Page 59 of Zodiac Beasts

A mate mark.

Worse yet, I could feel the burn on my own skin, in the same place. With absolute fear and hesitation, I glanced down and pulled away the towel I had wrapped around my waist. The Virgo’s symbol was burned into my skin, with the deep, unsettling glow of a completed and mutual blood ritual.

I’d formed a mate pact with a woman who was not only my coworker, my classmate, and a completely unviable match, but one who already bore two other marks of two other Alphas, one of which I’d already rejected. I’d just permanently tied myself to both of them, when I couldn’t even commit to a first date.

I dragged a hand down my face, absolutely mortified. I needed to find some way to take it back, but I needed an Alpha for that. An Omega and a Beta shouldn’t have been able to fully form a completed pact at all without an Alpha’s permission.

I… I’d had her Alpha’s permission.

No no no no no. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Fuck my fucking life.

After last night, I could only hope that she was so terrified of what she’d seen, she’d want to reject the mark. She could probably convince Marcus to help her, right?

No, he was a psychopath. Maybe her other mate was better. I needed to try that angle. Whoever he was, he couldn’t be worse than Marcus.

But her other Alpha hadn’t completed his claim yet. Would that even work. Devil’s curse, please don’t make it so I need Marcus.

I didn’t have any other options though. I couldn’t tell Mother or the matchmaker. Even if they knew a way to break the pact, if she was truly Lamia’s daughter, they would never let me. That was the match of a lifetime.

I wouldn’t subject Lila to that. We weren’t a match. We weren’t compatible that way, by the stars or otherwise, even if she was apparently into things that no one should be into, and my beast had just loved that.

With a shake of my head, I picked up her limp body and carried her to the bathroom. Her eyes watched me, but she couldn’t move or speak. I couldn’t neutralize that much poison from her blood stream when I wasn’t shifted. She was going to be stuck like this for at least another six hours as the venom passed.

I filled the bath, because a shower wasn’t enough to scrub away my sins. I added soap, until the hot water was covered by a layer of soft pink bubbles.

I was trying to protect her modesty, if such a thing existed anymore.

I tested the temperature, then lowered her into the water. She truly was my little doll. My puppet that I had to bathe, dress, and take care of.

And I was calling her kinks fucked up. The only reason she’d ever experienced this kind of trauma was because I’d subjected her to it.

I sighed, ignoring my body’s reaction to the situation, as I did my best to pretend it wasn’t as dire as it seemed.

I supported her back with one hand, and I started washing her with a cloth and a loofa. I meticulously scrubbed every inch of her, from top to bottom, trying to focus my thoughts more on the bubbles that hid her from me, than the feel and shape of her body beneath my fingertips. A full body tremor shook through me as I ran the washcloth over my mate mark. I closed my eyes, and chanted to myself that it was fine.

A feeling of contentment and comfort warmed my chest, and I didn’t know how such a thing had penetrated my panic. I welcomed the easier headspace, even if I knew I didn’t deserve a sanctuary right now.

The bubbles popped, and the water sloshed as I repositioned her against the back of the tub, and I lifted her legs, one at a time, to scrub down to her feet. I rubbed soap and pressure into her arches, and I cleaned between her small and delicate toes. I took a deep, deep, deeeep breath before I lathered my palms and rubbed beneath her breasts, trying not to acknowledge how nice the weight felt on my hands. Every roll and curve of her soft body was heaven to touch, and it was getting harder and harder to reject the soothing calm and playful desire that kept knocking on my mind.

This wasn’t sexual. This was supposed to be healing: Gentle aftercare after a violent night.

I massaged shampoo into her scalp, assuring the lavender scented liquid penetrated fully. Despite the paralytics in her muscles, her eyes glossed with a hint of pleasure that nearly took some of my guilt away. The scent complimented her natural Apple Pie pheromones.

It had to be some cruel irony that apple compote was my favorite desert. I’d been told my Omega scent was more akin to chocolate chip cookies, while she smelled like the carefree innocence of summer.

I used the handheld showerhead to rinse out the shampoo, then I took my time conditioning every lock of her beautiful dark hair. My heart beat started to slow, and I gave into that sense of calm, as I saw this doll so serene in the water: clean, cared for, and safe. She’d survived looking into my eyes, and she survived me at my worst.

A goddess, indeed.

I lifted her from the tub, and I wrapped her in my softest robe. I positioned her on a stool in front of the bathroom mirror, then I stood behind her for support as I took my time brushing the tangles from her hair.

The adrenaline and panic was completely gone now. The more time I spent pampering her unmoving body, the more at ease I felt. I watched those soulful eyes through the mirror, and it dawned on me that this relaxed contentment wasn’t mine at all. We shared a bond now, and she liked what I was doing for her. Lamia was a goddess, after all. A fallen angel who became a demon, as punishment from a jealous wife. Her soul wanted to be served and waited on, and I was uniquely trained and conditioned to do exactly that.

The ways that we were a good match might have been what scared me the most.

If she was a lion—a cat, I mean—she would have purred as I used the blow dryer to fluff that luscious hair of hers, and she might have nuzzled into me as I thoroughly massaged lotion into her skin. There were no deep shared feelings of judgment or anger. Only peace.