Chapter 34 #2
“I don’t need another blanket,” she argues, trying and failing to sound practical. An adjective that has never been used when describing nesting.
I snort softly. “Lie to me like that again and I’ll put you over my knee then buy you ten more.”
Her eyes widen slightly, and the edges of her cheekbones pinken.
Leaning in just enough that only she can hear me, I tell her, “Your nest is important, Noa. You deserve to fill it with whatever you want.”
The words hang between us, heavy with everything we both already know.
With promises I’ve made her and refuse to break.
With the understanding that she deserves warmth and care simply because she’s mine—simply because she exists.
That she spent years putting the comfort and needs of others before herself, and I’m honored to be the one to spoil her now.
That I denied her once and it’s nearly killed her.
Because I would spend every cent I have and every year I have left trying to make up for that.
At first, I assume Noa’s restlessness is nerves.
The drive back has been long and slow, nearly two hours of white-knuckled focus as the weather worsens mile by mile. I chalk her shifting in the passenger seat up to the growing anxiety of whether we’ll make it back through the mountain pass before the snow closes the roads entirely.
The same heavy urgency has been pressing on my shoulders since I got the warning text from Canaan, and I’ve been painfully aware that I’m racing against a dwindling clock since I peeled out of the store’s parking lot basically on two wheels.
My jaw tight as I guide the Escalade along a road that historically encourages speed but today demands restraint.
The car’s speedometer says thirty-five miles per hour, but it might as well be a snail’s pace.
My knuckles are tight on the wheel as the wipers work overtime.
Ice flashes beneath the tires more than once, the kind that makes your gut drop even when the vehicle rights itself.
The mere thought of what it would mean to lose control of the SUV while Noa sits in the passenger seat…
I can’t go there. I won’t let myself even imagine it.
The closer we get to Silverthorne, the more I start to doubt the reason for Noa’s agitation.
She’s hardly settled for longer than a handful of minutes at a time. Not even when I try to assure her that we’ll make it through. Not when I point at the familiar landmarks that signal how close we are to reaching the small town we have to cut through to reach the roads that’ll take us home.
We’re about ten miles out when she catches me completely off guard.
Her window rolls down without warning.
The wind explodes into the cab, unforgiving and biting, carrying a sheet of snow with it that swirls violently through the space between us.
It hits me in the face hard enough to have my chin jerking back like I’ve been physically struck.
The cold instantly slices through the layers of clothes I wear.
“Fuck, baby, what are you doing?” I bark, startled, my eyes darting between her and the snow-coated road.
I reach for the control panel on my door and hit the button to raise her window again, closing it until only a narrow crack remains.
Enough for the fresh air. Not enough to let this bullshit weather in. “It’s freezing outside.”
She’s half risen in her seat, leather creaking as she strains toward the gap, like she’s trying to press her face directly into the path of the frigid wind. She mumbles something I can’t make out at first, words slurred and disjointed.
Then she repeats herself, louder this time.
“Hot,” she pants. “I’m so hot.”
My stomach lurches and I risk another look at her. Holding it longer than is probably safe, it all comes together at once. The flush spreading across her cheeks. The faint sheen at her temples. The way her lashes flutter, as if keeping her eyes open is already asking too much of her.
Fuck.
How long has she been like this?
Guilt lands hard and immediate. I’ve been locked into the road like it’s the only thing that matters, tracking ice, traffic, and worst-case scenarios, so focused on keeping us safe that I missed what was happening right beside me.
“Noa?” I say, and everything I’m feeling folds into that single word. “Talk to me, sweet one. What’s going on?”
I already know, and I wish I didn’t.
I should have caught it sooner. The signs were there in the store and I missed them anyway.
Her lips had been almost too hot against mine, the way she clung to that brief kiss like she needed more.
She told me my touch had triggered the other ones she’s had, but this…
this wasn’t that. This began in the store, the moment her instincts woke and that nesting fog settled in.
Omega instincts don’t exist in isolation.
They’re braided together, all serving the same purpose.
Every intricate part built to prepare and serve her through a heat.
The realization has tension coiling tight and ugly in my gut, because this is the worst possible timing.
She doesn’t answer me, just shifts again, chasing the cold air with a low sound that scrapes straight down my spine.
It’s a sound that is syrupy with painful need and threatens to gut me.
I keep my eyes forward and reach across the console, pressing my palm gently to her forehead.
Heat all but pours off her skin. I curse under my breath and pull my hand back, only to have her protest weakly and lean after it, searching for the contact she needs.
“Baby, I know it’s hard, but you have to focus,” I tell her, my voice rougher than I want it to be, but I have to lace the request with enough alpha command to make sure it lands. Even if something uncomfortable twists in my chest at using it on her.
