Chapter 31: The Sated Lull
Awareness returned in slow, syrupy waves. First was the profound, aching warmth between her legs, a deep, satisfied throb. Then the weight. A heavy, muscular arm was slung across her waist, pinning her to the mattress. The solid wall of a chest pressed against her back rose and fell in a steady, slow rhythm. His breath was warm on the nape of her neck.
He was still inside her.
Not knotted, but nestled deep, a lazy, possessive claim even in sleep. She shifted, a tiny experimental movement, and felt the slick, spent evidence of their night trickle down her inner thigh. A hot blush crept up her neck. The room still smelled of them—cedar and lavender twisted into something musky and profound, the scent baked into her sheets, her skin, the very air.
She moved her hand, her fingers trembling slightly, and traced the ink that wrapped around the forearm shackling her. A geometric design, black and sharp, disappearing under the swell of his bicep. She followed a line, over the ridge of a muscle, feeling the power in him even at rest.
A low, rumbling sound vibrated through his chest into hers. Not a growl. A contented hum. The arm around her tightened, pulling her flush against him, making her gasp softly as he sank fractionally deeper.
“Stop thinkin’ so loud,” his voice was a sleep-roughened scrape against her ear. “I can hear it.”
“I’m not,” she whispered.
“Liar.” He nuzzled the sensitive spot beneath her ear, his stubble scratching deliciously. He was softening, slipping from her body, and the loss drew a quiet, pathetic sound from her throat before she could stop it.
He stilled. “Fuck,” he muttered, but it was soft. Almost amused. “It’s not gone, is it?”
The heat. It wasn’t the frenzied peak from last night, but a low, insistent banked fire in her belly, waiting for a breath to reignite. She shook her head, her hair rustling against the pillow. “I don’t… I don’t know how this works.”
“Means I’m not getting coffee for a while.” He finally rolled onto his back, the mattress groaning under his weight. The sudden absence of his touch felt like a draft. She immediately turned, curling onto her side to look at him.
Morning light filtered through the lavender curtains, painting stripes across his torso. The tattoos were a sprawling tapestry over tan skin and defined muscle. Scars, too. A nick on his collarbone, a longer, silvery line across his ribs. He had one arm thrown over his eyes. The other hand lay on his stomach, fingers twitching slightly.
He looked… weary. Not just from the long night. A deep, embedded tiredness.
“You’re staring,” he said, without moving his arm.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry.” He slid his arm down, turning his head to look at her. His eyes were dark, but the frantic blackness of the rut was gone. This was just him. Rhys. Assessing, calm. A little guarded. “You okay?”
The question surprised her. It was so simple. So fundamentally considerate. Her eyes prickled. She nodded, not trusting her voice.
“You’re a shit liar, Aurora.” He reached over, his thumb wiping at a tear she hadn’t felt escape. His touch was calloused, infinitely gentle. “I wasn’t… gentle. At first.”
“You were what you needed to be,” she said, the words tumbling out. It felt true. The initial shock had been subsumed by a rightness that scared her more than the pain had.
He studied her face for a long moment. His jaw worked. “You need water. And food. Heat takes it out of you.” He sat up in one fluid motion, the sheet pooling at his waist.
The sight of him leaving the bed triggered a spike of pure, irrational panic. Her hand shot out, fingers closing around his wrist. “Don’t go.”
He looked down at her hand, small and pale against his tattooed skin, then back at her face. Her desperation was probably written all over it. Shame followed, hot and quick, but she didn’t let go.
“Omega,” he said, his voice low. “I’m just going to the kitchen. I’m not walking out the door.” He paused, as if listening to his own words. He’d said them. He’d committed to them. “I need to piss. And you need electrolytes. I saw the Gatorade in your fridge when I got the condom.”
The reminder of the condom—useless, abandoned on the floor—made her flush. She loosened her grip. He didn’t pull away immediately.
“Come with me,” she blurted.
A faint, surprised smirk touched his lips. “To the bathroom?”
She nodded, her face burning.
He let out a short breath, almost a laugh. “Christ. You’re clingy when you’re in heat.” He stood, but then bent, sliding an arm under her knees and the other behind her back. He lifted her from the bed as if she weighed nothing.
She squeaked, her arms automatically circling his neck. “Rhys!”
