Page 21 of In Knots

I frown. It seems like Ryan’s pack mate has got me all wrong, formed opinions of who I am that are entirely at odds with reality. “I’m not fooling around with anyone,” I say with a tad of irritation.

A growl plays out in Ryan’s throat and my eyes flick back up to his. He drags me closer and plants his lips on mine as if to remind me of last night. Of yesterday’s kiss.

I kiss him back, his mouth warm in contrast to the stinging cold of the river. He drops my hands and curls his arms around my waist, bringing my naked body flush against his. At my stomach, I feel his cock stirr into life, hardening and pressing into my flesh.

I hesitate mid-kiss. The sensation is alien to me, completely new. I’ve never even seen a cock before, not like this anyway, and I’ve certainly never felt one against my naked flesh.

“Alright?” he asks, lifting my chin.

“Yes,” I answer. He kisses my nose and then sets me free, drifting away from me, giving me the space I need.

Maybe Buzz is making assumptions about me. But maybe I’m making them too. I never thought an alpha like Ryan would let me go like that, would be able to. I’ve been fed stories since childhood of uncivilised alphas, unable to control their instincts, a blight on society, a danger to omegas like me.

Yet, I feel none of that from Ryan. I feel an understanding, an empathy, and a respect.

As for Buzz, though …

I twirl around in the water, meeting Buzz’s eyes. A dark blue, the colour of the water.

“Come on,” he says, spinning around and crashing through the water. Ryan follows him, both racing each other around the bend in the river.

I follow them as best I can, not possessing their strength or their speed, and find them waiting under the boughs of a huge tree, it’s gnarled branches stretching high across the river. From one, a length of rope dangles, ending in a knot.

Buzz jumps up, grabbing the rope in his hands, before scrabbling up the bank. I avert my eyes again, although a curiosity is creeping through me now. A desire to soak up the sight of both these alphas. To examine their broad bodies.

There’s a welp behind me and I spin around to see Buzz fly through the air and then land back into the water with a splash, water hitting my face.

Ryan dives for the rope next, and I marvel at how free they seem. No shame about their bodies or their nakedness. Not at all self-conscious that I’m there gaping at them, unable to force myself to turn around this time, wanting to see exactly what had pressed against my stomach. It’s no longer hard, but it hangs large and heavy between his legs and that thrill of excitement sweeps straight through me. I’ve never had a desire for that part of a man before. Their genitals looked slightly ridiculous to me and the thought of what an alpha would do with it frightening.

Now I see I was wrong. There’s nothing ridiculous about Ryan. Every part of his body is pure muscle and strength, honed to perfection, exactly like his cock.

“Like what you see?” Buzz chuckles beside me, as Ryan races for the river edge swinging through the air and then dropping into the water. My cheeks blaze as always, and I drop my gaze to the water. “Hey,” he continues to laugh, “there’s nothing to be ashamed of about that. You think I’m not admiring what’s in front of me.”

I peek up at him and he’s not teasing me. There’s dark desire in those blue eyes.

“I thought I was too prim and proper,” I say with a heavy lacing of sarcasm.

“Are you?” he jerks his chin towards the rope, Ryan holding it out to me. I peer down again at the view of my body shifting under the rippling surface.

Then I swim to Ryan, reaching up to grab the rope. Bobbing to the river’s edge, I pause, taking a deep breath, then lifting myself up onto the river bed. Behind me, I hear intakes of breath. My back is to them both, and I can’t help glance down again at my body. My nipples are creased and stiff from the cold, and water slides over my skin. Holding the rope tightly in my hand, I run up the bank, spin around to face the river and fly through the air, letting go just as I’m suspended above the middle of the water. I fall. Air whistles past my ears and then I crash through the surface, the cold hitting me all over again. I sink right to the bottom, my backside hitting the stonie riverbed and then I float back up towards the sunlight.

I shake the water from my eyes, exhilarated, and squint their way.

I don’t know what I expect to find, what I want to find, but a look is mirrored in both pairs of eyes, dark and hungry. Those two crocodiles circling me again. I have a sudden vision of being pulled under and I close my eyes willing it to happen.

“The scrape on your leg …” Ryan whispers and the noise of the river, the crickets in the grass, the rush of the water, the chirping of the birds, it all dies away. There is only my breath and my heartbeat. Loud and blotting out all other sound.

“It’s nothing.” I start to swim, back in the direction we’d come, back to where my clothes wait in a neat pile for me.

“Alexa, wait,” I hear Ryan call.

“Omega,” Buzz shouts.

Then there’s more splashing and they are both beside me in the water before I’ve made the bend.

“Did someone do that to you?” Buzz asks, his hand is tight on my left arm, Ryan’s tight on my right.

“No,” I say, struggling to squirm from their grasps.

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