“No,” he said, pulling his face up even with mine. His eyes rooted me to the spot. “You don’t call on the gods when I’m touching you. You’remine,” he growled, his fingers against my neck tightening a bit more. “You use my name. Weston or Alpha. Now come for me, Little Wolf,” he commanded.
Like a damn bursting, pleasure exploded through me. I cried out with the sheer power of it, this time using his name and earning an approving growl for my efforts. My knees weakened and I clung to him.
He dropped his head to rest his lips right beside my ear, pulling out his fingers and then rolling them around my clit. Aftershocks rippled through me.
“Good girl,” he praised, and his electric heat sizzled across my skin. “This was a warning. The next time you wander away, you’ll be on your knees, worshipping my cock.”
Tingles flowed over me. He pulled away, leaving me standing there panting, my eyes closed. I didn’t hear him leave but felt his growing distance as though part of him was still attached to me. In a moment, when the feeling subsided, I let my eyes drift open.
Hadriel stood in the clearing with his hands braced on his hips and his colorful jacket catching and throwing the sunlight.
“Well,” he said, not coming closer. “That’ll teach you to wander off, hmm? Looked like a nice little fingerfuck you had just there. I see you have a darkening mark to show for it. I sure hope you didn’t intend to fuck any more of your captors, because there’s no way that’s going to happen now. No one is going to come near you.”
“They wouldn’t have, anyway.” I shivered with a lingering aftershock.
“I suppose you’re right. No one’s stupid enough to touch an alpha’s—never mind. Come on, let’s go get you a new shirt. It’s like he thinks we have an endless supply of your drab attire. What if you have to start borrowing from other people? I’d bet you won’t know what to do with yourself if you slapped on a little color, not that there’s much of it around this place.”
I followed after him like a lost little lamb, not really sure what to say for myself. WhatcouldI say for myself? He was right. I’d just let my captor, the guy who’d I’d sworn not to touch again, finger me until completion. And though he hadn’t claimed me, he’d marked me for all to see. I was his prisoner in body and now in flesh. Worse, whenever he was near, I was his in spirit, too. It was like every time he came close, he gave me a drug that stripped away my rationale. A drug I couldn’t chase away with my mind.
A drug I really fucking liked.
Maybe that was why people were getting so addicted—assuming I could believe my captors. They loved the experience my product created. They didn’t have the mind power, or the threat of Granny’s punishments, to balance out the temptation.
I wasn’t sure what I could do about that, though I guessed it didn’t really matter, anymore. Granny was gone and her organization with her. Unless he handed me off to another distributor or his dragons decided to forgive whateverwrongdoing they thought I was a part of and jump into the trade, my days of making product were over.
Getting back to what he’d said, I chose the most obvious to focus on.
“You watched all that?” I asked meekly.
We wound through the trees.
“Of course I watched all that. I got there late but absolutely stayed for the end of the show. You were standing in a fucking field, getting off on him manhandling you. I was riveted.”
I grimaced, expecting embarrassment or outrage. Instead, a strange sliver of heat wormed through me. A weird sprinkle of pride that he should witness me with the alpha.
What in the hell was going on with me? More importantly, what could I do to stop it?
“I bet his wolf was leaning on him hard. Sometimes our animals have a way of influencing us. Too bad Leala isn’t here,” he murmured. “She’d help you work out your kinks. Seems like you like a little dominance play, huh? You like being... maybe not submissive, but a little passive? You should try enraging him next time and letting him take out his aggression on you. You might like that. You’d probably get the bang of your life.”
In the space where the camp used to be, people were waiting atop their horses, the shiny and well-groomed animals swishing their tails. Other people waited near them, holding supplies or standing with donkeys. The alpha—Weston—was nowhere to be found.
Hadriel walked past and I followed, noticing people look my way, their gazes once again tracking my movements. It wasn’t my lack of magic they were gawking at this time—it was the prisoner with the ripped shirt and intimate mark on her neck.
“What the fuck am I doing?” I murmured, my face heating.
“Making very delightful, if somewhat questionable choices.” He plucked at my shirt to get me moving faster. “I wouldn’tworry too much about it. You might as well have a little fun before the end, if that is what’s to come. I know all about that. I lived that for sixteen years or so. Just please, love...” He stopped and faced me, his expression serious. “Stop before you reach shame-fucking. That’s a very slippery slope. Learn from your ol’ pal Hadriel. Hate fucking is fine. Getting off on the power play of captor and prisoner? Sounds fucking amazing, and I’m definitely going to roleplay that as soon as I can wrangle up some kinky fuckery. But shame fucking? No. You’ve gone too far.” He started walking again, leaving me sputtering awkwardly. “I promised you stories and I will absolutely deliver. You’ll see what I mean. By the way, did you find all the dicks on my jacket, yet? I wore it again today since you didn’t have enough time to see them all last night. Wasn’t that nice of me? Now, where the fuck is that fucking supply wagon?”
As my mind tried once again to process his words, my gaze dutifully fell to the back of his jacket, quickly spying several dicks sewn into the design. Various carts and wagons gathered in the middle of a forming line, many of these pulled by a sturdy horse or two.
“Ah, here we are.” Hadriel ran his hand over the rump of a black horse with white spots before stopping at the cart it was attached to. A man off to the side glanced his way and then noticed me. He saw my ripped shirt and then the mark on my neck, his eyes widening a little.
“What do you need?” he asked Hadriel, his surprise not coloring his tone.
“A shirt for her. She had a tryst with her enemy and ended up coming all over his fingers.”
My face started burning but the man seemed to take it in stride. Apparently Hadriel’s manner was no secret among the pack. It meant he wasn’t putting on an act for me, something I appreciated.
“The alpha is acting fair peculiar with her, ain’t he?” The man helped Hadriel unhook the latch and pull open the back of the cart. He stood back, leaning against the edge of the cart as Hadriel started rifling through packages neatly stacked inside. His gaze took in my face and drifted down my body, sticking on the mark again. I did everything in my power to stop from fidgeting at the appraisal. “I get the appeal—she’s stunning—but it isn’t like him to let down his guard like that. She’s a murderer, for heaven’s sakes. She took down my mate’s friend’s nephew. Our alpha can’t stand the things she’s responsible for. You’d think he’d kill her himself, not take her to the dragons. He’s got that personal grudge against it, you know? Why wait when we can just be done with her now, that’s what I say. I can’t stand the sight of her, let alone want to have sex with her.”
