Page 51 of The Alpha’s Unclaimed Mate

“You’re right,” I murmur. “Acquaintances.”

I press my lips to the side of her neck.

I feel her shiver, taste the change in her scent. Her voice trembles. “Stop that.”

“All right.” I do it again.

She doesn’t move away. Her pulse is going hard under my mouth, loud enough that I could count it, and the sound fills me with unfurling hunger. “It’s nothing,” I breathe against her skin. “We’re only acquaintances, remember?”

My wolf is up and circling, drunk on her, rolling over with no shame in him. I could stay here all night with my mouth at her throat and her trying to remember why she’s angry. She tilts her head a fraction, giving me more without meaning to, then catches herself and goes rigid.

My chest tightens with a strange pulling sensation that has my animal straining toward something held just out of reach, restless, hunting a thread in the dark it can’t close its teeth on. It rises and dies before I can get my hands around it.

Footsteps come down the hall, and Jessa plants both palms on my chest and shoves. I go stumbling back into the couch while she scrambles two strides clear. Righting myself, I let the smile stay even as I hear her ragged breath, smell the spicy edge to her scent.

She wants me. I bet if I put my fingers in her panties, she would be drenched. The thought makes my cock stir. An image flashes before me: Jessa bent over the counter, my fingers driving into her wet pussy. The sounds of broken moans as I push her to the edge…

I swallow my own groan as Jessa rushes out of the room, almost as if she knows what I’m thinking.

Adjusting my pants, I finally take stock of the place. The first time I stood here, I didn’t get the chance to poke around. Now I do. Framed photos crowd a shelf by the window. Mia as a fat-cheeked baby, and in two of them, her shoulder is bare, the birthmark dark against the skin. I lift one and hold it to the light. The mark sits high on her shoulder, dark against the baby skin, in the exact spot mine has been since birth. Jessa told me once how hard those nine months were with no one beside her.

“Are you mine?” I ask the picture, low enough that no one hears it. The baby in the frame can’t answer me. She has Jessa’s mouth and a stubborn set to her brow I can’t place because I’m looking too hard to see straight.

I set it down and lift the next one. It’s Jessa and the baby this time. The circles under Jessa’s eyes are deep enough to see even in a snapshot. Mia can’t be more than a few months old, lying on the grass of some park in the sun. Whoever held the camera loved them both. I want to know who that was and whether it should have been me holding it.

I find the exhaustion she’d tucked under that smile, and I speak to it. “If she was mine, why didn’t you come to me?”

Except I know the answer, or half of it. She went to a door, and somebody turned her away. If that door was mine, if my own people sent her off pregnant and alone, then this anger I want to aim at her belongs somewhere else entirely.

I touch the shadows under her painted eyes, and my chest pulls tight. The truth isn’t mine yet. What I do know is that I want to be part of this life that she has built for her daughter and herself. For ten years I’ve told myself I didn’t need a family. Or want one.

I look toward the hall where Jessa disappeared, and I make myself a promise. If that girl turns out to be mine, I’ll keep both of them. And if not, I’m still keeping them.

Chapter Eleven

Jessa

He brought me flowers.

I stare at the beautifully arranged basket, and my heart throbs, an old scar aching painfully. I was never in love with Marcus back then. Like every other fan, I just loved watching him play.

My fingers pluck one of the petals off the roses in the center. Not once did I think I would ever run into him outside a bar, being supported by a woman. I had watched them for a minute, awed to see a celebrity in person, but it had started to rain, and I left.

I didn’t expect him to fall against me a few minutes later as if he was running from someone. He was drunk but not that drunk, it seemed. I shouldn’t have played the good Samaritan. I should never have agreed to let him crash at my apartment. And I should never have let him seduce me into bed.

The humiliation I endured after that night is something only I know. His people made me feel cheap, like some floozy looking for a handout. My lower lip quivers as I stare blankly at the flowers, my hand clenched around the wayward petal. It’s been years, but I never forgot how I was tossed on to the hotel’s floor, one dollar bills scattering around me, like I was some common whore that the famous soccer player just used for his pleasure.

I don’t want to remember that night. Or how foolish I felt, how small and worthless. But right now, seeing these flowers, it reminds me of what I was made to feel. I turn around.

I don’t want to go with them. Why should I let Marcus emotionally blackmail me into going to the festival? I have no reason to do anything he wants. I’m just going to kick him out and throw these flowers at him. I don’t want his handouts.

I open the door to my room and am about to storm down the hallway to the living room when I hear Mia and Bella’s hushed voices.

“...think she’ll like them? Uncle Marcus and I picked them out ourselves.”

Mia giggles. “It would be so cool if your uncle and my mom got married. Then we could be sisters. And you’d have a mom.”

“And Uncle Marcus will be your dad too.”