Chapter 50: The Scent of Safety
The truck’s engine cut off, leaving a silence that felt charged, heavy. Rhys’s apartment building was older, brick, with a quiet dignity. He came around to her side, opened the door, and again, his hand found hers.The contact was a live wire. He didn’t speak as he led her up a single flight of stairs, his keys jangling in the other hand.
He unlocked a heavy wooden door and pushed it open, standing back to let her enter first. The air inside was still and warm, carrying his scent so profoundly it was like stepping into his skin.Cedar, polished leather, a faint, clean hint of his soap. No trace of anyone else.Ever.It wasn’t what she’d expected. It was neat, almost austere. Exposed brick, dark wood floors, a single large leather sofa that looked worn in the right places. There were no pictures on the walls, just a few framed black-and-white prints of vintage cars.A floor-to-ceiling bookshelf held more technical manuals than novels. It was the space of a man who lived inside his own head, who didn’t entertain. It felt deeply private.He’d brought her into the heart of that privacy.
She stood just inside the doorway, suddenly unsure of what to do with her hands, her body. The boldness from the shop was fading, replaced by the visceral reality of being alone with him in this intimate space.
He watched her take it in, his own tension visible in the set of his shoulders. “It’s not much,” he said, his voice rough. “But it’s clean.”
“It’s perfect,” she whispered, meaning it.It was him.All him.
He kicked off his boots by the door, a domestic gesture that felt strangely profound.“You want a drink?Water? Something stronger?”
She shook her head. She didn’t want anything to dilute this, to blur the sharp edges of what was happening.
He nodded, then ran a hand through his hair, leaving it mussed.The gesture made him look younger, more uncertain. The formidable alpha from the shop was gone, replaced by a man navigating uncharted territory. “Aurora…”
She took a step toward him, then another, closing the distance. She didn’t know how to do this, any of this.Her inexperience was a vast, echoing chamber inside her.But she knew what she felt. She lifted her hands and placed them on his chest, over his shirt. The solid, warm reality of him steadied her.He let out a shaky breath. His own hands came up to cover hers, pressing them tighter against his heart. “You should be running from me,” he murmured, his eyes searching hers.“After today. After the way I… I lost it back there.”
“You were protecting me.”
“It was more than that.” He looked pained. “It was possessive.Primal.It scared me. I haven’t felt like that in… I don’t ever want to feel that out of control again.”
“But you did it for me.” She said it like a revelation. Her thumbs stroked the hard plane of his pectoral muscle through the cotton.A new, daring impulse took hold. Slowly, she leaned forward and pressed her nose against the base of his throat, where his scent was strongest. She inhaled, deep and slow, filling her lungs with cedar and safety and Rhys.A shudder went through him. His fingers tightened on hers.“Christ, little one. What you do to me.”
The term of endearment, so rough and tender, unspooled something low in her belly. She nuzzled him, instinctively seeking more contact, more scent. A soft, unbidden sound escaped her—a low, thrumming purr that vibrated from her chest into his.He froze. The air left his lungs in a rush.“Aurora.” Her name was a gasp. He pulled back just enough to look down at her, his expression one of stunned awe. “Are you… are you purring?”
Heat flooded her cheeks. She tried to stop, to clamp down on the instinctive response, but it was impossible. His closeness, his scent, his protectiveness had triggered something deep and omega inside her she didn’t know she possessed. The purr stuttered, then grew stronger, a steady, contented rhythm.She hid her face against his shirt, embarrassed.
His hands left hers. One curled around the back of her neck, the other arm banded around her waist, lifting her off her feet. He carried her the few steps to the large sofa and sank down into the worn leather, settling her firmly on his lap, her legs curled beside him. He held her cradled against his chest, one large hand splayed across her spine, keeping her purr pressed against his heartbeat.“Don’t stop,” he rasped, his voice thick. “Please. Don’t ever stop.” He buried his face in her hair, his own breath coming unevenly.“No one’s ever… fuck. Just let me…” He held her, letting the vibration move through him, a physical manifestation of her trust, her satisfaction.
