by Zoey Ellis
“It doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel guilty about it.”
Drocco shook his head. “No.”
“Guilt can make people do—”
“No,” Drocco said, sternly. “It’s not guilt. He was there that day. He understands.”
Cailyn stared at him. “Understands what?”
Drocco glared back at her, his nostrils flaring as his black eyes took her in, almost challenging her to make the connection.
Cailyn’s eyes widened with understanding. “You feel guil—”
Drocco growled and grabbed the back of her head, leaning in close to her, his mouth inches from hers. His body pressed against hers, and his cock rubbed against her. She didn’t remove her eyes from his, but relished the feeling of being held so securely. That familiar trembly feeling slammed into her full force.
“My mother told me that Omegas need their Alphas,” he breathed, his eyes wild. “They rely on them fiercely and need their devotion and protection. She had three, and she still died in the most disgusting way.”
“You were only eight—”
“It makes no difference!” he bellowed. “It was my word that decided her fate and the fate of my brother. I will be responsible for that forever.”
He held her eyes, his determined gaze softening as he took her in. The trembling within her spiked in intensity, until she could barely stand it. She wanted him. Just as she began to open her legs and entice him to take her, Drocco let her go and got up.
Her sexual need for him became worse after that. She remained in a constant state of acute arousal no matter what she did to try and distract herself from it. Drocco also seemed to be distracted, but she could only assume it was because of the bad memories he had relived. The worst of it was that she was annoyed by his lack of interest in her. She wanted his attention. She wanted him to fuck her and knot her and stroke her. She couldn’t deny it or blame it on something else this time. And if she was going to die anyway, why couldn’t she have that if she wanted it?
One morning, Drocco left to collect wood for the fireplace and she remained in bed. She had woken up unconsciously grinding her ass on his hard length and he got up and left pretty quickly. It infuriated her. After months of fucking her when she didn’t ask for it, he was now suddenly deciding not to bother. Maybe now that she had given him some of the information he wanted, he no longer had an interest in her, but that couldn’t be true.
She rolled onto her back and ran her hands down her stomach. He had once not been able to keep his hands off of her, gripping her roughly, spreading her wide, holding her down. She ran her fingers over her breasts, playing with her nipples until they hardened, then slid them down to her pussy, running them through her slippery slit before fingering her clit. Their time in his bedroom stirred in her mind heightening her longing for him. Maybe if she relieved herself, it would dampen her arousal for him.
Her slick increased, soaking her fingers and running onto the bedding. She kicked off the sheets, eyes closed as she sought her release, knowing it would never be as good as what Drocco gave her, but needing it anyway. Nothing could compare to his tongue, his fingers, his cock. She pushed her hips up into her hand as she slid two fingers in, trembling with anticipation.
The clatter of branches sounded in the kitchen.
Cailyn’s eyes flew open and she scrambled for the sheets as Drocco walked into the living room.
“I managed to get enough for the next week but…”
Cailyn covered herself, tucking her face below the blanket as he slowed to a stop a few feet from the bedding. She heard him sniff once.
“Cailyn.” His voice had a grit to it that she recognized, and more slick trickled out of her. She squeezed her eyes shut, a searing heat rushing to her face.
“Cailyn!”
Cailyn inched her head up slowly and looked at him.
His eyes were wild, his fists clenched. “What were you doing in here?”
She didn’t know how to answer, so she didn’t. She simply blinked back at him, her cheeks burning.
“Fuck!”
His exclamation made her jump. She tried to say something but her mouth wouldn’t work.
“Fuck!” He paced the length of the living room, the bulge of his pants growing bigger and more defined by the moment.
She tried to think of something to say, but all of her explanations seemed weak and she wasn’t even sure exactly why he was angry.
The more he paced the more agitated he became. His scent reached her and she breathed deeply, closing her eyes, her head rolling back. “You want to torture me, is that it?” he snarled at her. “It’s not enough that you expect me to fucking kill you, you have to torture me on the way too?”
