CHAPTER 61: SHOWER

Kael Stormhold had never been so angry in his life. Or maybe he had, but never at himself. Tonight, he’d broken a promise he’d made to himself. Never to touch a woman in the absence of his brothers. Never again-not after her. And now, his anger and his raging hard on were his punishment...

Pushing open the door to the shower, he turned on the cold settings and let the water cool him down as he closed his eyes. But closing his eyes even turned out to be a sin...

Because the vision he had just escaped flashed before him with merciless clarity. Her, on her knees, as if offering herself to him, weak with desire... the sight so vivid that he could almost reach out and touch it again... touch her again.

The way her flesh had quivered under his touch burned into his hands, a memory his body refused to release. Worse still were the sounds-the tiny little breaths that had slipped past her lips when he pushed his finger into her tightness, each one a plea that undid him more than any scream could have.

He braced both hands against the cold tiles, his forehead pressed to the wall as the water struck his back in unrelenting torrents. He wanted to drive the memory away, to let the freezing spray carve her out of him, but the harder he tried, the deeper she sank into his mind.

The taste of her lingered on his tongue, the scent of her heat clung to his skin, and no amount of denial could strip it from him as his hand moved lower.

His hand moved lower, on himself, and though the water struck him like shards of ice, it did nothing to silence the heat coiled inside him. Each breath came heavy, uneven, fogging against the tiles as he pressed his forehead harder into the wall and his hand tightened over himself... remembering her tightness. So tight. She had barely fitted his finger inside... how would she look when she took a co*k...

He squeezed his eyes shut, but the darkness only gave her more shape, more voice. He could hear the way she had breathed in tiny moans,, trembling with both need and defiance, as though every sound she made was a battle she was losing. It was.. he knew. She did not feel anything for them. They knew it. It was why he kept his distance.. But all that was forgotten in this moment.

His hand moved faster, trying to replicate the speed with which his finger had moved within her. And then as he remembered her reddened a**, with his hand imprints clear for anyone to see, and then the breathy way when she’d called out to him asking him if he didn’t want to... he came in short bursts, breathing hard... Dam* it! He wanted to... He wanted to fu*k her! Fuc* her hard until she didn’t know where he ended and she began...

Finally, having emptied himself, much to the anger of his wolf, who did not want to ’waste’ the speed and deposit it in ’her’, Kael grabbed a towel to wipe himself off.

While the shower and other things had dulled his desire, as he walked out of the bathroom, his anger was even worse. He’d already worked out the reason for his weakness.

The reason his body was in such a terrible state, the reason his wolf snarled inside him as if caged, was because tomorrow they would be returning to the Pack. And this time, they would not be walking in as the two untethered Alphas who had left the pack. They would be walking in with an Omega slave at their side. An Omega bound to their shadow wolves.

It would cause a ruckus in the Pack. That much was certain. After all, everyone knew the truth within the pack. There were no secrets within the pack.

But the real problem was not the others. It was her. Seeing her again would cause them unbearable pain.

He and Zen had left Stormhold almost two years ago, wandering from place to place on ’Pack business.’ Everyone believed it. Everyone had pretended to accept the excuse. They had not been chasing duty. They had been running.

And the thought of returning there was what had driven Zen to act rashly, to claim this new Omega as if she were salvation instead of disaster. And, Kael admitted to himself now, it was also what had made him agree to Zen’s madness.

As for Lance... Kael exhaled heavily, dragging the towel down his face. Lance had probably done it for both of them for protecting them, or binding them, or maybe simply forcing them to stop running and return to the pack forever. Or maybe to stop feeling guilty.

Whatever had made Lance agree, did not mean that Kael was fully on board with this idea. And from the way Zen was suddenly avoiding the Omega and avoiding returning to the pack, instead ’waiting’ for him on the outer periphery of the pack, he knew Zen was unsure about tomorrow too.

Tired now, Kael threw aside the towel and let it fall where it landed, not caring enough to put it away. He dropped heavily onto the bed, muscles still tense, but his body too drained to move again. Forcing himself to stop thinking of the past was no easy task—it clung to him like a shadow, always waiting for the moment his guard slipped. But he had to push it back. He needed to shift his attention elsewhere, to remind himself of the one thing that still demanded clarity. The Ruins.

Tomorrow, they would present everything they had uncovered to Lance and the pack elders. And once they’d discussed all strategies and outcomes, they would leave the Pack and return to their nomadic lives. It was going to be difficult His and Zen’s wolves did not like being away from the pack for so long. He could feel that too... their wolves felt untethered... almost like rogues.

So, this visit was also a necessity. But soon, once everything was in place, they would leave again. No longer than a week at most, he decided.. That was what he told himself. One week was enough to torture himself. As for whether they took the little Omega with them or not, he would not worry either way.