Chapter 30
“Go!” I’m panting as I climb into the helicopter. “We need to get out of here.”
“Where’s Caspian?” Madi’s already buckled into a seat, but her shaking hands frantically try to unclasp the hooks. “We can’t leave without him!”
“We have to.” I lunge for her, kneeling on the floor, and covering her hands with mine to stop her from trying to get up.
The pilot is already turning around as one of the crew members pulls up the ladder. I thought the helicopter was excessive when I first saw it, but now I’m so thankful.
Tears spring from Madi’s eyes as she shakes her head. Phoenix and Sebastian wrap her in their arms from either side, and we all offer what comfort we can.
Once the ladder is in, the crewmate offers me a headset. I quickly put it on so Madi can hear me better.
“It’s going to be okay, sweetheart. He’ll find us. But we need to get you safe.” I squeeze her hand in my larger one. “It’s what he wanted.”
She just cries harder, her sobs breaking my heart. I can’t bring myself to separate from her, even just to sit in a seat across the aisle, so I stay where I am on the floor and rest my head in her lap.
We can all feel Caspian’s reassurance through the bond even with the underlying current of stress. Hopefully, it’ll be enough to calm our sweet omega.
We don’t talk on the rest of the short flight. We just hold each other and hope. I have to believe that Caspian will find his way to us. There’s no other choice. Now that the submersibles have been destroyed, we have no way of helping him. All we can do is stay close by and wait.
When we land, the captain is waiting for us.
“Thank the gods we found ya,” he says. “Had me nervous there for a minute, kid.” He claps Phoenix on the back as he climbs out of the helicopter first. “When ya didn’t come up, and we saw that sub wreckage floatin’…
” He shakes his head. “Well, I’m just glad you found your way to safety, whatever happened. ”
Madi and I are still in the chopper, but we can hear them from where they’re standing. She makes no move to get out, though.
“You okay?” I ask.
She stares past me at the ocean. “No. I just got you all back, and now… No, I’m not okay.”
With a sigh, I undo her seatbelt and lift her into my arms. The strain pulls at the cut on my bicep, but it’s not enough to make me let go of my omega.
“Let’s get you inside and have someone look you over. Then we can make a plan, okay, sweetheart?”
She doesn’t respond. The rest of the guys follow us into the ship.
We don’t have a doctor on board, which was probably an oversight, but Phoenix says a few of the crew have some basic medical training.
One such young man joins us in the main deck lounge.
He attempts to look at the cut on my arm, but I pull away.
“Her first,” I growl.
He seems like he wants to protest, but he doesn’t. He listens to Madi’s heart, takes her temperature, bandages a few minor scrapes she has from the volcanic rock, and gives her some vitamins that he suggests she takes for a while, since she’s probably malnourished.
He doesn’t ask questions about what she was doing out there, and my respect for Sebastian’s ability to pick a discrete crew increases even more. While he works, I let Phoenix clean and bandage my own wound. It’s not deep and should heal up just fine.
“Honestly, you seem fit as a fiddle,” the guy says to Madi. “Apart from the sunburn.” He grabs a bottle of aloe and squirts some onto his hand like he’s about to put it on her.
Hell, no. Two alpha growls fill the room, and he instantly freezes.
“Sorry, man,” he says, almost sheepish. He tosses Phoenix the bottle of aloe. “She should get something on that burn, though. And rest.”
“We’ll take care of it.”
As soon as he leaves, Madi is off the couch. “Come on. We need to get Caspian.”
The three of us just stare at her.
She puts her hands on her hips. “Well?”
“Madi, the submersibles were destroyed.” Sebastian takes a tentative step toward our omega. His tone is calm. “Tythas is at least a thousand feet under the water, maybe more. I know you’re worried. We all are. But there’s nothing we can do right now.”
“He’ll find us,” I add my assurance, but it doesn’t land with my mate. She turns her hard eyes on me, the same determined fire I saw when I rejected her thesis sparking to life.