Cailyn frowned and lowered the blanket, trying to understand the meaning of his words.
“Fuck.” He stopped in the middle of the room, staring at her. Her whole body shivered at his gaze but she didn’t move.
He backed away slowly and sat on the couch before turning away from her, breathing hard.
Cailyn lowered her blanket and got up slowly. Her hard nipples grazed the fabric of her tunic and sent shock waves of pleasure through her body. She breathed in his scent, her slick dripping onto her thighs as she made her way to him.
He didn’t look at her but she knew he was aware of her. She stopped by his leg and noticed how tense he was holding himself.
Raising her hand, she reached out to touch his shoulder.
Drocco grabbed her wrist, his eyes snapping to hers. “If you touch me,” he growled, “I will fuck you.”
A spark shot to her clit as his rumbling words vibrated through her.
“I will not hold back. I will not be careful. I will not care about your emotions.” His eyes were dark and inky, just like when he was in his rut. Fucking amazing. “I will do everything you thought you hated back in our bedroom—everything your body called for. So do not touch me, Cailyn.”
Cailyn lifted her other hand and reached for his face. His eyes widened slightly when he saw it and then snapped back to her face. They stared at each other as her hand inched closer, his eyes becoming darker, his scent deepening as he realized what was about to happen. And then the pad of her finger brushed his cheek.
Drocco shot off the couch and scooped her into his arms, slamming her to his chest and maneuvering her legs around his waist. Cailyn moaned at the feel of him, hard, muscled, thick, hot—a thrill soaring through every part of her body. He kissed her hard, shoving his tongue into her mouth and sucking her like a desperate man. She locked her arms around his neck and sighed into his mouth. She had missed his taste, his claiming kiss, his fucking amazing sexual scent. He yanked at her tunic, tearing the material away so he could squeeze her breasts and pinch her nipples.
A wall hit her back, but Cailyn was too far gone sucking Drocco’s tongue to notice. She writhed against him as he pushed his whole body against hers, holding her ass with one hand as he pressed in between her legs.
“You want it, Cailyn?” he murmured into her mouth, unbuckling his pants. “Tell me.” His cock pressed into her slick-drenched pussy, rubbing against her clit as he ground into her. She hummed in delight, squeezing her legs around him as his hips undulated. “Tell me,” he demanded, as he lined himself up.
A hazy memory flashed in her mind.
Do it again, Cailyn. Smile for me.
She eased her head back to the wall, loving the way his black eyes roved over her face, and smiled at him.
Drocco groaned and thrust into her, ramming her to the root. She gasped, shuddering at the fiery gratification of finally having him. The satisfaction resonated so deep that nothing else existed. Her eyes rolled, her head lolling on the wall.
“Eyes,” he barked.
She forced her head back to look at him and he lowered his forehead to touch hers. Then he fucked her.
He held her open, pushing her thighs toward the wall as he pummeled her, plunging so deep and hard that her toes went numb and a sweet ache developed in the base
of her spine. The soppy sounds of their fucking filled the room and Drocco’s primal grunts caused even more slick to cream around his cock. But he wouldn’t let her look down between them. He wanted her eyes on him the whole time, his exhales becoming heavier as her eyes stared into his.
Then he suddenly withdrew and carried her to the bedding. Kneeling down, he turned her away from him and ripped away the torn tunic hanging from her. He grabbed her hip and guided her down onto his massive cock. She whimpered at the stretch, wriggling in response to the newly caressed spots singing within her. Drocco moved her up and down on him until he was slamming her down in a punishing rhythm. Yanking her head back by her hair, he forced her to arch back toward him, jutting out her chest so he could reach around and squeeze her breasts and caress her nipples as she rode him unaided, her eyes locked on his.
“You’re beautiful, little Omega,” he breathed. “You’re the most incredible thing that exists. Fucking incredible in every way.”
