Page 214 of Kingdoms of Night

Which, arguably, I was already going to do, but I could at least try to help by purring for her. Assuming my animal even allowed it at this point.

“I’m not trying to test your control,” she snapped back. “I just… I wanted to touch you.”

“It’s not your right to touch me, Doctor.”

She released a disgruntled little growl of her own, causing my wolf to stand up and take notice. He rather liked that sound. “I didn’t reject you,Alpha. But I’ll concede that Iinsultedyou.”

All I could do was grunt in response. I wasn’t having this conversation again.

“I didn’t mean to insult you, Jonas.”

Another statement unworthy of a response. Whether she meant to or not, she’d done it.Repeatedly. For months.

A year.

I’d tolerated it because I’d seen it as a challenge. Now I understood that it wasn’t a challenge; it was an Omega rejecting an Alpha.

I would not be my biological father.

I would not force myself on an unwilling Omega.

I’d been raised by a good Alpha. He was a V-Clan wolf with a penchant for the night and a taste for blood, but he was also a strong man. AnhonorableAlpha.

He still protected my mother, living peacefully in Blood Sector.

Well, as peacefully as one could during this turbulent time.

But his safety and security was what had allowed me to explore other options. To live outside of the nest. Otherwise, I would have felt compelled to remain home to protect my mother.

Neither of them had withheld the story of my birth, or the events that had led up to it.

He’d claimed my mother while I was still in her womb.

They hadn’t known what it would do to me.

But I’d been all X-Clan Alpha.

Although, if Riley was to be believed, that meant I had no control. So hey, maybe I adopted that “power” from my mother’s mate.

“You’re really mad,” Riley marveled. “I don’t think I’ve seen you mad before.”

It took physical restraint not to react to that asinine comment. Whether she was purposefully goading me or not, I really didn’t know. It seemed all she did was try to piss me off. So why would now be any different?

She fell quiet again, giving me a few minutes of blissful silence.

Until she suddenly jolted against me.

I nearly dropped her as she wrapped her arms around my abdomen, a moan falling from her lips that sounded extremely pained.

Her eyes squeezed shut as she tried to breathe through the movement.

A sigh caught in my throat, my wolf fully aware of her current state. She wasn’t in heat yet. Based on her scent, I’d give her maybe twelve hours before she was out of her mind with need.

But it would still be an uncomfortable climb to that state.

And then pure agony while she suffered through it without being knotted.

I didn’t want to react. I really just wanted to keep walking. Alas, my beast forced a purr into my chest, one meant to soothe the shaking Omega in my arms.

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