21. Raptor
Raptor
Isit upright and swing, my fist punching through the air where he was sitting, mocking me. My breathing comes hard and loud, but as soon as I register the strangeness of the room I’m in, the light filtering through pink flower-decorated curtains and the smell of the alphas, I realise I’m safe.
Realising it and convincing my body are two different things. I lift my shaking hand to my face and wipe away the sweat, then shove the sheet off me and slip out of the bed. When I look back, I can make out a tangle of alphas that are rousing, but I don’t want to face them yet.
They make me weak.
The house is unfamiliar, and I get flashes of memory from Merle, but she was tired and wasn’t paying attention.
Stupid. We’ve told her a dozen times or more that she needs to map the buildings so the rest of us know how to get out.
I walk quicker, frustrated and getting more so when I can’t easily find my clothes or my pack.
My bra and underwear are comfortable, but I feel exposed, and I don’t need that right now. In this moment, I need safety.
Clothes are part of that.
Two bedrooms, a fugly ass bathroom with peach porcelain from way too many decades ago. The tiles have flowers. It’s just too much. I use the toilet, then wash my face, looking into the mirror on the medicine cupboard that is hanging on the wall.
I look tired and worn out. Shell shocked.
When is this going to end?
I slip out of the bathroom and head deeper into the house until I find a lounge with a dining room attached and then finally the kitchen.
Blaze is frying something in a pair of jeans and nothing else. He’s got a dragon tattoo that winds up the side of his ribs with its head sitting on his shoulder blade like it’s daring someone to attack him.
I trace each muscle, each scar, each imperfection, the hairs, the freckles. Try to look at him objectively. Try to find a weakness and convince myself that he’s just an alpha. Same as any other alpha.
He turns, and all my intentions fly away.
His expression shifts, and he reaches out with one arm. I slip into his embrace. He holds me with my back against his chest. His arm comes down over my shoulder and wraps around me. He doesn’t hold me gently. Blaze holds me like he knows I want to run, and he forbids it.
“What’s wrong?” His gruff, sleep soft voice is almost too loud.
“Just nightmares. Memories. Things I don’t want to carry anymore.”
He hums, and the vibration of his chest goes through me, soothing the jagged edges.
“You’re always so strong, ready to fight and kill, ready for war. I had wondered if you had a softer side, but you hurt just as much or more. Because he made you weak when you were strong.”
I shudder, biting my lip until it bleeds.
“In your mind, he told you his weakness. You just need to remember it.”
“I don’t want to remember any of it.”
His arm tightens. “Okay, let’s talk about other things.”
“Like what?” I say, staring at the sizzling crêpe.
“Like how we’re going to make you feel better.”
I snort. “Nothing can make me feel better.”
“Oh, I think you underestimate just how determined I can be.”
He uses a spatula to easily remove the crêpe onto a plate with a couple of others already stacked up and moves the frying pan off the stove.
Blaze lets go of me and moves to a drawer where he pulls out a knife and fork. His hair is loose and hanging down to his waist. It looks like a black waterfall.
He comes back and cuts into the stack and stabs a layered section. He lifts it easily and turns to me.
“Open.”
I narrow my eyes. “No one has ever fed me before.”
“Then this will be a wonderful experience. Think of it as learning a new skill.”
He jiggles it in front of me.
“I think this is a terrible-”
He shoves the forkful into my mouth. I almost spit it out, but it tastes good, and I’m hungry.
It’s warm, and it reminds me of being safe and laughter.
Memories I don’t think are mine, but I like to pretend that Merle’s happiness could belong to me, just a little bit.
I blink back the burning in my eyes while I chew.
When he lifts another mouthful, I don’t protest. In fact, I silently eat the whole thing, but I feel like, with each mouthful, he’s stripping me naked, revealing parts of me I never wanted the world to see.
“Okay. So, now that you're fed, let’s get you cleaned up.”
I follow silently as he leads me into the bathroom, closing and locking the door. Blaze is gentle when he takes my clothes off. He doesn’t get out of his jeans, doesn’t try to make it sexual. He just turns on the hot water and gets the shower ready.
“When I was growing up, my dad hated the fact that my mum met her new bonded. That she dared to leave his abusive ass. I was a tool, a weapon to be used against her, and she was just as vicious in making sure I hurt him, too.”
“They hurt you.”
He lifts those freaky grey eyes to me and smiles. “Yes, they did. Until I stopped letting them.”
The deadly violence in his eyes is mesmerizing. He reaches out, watching me carefully. I don’t dare flinch. When his fingers slide over my shoulders, across my collarbone and up to circle my neck, all I can do is groan.
“Do you trust me, Raptor?”
I lift heavy eyelids. That is a loaded question, but the answer is easy to find, harder to say. “Yes.”
He applies just a slight amount of pressure and walks me backward into the water. One hand leaves me and then returns, sliding up the naked curve of my ass and up over my lower back.
I want to lean into his touch, let my shaking knees collapse and cling to him.
The smell of soap poisons the air between us, but we both ignore it. Blaze lathers up his hands and then starts at my neck. Long, slow massages that relax, arouse, break me down and build me up. He is methodical in his movements, not lingering over one part of my body longer than any other.
I watch him, unable to look away. He gets wet, his jeans soaked.
His hair hangs in wet clumps around him.
Somehow, the water makes him seem bigger, stronger, more mysterious.