With each word, he became rougher. Cailyn cried out as he clawed her, the wild, almost feral nature of his claiming electrifying every nerve within her. The sharp pain of her scalp, the raw, hard, scratch on her breasts, the zinging pinch of her nipples, and the blunt, savage nature of his cock plundering her pussy.
Her climax shattered her. Everything twisted inside out and upside down. She was simply a mass of contorting, convulsing nerves broken and scarred by something more powerful than she could ever hope to comprehend.
She didn’t even know when Drocco came. She found herself underneath him, crushed into their bedding, his knot locked onto her, his breath in her ear. As she slowly came to realize the position she was in, the one he had fucked her in most of the time back in Malloron’s castle, she began to struggle against the weight on top of her. The purring began immediately, this time soft and mellow. Drocco shifted onto his side and cocooned her with his arms and legs. He moved the hair covering her neck and kissed her, trailing down to her shoulders and back again while his knot connected them together.
As she drifted to sleep, a sensation appeared in her stomach. This time instead of a jittery flutter, it rippled within her as a slow wave, rising and falling in its own rhythm. Within a few moments, its vibration transformed to match Drocco’s purr, and an intense feeling of contentment spread through her mind and body as the three of them finally connected as one.
***
When she woke again, the day had suddenly jumped to the afternoon. The smatter of rain on the window panes signaled a change in weather and the mood within the hut had also transmuted into something different.
She knew Drocco was awake, she could tell by his breathing, but she said nothing. They lay in silence for a long time, Cailyn thinking through everything that had happened between them.
“Why did you touch me when you knew what would happen?” Drocco asked, his deep voice gravelly.
Cailyn sighed. “I was just thinking that myself.”
His arm tightened. “You regret it?”
“Not exactly.”
“That is not a satisfactory answer,” he said, his tone sharp. “Are you going to tell me it was your hormones again?”
Cailyn hesitated to answer. She turned around and cuddled into Drocco and he encircled her with his arms just like when they were in her nest back in the Palace. The rippling wave in her stomach was still present as well as slight burn of the scratches on her breasts; both sensations calmed her somewhat. She decided to be honest. “I don't know what is me or what is my hormones anymore."
“It is all you," Drocco replied, unknowingly echoing what the Mothers had said. "You deny the most unique part of yourself, Cailyn. You hide it, and shut it away. You talk of it as though it is something separate from who you are. It is unnatural, and has caused you much more mental anguish than is necessary."
She knew this to be true now, but he couldn’t blame everything on her. “You’re the one that has caused me mental anguish," Cailyn murmured against his chest. "You impregnated me against my will. You used my Haze to trap me with your child. You enjoy using my instincts against me, Drocco. You didn’t give me a choice."
Drocco yanked her back from him, so he could look in her eyes. "No, you didn’t give me a choice," he said harshly. "You told me I would never see you again. Even after everything I did to try and settle you. I had to make sure you could never again use that threat against me. And besides, it was the only way I could insert myself between you and Malloron." His black eyes drank her in. “I told you that you were mine, Cailyn, and I wasn’t jesting or biding my time or drunk on your pussy. I could feel, from the beginning, that you were mine. You should be able to feel it too, but you resist it.” His eyes burned with a smoldering annoyance. “I do not force you to be attracted to me, you just are. You cannot lay blame for your feelings at my feet. Yes, I enjoy every part of you I can, but tell me what Alpha would resist something so irresistible? So beautiful? So pure and raw? I tried to stay away from you in that way, but tell me what Alpha would say no to an Omega made for him? An Omega whose scent begs him to pleasure her the way only he knows how?” He exhaled again and then pulled her into him. “There is none that would, Cailyn,” he murmured into her temple. “Your opinions of Alphas have been disfigured by those who have forced you to think that hiding your true self is normal.”
Cailyn breathed shallowly against his vibrating chest for a long while thinking upon everything he said. “You haven’t fucked me in all this time because you wanted me to realize I want you?”
“I didn’t want you to blame me for something that cannot be helped.”
