Page 31 of Rejected Wolf

He laughed too and leaned back, staring down at the mess we made. “Let me soap you up again. I’ll be good this time, I swear.” I didn’t believe him for a second. The heated look in his eyes, paired with the way his dick was already hardening again in preparation for round two, said otherwise.

I gave him a coy look, bringing his hand up to my mouth and licking our cum off his fingers. “I dunno, maybe weshould just stay in here all day, rotating between clean and dirty.”

The decision, however, was made for us when the water temperature began to take a dip toward sub-arctic. We each washed ourselves this time, in a race to get out as quickly as we could, and when I hopped out onto the bathmat, I was shivering and covered in goosebumps.

“Come here.” Jude brought me close and wrapped me in towels, scrubbing at my hair, but it was the heat coming off his body that finally warmed me up.

I sagged against his chest, wrapping my arms around his waist, while he finished drying me with the utmost care. I’d always been a pretty independent guy—had even prided myself on providing for myself and relying on nobody—but letting him take care of me like this felt better than I ever would’ve guessed.

I looked up at him, propping my chin on his chest. “What made you come back?” I whispered.

Jude sighed, a haunted look in his eyes. “I just decided it was time to put my past behind me, and you are my future.” He took me in his arms and carried me to my bedroom where he set me down on the edge of the bed and began to open dresser drawers, searching for clothes. I had no clue what criteria he had for what he chose, but hesomehow ended up selecting my favorite band t-shirt and a pair of gray sweats.

The whole time he dressed me, he talked—a little about his pack, but mostly about where he grew up. His voice remained calm while he recounted the most traumatic story I could’ve imagined. Though he didn’t go into detail, likely to shield me from the worst of what transpired, I wasn’t sure I would make it through to the end. My heart broke for the little boy he’d been, for his sister and brothers, his father. I couldn’t imagine what kind of monsters would do that! Experimenting on children? It was…barbaric.

Not once did I interrupt him. By the time I was dressed, tears were streaming down my cheeks.

Jude brushed my cheeks tenderly with his thumbs, collecting my tears. “It’s okay, Morgan. You don’t need to cry for me. I survived, and everything I lived through led me to you. It was fate.”

“You are so… incredible. So strong to have lived through that nightmare, and instead of letting it break you, you emerged as the most kind-hearted man.” I cupped his stubbled cheeks between my palms and rested my forehead on his. “I love you, alpha mine.”

A small, relieved sigh slipped from his lips. “I-I love you too,” he said at long last before pausing, and I was pretty sure he was holding his breath. After a long moment, heblew out a breath, smiling. “I was so scared to love you, because I thought it would curse you or something. But look…” He swiveled his gaze around the room. “We’re both still here. Lightning didn’t strike us dead. We’re here, and we’re together.” His grin widened. “I love you,” he said again, with more force. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” he chanted, peppering me with kissing until I was giggling madly.

Then he jumped to his feet and tugged me up by the hand. “You’re coming home with me,” he said.

“Yeah, okay,” I agreed without any hesitation.

When Jude started dragging me toward the door, barely hanging on its hinges in the splintered frame, though, I dug my heels in. “Uh, Jude, aren’t you forgetting something?”

He turned back, frowning. “What?”

“Um, your clothes?” I gestured to his utterly delectable member, still semi-hard. “You can’t really walk around like that here.”

He grumbled something about stuck-up human sensibilities, then headed back toward the bathroom where all our wet clothes were still in a pile overflowing from the sink, across the counter, and dripping onto the floor. Of course, none of my clothes would fit him, and while heseemed perfectly ready to put his wet clothes back on, it was freezing outside.

I set a hand on his arm. “How about we put your clothes in the dryer down the hall, and while we’re waiting, we’ll pack up a suitcase with anything important I want to bring with me.” Honestly, I wasn’t sure I would ever be back here. Now that I knew we would be together, nothing else mattered.

Jude’s grumpy frown softened. “Okay. I guess I can wait an hour.”

Chapter 15

Jude

Mate, pup, baby, home!My wolf was nearly beside himself with excitement, spinning in circles and chasing his metaphorical tail, and I couldn’t blame him one bit. Morgan was pregnant! We’d scented it as soon as we broke down his door. And now I had his suitcase in one hand, him in the other, and we were headed back to Grim Wilds. The future with my mate and our baby was spread out in front of me, and it filled me with the purest happiness I’d ever known, all clean and bright.

But…

It felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff, with my toes hanging over the edge, just waiting for a strong breeze to tip me over. I was so terrified of what would come next, because as impossible as it was to believe, I loved Morgan. Everyone I had ever loved had come to harm, and now thatI’d admitted out loud how I felt for my omega, my mate, the father of my children, I had this dread pooling inside me of all the ways this could go wrong. Pax, Vesta, and I had all had a nightmare for a reason.

It can’t be as easy as this.

We stopped off briefly at the landlord’s apartment to tell the man we were leaving. I knocked sharply, and I heard grumbling from inside as he stomped through his apartment. He finally answered the door tying the sash of his robe around his waist, a scowl on his flushed face. His black hair looked like it was trying to fly off his head, stuck up in all directions, and a waft of air from inside carried with it the aroma of sex.

“This better be good,” he snapped. He directed his narrowed black eyes at me instead of Morgan, as if he blamed me personally for the interruption.

Morgan looked awkward and shrank into my side a little. “Uh, I’m leaving, Al. Maybe forever.”

Al looked back and forth between us. “Took you two long enough. It’s not normal to ignore the mating pull, not healthy.” He shook his head sharply. “Fate or not, though, you’re not getting any rent back.”

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