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Only Perfect Omegas: A Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance Series (Rebel Werewolves Book 1)

Page 20

by Rosemary A Johns


  “Seriously, not happening,” I muttered, as I reached up to unwind the chains that bound him to the post.

  Suddenly, like before in the Justice Chamber, his sweet aroma wound around me but this time, my shadows were fully freed to scent it as well, and they caressed it, unsure. There was something wrong and unnatural. Emperor smelled like honey dripping over sharp liquorice. It was as if two natures were competing or one was being artificially smothered.

  I yanked off the end of the chain and backed away.

  Emperor staggered, rubbing his bruised wrists briskly, before matching my posture and eying me, uncertain with my sudden shift in mood. I longed to kiss away the soreness in his wrists, yet he didn’t reach for my comfort or even sooth himself in the way that Moon would have.

  Even naked, he commanded the room.

  Emperor held out his arms. “By my hide, I’m your gift now. I’ve been schooled all my life to be ready for you: The infamous last Wolf Charmer. And here you are, ready to beat us bad wolves into our place. I’m truly delighted to make your acquaintance, Crimson. Do you want me on my knees again or my back?”

  I flushed, but paced closer. His jaw clenched, but he didn’t back away. When I gently held his wrist and brushed my thumb over the chafed skin in comfort, I could feel how fast his pulse was racing.

  “It’s kind of hard to put an Alpha in his place,” I whispered.

  Emperor jerked back from me, as his eyes widened in terror. Then he snatched me by the arm and slammed me against the wall. “What do you…? Look, I’m an Omega.” He tapped the OM that was branded on his chest. “A-and look at my hair.” He raked his hand through his golden locks. “A-and…”

  “Shh, chill out,” I hushed him, cupping his cheek. “I’m sorry I just blurted it out like that but I don’t care if you’re an Alpha. Amadeus is a Beta, so I get to have one of each type of wolf. It doesn’t matter to me.”

  “Yet it matters to every wolf.”

  Didn’t the Queen of the Wilds say that it was tradition to kill all male Alphas because only women were suited to be an Alpha? It was no wonder that Emperor hid this side of himself.

  “Your rules on Alphas are harsh and messed-up. I promise, I’ll keep your secret.” I stroked down Emperor’s cheek, and although he didn’t lean into my touch like Moon, he caught my fingers between his lips and kissed their tips in thanks.

  My skin tingled, as I shivered. Boy, did I wish he’d stop doing that…or else, do something more.

  Emperor cocked his head. “So, what gave me away?”

  I laughed. “Besides the fact that you could teach How to Be a Dom For Dummies…?”

  Emperor huffed. “I might’ve forgotten some of my tricks to cover what I am because seeing the other two princes after so long, threw me off.” I stiffened, looking down so that he wouldn’t read the guilt in my gaze. He didn’t know that I’d seen his intimate memory, and I figured it wasn’t the best way to start out together. “I knew that one day they’d be given to the Wolf Charmer. We all knew. It’s only… I haven’t seen them for a long time, so it was a shock.”

  Emperor spoke of Moon and Amadeus with such tenderness. So why did Moon hate him?

  Yet I wouldn’t pry because I had no right to pull out Emperor’s memories, if he didn’t want to share them. He didn’t know what had happened with the Jump Vision, and even if he’d been left chained up for me, he wasn’t here for my entertainment.

  Emperor was my third Charm. If I could only get my three wolves together, my magic should become powerful enough to keep us all safe. Yet how could I manage that, when Moon was with Lux, Beta was somewhere else in this mansion, and Emperor had his own secret?

  Then Emperor’s snooty smile was back, as he clutched my arm and hauled me over to the bed, pushing me onto it. “Let me show you just how much of an adorably perfect Omega I can be.”

  When he slid to his knees in front of me with a smirk in all his naked hotness, I gasped. Yet he merely slipped off my boots and then my socks, before resting my feet on his lap.