“You said come with you. We’re coming.” He carried her out of the bedroom, past the plush armchair where her stuffed rabbit sat, its beady eyes witnessing this new, unbelievable reality. He shouldered the bathroom door open and set her carefully on the closed toilet lid. The bathroom was tiny, and he filled it completely.
He did what he needed to do, utterly unselfconscious, while she stared at the tile floor, listening to the sound of the shower being turned on next door. Steam began to billow.
“In,” he said, gesturing to the shower.
“You first.”
He gave her a look—a patient, alpha-is-getting-impatient look—but stepped under the spray. He tipped his head back, wetting his hair, water sluicing down the hard planes of his body. He looked like a god carved from stone, etched in ink. He held out a hand. “Your turn.”
She stepped in, the hot water a shock on her oversensitive skin. He guided her under the spray, his hands turning her. He didn’t speak, just began to wash her. His movements were methodical, thorough. He poured her vanilla-scented body wash into his palms and worked it over her shoulders, down her back, over the curve of her ass. He soaped between her legs with a clinical efficiency that was both mortifying and intensely caring. He rinsed her, his hands pushing the water from her skin.
Then he turned her to face him. Water droplets clung to his eyelashes. “My turn.”
He handed her the soap. Her hands shook as she lathered them and touched his chest. She washed the ink, the scars, the powerful swell of his pecs, the defined ridges of his stomach. He watched her, his gaze hooded. When her hands drifted lower, he caught her wrist.
“Don’t start something we can’t finish in here,” he said, his voice tight. “I’m trying to be practical.”
She finished washing him in silence. He turned off the water and wrapped a large, clean towel around her, rubbing her briskly until her skin glowed pink. He used a smaller one on himself.
Back in the bedroom, he rooted through his discarded jeans, pulling out his phone. He thumbed a message, frowning at the screen.
“Everything okay?” she asked, pulling on clean panties and a soft, oversized t-shirt. It swallowed her.
“My shop. Told my foreman I’d be out a few days.” He said it like it was nothing. Like closing his business for an indefinite period because a stranger went into heat was a normal Tuesday.
He went to the kitchen. She heard the fridge open, the clink of bottles. He returned with two blue Gatorades and a sleeve of saltine crackers he’d found in her pantry. He handed her one of the drinks, opened the crackers, and put them on the nightstand.
“Drink. Slowly.” He sat on the edge of the bed, facing her, his own bottle dangling from his fingers.
She sipped. The cold, sweet liquid was shocking. He was right. She was parched. She drank half the bottle in greedy gulps before she stopped herself.
“So,” he said, after a long silence. “A heat. Your first.”
“Yeah.”
“And I triggered it.”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know it wasn’t my fault,” he said, a hint of that earlier impatience returning. “It’s biology. But it’s a complication.”
There was that word again. It landed like a stone in her stomach. She looked down, picking at the label on her bottle.
“Aurora.” He waited until she looked up. “It is a complication. I walked in here for one thing. This,” he gestured between them, at the room, at the situation, “isn’t what I signed up for. I need you to know that.”
The honesty was a blade, sharp and clean. It hurt, but it was better than pretty lies. She nodded.
“But,” he continued, his gaze steady, “I’m here. And I’ll see you through it. That’s my responsibility. You don’t need to be scared I’m gonna bail.”
The relief was so potent it made her dizzy. It wasn’t a declaration of love. It was better. It was a promise of steadfastness. A rock in the terrifying, swirling confusion of her biology.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“Don’t thank me.” He took a long swig of his drink. “Just drink your electrolytes. The fever’s coming back.”
He was right. She could feel it, a warmth climbing up from her core, making her skin feel too tight. The clean cotton of her shirt began to itch. Her gaze drifted to him, to the drop of blue liquid that escaped the corner of his mouth and traced a path down his stubbled jaw, over the column of his throat.
He saw the shift in her. He set his bottle down with a definitive clink.
“How long between waves?” he asked, his voice already dropping, turning rough.
“I don’t know.”
He nodded, as if accepting a new work order. He reached over and slowly, deliberately, pulled the Gatorade bottle from her slack fingers. He placed it next to his.
“Lie down,” he said.
It wasn’t a request. It was an instruction. And her body, the heat coiling tight in her belly, sang in response. She sank back onto the pillows, her eyes never leaving his as he stood and peeled his damp towel away.
The complication was here. And he was going to meet it, head on.