Chapter 9 #2
Every muscle in my body is strung tight. I listen, eyes scanning. No sound from the kitchen. No creak from the living room. But then I hear it.
A thump.
Upstairs.
Fuck.
I’m moving before I think. Past the laundry, into the open-plan living room. Moonlight slices through the front windows. I barely register the furniture or the scattered books. All I see is the stairs. Straight ahead.
I take them two at a time, nearly silent, my hand skimming the wall as I go. My pulse hammers. My teeth grind. My mouth is dry, and all I think is if that motherfucker laid a hand on her, he’s dead.
No second chances.
No warnings.
I reach the top. The hallway is darker than the rest of the house, the power still out. But I hear her.
“Holt?”
My name. Shaky. High. I lunge for the door.
“Cindy!”
I shove it open. Hard. The wood slams against the wall with a crack that echoes through the house.
And then I freeze.
Time warps. Everything slows. I don’t even know how to breathe.
She’s in the middle of the bed, moonlight lighting her up. Sheets barely covering her. Her legs are parted under the thin cotton. Her dress is rucked up over her hips. She’s panting, eyes wide and dazed, cheeks flushed like she’s just?—
Then she gasps. Her head jerks toward me. Her mouth falls open in a little moan that turns to shock. The panic hits her late. She fumbles, yanking the sheet, hands flailing, and for a split second, she seems to forget everything else.
Including what she’s holding.
Something small. Slick. Pink.
A vibrator.
It flies from her hand as she jerks the covers up to her chin. Pure instinct, probably meant to protect herself, but instead she launches it like a missile.
It hits me right between the eyes.
“Fuck!” I stagger half a step, wiping my brow with the back of my arm as the damn thing bounces off my forehead and lands with a thud at the edge of the bed.
We both stare at it.
Long. Silent. Sheer disbelief.
It’s curved. Coated in her slick.
And the scent hits me.
My knees nearly buckle.
Fucking addictive. My cock was already half hard, but now it pulses, thick and aching, straining against my jeans with nowhere to go. I wipe my forehead again, slower this time, as if I can delay the inevitable.
Her gaze flicks between me and the vibrator.
Her eyes go huge.
“Oh my God!” she shrieks, diving under the covers so fast it’s like she’s trying to disappear into the mattress. “Holt! Shit—I’m so sorry—oh my God, what are you doing?! I want to die!”
The sheet scrunches higher. Her hands go over her head.
She’s mortified.
I’m hard enough to tear through denim.
And trying not to fucking laugh.
She’s still got that damn sheet yanked over her head like it’s going to save her dignity. Pillow clutched in one hand, voice muffled beneath the covers as she hisses, “I can’t believe this is happening. I can’t believe you saw—oh my God?—”
I laugh. Deep and raw, because fuck, what else am I supposed to do after nearly shitting myself thinking someone broke in, only to get bitch-slapped in the face by her pretty little pink vibrator?
“My good girl,” I say, biting back another grin as I nudge the vibrator off the bed with the back of my knuckle. “If you wanted me to come upstairs, all you had to do was ask.”
She groans, high and horrified. “Don’t talk to me. I’m dying. I’m already dead.”
“Don’t think that’s how death works.” I grab the edge of the sheet and tug it slightly, not pulling it away, just enough to piss her off.
She squeals and yanks it tighter. “Holt!”
“Jesus, woman. It’s not like I walked in on you sacrificing a goat. It’s just your heat.” I fold my arms. “Natural. Beautiful. A little fucking dangerous, if I’m being honest, but God, baby girl, you smell like sin and sugar and everything I’ve ever wanted.”
“You are not helping,” she mutters.
“I’m not trying to help. I’m trying not to rip that sheet off and bury my face between your thighs, so frankly, I think I deserve a goddamn medal for standing here talking to you instead.”
Another horrified noise. The pillow comes flying toward me, hitting me in the chest. “Out!”
I catch it before it hits the floor, toss it right back onto the bed like I own the place. “Fine. You win.” I take a step back, but I don’t leave yet. “But if you need anything, and I do mean anything, I’ll be right downstairs. On the couch. Ready. Willing. Very, very able.”
She groans louder, and I can’t tell if she’s laughing or crying. “You’re the worst.”
“No, sweetheart. I’m the best mistake you’re ever gonna make.” I grin, letting the cockiness sit heavily between us. “Also, next time you decide to set the mood, maybe skip the whole lights-out-like-a-horror-movie setup. I thought someone broke in.”
Her voice goes small. “The lights went out?”
“Yeah. Porch, too. Whole damn house blacked out. Why do you think I came running in here like some crazed lunatic ready to take down an intruder? Thought Van managed to slither in somehow.”
“Oh God,” she whispers. “I didn’t even notice. I was… I wasn’t exactly paying attention.”
“No shit.” I smirk. “You were paying attention to that little pink devil you threw at my face.”
“I didn’t mean to!” Her voice cracks with half laughter, half mortification. “I panicked.”
“Not gonna lie, most creative thing I’ve had chucked at my head in a while.”
She makes a strangled sound, still buried under the sheets. “You’d better not tell anyone.”
“Oh, I’m definitely telling the guys?—”
“Holt!”
“—after your mom hears the story first.”
She whips the sheets down just enough to peek out, wide-eyed and red-faced. “You wouldn’t.”
I hold up two fingers. “Swear to God. First chance I get, I’m calling her.”
“Don’t you dare!”
I start backing toward the door, grinning like a bastard.
She groans and disappears under the sheets again. “You’re evil. Pure evil.”
I pause with my hand on the doorknob. “Maybe. But you like it.” And then, before she can launch the whole mattress at me, I slip out and shut the door behind me.
My laughter follows me down the stairs. The house is quiet again, but not in that eerie, something-is-wrong way it was earlier. Now it’s warm. Real. Hers.
I pass the laundry room, where the back door is still shut. Locked now. I made sure when I came in. That damn cat is nowhere to be seen, probably hiding in the shadows and plotting my death.
The couch is old, the kind that appears to sink in the middle like it’s been through some shit. I kick off my boots, take off the blade and Glock, then drop onto the sofa and let out a long breath.
Fuck me.
I run a hand down to the hard length in my jeans. Still there. Still rock solid.
That scent… her scent. Sweet heat, slick arousal clinging to the air like a drug. It’s in my lungs, on my skin, seared into my fucking soul. I adjust myself with a grunt, thumb pressing along the thick ridge. Yeah, no way I’m sleeping tonight.
And that view? Her, sprawled in bed, dress shoved up, moaning my name like a prayer before she even knew I was there?
I’m ruined. Fucked. Completely fucking claimed and she doesn’t even know it yet.
That’s mine.
All of her.
I rest my head back against the cushion and stare at the ceiling, trying to will my body to calm down. It’s a lost cause. The only thing that would take the edge off right now is going back upstairs, pulling that sheet down, and giving her everything she just tried to give herself.
But I won’t.
Because she’s not just an Omega in heat. She’s Cindy. She’s fire and “fuck you” and strawberry lip gloss, and damn it, she deserves more than me using her like a fix for an addiction.
Still, I stay. Right here. Guard dog on the couch.
If she needs me, I’ll come running. If she wants me, I’ll tear the world down to make it happen.
Until then, I close my eyes, cock aching like hell, and whisper to the dark ceiling above, “God help me… I’m going to destroy her.”