“I swam to the city before.” She props her hands on her hips and stares at us like a challenge.
“How?” Phoenix sounds incredulous.
“I don’t know. Maybe being mated to Caspian changed something.
I feel like the longer we’re mated or the more time we spend together, the more I can withstand his world.
It would make sense. Nature’s way of ensuring our mating can survive.
” She shrugs. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is Caspian. We have to help him.”
The thought of her down there alone has my alpha going wild. I can’t let her do it. I won’t let her out of my sight again. “Absolutely not.”
She squares off with me. “You can’t make me abandon my mate!”
“Yet you’re fine abandoning me?!” I immediately regret raising my voice, but the thought of losing her again has my alpha instincts howling.
Her eyes soften a little as she stares at me, but they don’t lose any of their fiery resolve.
I tug at the roots of my hair. “I’m not fine with it. We’re not abandoning him. But there’s no way in hell I’m letting you go down there alone.”
“Letting me?” Her voice is icy cold.
Shit. I look to Phoenix for help, but he just crosses his arms over his chest and lifts his eyebrows. Sebastian’s expression is tense, but he doesn’t weigh in either. Smarter men than me. But I can’t seem to control myself.
“Yes, letting you,” I hear myself say, even as an inner voice screams at me to shut up.
“I’ll tie you to the bed if I have to. Chain you to me.
Keep you locked on my knot every second of every day, so you can never…
so I never have to…” My voice is choked.
I drag my palm down my face and shake my head before looking at her again.
“I can’t lose you. Don’t leave me. Please, baby. Please.” A sob shatters the last word.
Madi’s hands are on me a second later, palms rubbing soft circles over my chest. “Shhh, it’s okay. I’m right here.”
I lift her up, and she wraps her legs around my waist. My vision blurs with tears I’ve been holding back for too long.
Heedless of the other men, I carry my omega out of the room, down the hall, and into the bedroom I’ve commandeered on the ship. She strokes my hair as I walk, cooing sweet nothings in my ear. We both know what my alpha needs. There’s only one thing that’s gonna calm me down.
I fumble the door open and kick it closed the second we’re inside. “Need you. Now.”
The heat spike, taking care of her with Phoenix and Caspian, was incredible, but it wasn’t enough to soothe my frayed edges. We’ve been separated for too long.
She kisses my neck, scratching her nails through my hair. “How do you want me, Professor?”
I groan and carry her straight into the bathroom. Our clothes are stiff from sun-drying after being drenched in saltwater. I need them off. Need every reminder of what she went through washed away.
I’m not careful as I rip her shirt and shorts from her body and set her inside the tiny square shower.
It’s barely big enough for both of us, but that will just put us closer.
After pulling off my own clothes, I climb in after her and turn on the water.
I don’t care that it’s freezing cold. I need the sting right now.
Plus, I don’t want it to be too hot for her, not with that sunburn.
Madi yelps, and I cover her body with mine, taking the brunt of the sharp spray until it warms. Once it’s a comfortable temperature, I spin us so she’s under the rainwater shower head.
She moans, a small smile lifting her lips as her eyes flutter closed.
It’s got to feel good after days of having only the salty ocean.
She opens her mouth, rinses it out, and spits. Did she even have fresh water on that rock? How did she survive? It’s honestly a miracle, and the stress and anxiety of the past few days have me feeling feral and desperate as the adrenaline crashes out of my body now that we’re safe.
I have the sudden urge to have her spitting something completely different. I picture her with Phoenix’s cum in her mouth, dribbling it onto my cock before I fuck it into her tight cunt. Fuck. I squeeze my knot and slam my other hand on the wall behind Madi, boxing her in and making her jump.
“You know what I need, omega,” I growl.
She innocently bats her wet lashes at me. “I haven’t a clue, Professor.”
