Chapter 12 - Dina
I know all about waiting and wondering. It’s a specific kind of being frozen in place, standing still with your skin prickling and your heart beating too loudly.
I wait at Caleb’s kitchen island while he soothes Alora down the hall, unable to move but also on the edge of running.
The silence of the cabin isn’t really silence at all; it’s the full weight of the ghosts of things I can’t outrun.
I absentmindedly twist the label off my water bottle, shred it to confetti, and listen to the muffled cadence of his voice singing along to Goodnight Moon, his soft, off-key humming.
He’s doing the lullaby that plays on the mobile Skylar gave Alora, and I hate how much I want to hear it, even if I’ve heard it play a hundred times already.
I should leave. I should run, because in the time since he disappeared to the nursery, every cell in my body has started to panic.
I feel like there’s a glass wall between me and the rest of the world, and on the other side are all the people who might see me for what I am: a traitor, a coward, a woman who slept with the enemy and liked it.
If my father could see me, if any of my old pack could see me, they’d disown me.
They’d never understand the new world that Silvercreek is building.
Hell, maybe they are watching from beyond the grave, maybe the goddess will let them witness all my transgressions. Maybe they’ll be waiting for me when my time comes and demand answers I know I’ll never be able to give.
But I don’t leave. I stay, and I listen, and I think about how the sound of Caleb’s voice in the baby’s room is the closest thing to safety I remember.
Tender moments in my own life like this seem so long ago; when did I last feel safe?
Even the memory of safety, the shadow of it. All lost to Cheslem’s evil.
The lullaby ends, and the silence increases as it becomes obvious Alora has fallen asleep again.
I hear the click of the door, then the soft tread of feet.
When I look up, he’s standing in the kitchen, one hand braced on the doorframe, the other running through his hair.
He looks at me like he’s not sure I’ll still be here, and for a second, I want to laugh at the realization that I still am when so much was compelling me to run.
We stand there for a moment, perhaps gauging the lasting peace from Alora for a moment.
I find myself thinking about the way his hands felt on my skin, about the way he pulled me close, about how nothing in Silvercreek has made me feel alive the way he does, or felt as real.
I think about the magic that flared blue between our hands at the lottery, about the way I pretended not to want it, about how my wolf is losing her mind inside me, clawing at the inside of my ribs. And how hard I’ve tried to ignore her.
The silence suddenly feels suffocating, and I see the uncertainty in his eyes, along with a weariness I know all too well myself.
I have no idea what I’m going to say, but something tells me that words won’t help anyway, and what I can’t say might be better felt.
Instead, I cross the kitchen in three steps, take his surprised face in both my hands, and kiss him before I change my mind.
My breath hitches as for a split second he pauses, but then he kisses me back, full force, hands at my waist, pulling me in.
It’s not gentle or easy. It’s messy and desperate, like a silent war between two people who want to hurt and heal each other at the same time. I feel lost for a moment as he turns me in his arms, pushing me against the wall, but I hold onto his shoulders, and he anchors me.
Pulling away slightly, he looks down at me. “Don’t you want to talk about it?” He asks, his lips forming a small smile.
I laugh, and the sound feels unexpectedly light. “No, not really,” I admit, my cheeks heating.
He laughs, low and hoarse, and the heat in his hands travels straight through my clothes to my skin. “You’re not going to run?” he says, and I shake my head, fingers already fisted in the collar of his shirt.
“Not tonight,” I whisper, and he takes the invitation for what it is; his mouth finds mine again, rougher this time, more demanding.
I let him take control, and it’s a relief, honestly, to not have to think for a little while, to just let myself be devoured.
He walks me backward down the hall, never breaking the kiss, one hand at my back, the other tilting my head just so, until I nearly trip over a basket of laundry and laugh into his mouth.
We’re at his door before I even register the movement, and then he’s pressing me up against the wood, mouth trailing down my jaw, teeth grazing my throat.
I tilt my head back, eyes fluttering shut, and feel the shudder that goes through him when I let out a helpless little sound.
I feel drunk on the sensation, on the power of making him lose his careful control.
He finds the hem of my shirt and pushes it up, warm palms flattening against my stomach.
I brace my hands on his shoulders, hold on tight, and let him strip the shirt over my head.
It lands somewhere on the floor. The air in the hall is cold, but his hands are so hot and greedy that it hardly matters.
He kisses me again, slower now, like he wants to taste every inch of my mouth, and then he pulls back, breathing hard.
“We shouldn’t do this,” I murmur, but my hands are already drifting to his waistband, and I’m not fooling anyone.
He grins, and it’s wild and reckless. “We’re already doing it.”
I groan with mock defeat, and he scoops me up, one arm under my legs, the other steadying my back, carrying me through the door as quietly as possible.
We both freeze for a second as we pass Alora’s room, listening for any sign she’s awake, but there’s nothing.
Caleb’s eyes meet mine, conspiratorial, and he grins as he nudges his door shut behind us.
His room is neat in a sparse way I recognize all too well, the bed made military-tight, but the second I’m in his arms again, all his discipline dissolves.
He sets me down on the edge of the bed and drops to his knees in front of me, hands running up the outsides of my jeans, slow and reverent.
