Page 82 of Reaper's Pack

I went for her legs, trying to untangle myself from them, but she held tighter, eyes shimmering, fighting to stay open—as if holding back tears, anguish that would streak down her cheeks if she dared blink. Guilt twisted in my gut, but I shoved it deep, deep down, like always, not wanting to hurt her but knowing my duty had to remain elsewhere. We had already detoured so far off the beaten track, the path to pack freedom, and it became bumpier and bumpier with each passing day.

“Hazel—”

“Don’t you want me?”

Her choked whisper shredded my heart to pieces, and I stiffened. “What?”

She studied me for a tense beat, and then she sucked in her cheeks. Fury replaced heartache in a flash, and Hazel blinked hard, tears careening down her cheeks, so distinct from the rain. A stiff flourish of her hands brushed the streaks away before she shoved at my chest, hard, that seductive tentativeness dead and buried. I set her down with a soft clearing of my throat, a throat that felt too tight, and any attempt to shove down the lump that had settled there was like swallowing a mouthful of bees, stingers and all.

As soon as her bare feet touched the ground, Hazel shouldered her way around me and stomped into the clearing—her dress hiked up, especially at the back, high enough to reveal the tantalizing curves of her ass. Just the bottom bit, nothing too scandalous, and yet my cock, roused from our kiss, shot to full attention at the sight.

Fuck me. Teeth gnashing together, I took a moment to readjust my trousers. Constrictive things. Would have been better to just be naked. Desire threaded with my own anger as I stalked away from the cedar, and rain pelted me from all sides as soon as I left the safety of those piney boughs. I glared at her retreating form.

“What?” I demanded, my voice cracking across the clearing and making her stumble. “Are you angry because I won’t fuck you like Declan and Gunnar did?”

Hazel whirled around, her furious gaze catching the lightning that cut overhead.

“No,” she snapped, one hand tugging at the hem of her dress, the other motioning between us. “I’m angry that you keep pretending there’s nothing here. We don’t have to fuck to accept it—or at the very least acknowledge it.”

“Stop. This is nonsense.” If only there had been a slight wobble to her words, something I could latch onto and blame on all those drinks. “Drunken nonsense that you’ll regret in the morning.”

Those busy hands fell to her sides, coiled in tight, trembling little fists. “Fuck you, Knox.”

And then she was off again, marching toward the tree line on the other side of the slanted clearing, like she had some true destination in mind. I could have stayed right here to stew in my thoughts, in my ridiculous feelings—in the truth behind her words. There was something here, something between us that I simply couldn’t deny anymore.

Affection.

Acceptance—of my role as alpha, of the strengths of my miscreant pack.

Desire.

But…

But that didn’t matter.

It simply couldn’t.

Rolling my eyes, I carried on after her. No matter how irate she was at my rejection, no matter how my traitorous body desired her, I would still get her back to the house, safe and sound. I would see her to her bedroom door, possibly even a bathroom so she could clean the mud from her taut calves, her milky thighs.

A cluster of shrub and close-knit trees slowed her, and I’d caught up just enough to snag her by the elbow when the forest floor gave way beneath her feet. Hazel slipped about a foot down the decline, headed for the ravine, before I snatched her up and steadied her. While I hadn’t expected gratitude, her violent wrenching away had my eyebrows shooting up—

And then she slapped me.

Clear across the face.

The blow landing out of nowhere.

A sharp, pleasant sting echoed across my skin, and renewed desire pounded through me, made my hands quake, my cock ramrod straight, my vision narrowed.

“Go back to the house, Hazel,” I growled, low and dangerous, words laced with an unspoken threat. Not of violence—but of a loss of control.

She rolled her shoulders back, lifted her chin, and inched up on her tiptoes. “You go back to the house.”

I concentrated on my breathing as she marched off again, willing my body to settle—ordering my mind to let go of the notion of fucking her into the mud.

Really though. Rogue spirits had to be easier to corral than a drunk reaper.

Sick of this back-and-forth, sick of her effortless sway over my own damn body, I caught up with her in three long strides. This time, however, when I snatched up her arm with the intention of hauling her all the way back to the manor kicking and screaming, the forest had other plans. Hazel reared back as if to strike me again—and the mud gave way, forcing my foot to take a hard right down the ravine. My knee buckled. I flailed. Hazel scrambled to grab a tree branch. I fell.

---