When his grey eyes flash up to my face, my knees get weak, and I hold my breath, not daring to move lest he disappears like some fairy prince I’ve conjured in a lucid dream.
He kneels down and soaps my legs, then washes my feet.
I can breathe, ah, fuck, no, I can’t.
My alpha stands up and walks me back into the water, reaching for my hair.
He’s gentle but thorough, his fingers slide over my scalp, pulling moans from me.
For some reason, this is far more intimate than him washing any other part of me.
I’m struggling, leaning into him, my breath catching as I fall into the sensations he’s evoking.
He shampoos and conditions my hair, and by the time he’s rinsing it out, I think I might die for this alpha. Murder for him. Crawl for him.
He gets me out and just as meticulously dries my hair.
Blaze ruins me. I have nothing left, no barriers, and worse, I’m not angry. I’m lost, tears prickle at the corners of my eyes.
I’m so broken, how can an alpha like this love me?
“I’m going to keep you safe because I have never wanted anything more than this future we are building.”
I tremble. Me, Raptor. The most fierce of the alters, and this alpha has me shaking like I’m the last leaf hanging on the tree in winter. I’m ready to bend my knees and kneel, shattered, at his feet.
Ready to give up everything. Give him everything.
“Blaze,” I plead.
Stop breaking me. Shatter me. Fix me. Save me. Help me. Make the pain stop. Touch me. Don’t go away. Stay with me. Please. I think I love you.
He dries me and stands behind me, pressing his rock-hard cock against the curve of my ass.
“You’re not alone anymore. You might feel broken, but so am I. Broken things can be beautiful, too. So, next time you wake up with your heart racing and panic driving you out of our bed and into fleeing-”
“I wasn’t running,” I say hoarsely, but it’s a weak protest, we both know I was.
“-you remember that there is an alpha who is all sorts of insane and all yours, ready to kneel in a shower and wash your feet or spill the blood of whoever wrongs you. Your pain is my pain. Your fear is my rage. You don’t walk alone anymore, so don’t turn away from us.”
I spin in his arms, wrapping my arms around him. Holding him so tight that it hurts me.
“I’ve killed for him,” I whisper, my shame scorching the air and our scents.
“He made you.”
“I’ve done horrible, horrible things.”
“You did what you had to do to survive. You were a child. No one could fault you, and I would never. Do you think my hands are clean? Do you think I have lived a life without taking lives?”
His face is stark, completely honest as he looks down at me.
“I will make mistakes.”
He smiles. “So will I.”
He brushes my hair back from my face and then lifts me up. “Let’s get you dressed and see what the plan is for today.”
Blaze reaches for the door, but I grab his hand, stopping him.
“I want…”
“What? What do you want?”
“You,” I say, all the hesitance, all the doubts melt away, and there’s this surety. “I want you.”
He stares at me, his long black hair dripping water.
I reach up with one hand, brushing it back, and then I drop the towel.
It feels symbolic and like I’m giving him something special.
I reach out and hesitantly reach for the zip of his jeans, tugging it down.
The button was undone already, and so when I peel it apart, his jeans just kind of loosen and sit on his hips.
I feel like one brush of my fingers will have them pooling on the floor.
Instead of focusing there, I slide my fingertips up over his stomach and abs, watching the way his muscles tighten and his skin pebbles.
He doesn’t take his eyes off me, and he doesn’t move.
When I get to his chest, I watch in fascination as his little brown nipples harden. I toy with them and then slide my hands up, exploring his shoulders and neck. He really is beautiful.
But then he shivers.
I react instantly, shoving away his jeans and turning back to the shower, turning it on and getting it hot. Once it’s at temperature, I walk him backwards into the shower.
Up until this point, he’s been completely passive, allowing me to explore his body without judgment or pressure, but the heat of the water breaks his control.
I can see it in his eyes.
His hands slide up from my hips, over my ribs, until he cups my breasts. With each stroke of his palms, I lose myself in the mastery of his touch. My body is leaden, twisted up with a heady desire and a focus that has erased the rest of the world.
There is only this shower, me, and this alpha.
He leans in and, without closing his eyes, his lips touch mine.
I wrap my arms around his neck, and he lifts me off the ground, turning so he can press me against the foul pink tiles.
His hot mouth sears my lips, then kisses a path down my throat.
I tilt my neck, giving him more access, my eyelids fluttering.
How is it possible to feel this good? How is this alpha real? This is a dream. I’m going to wake up in hell, but at least I’ll have this one memory.
“Omega,” he whispers. “My omega. I need you.”
I lock my legs around his waist and reach down between us, taking that satin-covered cock in my hands and stroking, feeling like I have the power of a god as this alpha's knees tremble, and he moans for me.
I press him to my entrance, staring in complete fascination at his face as he sinks into me.
The pleasure so honest and raw. And now I can see that he’s giving up something to me.
Something more powerful than I’ve ever been given, something that I have longed for without knowing what it was.
I wrap my arms around him and seal our mouths together.
If he notices my tears under the spray, he doesn’t mention them, and he doesn’t stop, he just gives me everything.
Until we’re as close as an omega and alpha can get without a bond.
But this is better. This is honest. And more than enough.
“Blaze?” I whisper his name, uncertain, scared.
“You take what you want, what you need. Those are the rules,” Blaze whispers against my lips. “Those are your rules now.”