“Brat.” I nip at her breast, right over Phoenix’s still healing bond mark and mine. Damn, they look good on her gorgeous skin. “Need inside you, baby. Need it so damn bad.”
“You were inside me just a few hours ago.” She chuckles, teasing as she drags her hand down my chest, stopping just before she reaches my stiff cock.
“Not enough,” I grunt, lifting her off her feet with my hands on her ass, sliding her up the shower wall. “Never enough.”
She wraps her legs around me, and I don’t waste time prepping her or easing her into this. I’m too desperate, and I can tell from her scent, she’s plenty wet for me. I tug her straight down my length, both of us groaning in harmony as I fill her.
“Fuck… Madi, baby, you feel so good.” I rock my hips, and she arches her back, breasts forward, showing off my bite mark. We’re in basically the same position we were in when I bonded her, but this time we’re completely naked, nothing between us. As it should be. Gods, I’ve missed her.
She claws at my back, the pain just what I need to keep me from going completely feral. I palm her ass, lifting and lowering her, spearing into her like my life depends on making her come. I swear it does. Wanna hear her screams more than I want my next breath.
“Come on, baby girl. Show me how good I make you feel. Show your alpha how much you want it. Prove what a good girl you are for your professor.”
“Yes, yes, alpha, need you.” She’s not lost to the heat haze this time, but she’s just as demanding. My perfect angel.
“Can’t… hold… off,” I growl between thrusts. “Touch yourself. Need you to come, sweetheart.” I pound into her ruthlessly, barely clinging to my sanity. She snakes a hand between us, and her pussy tightens as she rubs rough circles over her clit. “Yes! Come all over my cock.”
“Ah, fuck!” She throws her head back, eyes rolling to the ceiling.
Her cunt flutters around me, and then she’s crying out my name loud enough for the entire ship to hear.
Good, let them all know who she belongs to.
She’s mine. I sink my teeth into the same spot I bonded her before, needing to taste her life on my tongue.
I’m seconds away from coming, but I hold off long enough for her to ride out her orgasm, turning pliant in my arms. Then I pull her off.
She whimpers in protest, but when I set her on her feet and push on her shoulders, she smiles, dropping to her knees.
Knowing exactly what I want, she opens her mouth and sticks out her tongue.
Fuck, what a sight. Madi on her knees, naked and dripping wet. I think of all the times I pictured exactly this as I jerked off in the shower. The reality is so much better than anything I imagined.
I slap my cock against her tongue and that’s all it takes for me to shoot off. “Don’t. Swallow.” I snap the words through gritted teeth.
Madi wraps her lips around me and sucks. I see stars, vision whiting out, coming so hard, I fall back against the wall behind me. When I’ve stopped shaking, Madi stands up and opens her mouth, showing me the pearly release on her tongue.
I wrap my hand around her throat. “Now swallow.”
Her neck muscles flex under my hand as she does what I asked. I nearly lose it again as I feel her work my cum down her throat. A second later, I’m kissing her, holding her up to explore every inch of her mouth. Her knees give out, and I draw back to find her heavy lidded.
“Sorry,” she whispers. “Tired.”
“That’s okay, sweetheart. You did so well. Such a good girl for me.” I kiss her forehead. “Let me take care of you now.”
With an arm banded around her waist, I wash her hair and body one-handed, supporting her weight as I work. It might not be the most thorough cleaning, but I get most of the salt off and comb my fingers through her hair until the tangles are all gone.
“You’re so perfect.” I kiss her softly, both of us finally coming down from the frenzy.
“My sweet Madi. I’m so proud of you for taking care of yourself, for staying alive until we could get here.
You’re so strong. So smart. So beautiful and perfect.
” I praise her and tell her all the things I admire about her until her eyes drift closed, and still I whisper in her ear.
“I love you, angel. I was lost without you. Please, never leave me again.”
Even though she’s half-asleep, I keep us under the spray of water, holding and rocking her, unwilling to let go.