He’s never looked at me like this before, not with this much raw hunger.
My heart gallops, nerves alive, as he undoes the button at my waist and draws my jeans down, his palms following every contour of my thighs.
I feel, for a moment, like I might come apart from being looked at like this.
He hooks his hands behind my knees, spreads my legs, and leans in, dragging his mouth up the inside of my thigh slowly.
My underwear is black cotton, plain and practical, and for a second I’m acutely mortified by the thought of him seeing me—really seeing me.
Not just the parts I choose to display, but all of me.
My thick thighs, the scars, the body built for survival and not for show.
I want to crack a joke or pull away before he can clock the full reality, but he’s looking at me with such laser focus that I can’t even muster self-deprecation.
“Dina,” he says, voice low and starkly reverent, “do you have any idea how fucking perfect you are?”
He kisses the inside of my knee, then my thigh, then the line of my hip, inhaling like he wants to memorize the scent.
His hands are rough, but they touch me like I’m breakable.
For a second, I’m so overcome by the rawness of it that I can’t move.
I just sit there, breathing hard, thighs spread wide, letting him kneel between them and worship me.
He slides my underwear down my legs, slow enough that I want to scream, and then he leans in and puts his mouth on me.
It’s not tentative, not trial and error.
His tongue is hot and sure, and he moves with an intensity that makes my head spin.
My hips buck, and I hear myself make a noise I’ve never made before; something between a gasp and a plea.
He groans in response, like the sound does something to him, and he doubles down, licking and sucking until I’m shaking, one hand in his hair, the other clawing at the bedsheets.
He pulls back just enough to look up at me, grinning, then says, “I want to see you come for me.”
The words shoot through me like a fuse. I’m panting now, my vision growing fuzzy, my whole world narrowed to the heat of his mouth and the relentless drag of his tongue.
My legs are spread so wide I feel like I’ll break, but he just holds them there, big hands bracing my thighs, keeping me open for him.
I can’t look away from the sight of him between my legs, eyes locked on mine, like he’s daring me to look away.
And then he slides two fingers inside me, thick and perfect, crooking them just right as he keeps sucking my clit, and I nearly black out with the force of it.
My vision goes white at the edges, and I hear myself cry out, the sound so raw and wild I barely recognize it as my own.
I come so hard I nearly arch off the bed, but he holds me steady, working me through it until I’m gasping and boneless.
When the aftershocks finally let me breathe, he eases his grip and kisses my thigh, slow and gentle, like he’s proud of what he’s done to me.
He stands, stripping off his shirt and sweatpants, and I see all of him for the first time.
The body I’d only glimpsed in flashes; every scar, every stretch of muscle, every mark of a life spent fighting.
His cock is hard and heavy, flushed dark against his skin, and my wolf all but howls at the thought of having him inside me, and I want him so badly I forget all about guilt, about fate, about the ancient rules of the pack.
All I want is this man, in this moment, with nothing between us.
He kneels on the bed, crowding me back until I’m sprawled against the pillows, legs spread, thighs still trembling.
His hands frame my hips, holding me so tight I’ll probably bruise, and I’m glad.
He kisses me, slow and deep, and I taste myself on his lips.
It should embarrass me, but it just makes me want him more.
I press up into him, desperate for the weight of his body, the bite of his teeth at my jaw, the thick, relentless press of his cock against my thigh.
He breaks the kiss, dragging his mouth along my ear, and murmurs, "You’ll have to keep quiet for me, or we’ll wake her." He means the baby in the next room, and for a second, I almost laugh, but the heat in his voice wipes all humor from my mind.
He lines himself up and pushes in, slow at first, letting me feel every inch, the stretch so good it hurts.
I dig my heels into his back, and he groans, the sound dark and desperate.
He’s so big I have to adjust, shifting my hips up to take him deeper, and the sensation nearly undoes me.
I want to scream, but I clamp my lips together, stifling it.
He sees it, feels it, and his mouth curls into a wolfish grin.
He fucks me like he means to stake a claim, every thrust harder than the last. The headboard thumps a slow, steady rhythm against the wall.
I try to smother the noises that threaten to spill out as his hands never stop moving, one at my throat, thumb stroking my jaw, the other gripping my ass, kneading and guiding me, as if he knows exactly how to unmake me and is determined to do it.
My body is hypersensitive, every nerve ending tuned to his touch.
Each time he pulls out, slow, then slams back in, I see stars.
My breath comes in ragged bursts; my nails rake down his back, and he hisses, a sound that’s half pain and half pleasure.
I want to mark him too, want him to carry the evidence of me on his skin.
He’s close, I can feel it, but he slows down, grinding circles inside me, drawing it out until I’m half-wild with need.
I lose count of how many times I come. Once, twice, the third nearly making me sob, all of them muffled into his neck or my own hand, because I’m terrified of waking Alora and also completely unable to stop.
When I finally feel him let go, he buries his face in my shoulder and growls, low and animal, the sound vibrating through me from the inside out.
We collapse in a tangle of limbs. My head spins, and my legs are weak. I can still feel the imprint of his fingers on my hips, the bruised ache between my thighs, and the echo of his voice in my ear.
I get the feeling he’s imprinted himself on me in more ways than one, and my wolf will never forget this moment.