47 Ryatt
Asmall knock came at our door. It surprised me because not many knew we were in our quarters again. Being separated from Kit drove us mad, but we respected her wishes to leave her alone. We respected her recovery, so she needed to get through it without us hindering it.
Opening the door, I found the very woman I had on my mind. She still looked pale with hollow eyes, but she had a normal glow to her again. “Hi.”
“Hi,” I replied, surprised by her visit.
“Do you have time for a walk?” she let her sweet voice carry in a timid tone.
“Uh, yeah.” I looked back inside to see Franco watching me. Nodding my head, he got the gist that I’d be heading out with Kit. His curiosity made him envy my precarious predicament with her, but he knew to let me handle it as the ruling Alpha of our group.
Falling in stride with her, she still wasn’t healed enough to hold up a brisk pace, so I let her lead with what she was comfortable with.
Meandering down the hall, Kit remained quiet while fiddling with her fingers in front of her.
It made me wonder if she planned to give me a bout of bad news.
She finally sighed, relenting to whatever ate at her mind.
“I’m sorry,” she started. I choked on my saliva because I hadn’t been prepared for her apology.
“Sorry? For what? Kit, you’re the last person who owes me an apology.”
“For how I snapped at you guys when you were trying to help the other day.” Ah, I understood a little bit more, but I still disagreed with it.
“Anika was there for me, my rock, being who got me through it last time. There’ll never be a word for how vulnerable I feel when compromised by drugs, violated for everyone to see, so I don’t want them to.
I don’t want you to see me as someone so fragile and desperate. ”
“You’re not,” I argued.
“But I am.” She stopped walking halfway down the empty hallway.
Chewing her lip, she rolled her ankle in place anxiously.
A sadness made tears gather in her eyes.
“I’m addicted to drugs, Ry. No matter how many good days pass in between, I crave them.
I yearn for the escape they offer from reality.
There’s a peace within drugs because they take away the nightmares for me to embrace my delusions.
I never feel haunted or anxious, and my heart never nearly pounds out of my chest when on them.
I love that feeling even though I know the cost to achieve it. ”
“But you’ve been fighting your addiction. You’ve proven to be stronger than it.”
“No, I just learned to give myself bumpers to help me stay away.” She looked at me like her next confession would ruin how I felt about her.
“When you first came here, I told you no drugs for my people. And while that’d been partially true, it was for me.
If I knew you had them on you, I’d want them.
I’d stoop to low levels to use you to have them, and I don’t want to be that weak girl Saul turned into a crack whore.
I don’t want you to see me be that broken. I didn’t want you to see…”
She couldn’t finish, rubbing the outsides of her arms to hold herself together.
It was hard seeing her lose the battle to her mind, unable to fend off the demons within by my own force.
Stepping closer, I placed us so close that our fronts begged to skim with each inhale.
My hand reached forward to tuck some hair behind her ear.
Kit hadn’t gotten ready the way she typically did in this place, but I liked this simple version of her.
This was the one I had fallen head over heels for.
Stroking the raised skin Saul branded her cheek with, he had done something archaic and outlawed, and I hated he tried to ruin what’d been mine.
I taught her how to take my knot and eased her into taking Turners. She’d been perfect.
“My opinion will never change about you, Kit. Knowing your struggles just makes me love you more because only you could turn all of it into this.” I gestured to the place we stood in.
“Clearly, I hate myself a little more for everything that has happened to you, but you have proven you’ll always be more than it all. You’ll always be more than I deserve.”
“Ry,” she breathed my name in a plea, closing her eyes to feel my touch that now cupped her cheek. A small tear was shed for me to feel the warmth of the wetness follow the length of my finger. “I’m not who you need anymore. I’m not that girl.”
“Because you became this woman: strong, powerful, demanding.” She needed to hear me stay it out loud, even if it bothered me to see an Omega fight.
Not an Omega, my Omega. “Your beauty will forever render me the fool, Kitty, but I’ve changed from the boy you loved.
I’m harder, meaner, cruel to the lower powers. ”
“You’re everything I thought you’d become,” she admitted, knowing where my life was destined to become.
“And you’re everything that can handle it.”
Walking her backward, I let her hit the wall to be caged in by me.
Her spooked eyes weren’t from not wanting me.
She knew her soul could no longer deny me.
We once thought we shouldn’t ruin her by claiming her in our dark world, but now I learned we’d been the idiots back then.
Nothing could make up for that, but I wouldn’t let the immaturity of our youth destroy my future again.
I blocked her in with my arms and made her hold my stare to feel the authenticity of my next words. “I want you. The others want you. Goddammit, Kit, we fucking need you.”