  “A Cursed Alpha is an abomination because it threatens everything that werewolves believe, even though the truth is that a percentage of males are born as Alphas every year,” Emperor murmured. The disappointment that I felt as he did no more than massage my feet, melted as quickly as I did at his skilled touch. I sighed, closing my eyes. Somehow, his words were even more powerful, as I imagined them painted in the black. “My mother would’ve torn me to pieces as a baby, but my older sister snatched me up and wouldn’t let go. She saved and raised me. Fur and fangs, in those long years, when I was locked away, no one cared for me but her. Finally, they discovered a way to mask my scent and cage my Alpha nature. My hair is dyed, although I do consider it most handsome even like this.”

  I opened my eyes, expecting to see the same cocky grin on his face, but instead there was such a raw vulnerability that I couldn’t look away. “Yeah, wicked hot.”

  He almost smiled. “Of course, its most unbearable on the night of the full moon. I’ll admit that it’s hellish to be confined to a cage to hide my black fur, rather than to run in the woods with the others under the moonlight. If I could run free as a wolf even once…” His breath hitched, and he caught himself. “Well, I’m here now and I’ve survived when by the odds, I should be dead.”

  I jolted, sitting upright. Emperor stopped massaging my feet in surprise.

  He was a survivor? Just like I’d survived the massacre of the wolves? All throughout my years in East Hampton, I’d needed somebody who understood how that felt because it was a lonely, guilt, and shame infested island that you created for yourself. But now my Charm had gone through something even more isolating, even if he was an arrogant asshole.

  I cautiously held out my hand. Emperor stared at it like he’d never been offered such a simple gesture. Then he gently took my hand in his, squeezing my fingers. My crimson coiled out, wrapping around his butterfly tattoo again, whilst its purple wings nipped with magic.

  “Your ink,” I asked, “is that what’s controlling your nature?”

  “Do you like it? Such a clever tattoo with magic woven into it that hides my Curse, whilst appearing nothing more than the mark of the Alpha Kingdom, where the Purple Emperor butterfly is our national emblem,” Emperor spat out, flinching as I reached to touch the tattoo.

  I instantly pulled back. “I’m sorry, it’s just so…”

  “Beautiful, pretty, cute… Oh, why don’t you just lie back now, sweet boy…?” He rolled his eyes. “I’ve heard it all before.” Then he whispered, glaring at me with such intensity that I shrank back, “the Ambassador will be outside listening and reporting back to your aunt. At least my mother is modern enough to insist on privacy for the act but—”

  I scrambled back onto the silver sheets of the bed. “What act?”

  Emperor’s lips curled up at one side mockingly. “I’d have thought that me — naked and tied to the bed — was enough of a clue.”

  I shook my head, hurling a pillow at him as he crawled after me onto the bed. I trembled, whilst my heartbeat was suddenly too loud in my ears.

  Huh, that was what it was like to be hunted and seriously crave to be caught.

  “Trust me, I appreciate the offer.” I hurled a second pillow, and it bounced off the rippling muscles of Emperor’s back. “But my Charms aren’t my whores. If we do this, it’d only be because you want to.”

  Emperor paused, sitting back on his haunches. “You don’t want to?”

  I took a quick steadying breath. “Boy, would I like to…just, not because we’ve been ordered to and you think that it’s part of your job description.”

  Emperor arched his brow. “Now I understand why Moon is being trained by that frightful witch. Unless you wish to make it a two-for-one special, we need to have wild, dirty, blow your mind sex. Right now.”

  I gaped at Emperor.

  Hey, if the guy was asking, I could get on board with some wild, dirty, blow your mind sex.

  Then
Emperor gave a cheeky grin, as he leapt to his feet and threw himself down onto the bed, which squeaked in protest.

  Huh, that wasn’t how I normally started a passionate session but each to his own.

  “Why, Wolf Charmer, calm down or you’ll break poor little me,” Emperor panted loudly, turning his head to wink at me. What on earth was he doing…? Then he cracked his hand across his own cheek, and I winced. “Please, I’m sorry, no need to be so rough. I’ll be your perfect Omega.”

  Emperor hid his grin behind his hand, as I snarled.

  The cocky asshole.

  So, like that was it? He was the naïve one if he didn’t think that two could play at his game of Con the Ambassador.

  I bounced up and down on the bed next to Emperor like I was having wild sexy times with him, throwing in some gasps and moans of my own. I wouldn’t admit just how fun this was. “Aw, can’t you keep up? Not so perfect, but definitely little. Is Little Emperor flagging already?”

