4. Khalil
Khalil
By the time I reach home, dawn is beginning to lighten the trees behind the house.
The pack has been running for hours, and I can hear them beyond the yard as I cross toward the back door, paws tearing through brush and the occasional howl carrying between the trunks.
Usually the sound settles something in me.
Tonight, my wolf throws himself toward it so hard my stride breaks.
He’s been riding beneath my skin since I left the fraternity house, restless enough that my shoulders ache from holding him back.
I get the door closed behind me and make it to the kitchen island before another wave rolls through me, heat spreading under my skin as my fingers close around the edge of the counter.
He wants out, but the woods aren’t what he wants most. Every instinct in him keeps pulling in the opposite direction, back toward the house I just left and the three men still inside it.
Mine.
I grit my teeth as the word pushes through me again. “No.”
My wolf answers with enough pressure that my vision sharpens for a second, every sound in the house suddenly too clear.
He’s never cared much for my reasoning, but there’s usually some room to negotiate with him.
Tonight, there’s none. He wants to turn around, go back across town, collect what he’s apparently decided belongs to us, and deal with the inconvenient fact that all three of them are human sometime afterward.
I stay where I am until the worst of the urge passes, then straighten and roll the tension out of my shoulders. “You are not dragging me back there.”
The back door opens behind me before my wolf can offer an opinion.
Malik steps inside barefoot with his shirt slung over one shoulder, sweat still shining across his chest from the run.
He gets two steps into the kitchen as he shovels on his pants before looking at me properly, and whatever greeting he intended dies on his face.
“You look like hell. Did the party go that badly?”
“I’m fine.” I move toward the cabinet for a glass, mostly because standing still is making the urge to shift worse.
Malik closes the door behind him and heads for the refrigerator. “You’re alone in your kitchen arguing with your wolf before sunrise. I’m comfortable questioning your definition of fine.”
“I wasn’t arguing with him. I was informing him of a decision.” I fill the glass at the sink while Malik takes out a bottle of water, and I can feel his attention stay on me even after I turn away.
“That distinction doesn’t help, Alpha.” He drinks deeply before lowering the bottle, his amusement disappearing when his nostrils flare. His gaze moves over me once, slower this time. “You smell like sex.”
“I spent several hours in a fraternity house. Half the building smells like sex.”
Malik shakes his head. “I know the difference between a room full of horny humans and an Alpha who fucked somebody recently.”
My wolf pushes forward again before I can answer, immediately irritated by Malik taking too much interest. I tighten my grip on the glass until the pressure in my fingers becomes uncomfortable and force myself to loosen it before I end up cleaning glass off the floor.
Malik notices anyway. “And now you look like you want to bite me for mentioning it.”
“I don’t want to bite you.” My wolf disagrees strongly enough that I take a drink just to give myself something else to do. “I want you to answer a question.”
The sudden change in subject gets a suspicious look from him. “That depends entirely on the question.”
I set the glass down and lean against the counter. “Before Jonah, how pronounced did your knot get?”
Malik’s bottle stops halfway back to his mouth.
He lowers it slowly, studying me like he expects the rest of the question to explain why I’m asking something we both learned before we were old enough to lead anybody.
“During rut, more than usual. During sex, some swelling. Nothing close to what happens with Jonah.”
“How different?” I ask, and his brows pull together.
“You know how different.”
“I know what should happen. I’m asking what happened to you.”
That wipes away the last of his amusement.
Malik sets the bottle beside him and thinks for a moment before answering.
“Once my wolf recognized Jonah, it stopped being ordinary swelling. Full knot, longer lock, stronger response from both of us. My body wasn’t deciding whether I wanted to mate him anymore. My wolf already had.”
The answer lands like a match against everything I’ve been trying to keep contained since leaving the study. Heat moves beneath my skin again, and my wolf rises with it, pleased by Malik confirming something I desperately wanted him to contradict.
Malik watches my hand tighten around the edge of the counter. “Khalil, what happened?”
I ignore the question. “Have you ever had a full knot with anyone else?”
“No.” Malik answers immediately this time. “Not even during rut. With the few humans I hung out with in college, it was almost nonexistent.”
“So, it just wasn’t there?”
His expression tightens. “Not without a mating response strong enough to trigger it. You might swell more with someone you’re extremely compatible with, but a full lock is different. Your wolf has to be involved.”
Mine.
The word pushes through my head with such certainty that I close my eyes briefly. My wolf has been involved from the beginning. That’s always been the problem.
