Page 132 of Torment Me Knot
She lets out a breath, short, caught at the end of it, like she'd been holding it longer than she knew.
I get my hand into her hair and tip her head back and put my mouth on hers.
She makes a sound against my lips, and I swallow it and press in closer and she grabs the front of my jacket and holds on. Not pushing me away. Anchoring herself.
I deepen the kiss and she opens for me. I make a sound low in my chest. She tilts into me, and I get my arm around her waist and pull her flush against me and she exhales hard through her nose, and now both her hands are in my clothing and she is not letting go and I am not going to survive this woman.
I kiss her slowly, learning her. The way she angles her head when I press deeper. The catch of her breath when I drag my teeth across her lower lip. The way her grip on my collar tightens when I do it again.
Her blood orange deepens, turning warm and lush, the basil beneath it mellowing into something softer. And under all of that is something new. Fresh. Something her body is making right now, here in this tunnel, for me.
The scent floods my lungs before I can stop it, and I drag her closer.
I pull back enough to look at her. Her mouth is swollen and her eyes are open and dark and she is right here, present, both hands still in my clothing.
“This is what we are,” I say against her mouth. “All of it. Do you understand now?”
Kev comes up beside me and puts his hand at her shoulder, and the shift in her is immediate. She turns toward him, and I let her go.
Kev
“We will always come for you. You are ours, Sera. Our mate. Our alpha. Do you understand what that means.”
Both of her eyes are on mine, nothing else moving.
“I do now,” she says.
I walk her back. One step, two, until her shoulders hit the wall and she has nowhere to go. I press the full length of myself against her, hip to chest, and she pulls in a sharp breath through her nose and I do it again, harder, a slow deliberate roll of my hips into hers, grinding my hard cock into her soft belly.
I lick into her mouth, slow, before she kisses me back with her tongue sliding against mine and a low sound that vibrates through both of us. I pull her closer and go deeper and she lets me, her mouth open, her body pressed against mine. Through the layers of clothing I feel her nipples harden against me. She makes a soft, bitten-off sound and I cup her ribs and hold her there.
Her hips push forward against mine, deliberate this time, and I groan against her skin and pull her in tighter.
I press my forehead to hers, both of us trying to catch air, her scent thick and warm and blood orange going deeper by the second, and her skin under my hands is no longer cold.
“You will be wanted every single day. There is no version of this pack without you in it.” I step back enough to see her face.“You are loved, Seraphine Vidal. Every stubborn, stupid inch of you.”
Her eyes gleam. She blinks, but a tear falls from the corner of her eye. She tries to hide it, but I stop her and catch her tear with my thumb.
“Never be ashamed of who you are because you are everything.” I hold her gaze until knowing firms in her eyes. Acceptance. Full acceptance. At last.
Wallace groans. I pull back from Sera and the whole pack turns to see him coming round on the tunnel floor, head lifting, eyes going in and out of focus. Then they sharpen. He takes in the scene — the pack, Sera on her feet, all of us breathing and present — and something ugly moves through his face.
“Let me go.” His voice is rough. “You have no legal authority to —”
“Save it,” I say.
He starts in on all of us, voice rising.
“You think this is over? You have no idea what you've done. I will have every one of you prosecuted. I have people in every agency, every office, every —” He stops, coughs, blood on his lips. Starts again. “You will regret this. You will spend the rest of your lives regretting this. I will make sure of it. I have friends you have never heard of and they will come for you, they will come for your omegas, they will —”
“Fascinating.” Lex sounds genuinely bored. “He's still talking.”
Then Wallace’s eyes find Espie. His lips pull back. “You stupid little omega. You did this. You untie me right now or I swear to gods I will —”
My boot connects with his chest. The air goes out of him in a wet, ugly grunt and his words go with it. He curls around the impact, gasping, and I crouch down and wait for him to look at me.
“Some people never learn,” I say.
