Chapter 5: Steam and Surrender
The water held them both, heavy and silent. Mark’s hands remained on Rowan’s thighs, a warm, immovable weight beneath the shimmering surface. The earlier silver glow had deepened, turned murky, as if the minerals had reacted to the Alpha’s mood. Now it looked like a pool of dark wine, blood-scarlet and opaque.
Rowan kept his eyes shut, focusing on the ache leaching from his bones. It was almost working, until Mark’s thumbs began to move again. Not an absent stroke this time, but a deliberate, slow sweep along the tender skin of his inner thighs, tracing the fading edges of the bruises left by the clinic’s restraints.
A jolt went through him, sharp and electric. His breath hitched.
“Easy,” Mark murmured, his voice a low vibration that traveled through the water and into Rowan’s core. The alpha’s touch didn’t stop. It mapped the injuries with a terrifying gentleness, a surveyor assessing damage to his property.
“Don’t,” Rowan whispered, the word barely audible over the gentle lap of water.
“Don’t what?” Mark’s voice was closer. He’d shifted, the water sloshing softly. Rowan could feel the heat of him along his side, a solid wall in the liquid warmth. “It’s just touch.”
But it wasn’t. It was a reclamation. Every pass of those rough fingertips over the mottled skin felt like an erasure, a new claim stamped over the old violence. Shame burned hotter than the water in Rowan’s gut. His body was a ledger of every time he’d been helpless.
Mark’s hand slid higher, just a fraction. His palm pressed flat against the worst of the bruising on Rowan’s right thigh, a broad, encompassing pressure. A soft, wounded sound escaped Rowan’s throat before he could catch it.
In the absolute stillness of the chamber, the response was unmistakable. A faint, involuntary twitch, a thickening against the alpha’s wrist where it rested near his hip.
Rowan froze. Mortification turned the water icy.
Mark went perfectly still. Then a deep, rolling growl started in his chest, a sound of pure, primal satisfaction that echoed off the marble. Rowan felt it through his back, where it pressed against the alpha’s front.
“See?” Mark’s breath was hot against his wet hair. His hand moved, cupping him fully, and Rowan cried out, back arching, trying to twist away. The motion sent pain lancing through his side, pinning him. “Your body knows what it is. What I am to it.”
“Stop it,” Rowan gasped, pushing weakly at the arm banded across his chest. “Please.”
“Why?” The question was genuine, curious. Mark’s hand didn’t tighten, didn’t move. It just held him, a hot, relentless truth in the water. “It’s just a reaction. Biology. The bond warming up.” He nuzzled the damp hair at Rowan’s temple, a grotesque parody of affection. “You can hate me all you want, little omega. Your blood doesn’t lie.”
Tears of frustration welled in Rowan’s eyes, mixing with the condensation on his lashes. He hated it. Hated the traitorous heat pooling low in his belly, the way his skin prickled everywhere Mark touched, even with fear singing in his veins.
“Let me go.”
“No.” The arm around his chest tightened, pulling him more firmly back against a solid, unyielding body. Mark’s other hand finally began to move, a slow, torturous stroke that wrenched another gasp from Rowan. It wasn’t about pleasure. It was a demonstration. A brutal lesson in ownership.
“You’re mine.” The words were spoken into his skin, a vow and a sentence. “Every scar. Every sigh. Every pathetic, helpless twitch. Mine. The sooner your mind accepts what your body already knows, the easier this will be.”
Rowan squeezed his eyes shut tighter, trying to retreat into the dark behind his lids. But there was no escape from the sensation, amplified by the strange, mineral-rich water that seemed to conduct every feeling with shocking clarity. The slide of Mark’s calloused palm, the press of each individual finger, the dizzying contrast between the violation and the shocking, unwelcome spark it ignited along his nerves.
He was trembling, a fine, constant shudder that had nothing to do with the cold.
Mark felt it. He slowed, his movements becoming almost thoughtful. The growl subsided into a quiet, continuous rumble, like distant thunder.
“You’re still afraid,” he said, as if realizing it for the first time.
Rowan gave a wild, choked sound that was almost a laugh. “What was your first clue?”
For a long moment, Mark said nothing. The rhythmic motion of his hand stilled, though he didn’t let go. The only sounds were the water and their breathing—Rowan’s quick and shallow, Mark’s deep and measured.
“The men who did this,” Mark said, his voice losing its predatory edge, turning flat and cold. “They’re already dead. I saw to it last night.”
The statement hung in the steam, brutal and final. Rowan’s stomach lurched. He hadn’t even considered their fate. He’d been too consumed with his own.
“I don’t…” he started, then stopped. He didn’t know what he wanted to say. Thank you felt obscene. Horror felt insufficient.
“It doesn’t matter if you wanted it or not,” Mark continued, as if reading the conflict in his silence. “They touched what was mine. There’s only one answer for that.” His hand flexed around him, a possessive squeeze. “This? This is different. This is me. And you’re not going to fear me in my own baths.”
The arrogance was staggering. Rowan’s fear curdled into a sharp, sudden anger. “Or what? You’ll kill me too?”
The instant the words left his mouth, he knew it was a mistake. The air in the chamber changed, the humid warmth turning charged and dangerous. Mark’s arm became an iron bar across his ribs. The hand between his legs tightened, not enough to hurt, but enough to make the threat of pain vividly clear.
“Don’t be stupid,” Mark hissed, his voice dropping to a blade’s edge. “You’re my mate. The only one I’m ever going to get. Death is a mercy I won’t grant you, Rowan. Or myself.” He pulled Rowan harder against him, his next words a raw whisper against the shell of his ear. “You’ll live. You’ll stay. And you’ll learn.”
He released him then, both hands leaving his body suddenly. Rowan sagged forward in the water, cold air hitting his wet skin where Mark had been. He heard the alpha rise from the pool, water cascading from him in a torrent.
Rowan didn’t turn. He stared into the blood-red water, his own reflection a pale, blurred ghost. He listened to the rough sound of a towel, the quiet footfalls on marble.
At the door, Mark paused. His voice, when it came, was back to its usual controlled, imperious tone, but it couldn't hide the ragged edge beneath.
“James will bring you food. Eat it. Then rest. The physician will be here at dusk to check your ribs.” A beat of silence. “The water will drain in ten minutes. Don’t try to stay in longer. You’ll prune.”
And then he was gone, the heavy door sighing shut behind him, leaving Rowan alone in the scarlet silence, the ghost of a touch burning on his skin, and the king’s contradictory promise echoing in the steam.
You’ll learn.