Her head lolls toward me, neck seeming too weak to hold it upright, and her eyes are glassy when they find mine.
“That’s it,” I say softly. “That’s my good girl.”
The praise pulls another broken sound from her throat, and I grit my teeth against the instinctive drive to give her more than I safely can right now.
“I need to know if this is your heat or a spike.”
She blinks, confusion flickering in her hazy and need-soaked eyes.
“You have to answer me, Noa. This is important.”
It is, but either way, the next step is the same.
I need to get her off the road and somewhere safe so I can help her through it.
But if this is her full heat, it changes everything.
That would mean days, not hours. And if I can’t get her home in time, she’ll be facing her first heat in the very rustic, hunting lodge-style motel in Silverthorne.
It’s the only place to stay for thirty miles in either direction.
Her lips part again, breath hitching before the words finally come. “Heat…spike,” she pants. “Just a…spike.”
Thank fuck.
I activate the Bluetooth and call Canaan.
“Where are you?” Canaan answers without preamble.
“A few miles outside Silverthorne.” My grip tightens on the wheel as my other hand reaches for Noa again.
I cup the side of her neck, thumb brushing along her delicate jaw.
It’s what little comfort I can offer right now.
She melts into it, trying to nuzzle closer, hunting for the physical contact I can’t give her yet.
“Shit,” Canaan curses under his breath, and I hear him relay the information to someone else.
A moment later, Rhosyn’s distant voice floats through the car’s speakers. “They didn’t make it through in time—the pass is closed already. Plows haven’t been able to get in yet, either. They won’t be able to make it home for hours—if at all tonight.”
“Did you hear that, Nick?” my second-in-command asks.
I swallow hard. “I heard.”
The prospect of being stuck in town overnight was bad enough on its own, but it’s worse now that Noa is actively tipping into a heat spike—and not the mild ones she’d already admitted to having. She told me they were usually small.
This does not appear small.
Beside me, Noa shifts again, her back bowing and hips lifting, and that’s when her scent reaches me fully.
Her slick. Her arousal. Sweet and warm in that way that’s distinctly her.
It sinks straight into my bloodstream and summons my wolf and cock.
My beastly half answers with a sound that is a half-snarl, half-pleased rumble, and I have to swallow it down before it escapes me.
There’s nothing I can do to stop the blood and arousal from rushing low.
My shaft hardens, pressing uncomfortably to the zipper of my jeans.
At the base, the telltale pressure of my knot starting to swell makes itself known.
There’s nothing that can quite make an alpha lose all semblance of control than the scent of his omega’s slick. Fuck me.
Noa whines and the desperation in the small noise lands straight in my chest. Her distress claws at every instinct I have to tend to her, to steady her, to make this better.
“Nick?” Canaan’s voice cuts through the heady mist starting to fill my head. “You still there?”
“I’m here,” I snap. “But I’ve got a problem. Noa’s in the middle of a heat spike. A bad one.”
Canaan curses in sympathy. “Can you pull over and…you know, help her through it?” he asks, but before I can answer, I hear a sharp slap and his startled yelp. “Ouch! What the hell, Rosie? Why are you slapping the back of my head?”
“Rennick’s not pulling over to fuck Noa on the side of the road like some bad or secret hookup,” Rhosyn cuts in flatly.
“Come one, Cane, that’s his mate. He’s got more standards than that.
” It may be blunt and crude—typical Rhosyn—but she’s not wrong.
If it comes down to it, of course, I’ll do whatever is necessary to help Noa.
I just refuse to allow this to be the only solution I consider.
“Nick?” Rhosyn continues, clearly having taken control of the phone since her voice is crisper now.
“How close are you to the motel? I’ll call and get you a room—make sure it’s ready for you before you get there.
You guys are going to need somewhere warm to wait out the plows anyway. ”
Thank the Goddess for this woman.
“We’re still a few miles out,” I answer, already looking back at Noa.
She looks undone, heat and pain pulling her apart from the inside.
Guilt is immediate. Familiar and unwelcome.
This is another moment where she’s hurting and I can’t fix it.
Not yet. It feels too much like all the other times I was the source of her pain instead of the one who stopped it.
“I’ll call the motel,” Rhosyn tells me. “Just focus on getting there safe and taking care of our girl.”
Despite the tension, I can hear the teasing smile in her voice. She knows I’m already on edge, my possessive instincts riding me hard. And she’s pushing me on purpose by invoking a shared claim on Noa.
My warning growl is cut off when the line goes dead and the silence that follows is heavy as heavy as the storm pressing in around us. I flex my fingers gently on Noa’s neck until her eyes find mine again.
“I just need you to hold on for a few more minutes,” I plead, keeping my voice steady even as stress grinds it rough. “We’re almost there, and then I promise I’ll make it better, baby.”