Chapter Twenty-Nine
Rhea
“Y ou let her out.”
Oh, great. Here we go.
Theo turns like the poster boy for calm, but I know that tone - the one that's alpha for please-don't-throw-anything.
“She asked.”
“She’s in heat, ” Lucian snaps, already halfway to throwing a full-blown alpha tantrum. Probably the marble-busting kind.
Kai, bless him, mutters under his breath, “Somebody get the popcorn.”
Theo stays composed - of course he does - but there’s steel under the softness now.
“She’s lucid. Calm. She needed a break.”
“She needed control ,” Lucian growls. “Which you just undermined by letting her waltz barefoot into a room full of scent-drunk -”
“I’m wearing socks,” I mutter, wiggling them for emphasis in case anyone missed it.
Lucian ignores me. Classic.
“You should’ve come to me first.”
“She’s not your prisoner,” Theo says, still calm, but with that slight I-will-body-check-you undertone he apparently saves for when he’s one emotional shift away from snapping a chair in half.
“No,” Lucian growls. “But she is mine . ”
The air changes like someone flicked off the ventilation. Tension, meet suffocation. I’m the omega in the middle, still clutching a piece of toast like it might save me.
Theo doesn’t flinch. “She hasn’t chosen anyone.”
Lucian’s eyes slice to me, and for one second, I see something. Hunger, yes. But also something almost… broken.
And then, blink , it’s gone. Replaced with granite and contempt.
“I brought her here to burn this out. Without interference.”
He sounds like someone scraping frost off a window with a knife.
“You mean without us ?” Kai says, slouched like he’s hosting a brunch show. “What, you think we’re the problem?”
Lucian doesn’t respond. He doesn’t need to. His glare is so aggressive I half expect it to file a noise complaint with the HOA.
Theo steps in again. “She’s not fragile. And she’s not yours to lock away.”
“Oh, but you’d give her anything she asked for, wouldn’t you?” Lucian’s voice cuts like a wire pulled too tight. “Even if it broke her. Even if she asked you to walk into fire with a blindfold on.”
Theo says nothing, but the answer’s clear.
Yes. Of course he would.
He’d probably apologize for how hot the fire was, too.
Ash - who up until now has been perfectly still and perfectly terrifying - finally speaks.
“Lucian. This isn’t helping.”
Lucian looks at me again, and it’s like a damn seismic shift. The word mine isn’t said aloud, but it might as well be tattooed across my chest in bold, flashing ink.
I shift in place - because of course my body responds to that.
My thighs press together. My skin flushes like a liar.
“ Shit ,” Ash mutters. “She’s peaking again.”
“No kidding,” Kai says. “We’re one eyebrow twitch away from a full meltdown. Someone get her a fan. Or a fire extinguisher.”
Theo, ever the gentleman, moves to stand slightly in front of me, grounding hand at my lower back. I’d thank him if I weren’t busy vibrating with what I can only describe as alpha-induced horny outrage.
Lucian sees it. His nostrils flare, jaw like stone, his eyes locked on mine.
“You wanted all of us? Fine. Congratulations. You have them .”
The way he says it… it's like he’s congratulating me for stepping in something.
“But don’t expect me to be soft about it.”
He turns on his heel and walks out of the kitchen like a melodramatic Victorian ghost.
No door slam. No shouting. Just maximum emotional damage and one emotionally repressed exit stage left.
The silence is so loud I can hear my ovaries hissing.
I grip the counter, knuckles white. Not just because of the heat - because of him. Because of the nerve. The audacity .
This is the same alpha who whispered to me through the door like I was a poem. Who talked me down from the worst of it with nothing but his voice. Who made me feel wanted when I was a mess of slick and panic and instincts.
And now he acts like I’ve personally betrayed him by not remaining celibate until he graced me with his approval?
What is his problem?
He’s acting like I blindsided him. Like he didn’t know - but he did . He’s known since the car. Since my heat hit like a goddamn bomb and I begged for all of them. He felt it - same as the others.
The bonds starting to form. The need unraveling me in four different directions.
He knew what I wanted, and he still stayed on the other side of the door. He chose that.
So what now? He’s pissed because I didn’t wait forever? Because I didn’t hold off for his royal approval while I burned?
I wrap my arms around myself, jaw tight, heat blooming like shame, as though I’ve done something wrong just by existing too loudly, by reaching for more than one.
For wanting all of them.
If he’s hurt that I let Ash and Theo touch me - if it guts him that he wasn’t first - then fine . Let it hurt. I didn’t exactly schedule a guest list for my heat, I didn’t print RSVP cards -
I burned. I begged.
And he stayed away.
So yeah. That’s on him.
