*
KEON WAS ABOUTto break the cover of the trees and enter the clearing where he’d once found solace, when voices froze his step. This land lay at the rear of his parents’ home, and no one knew it was an escape when he needed to think. Unless Weston needed him, no one encroached on this sacred space.
Keon edged close enough to recognise the voices. Vega and Eliseo, the twenty-two-year-old Weston claimed changed after Simeon became Alpha. An unusual pairing. He knew Eliseo vaguely from a childhood of being the same age, but not spending much time together. When had he and Vega grown close?
Rumour claimed Eliseo had ‘corrupted’ Simeon, but Keon imagined the reverse was true. Simeon never needed an excuse to be reprehensible, but Eliseo had always been sweet, strong and independent. His brother had broken more hearts and crept into more beds than Keon cared to count. Only Simeon could change the teenager he’d known into the man he’d become.
Keon peeked around the tree, dismay flooded Keon to see Eliseo pressed against Vega. Grabbing Eliseo’s ass and kissing with abandon, Vega showed no interest in whatever Eliseo whispered in his ear. Disappointed but unsurprised, Keon leaned against the tree, taking slow, deep breaths. He wished they hadn’t corrupted the one place he could find peace in this forsaken land.
Weakness rooted his feet to the ground, despite the noises, though he refused to watch the betrayal. Vega and Eliseo descended into noisily groping and inevitable screwing, feet away, but he couldn’t find the strength to leave. A brutal mirror to a similar night years ago.
Part of Keon needed to confront Vega, to get closure, to discover why Vega rejected him. The betrayal of Vega sharing his body with anyone but his true mate stung deeply. It would have hurt a human but not to the point of crippling pain. Faithful, Keon had never indulged in the men who flirted and danced at the fraternity, never succumbed, despite what Rylee thought.
Drew understood, encouraging Keon to embrace a social life but hold his traditions close. Drew, who begged him not to discard his beliefs from loneliness and despair, to wait for a real connection. He’d never shared a kiss or intimate touch, hoping for his mate to be the first. Knowing it would never be Vega.
Knowing the pain Drew had gone through with Aniel, Keon had trusted that no one could guide him through relationships better. Drew would be ashamed of the Fates for giving Keon a mate like Vega.
Sharing his body with half the pack while Keon was gone was a sin to traditional foame. The truth was harder to swallow. A memory so painful he could barely recall it without fear of breaking.
When Keon’s thoughts grew quiet and the heavy breathing dissipated, he risked a second glance. Vega lay naked on the grass, Eliseo straddling his waist and kissing his chest. Vega’s face was blank, barely reacting to Eliseo except to brush fingers through his blond hair. Drew and Rylee would have been teasing, kissing, sharing signs of their pleasure, their love.
What Keon witnessed proved this meant nothing to Vega. Adding another token of betrayal to the fire already burning in his heart.
“I needed this,” Vega said, dispassionately.
“You thought I’d say no?” Eliseo peeked through his hair to watch Vega.
“Erin did.”
This wasn’t a relationship or a one-off indiscretion. He was using Eliseo as he used others. He wasn’t sure what was worse: Vega treating others with disregard or Eliseo tolerating it.
“Her loss is my gain,” Eliseo said, drawing a laugh from Vega, becoming a hum of approval as Eliseo’s mouth drifted lower. As lips grazed his exposed cock, Vega grabbed his hair and yanked hard enough to make Eliseo yelp.
“What did I tell you?”
“It’s not mine,” he grumbled, sighing when Vega pushed him away. He looked devastated when Vega rolled to his feet, tugging on trousers. Proof his emotions were being toyed with. “Seriously, I can’t suck it, because it belongs to the Alpha?” He mocked, lying in the grass, but Keon saw the hurt. Knew it from personal experience. “You think he won’t know what a whore you’ve been?”
Vega pulled on his shirt and huffed, as Keon’s gut clenched. “We’re mates. Nothing else matters.”
Eliseo exploded from the grass to his feet, startling Keon into darting behind the tree to avoid being seen. “You think he’ll want you after he knows you’ve fucked half the pack?”
“Four people is not half the pack.”
“It’s enough to make Keon refuse you. He already told the pack he’s rejecting your ass. Never intending to accept his true mate.” Anger and hurt rising, Eliseo pushed Vega. “You thought you were about to upgrade from a nobody to an Alpha’s Consort, right? Let me tell you?” He stepped closer, words low, bitter fury wrapped in hate. “?being the Alpha’s mate doesn’t make you better than us. It makes you a willing bitch-in-heat for an asshole who won’t take no for an answer.”
Keon’s breath caught, the venom in Eliseo’s voice suggesting his mate was an Alpha. Or, was it possible his true mate was Simeon? The Fates had a tendency to match those of similar age.
Eliseo must be made of steel to have survived his death.
The revelation made sense, and raised Keon’s opinion of Eliseo while adding another layer to his ruminations. If Eliseo and Simeon had been true mates, Keon wasn’t alone in having a same-sex true mate. The Fates had giventwosame-sex true mates in one generation.
Suddenly, stepping out the closet wasn’t as terrifying. If Keon stood proudly, others would feel capable of doing the same. Rejecting people like Vega and Simeon, who made them feel guilty or ashamed. People who stuck to the idea of an Alpha—or any male—being dominant, and in terms of being gay, the top. That wasn’t how Keon felt. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t been craving a cock in his ass since he was sixteen.
Walking in on Simeon in the midst of one of his orgies had started it. Girls had never stirred a reaction, but it took one man toknow.A stranger Simeon had brought from another pack. Slim, compact, lithe, and stunning. He’d picked a cute ginger man from the crowd, got him onto all fours, and fucked like a God taking his dues. The look on the ginger man’s face, pure bliss, the adoration when a hand grabbed his jaw and tilted his head for the stranger to plunder his mouth. The sounds emanating from him.
Keon had been transfixed, hiding behind a tree as the activity drifted, and those two men became the basis for every fantasy to follow. The most erotic scene of his existence, until he found gay porn in Dnara. After watching those two for hours, bringing in another body to tongue-fuck or grope but never drifting far, Keon had been sure. He’d gone home and replayed the scene a million times. While the top had been hot, the way his hips pounded into a tight ass, and hands dug into hips, made Keon shudder when he imagined themonhim.Inhim.
The revelation shook his world, leaving Keon stricken and confused, until Dnara revealed men were multi-faceted, not the linear image of Vihaan. Rylee was right about his daddy issues, but had misinterpreted what he craved. It wasn’t the size or authority he wanted, but a man who took what he needed, what he wanted, when and how he wanted it, because it was his to take. Keongavehim the right, the power, to take it.