  Emperor glanced at his dick in outraged solidarity, as he flushed with anger all the way down his chest. Then he flipped over to hump the bed enthusiastically. Now it was me hiding my laughter in my cupped palm.

  “Does he feel little now?” Emperor panted. He had nothing to be reassured about. In our game, I’d more than sneaked a look and his dick was as gorgeous as the rest of him, but then, maybe he thought that the compliments that’d been thrown at him had been hollow. What was real if someone only wanted to use you? “You want me to do what, my naughty witch? How filthy you are. So, your kinks are—”

  “For my wolves to be silent in bed,” I yelled hurriedly, grasping Emperor by the shoulders and twisting him, so that I rocked on top of him. The bed squeaked beneath us, whilst I stared down into his furious gaze. “It makes me last longer.”

  I met Emperor’s sheepish smile, when I felt his hard-on pressing against my thigh.

  “It’s just involuntary…masculine biology,” he muttered. “I become hard in a tight pair of pants; it’s simply the friction.”

  I smirked, even as desire coiled and thrummed within me. “Yeah, all just the friction.”

  He dropped his gaze, although his hands clutched at my shoulders. “As the Alpha speaks, I had to witness both the celebration of your Wolf Biting and Claiming of Amadeus.” I didn’t understand the concern in his gaze or the way that he bit his lip. “On my honor, I wouldn’t…perhaps…have acted like such a…”

  “Asshole?” I ventured.

  His mouth twisted. “Entitled Alpha prince, if I’d sensed that you’d managed to save the Moon Child.”

  It was hard to keep up a whispered conversation, whilst rocking backwards and forwards against a naked prince and occasionally letting out a gasped ah like I was teetering on a frenzied peak. It was even harder when Emperor suddenly made me panic for Moon’s safety.

  “Why are you calling him that?” I hissed.

  I hated the way that Emperor’s expression became pitying. “He hasn’t even told you? Moon always did like his secrets. He’s not the same as the other Omegas. Unless your connection is equal by the next full moon, then he’ll die.”

  I stopped rocking, hanging motionless over Emperor. His fingers stroked my shoulders. I shook with tremors at the thought that Moon had known that a death sentence awaited him and yet he hadn’t told me.

  I’d save Moon, no matter what it took.

  “How many nights until the full moon?” I demanded.

  “Five.” Emperor seemed to read something in my gaze because his own expression softened. “And equal…? Only your magic and his will know if you’ve achieved such a bond. Maybe you’re capable of it. Please, do surprise me.”

  “How about this?” I tenderly kissed his forehead, waiting to see if he’d flinch but instead, he pushed up, as if asking for more. I pressed my lips closer to his skin, before whispering, “I’m aware how serious the night of the full moon will be because if I don’t discover what wolf came across from Wolf Kingdom and murdered the son of a witch, then the war will begin again.”

  When I pulled back, Emperor had paled and looked stricken.

  “I was young but I still remember snatches of the war and the end of it. Goddess Moon! I’ll never forget how we survivors were forced into Wolf Kingdom, having to leave behind our lands and heritage in England, Wales, and Scotland. Instead, we were trapped together here, having to build everything from the dirt…” He gripped me by the chin, whilst his eyes glowed. “We can’t allow this to happen to my people again.”

  My eyes narrowed. “Then tell me who murdered the mage.”

  Emperor gawked at me. “Like I’d know? On my fur, I can’t imagine any wolf idiotic enough to dare or wish it. Now, our next piece of business appears clear to me.” He tilted his head imperiously. “We’ve made crazy love convincingly enough. Are you going to just let them torture a member of our pack?”

  Our pack?

  My shadows bristled at his challenge to my authority. He wasn’t like Moon or Amadeus; he was a natural leader who desired to protect as much as he had the other princes as a kid. I’d never wanted responsibility before it’d been thrust onto me, but now I had my Charms, they were mine.

  I growled, as my red snapped warningly across his neck.

  Emperor only quirked his lips. “You’re the Chief Alpha still.” Then he leaned up and shoved me away. I tumbled with an oomph off the bed. Emperor prowled after me. “Surely you’re not insecure enough to need to prove it…?”

