Page 177 of Psycho Beasts

I prayed to the moon goddess that Sadie was okay with that.

Chapter 31

Sadie

OH SHIT

I moaned as I stretched out my aching limbs. Apparently, I’d been run over by a car, then tortured while I slept.

Every single cell throbbed with pain.

Also, why was my bed so hard?

Pulling open crusted eyes, it took me a long moment to realize I wasn’t in pain because Aran had snapped and beaten me in my sleep.

Nope.

Fire crackled and snow swirled in a dark room, but it was the stench of cinnamon and sex that had my eyes widening and memories crashing into me.

A fluffy white kitten was curled in the nook of my arm.

I remembered Xerxes saying that he was ashamed of his kitten form, and that alphas taunted him for it.

The little fluff purred against me, and my heart broke into a million pieces.

My chest twisted as I drowned in the waves of foreign emotions.

For the longest moment, I closed my eyes and pretended the footsteps crunching through snow were Lucinda’s and we were exploring through the forest of the shifter realm. Life wasn’t easy, but we were young and filled with children’s naïveté that everything would be okay.

Instead of crisp forest air, musky sweat and coppery blood hung heavy.

I sighed heavily as the mirage broke. Buck naked in an omega’s nest, I debated my options.

I could start screaming and cause a scene (extremely gratifying but emotionally exhausting).

I could play it cool and pretend I was a sexual goddess who regularly fucked men violently (appealing but hard to pull off).

I could find Walter and ask if he knew a therapist, because my mental issues extended to sexual issues (boring and predictable; no one was surprised).

I could go brag to Aran that I’d lost my virginity before her, so she was officially the crusty prude between the two of us (very enticing, but Aran would probably attack me, and my body was on its last leg).

I could just act normal (like a loser).

Evidently, having my hymen brutally removed had shifted something inside me, because I wanted to choose the fifth option.

I was turning into a proper lady.

Just kidding. My aches throbbed in tune to my heartbeat, and I was in too much pain to do anything other than kiss Xerxes’s kitten head.

Denial was my bestie.

“You’re so cute,” I cooed and ran my fingers gingerly across his fluffy white ears.

Kitten Xerxes rolled over and showed off his tiny belly.

I reached forward and gave his fur a gentle kiss. His miniature paws clawed at the strands of my hair that fell around him.

My heart melted, and I held my hair in front of his paws like a string. “Little kitty wants to play?”

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