Page 102 of Unmarked

His restraint is brutal. Admirable. Maddening.

And I love him a little for it.

We lie there, both of us slick and panting, like survivors of a very specific natural disaster.

My muscles twitch in aftershock, nerves still humming, but I don’t feel dazed anymore.

Not undone. Not broken.

I feel…clear.

“Better?” Ash rasps.

I tilt my chin up, catch his eyes. They’re blown wide, jaw clenched like he’s still holding something back.

And yet - he’s here. With me.

I grin, ruined and smug.

“Yeah,” I whisper. “God, yeah. So much.”

Ash lowers his head and presses a kiss to my temple. It’s soft. Gentle. Almost reverent.

Honestly, it would’ve been sweet if I weren’t currently lying in a puddle of post-orgasmic slick with my legs still shaking like I just ran a marathon and got hit by a lust truck on the way.

He lingers there - nose in my hair, breathing me in like I’m some sacred relic instead of the deeply unhinged omega who just screamed his name like I was auditioning for a metal band.

But beneath the soft, there’s something missing.

Or maybe not missing - just...withheld.

The bond.

I offered it. I felt it rising between us like a tidal wave of instinct and want.

And he didn’t take it.

Not out of cruelty, I don’t think. But still, there’s a quiet kind of hollow in my chest where something could have settled.

Shouldhave.

I lift my hand and rest it against his chest. His heart’s pounding like he just won a bare-knuckle street fight, which is fitting, really; since that’s kind of what this felt like.

“You didn’t accept it,” I murmur.

A beat passes before he answers, voice low and rough. “No.”

I nod. Slowly. Unsure of what I feel.

Not rejection. Not anger. Just... confusion. Curiosity.

An annoying little ache like a missed line in a song you really wanted to hear.

“I offered,” I say.

“I know.”

I glance up. “You planning to elaborate, or is this the part where you just do the strong, silent thing and emotionally repress me into a coma?”

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