  Yet his eyes had lit up with excitement (not to mention the impressive hard-on between his legs). I wouldn’t battle him for my own ego, but oh boy, was he into this.

  Was that a shifter thing?

  “Aw, wolfie wants to play?” I crouched, ready to spring.

  If Emperor had been in wolf form, his tail would’ve been wagging.

  Then I leapt, wrestling Emperor onto his back, whilst my shadows wrapped around him. He pushed back, rolling me over. We hit the side table, and a vase fell and shattered. I winced at the crash. I cringed at the thought of what the Ambassador would report about my love life.

  Of course, I should’ve known that Stella wouldn’t wait long to crow.

  “Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex Machine” burst out in joyful funk from the phone in my pocket like an invitation. Okami was growing even better at his pranks. I had to find a way to pay him back, although this time Emperor only laughed, as we both lay panting and I pinned him beneath me. My crimson cocooned him, holding him feather-light.

  Yet he’d let me catch him, and we both knew it.

  “I’m already up and at your service.” Emperor’s grin widened. “Why, what a seductive witch you are.”

  I snorted, wriggling out my phone and waggling it in his face. “It’s a text from my aunt.”

  Ambassador reports wild sexy times. Good girl *wink* :) Ste X

  “Stella agrees.” I shoved the phone away, before pinning Emperor down more firmly. “So, just you and me now.”

  “Chief Alpha.” Emperor bared his neck for the briefest of moments as if it was agonizing, before grimacing and glancing down at the branded OM, which was just above his heart. “It would be a privilege to wear your mark. If I could request it, brand me over the OM.”

  I flinched. “I don’t think that you should screw with a brand by putting another on top of it. They’d both be messed up…”

  The Emperor’s smile was all sharp teeth. “Excellent. I’ve dreamed of the day that my Omega mark could be obscured. Only your brand can do that. This way, you’ll be creating something new, which belongs only to me. Allow me this.”

  I nodded because if I could grant him this gift, then I would.

  I held my hand over his mark, whilst he held my gaze. Our breaths gusted across each other’s mouths, and in that moment, I knew that I was freeing him.

  Emperor’s lip trembled, but otherwise he swallowed the hiss of agony as my palm heated. I caught him, as he collapsed backwards, laying him down and staring at the fresh, throbbing bra
nd.

  Huh, he’d been right. The brand no longer even looked like letters but a beautiful pattern, which we’d created together.

  Emperor linked our hands. I couldn’t help loving that this time, it was him reaching to touch me.

  “We’re a pack now, and pack is only strong if it’s together.” Emperor’s gaze burned as it met mine. I shuddered because I felt the bond between all three of my Charms in my shadows and deep within my bones. We were pack. “Moon sacrificed himself for you. Yet the other cruel witches have no right to break him.” His thumb brushed across mine. “He’s yours, Crimson. Please honor that. He’s yours to control, discipline, and love. No one else should be allowed to hurt him. You can’t allow this travesty.”

  Emperor was right: Moon was my responsibility. If the werewolf world was screwed-up, was it any surprise after a war, and then being thrown together into three rival kingdoms next to each other, with all the witches’ rules, collars that stopped them shifting, and sacrificing their princes?

  What was the witches’ excuse for being dickheads?

  “If we sneak through the House of Seasons to rescue Moon, I’m choosing the wolves over the witches. There’s no going back on it.”

  Emperor gently kissed my palm that had branded him. “You’re not choosing any side, only protecting your pack.”

  “Stella told me that you were good at diplomacy.” I took a deep breath, before I nodded. “First, we find and rescue Amadeus and Moon.”

  Emperor grinned. “Whatever you say, Chief Alpha.”

  I dived up, hauling Emperor with me. I quivered at the thought of creeping through Stella’s house and risking capture again. Yet I’d do anything to save Moon because now that I was bonded with Emperor, I could feel the drive to protect my Wolf Bitten, and if Emperor and I were caught, then to save them, I’d die.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  I stared with widened eyes through the one-way mirror, whilst my crimson snapped angrily at the glass, at the lab in which Moon was being trained by Lux and Aquilo like the Blood twins had paired up again fresh from my nightmares.

 

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