Page 10 of Betrayed By the Alpha Wolf

Fucking hell, seriously? I can’t stay trapped in this damn bathroom forever.

I scrambled for something else to wear, but my options for sleeping were pretty limited, and I would be horribly uncomfortable wearing the rest of my options. Then, it hit me.

“I’m taking a shower,” I called out and quickly stripped again and turned on the faucet.

That should buy me enough time to let Grayson change and hopefully pass out somewhere. As the bathroom filled with steam, I didn’t hear a response from him, so maybe I’d lucked out after all, and he was already asleep.

Still, a shower sounded good now that I mentioned it, and I knew I needed to wash the product out of my hair anyway.

I stepped under the warm spray and got to soaping up. Thankfully, I’d thought ahead enough to pack my body wash and shampoo, and I wouldn’t be chafing my skin with some cheap guest stuff my brother put in here.

As the warm water eased the tension in my shoulder, I let myself forget everything waiting for me outside this room. I didn’t want to deal with mates and trials andGraysonfor like five whole minutes.

And I was going to enjoy every damn second of it.

Chapter 4 - Grayson

Everything about this situation was so much harder than I expected. I knew that Kenzie was pissed at me. I knew she had every right to be pissed, but standing here while she flung constant insults my way was not what I would call a good time.

Worse, I could see it all came from a place of hurt. I could scent that her fragrance was consistently laced with char, and there was no hiding the way she seemed skittish around me.

Fucking hell, this sucks.

My nerves were damn well shot after today, and I rubbed absently at the healing scab across my wrist. Being up there with Kenzie had felt right and wrong at the same time. She was my mate, and my body and wolf reacted to her the way it always did.

More so, actually, now that her status as my mate had been rekindled by the ceremony.

I glanced over at the door, which was having trouble shutting, and it took everything I had not to stare openly as Kenzie stripped down to nothing behind that thin section of wood. My cock throbbed with need, desperate to be inside her, to help me to prove that I was her mate.

Not going to happen, buddy.

Dimly, at the back of my mind, I wondered if I was close to a rut. It had been a while, and hell, I couldn’t remember when the last time I let myself go wild like that was. Years ago, at least.

I hadn’t even let it happen when I’d been with Kenzie before, and I’d been there with Kenzie to help her through a heat. That had been beyond intense, and I still didn’t know how I’d managed to keep myself from biting her and claiming heras my mate for good. It probably helped that the twins had just been born, and I was acting as Beta for the first time.

Nerves had a way of diminishing anyone’s abilities.

Sighing, I shook my head. This was not the conversation I needed to be having with myself. When I looked over at the door again, I couldn’t stop the eye roll.

Kenzie was taking her sweet time in that shower, and I was getting antsy. I was supposed to be sleeping on that tiny ass couch tonight, and my wolf howled for me to do something about the flimsy wood door that separated him from our mate.

What’s more, I was strongly considering reining in Kenzie’s attitude, and none of the methods that my dumb libido had come up with were appropriate for the situation. I’d never really thought about it before, but evidently, the thought of being a brat tamer was quite appealing to both my wolf and me.

She hates you. None of that is going to happen, and you need to drop it.

I shook my head again, dropping it between my arms as I stared down at the floorboards. I was ready to count them all, to find each imperfection on each old, battered piece of wood if it meant distracting myself from the aching need that pulsed through my blood.

However, I had a feeling that not even that would work.

Heat bloomed through me, and I could smell Kenzie’s fragrance get stronger. The steam that escaped the bathroom wafted it my way, only making that scent of ocean and old paper zing brighter in my veins.

My temples throbbed, and my muscles itched, stretching invisibly as my wolf fought for more control. Damn, I wanted to shift, but that was not a fucking option right now. The beat of mytoo-fast pulse funneled directly to my eardrums, and the sound made my brain ache.

Whoomp, whoomp, whoomp.

Everything tunneled as my attention went to the room behind me. I didn’t turn around. I couldn’t. But it didn’t fucking matter. All I could see was the thin channel of visibility and the millisecond-long view that I’d gotten before Kenzie wedged something against the door to keep it closed.

It had been more than enough to get my memories swirling together with traitorous fantasies of the future. Kenzie could hardly look at me without growling, but here I was, imagining her gorgeous naked body all around me again.

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