My mouth crashed over hers, and I couldn’t fight the need to taste her for another minute.
Both my hands held her face as hers latched onto my forearms to keep herself upright.
A small gasp parted from her lips, begging me to never stop this merge between us.
My veins were hit with our arousing rush of heat, electrifying everything within me to begin humming.
White noise settled in my ears as I inhaled her heavy lemon scent.
More than anything, I wanted to keep going.
I wanted this spark between us to burst into the endless firework we were meant to become.
Our fire was eternal, so I’d be okay waiting for her to accept this between us.
Plus, I knew she couldn’t agree to be mine, knowing it would deny Damien access to her due to it.
There had to be a way around those pack laws, and I had every intention to find them.
Pulling back, I let us both catch our breaths.
Closing my eyes, I pressed my forehead to hers.
Tightening her grip, she held onto my arms to physically tell me she didn’t want me to pull away.
“Not a single day went by that my heart didn’t beat for you, bleed for you.
I fucking love you, Kit. I need you to be mine because I know I can’t go back to what we were for the last seven years. ”
“Ry.” Her lip quivered. Closing her eyes, she thought I was asking her to choose.
“If there was a way to have us both, would you be mine?” I finally asked the thing I was too afraid to discover the answer to. I feared her not choosing me, but now I knew she couldn’t deny either of us.
“I’ve never stopped being yours, but I became his too.” Letting me go, she wrapped her arms around my neck to hold me closer.
“Saying yes to either of us would break your heart without the other,” I concluded.
“And I know you’ll never be in the same pack with how our city is ran. Both your jobs hold importance, and I know I can’t be selfish when it comes to your roles. I’m also still grieving Saul. As dumb as that sounds…”
“He was your Alpha, Kit. Not by choice, but that bond doesn’t care.”
“It really doesn’t. I keep walking around with an ache in my chest that wants to suffocate me into permanent silence.
I fucking hated Saul, but he stuck it to me in his death.
” Rubbing her chest, she stepped back from me.
“I think it’s my hate for him that offers me a smidge of hope, though.
If I had loved him like you, I wouldn’t have survived. I wouldn’t want to.”
“You’ve already survived me,” I reminded her of the thing I regretted most.
“But we weren’t bonded. You guys ripped my heart out, but I was unmated. Plus, I got shoved right into the depths of hell after. The drugs helped me minimize what my heart felt, and I liked it.”
“You’re stronger than those drugs, you’re stronger than Saul’s forced bonding, and you’re strong enough to run an empire without being caught,” I emphasized everything she needed to hear because it was true.
“Hopefully that strength helps me endure the chaos now that things are changing again. Now that the Alphas are safe, I’m not sure what kind of environment will be left around here.”
“Whatever you do, you’ll always have us,” I offered her the olive branch between our packs.
“And you’re always welcome here. Thank you for walking with me today.” Reaching up to kiss my cheek, she began sauntering away from me.
She nearly got to the corner as my eyes stayed glued to her backside before she doubled over and rammed herself against the nearest wall to catch her. Falling over completely, I bolted to her side in an instant. “Kit! What’s wrong?”
Right after I said it, I smelled it. She went into heat, and she was an unmarked female.
Her secret scent wouldn’t be enough to hide this from the other packs.
Her panicked eyes flipped over her shoulder to see me pausing right above her.
My instincts told me to fuck her here and now, but I knew better as a man.
Kit couldn’t be fucked like a wild animal after what she just endured.
It took me a minute to fight the drive inside me, but I gritted my teeth and held my breath.
She needed me to get her to safety before someone else acted on a whim.
Without our emotional connection, I wouldn’t have been able to fight it. My animalistic urges would’ve won.
“Ry?” she worried over my intent.
“I’m taking you to your room. From there, the choice is yours.”
She hunkered into herself because she wasn’t sure if she was ready for something like that. Keeping quiet, I wondered what she had done for her past ones. At our age, I knew she had to have a few by now.
When we arrived, I placed her on her bed and backed up to her door for her to see me giving her the space she needed. I did this for her to know I wasn’t a threat to her healing. “You know how to reach me if you’d like help through this. I promise, I won’t ever mark you without your consent.”
Dipping her chin, I could see her beginning to stave off the initial wave of hankering need ebbing through every nerve within her. She tried to open her mouth, but she couldn’t breathe evenly enough to get her words out.
“Ssstay,” she hissed.
That was all I needed as I slammed her door shut and slid my pants down for her to see my hardened cock with my knot ready for her.
Kit’s eyes flared, remembering my girth that used to stretch her completely.
Licking her dry lips, I pounced on her before she thought better of this.
I was finally going to have the only woman I couldn’t forget.