She sighed. “I do know that our attraction cannot be helped, Drocco.”
He pulled back to look at her again, wariness in his eyes. “It’s not just about attraction. Do you know that you need me like I need you? Do you know that in your Haze you were happy about your pregnancy? Do you know that I’m your Alpha? It’s not just about the act of mating, Cailyn. It has never been just that for me.”
When she didn’t respond, he pulled her back to his chest, and her thoughts revolved, turbulent and confused, until she was unable to make sense of them anymore. “When did you know?” she asked, quietly. “When did you feel that I was yours?”
“The moment I scented you.” He paused. “And possibly before that. I wanted you when I met you, but I didn’t know why.” He stroked her arms, his purr deepening.
Her heart sped up. Drocco had always felt they were true mates, even with her blocks in place. Why couldn’t she tell like he could? Something Mother Orlee said floated back to her. Did you take time to get to know him? To find out why he is the way he is? Did you have any honest and open conversations with him without any hostility.
“If that’s true, why did you keep me locked up, then?” she asked, trying to keep the bitterness from her tone. “You claim to treasure Omegas. You claim I am your Omega, but you have no regard for my well-being. You tortured me. You hurt me. You treated me like a prisoner.” She could feel Drocco’s irritation building as she spoke, but she had to press on. She had to find out why he chose to treat her so badly. “You used my instincts against me and made me doubt everything I knew about myself. You think I should call you my Alpha, but you don’t behave the way I want my Alpha to behave.”
“You were a fucking spy!” Drocco bellowed, his voice making her quiver. “You have to take responsibility for that, Cailyn. You have to understand that you needed to suffer for that deception. I had no way of knowing how much I could trust you.”
“So you tortured me?”
“Of course! How else was I to know what was truth and what was lie? And on top of that, you were a Talent-crafter. So much deception that I was unprepared for.”
“I don’t think you would have treated me any differently if I hadn’t been a spy,” she whispered.
Drocco pulled away to look down at her. “I would have still fucked you and made you want me. It would’ve been harder if you weren’t an Omega, but you would have enjo
yed it. I never would have caused you any pain. At all.” He held her eyes, his black locked onto her brown. “It pained me to hurt you,” he said, his voice almost a whisper. “But I had to do it. Do you understand?”
Cailyn didn’t respond. She did understand. He was a product of his training, his upbringing, and his disgust of deception of any kind. He had felt obligated to punish her for her sins as a spy, as any ruler would. Could she fault him for that? Yes, she could.
“I understand that you did what any ruler would do,” she responded. “But you also knew, somewhere deep down, that I was yours. I cannot accept that you still tortured me knowing that. I cannot forgive it.”
Drocco’s entire body went rigid. He rolled away from her and got to his feet, his muscled arms contracting as his chest rose, his black eyes gleaming. The air changed, seeming to crackle as the tension built around him. “You cannot forgive it?” he bellowed. “You deceived me Cailyn, and I forgave you.”
“You did not,” she shot back at him, pushing herself upright. “You do not forgive, Drocco, you punish! You tortured me back at the Palace for being who I was raised to be, and then you were intending on having me as your breeder as punishment for escaping. Your determination to punish lies and deceit is more important to you than the Alpha/Omega connection you claim to revere. You may not think you’re dishonest, but you are. You lie to yourself.”
The flash of shock in his eyes only lasted a moment. “I did what I had to in order to ensure our connection wasn’t built on falsehoods,” he said, his voice low. “You never would have told me the truth or stayed with me no matter what I did.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do!” he roared. “Even now, you violently reject taking any responsibility for your actions. Why is that?"
“I do take responsibility for my actions,” she argued. “I accept that, as a spy, I would suffer if caught. It is the way you tortured me that I found repulsive.”
“You cannot choose your punishment.”
Cailyn huffed, her lips scrunching together. “It was barbaric,” she spat. “You cannot expect a prisoner you punish in such a way, to then be eager to be your mate.”