Page 118 of Pack Rivals: Part Two
“That’s not how this works,” Axel says, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “There’s no room for jealousy, for feeling slighted, for silly grudges in a pack.”
Bea turns her head and lifts her eyebrow at him as if to say, “What the fuck?”
And I have to agree with the woman. We’ve hardly been living by those rules.
Axel nods like he accepts the criticism. “I know,” he says, “we haven’t been doing things right. The six of us should have been a pack all those years ago, but we screwed up. We’re older now. We know what’s important. What matters. And we have more to lose.” He strokes his fingertips over her lips. “Do you want us all, Omega?”
“Y-y-yes,” she says, her voice faltering. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. How I can possibly want all of you? But I do and I’m going to stop fighting what I want, going to stop denying what feels right, and I’m going to start embracing it. I want all of you.”
“Then it doesn’t matter who has you first,” Axel says, then adds darkly, “We’re all going to have you.”
She shivers and I can see just how much she really does want that.
Fuck, this woman, this miracle of a woman.
“Then …” she says, “then I want it to be Silver.”
She turns her head back to me and I’m so stunned all I can do is gape at her. She smiles and my heart strains in my chest.
“Me?” I say, hardly believing that can be true.
She lifts her hand and strokes my cheek, her fingers soft as cobwebs. I lean into her touch.
“I’m so grateful it was you, Silver, that night. That night in the ballroom when this crazy, crazy journey began. I’m glad it was you that took me home. That made sure I was safe. I know now that I might not have been so lucky.” Her fingers brush over my jaw and my cheeks, caressing my cheekbones and around my eye sockets. “You didn’t hurt me. I know you won’t hurt me now. I trust you Silver and I trust you with this.”
I cover her hand with mine, twisting my head and kissing her palm.
I don’t have the ability, the skill, to tell her how much that means to me, how my heart lights up so brightly I can feel the warmth of it in my chest. If I’d claimed her, if we were mated, she’d feel it through the bond. She’d know it.
But there’s only one other way to show her.
I gather her up in my arms, and stumble to my feet. She snuggles up against my skin, just like she did that night I carried her up the stairs to her apartment. Then I stumble over the deck, towards the stairs and down into the cabin.
There are no protests from the others, no grumbles, not even any flash of dissatisfaction between the bond.
This is her first time.
“Just us this first time, sweetheart. There’ll be plenty of time later for something more.”
She hums her approval and I kick open the door to the giant bedroom below deck. It’s practically one giant bed, covered in soft blankets and multiple pillows.
I drop her onto her feet and shrug off my shirt, losing my pants and my boxers as she watches me silently. Then I step towards her and find the hem of her dress, lifting it over her head. Beneath my hands, her body shakes.
“Are you frightened?”
“No,” she says. She’s shaking from desire, and fuck me, I think I am too.
I take a little step away. Allowing my eyes to feast on her. Bare for me at last.
“You’re so fucking beautiful, Bea Carsen. So fucking precious. I’m going to spend the rest of my days ensuring you know it.” I shake my head, mumbling, “So beautiful.”
“You know you are too.”
I huff and she closes the space between us, placing her warm hands on my chest and then tracing her fingertips over me, over the muscles of my abs, the inks on my skin, the scar near my hip.
“What’s this from?” she asks, eyes looking up at me in alarm.
“Sweetheart, I’d like to tell you it was some war injury but it’s from having my appendix out.”
