Page 27 of Alpha's Embrace
In all my quiet studies alone in my room, I’d read about skin on skin contact between Sylphs with Alphas or Omegas. Most of the stories were fairy tales about bonds being unwillingly formed. But I had read other research that said Sylphs couldn’t bond. But how could anyone know? Sylphs did not live long enough to find out.Well, none of them had met me. And stories were only stories. Fables. No one could know the truth for certain. So they all operated based on fear.
We lived as if we were infected. A touch to my back by a guard steering me toward the exercise area, or taking my cuffs on and off, was never skin to skin. Never. They all kept their bodies covered head to toe, showing only their faces. The only naked body other than my own I’d ever seen was beautiful, feral Cedric through the hole in our wall.
Over and over I tried to analyze that moment when Geo’s bare fingers slid against my wet skin.
I’d felt the familiar tingles of my body, and the usual allure, but that wasn’t abnormal for me. My arousals were frequent and not necessarily inspired by anything. But with Geo, my king, of course I felt something more. He was special; he was different. Jolts of pleasure had coursed through my body and I could not control my erection. I had become fully hard in seconds from that touch, which had been only innocent and helpful.
But my body hadn’t known that. My breath got stuck in my throat. My skin heated up fast, hotter than the warm water he’d been using to bathe me. Added to that, the sensation in my chest and stomach created a great tension. It was almost like fear, but surrounded by cascades of pleasure. I had wanted to lurch forward and grab him as if I were falling. I had wanted to hold onto him. Curl into him. Never let go.
Certainly, I loved everyone I met unconditionally. But I had never had the urge before to leap into their arms and claw into them as if to make them mine. I had never felt passion toward another, or such great urgency.
Now, every time I took a breath an empty hole seemed to open up in my chest. I couldn’t breathe deep enough. One thought of him and the air would expand in my lungs, feeding me, but it wasn’t enough.
Last night, before I went to sleep, I’d felt tears fall down my face into my hair. My pillow grew damp. I didn’t know why I was crying. But Geo kept smiling at me in my mind, and I kept crying.
Now I wandered up and down the halls, unshackled. The nurses had gotten used to me. They said hello to me, but only if I spoke first. My two guards followed me around, switching out for new guards at the ends of their shifts.
I wore my usual jumpsuit and the robe over it, the robe Geo had given me, though I wasn’t cold.
I came to the elevator and activated it. I was allowed on the first two floors of the castle. The first floor held the king’s greeting room. The room he called his office.
Today I decided to go there. If King Geo would not return to me, I’d go to him.
A map to the first floor offices greeted me on the wall outside the elevator doors. I had never been down here before. But I knew how to read well, and I immediately saw the office number for Georgio Barrister. Geo. It had to be him. And what a beautiful name!
I turned to my guards. “Suite 111. Which direction?”
“This way,” said one in a low voice.
I led them to the door with the correct number. The door had a glass window in the middle and through it I saw a room with beige carpet, a big window and a desk.
An Alpha man sat at the desk. I’d seen him once before. He’d been with Geo on our first meeting but had refused to come into my room. It was Tory, the Alpha who had the strange bond scent.
I opened the door.
Tory looked up. His dark eyebrows rose as he saw me. His chair, which was on tiny wheels, slid back several inches on a plastic square over the carpet, and his hands gripped the armrests. His body went taut.
I smiled at him and bowed. “My lord.”
When I came up from the bow he remained frozen to his chair, the surprised expression on his face never wavering.
“I have come to see King Geo. I’m sorry I do not have an appointment. Is he available?”
“I—uh—don’t think you’re supposed to be here.”
“The king has proclaimed I have access to floors one and two of the castle,” I said. “I assumed that meant here as well.”
“All right.” The Alpha leaned forward in his chair and picked up a phone. He pressed a button on the base. In a low voice, he said, “He’s here.” A pause. “That one. You know. The adult Sylph.” Another pause. “I forgot his name. Yes. I will.”
As Tory looked at me and started to speak, a door at the end of the room opened.
Geo stood in the archway and my heart began to pound as I saw him. After not seeing him for two days, he was like a breath of fresh air to me. So handsome, his hair scattered to the sides of his forehead in brown streaks, his eyes like the green sea, and his white shirt fitted tight at his broad shoulders and chest, tapering to his slim waist and the black belt of his pants.
All of me wanted to surge toward him but I remained where I was.
“Misha.” He said my name with a sort of wind behind the softness of its pronunciation.
My skin began to tingle. In addition to the fever of my Burn, my skin heated even more.
