remi sees it.
She reaches up, her trembling fingers tracing the line of my jaw.
"Bite me," she whispers.
My heart stops. "Remi—"
"I want you to claim me," she says, her eyes locking onto mine, clear and completely certain despite the haze. "Make me yours. All of you."
"Are you sure?" Crew asks. His voice is tight, his breathing ragged, but he forces the words out. A final check. Even in the middle of a rut, the pack demands consent. "Remi, are you still with us?"
"Yes," she says, her voice breaking on a sob of pure desire. "Yes. Claim me. All of you."
I bow my head. My mouth opens over the juncture of her neck and shoulder. I inhale the pure, concentrated scent of my omega.
And I bite down.
My teeth sink into her scent gland. She cries out.
The taste of her blood, sweet and metallic, floods my tongue. The bond snaps into place with a sudden, permanent tether that feels as if it is connecting my mind to hers..
Steele and Crew roar in unison, the sound echoing off the walls, the completion of the pack pushing them over the edge into their own violent climaxes.
Her heat shatters, leaving her gasping for air.
Remi is ours.
The pack is real.
It always was going to be.