Chapter 21 Soren #3
Kaian enters the kitchen in a cloud of coconut and soap. He’s wearing what must be Connall’s shirt, carrying his jeans and sweater. The white button-up hits him mid-thigh, damp in places that Soren can’t think too closely about or he’ll be on his knees begging.
“I wondered if I could maybe wash this stuff? I travel light, and when I can buy shit I do, but it’s been a while—”
“Sure thing, bébé. Saw the machine when we came in.” Quinn leads the way. It takes the three of them ten minutes to figure out the domestic machine’s nuances. What the fuck is a Delicates Cycle?
Once the machine is agitating, Kaian reclaims his spot at the breakfast bar like it’s his throne—bare ass meeting cold stool, the hiss of breath, and a little moan. He doesn’t seem to notice what it does to them, but Soren watches the way Quinn’s spine straightens like someone snapped a line taut.
Then Kaian dips one finger into the bowl of cherry filling, glossy and thick. Brings it to his mouth. Sucks it clean with a sound that goes straight to Soren’s cock. Beside him, Quinn grasps the counter so hard it creaks.
Kaian looks up, tongue still peeking between his lips, eyes scanning the counter like he’s just realized he needs a spoon.
Maybe a fork. Something more efficient than his fingers.
Eyes wide, he freezes. They must be a sight: stock still, jaws clenched, with no way to hide that they’re hanging on by a thread.
He whines, swaying a little in his seat. His “please” is moaned high and light.
Soren wants to give him what he’s begging for. He knows his little mate is hard under his borrowed shirt, can smell his sweet pre-come. Quinn’s cherry arousal is a Pavlovian trigger that makes Soren’s mouth water with anticipation and his cock rock-hard in an instant.
Quinn groans under his breath. “Bébé, you haven’t slept in going on two full days, and as much as I—we—want to give you what we all want…first times are—” He doesn’t finish, but Soren knows what he was going to say. First times are special between mates.
Despite their history, mythical or real, Weres aren’t animals. Sure, they’re driven to bond in the most elemental ways. Like he and Quinn in the alley behind The Glory Hole the first time—only this is Kaian. Exhausted and on the run without any idea of what it would mean to take two alphas.
Soren draws in a slow breath, just long enough to taste shower-fresh skin and the softest coconut, choking on his restraint.
Kaian breaks the silence with a sulky, near-whispered, “But—”
“Blaze is right, angel-baby.” Soren’s voice is low, gentle. But there’s no give in it.
Kaian’s gaze snaps to him. “Not a baby,” he mutters, just loud enough to be heard. His cheeks flush—not the teasing heat from earlier, but something closer to bruised pride. “Fine. I’m going to bed. You know where to find me if you change your minds.”
He doesn’t stomp away, but he does close the door with a loud bang.
“He can’t think we don’t want him like hell-burning, right?” Quinn asks. He pulls out a spoon from a drawer near the dishwasher and digs into what’s left of the pudding.
Nausea surges in Soren’s gut. Whether it’s from disappointing his mate, his blue balls, or the concussion—Soren couldn’t say. Maybe it’s all fucking three.
“Want some?” Quinn offers the spoon.
“Fuck, no. We need to get him some real food tomorrow.” Soren grimaces. “He probably eats like shit. Did you hear him? He’s only got what’s on his back and in his pockets.”
“Yeah. We aren’t much better off, but at least we have—” Quinn stops so suddenly it takes a minute for Soren to realize that Quinn’s whole life went up in flames tonight. Literally and figuratively.
Nothing is going to be the same again.
“I’m on first watch,” Quinn says, and he holds up a hand the second Soren looks like he’s going to resist. “You have a concussion. Go.” He drops the spoon in the sink. “Trust me, Ren. Let me take care of you this one time.”
“You do enough of that,” Soren whispers. It’s the first time he’s said it outside of Quinn’s bed, and by the look on his mate’s face, it’s been a long time coming. Leaning in, he lays the softest kiss on his cherry-slick mouth.
He turns away so he doesn’t have to think about what this new expression means and why it hurts so good.
The door to the main suite is closed when he passes, and there’s no light under the door. He presses a hand to the wood, like he could feel Kaian’s heat on his palm, before slipping across the hall into the second bedroom. He closes the door partway, sitting heavily on the bed.
It’s not easy letting Quinn guard them, but it’s made better knowing that Connall is meticulous in his security. Soren will have to check on the particulars tomorrow in daylight, which, by the bedside alarm clock, is only three hours away.
He takes inventory of a day that had gone from perfect and rolled straight into a cosmic shit show and then right back out the other side. He raises his wrist to his nose, and there’s a whiff of sweet coconut blended with the smoky-cherry he’d carried with him all day.
It’s fucking scary to think that he’s attached already, but he also feels…good. More settled in his skin, as if it finally fits. Like he’s not just armor and teeth and the ugly things men made him be.
He hates it. Hates how much he wants this. How much he doesn’t deserve it. How they are eventually going to look at him—really look—and see he isn’t a protector or a partner or anything worth the trouble.
Just a blunt instrument with a pulse. A shield. An empty skin suit holding instincts and scars. Then they’ll leave, just like everyone else who ever mattered.
Now that he’s alone, he reaches back, needing the grounding weight of his phone—like a bruise he presses to prove it’s there and that his reason for living is still in his bed at home.
His hand finds nothing.
He’s standing, digging in his pockets. Jacket. Jeans. Bed. Floor.
Empty.
The loss hits him worse than Klein’s fist to his temple, and he lets out a pathetic whine.
He’s not been without a link to Connall since he figured he could track him without having eyes on him 24-fucking-7.
He wants to scream, tear Connall’s house to the foundation, wondering if its destruction would somehow bring him running all the way from Nashville.
Of course, he doesn’t. Doesn’t want to freak Quinn out or wake Kaian out of a much-needed deep sleep.
“Fuck,” he whispers, throat thick.
He remembers all the places he could have lost it after putting it in his pocket at Quinn’s. Jumping from roof to roof. Climbing down the sketchy fire escape. Digging around in his coat pocket for his cigarettes. He remembers sitting in the back of a dingy cab, and the cab driving away.
His link to Connall was severed by accident or Fate, or both. He feels untethered. Soren scrubs both hands over his face and drops his elbows to his knees.
“Shit,” he breathes. “I don’t know how to do this.”
In the kitchen, water hums in pipes—Quinn is washing something in the sink. Kaian shifts in the bed next door, the metal headboard tapping the wall before it settles into silence again. Soren listens to all of it—the house breathing, his mates alive—and forces himself to lie back on the bed.
His wolf curls around the memory of three scents instead of two—and for the first time in a long while, he doesn’t think about not waking up at all.
He falls asleep mid-vigil.