Page 92 of Unmarked

All of them stiff, cold, ruthless. All of them alpha.

One Omega each. One legacy. One fucking narrative.

I follow it inward until I come to stand at the foot of my father’s portrait. I stare up at same unyielding jaw, same cold eyes, same intolerance for weakness.

The face of a man who’s very much still breathing down my neck. The kind of man who doesn’t bend. Who doesn’t wait.

Who doesn'tshare.

Hewouldn’t have whispered through a door like a lovesick schoolboy, or let his omega crawl into someone else’s lap while he drove a vehicle at high-speed, trying to manage his feelings.

But he also wouldn’t have cared about her the way I do.

I want to be better than him. I do.

But right now?

I want to storm into that room, throw Kai through a window, wrestle Ash out of his emotional repression, and make Theo stop being so goddamn gentle.

And more than that, even -

I want her. Just her; singular and certain.

And not in some poetic, fated, destiny bullshit way. No, I want her messy and raw and in my arms, saying my name like it’s the only one she knows.

I don’t want to share her, but I already have. By allowing them here in the first place,I have.

But I couldn’t have gotten her out of that gala on my own. Not without compromising her safety, without risking exposure.

And whether I like it or not, I can feel it starting to pull again - the connection that’s forming, still igniting, still growing.

I rub the heel of my hand against my chest. The ache there isn’t just instinct: it’s jealousy. It’s frustration.

It’s the unbearable fact that she didn’t choose me first.

And worse?

I understand why.

I’m cold. I’m calculating. I didn’t touch her. Didn’t break. Didn’t offer comfort - only structure, onlyrestraint.

And maybe she didn’t want that. Maybe she wanted arms and warmth and someone who wasn’t one bad look away from growling at the furniture.

But she’s still mine.

Even if she doesn’t know it yet.

Even if she wants them, too.

This house is a fortress. But tonight, it’s holding me in.

Because if I go in there now, then I don’t come back out until she’s mine in a way no one else can touch.

Not Theo. Not Ash.

Not even that smug, chaos-addicted, hypersexual gremlin I let sleep in the guest room.

God help them if they break her, because I’m the one who will put her back together, and I’ll make damn sure she remembers who waited. Who held back. Who stayed outside the door because he respected her enough not to walk through it.

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