The last of her nervousness dissolved.This was where she was meant to be. Wrapped around him, enclosed by him, her scent mixing with his in the quiet room. She turned her head, her lips finding the strong column of his throat. She didn’t kiss, just rested them there, feeling his pulse jump under her mouth.His arms tightened convulsively. “You’re killing me,” he whispered, but he made no move to shift her, to stop her. He just held on, letting the purr wash over him like a tide.Time lost meaning. The sunset through the tall windows painted the room in shades of amber and gold, then deepened to twilight blue. Her purr eventually softened, fading into the relaxed, even rhythm of her breath as she drifted, lulled by his warmth and the steady thump-thump of his heart under her ear.
She was almost asleep when he spoke again, his voice a low rumble in his chest she felt more than heard. “You’re staying.Tonight.Here.” It wasn’t a question. It was a quiet, absolute statement.“Okay,” she breathed, nuzzling closer.
He shifted then, moving with a careful, deliberate slowness. He stood, lifting her with him as if she weighed nothing, and carried her down a short hallway. His bedroom was even more sparse—a large platform bed with a simple dark comforter, a nightstand, a closet. The cedar scent was strongest here.He laid her on the bed, the mattress firm and cool. For a moment, he just looked down at her, his face shadowed in the dim light from the hallway. Then he turned and walked to his closet.He didn’t pull out pajamas. He pulled out a soft, well-worn henley shirt, dark grey, and a pair of sweatpants. He brought them to the bed and placed them beside her.
“These’ll drown you,” he said, his voice gruff.“But they’re clean. Bathroom’s through there.” He pointed to a door.She took the clothes, the fabric still carrying a faint, comforting trace of him. “Thank you.”
He gave a tight nod and left the room, pulling the door halfway closed behind him, giving her privacy but not separation.
When she emerged, swimming in his clothes, the sleeves rolled a dozen times, the waistband of the sweats cinched as tight as it would go, she found him in the living room.He’d changed into a plain tee and loose pants himself. He was standing at the window, looking out at the city lights, a glass of amber liquid in his hand.He turned as she padded in.Seeing her in his clothes did something to his face. A muscle jumped in his jaw.He set the glass down hard on the windowsill.
“Come on,” he said, his voice low.He walked past her back to the bedroom.She followed.
He pulled back the comforter on one side. “Get in.”
She slipped between the cool sheets, the scent of him and clean laundry enveloping her. He walked around the bed and got in on the other side, keeping a careful space between them. He reached over and clicked off the lamp on his nightstand.Darkness, soft and complete, swallowed the room.
She lay on her side, facing him, her heart pounding again.The space between them felt like a mile.Then he moved. A single, decisive motion. His arm hooked around her waist and he pulled her across the mattress, rolling onto his back and taking her with him, so she was sprawled half on top of him, her head pillowed on his shoulder, her leg hooked over his. He arranged her with a few tugs, settling her firmly against him. One arm stayed locked around her waist, the other came up to cradle her head.“There,” he said, a finality in the word. “Sleep.”
Enveloped, surrounded, pinned by his warmth and weight, the last thread of anxiety snapped. Her body went completely lax. She let out a sigh that was pure relief, her purr starting up again, quieter this time, a nocturnal hum.
She felt his lips press against her forehead, a firm, lingering kiss.“Sweet girl,” he whispered into her hair.
She drifted, the world narrowing to the circle of his arms, the sound of his breathing, the steady beat of his heart under her cheek.Sleep pulled her under, deep and dreamless.
Rhys lay awake in the dark long after her breathing evened out. He stared at the ceiling, feeling the delicate weight of her on his chest, the soft vibration of her purr against his skin. The feeling that had terrified him in the shop—the possessive, all-consuming fury—was still there. But it had transformed.It wasn’t a wildfire anymore. It was a deep, settled burn, a bedrock certainty.
This sweet, precious, purring little omega, who trusted him with a terrifying, absolute fragility, was going to be the end of him. Not because she’d break him, but because she was rebuilding him from the ground up, and he had no defenses against it. None at all.
His arms tightened, holding her closer, sealing her into the space that was his, that was now, irrevocably, also hers.He didn’t sleep. He listened to her breathe, and knew, with a dread that felt oddly like peace, that he was already in too deep. There was no going back from this. From her.