When I look at Malik again, he’s stopped pretending this is a casual conversation. I push forward because of all the Alphas in our pack, Malik’s the only one who won’t ridicule me for it. “What about slick?”
His face goes blank for a beat. “What about it?”
“Could an Omega produce that much without the mating response being active?”
Malik sets his bottle down completely now.
“They can get wet during sex without their mate. Slick is different, especially the amount you’re talking about if you’re asking me this right after asking about a full knot.
Once an Alpha’s mating response is active, the Omega’s body answers it.
The knot rises, the slick follows, and both bodies start preparing for the bond whether the people involved have caught up or not. ”
My wolf surges so violently that I have to brace both hands on the counter.
Malik takes a step toward me. “Easy.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re about half a second from shifting in your kitchen.”
“I said I’m fine.” I force my claws back before they can fully press through, breathing slowly until the painful pressure in my fingertips subsides. My wolf prowls just beneath the surface instead, agitated and possessive, furious that I’m standing here discussing what he already considers settled.
Malik waits until I have myself under control again before speaking. “Who did you knot?”
I push away from the counter and reach for my water, but Malik catches the evasion for exactly what it is. His eyes narrow as I drink, and I can almost watch him start fitting the questions together.
“Khalil.” His voice has lost every trace of humor. “Who?”
“That isn’t relevant.”
“Bullshit.” Malik folds his arms across his chest, studying me while my wolf bristles at the challenge in his tone.
“You came home smelling like sex, your wolf is trying to crawl out through your skin, and you’ve spent the last five minutes asking me about mating knots and Omega slick.
Whoever you were with is extremely relevant. ”
I set the glass down harder than I intend. “Lower your voice.”
“Nobody else is here.”
“That isn’t why I told you to lower it.”
Understanding crosses his face slowly. His eyes sharpen, and this time when he looks at me, I know exactly where his mind has gone. “One of the humans?”
I catch the island before the shift can take me, my teeth aching where my wolf wants them longer and my skin suddenly too tight across my shoulders. I force him down through sheer habit and years of control, but the kitchen has already gone silent around us.
Malik looks at my hands, then at my face. “Well. I guess that answers that.” He stays where he is now, giving my wolf the space he clearly wants. “You reacted harder to me asking about one of those boys than you did when Rhys challenged you last year.” Malik’s gaze remains fixed on me. “Which one?”
I should end the conversation. Instead, something about the question irritates my wolf even more, because the answer Malik expects is the one answer I can’t give him.
I look toward the windows and the woods beyond them. “That’s the problem.”
Heat floods beneath my skin, my hands tightening on the counter while something low and dangerous gathers in my chest. Malik sees the reaction before I can bury it, and his eyes widen.
“Jesus Christ.” He stares at me for another second, then drags a hand over his face. “It was more than one of them. Fuck. I’m also guessing that these questions were about them.” Malik lowers his voice and leans toward me. “Alpha, this… this is huge! Are you saying they produced slick?”
I nod once.
His face loses the last trace of disbelief. “With the knot fully present?”
“Yes.”
He looks down at the counter, thinking through it, but I already know where he’s going.
Malik finally looks back at me. “Then I don’t know what answer you want from me.
I can tell you what our bodies are supposed to do.
I can’t make what happened fit the rules just because the other option scares you. ”
My wolf surges again at that, insulted as I try to reject the idea of mates and claiming those three.
“He’s already decided, hasn’t he?” Malik asks, watching me carefully.
I don’t answer because there’s no point.
Malik exhales and rubs the back of his neck. “You need Amos, preferably before your wolf decides the rest of us are unnecessary to the process.”
“My wolf has always considered thinking optional.” The answer slips out before I can stop it, and Malik’s mouth twitches.
“That explains more than I expected.” He reaches for his shirt while I give him a look over my shoulder, then raises both hands in surrender. He has enough sense to recognize that the conversation has gone as far as it is going to tonight.
Malik pulls the back door open, but pauses before stepping outside.
“For what it’s worth, I’ve only seen your wolf this close to the surface during a challenge.
” He offers me a small smile, patting the door twice.
“Alpha, your wolf is fighting against the challenge of our pack rules. Only a few have brought home a human mate but never the pack Alpha. Three Omegas? I hope you’re ready for that. ”
The door shuts behind him before what he just said clicks. Omegas. Three of them. Mates in my head worked but I never saw those men as Omegas. My Omegas.
Fuck.
My wolf just rumbles with contentment, already pushing fantasies of the three men falling apart from me in a nest that spans the space of my bedroom.
Shit.