"Well," Ash says, sipping his coffee like it’s whiskey and not a coping mechanism, "that could’ve gone worse."
Kai shrugs. “Ten bucks says he’s downstairs right now choking a punching bag with his bare hands.”
I barely hear them. I’m too busy trying not to cry. Or combust. Or launch myself off the nearest surface like a feral squirrel who accidentally slurped an energy drink.
Because despite the whole I’m fine, thanks for asking vibe I was trying to maintain, I am decidedly Not Fine.
My body is buzzing like a microwave left on too long. My knees lock, then buckle. The room tilts - just a little - and suddenly I’m gripping the counter like it’s the last lifeboat on a sinking ship.
Kai catches it first.
“You okay, Bambi?”
I shake my head. “I can’t - I can’t -”
And there goes the air. Abandoning me like Lucian’s bedside manner.
Theo’s already moving, calm but fast. “Hey. Hey - look at me. You’re alright.”
I am not alright. My thighs are soaked. My nerves are screaming. My brain has turned into a slideshow of hot, dangerous alpha memories.
And worst of all?
My heat, which I na?vely thought had packed its bags and left the building, is back.
And it brought friends.
“ Shit ,” Kai mutters. “She’s spiking.”
Theo scoops me up like I’m made of smoke and unresolved trauma. I fight him, because obviously now is the perfect time for a feminist crisis. “Put me down - I’m fine !
“You’re not,” he growls, tightening his grip like I’m about to levitate. “You’re spiraling. You need grounding.”
“Don’t touch me -”
“ Breathe , sweetheart.”
Kai materializes on the other side, his tone dropping into I’ve got you, baby territory, which does something truly evil to my ovaries.
“C’mon, Bambi. You’re not dying. You’re just… very horny and emotionally compromised.”
Ash steps in like the grim reaper of sanity. “Lounge. Now .”
So that’s where they take me. Or carry me. Or spiritually exorcise me. I’m not sure.
The lounge is big and expensive and smells like leather and male stress. Theo lowers me onto the couch like I’m glass, and for a second, it’s fine.
Then his hands leave me, and I flinch like someone just unplugged me from life support.
“ Rhea ,” Theo says, kneeling, his hand brushing my knee. “Just breathe. In. Out.”
I do my best impression of a fish on land.
“Breathing is canceled.”
“Pressure,” Kai says from my other side. “We need pressure. She’s spinning out.”
Ash doesn’t speak, doesn’t move , but everything about him screams I’m planning fourteen ways to fix this and five of them involve violence
“She’s stuck,” Ash comments. “She’s not sure if she wants to run or be ruined.”
“I do know,” I rasp. “I want both .”
Theo strokes my back. Kai offers his hand like a human grounding wire. I want to kiss him and scream into a pillow at the same time.
And then it happens.
That thought. That name .
A curse slithering back through my blood.
Lucian.
Of course it’s him. I can still feel him - the ghost of his rage like teeth against my skin, the way his eyes locked on me in the kitchen, like I’d betrayed him by breathing near another alpha.
My body… reacts.
Betrays me.
How ? How the hell is it possible that his mood has this much power over me?
We haven’t even touched, and still, the second he walked in and saw me in that kitchen, rage boiling beneath the surface like it wanted to crack the walls -
I felt it.
And worse?
I liked it.
Was he… jealous? I can’t tell. Without any real bond formed, I don’t know what he’s feeling - but my body thinks it does.
My body thinks it knows exactly what that growl meant, what that tension in his jaw was for.
Claim. Punish. Take.
I whimper. It’s not dignified.
Ash flinches.
Theo tenses.
Kai whispers, “ Fuck .”
“I’ll get him,” Ash says, stepping forward like a man headed to war.
“No,” Theo snaps. “She’s barely holding on.”
“She’s asking for him,” Ash growls. “We all felt it.”
“No,” I whisper.
And it’s like I dropped a bomb in the room. Everyone freezes.
“No Lucian,” I repeat, firmer this time. “Not yet.”
My body wants all of them - that much is obvious. Every nerve is still reaching - tugging invisible strings in every direction. The bonds are half-formed, thrumming low in my bloodstream, and Lucian’s is the sharpest, the most dangerous.
But I’m not ready for him. Not in this state.
Not when I already feel like I could burn down the room just by thinking too hard about him.
Because I know what’ll happen. I know if he walks in, I’ll lose the last thread of control I’ve got left. I’ll beg. I’ll crawl. I’ll bond without even realizing I’ve done it.
And I’m not letting that be how this ends.
Not when I want him too much. Not when I’m still bleeding from the way he walked out.
So I stay here. With Theo and Ash and Kai, who are all still trying - still holding me together while I fall apart.
And that? That means something.
Even if I’m still seconds from losing my goddamn mind.