Page 22 of Aries Mated

KAI

Idropped my cell phone in shock at the sight of Maeve in the skimpiest towel I had ever seen in my life. Holy shit, she lookedgood. I mean, I already knew that, she was hot as hell in her clothing, but now…I was blown away. Maeve seemed to be moving unconsciously toward me, that small bit of material already slipping away from her skin. Did she know her pert nipples were shining through, basically begging me for attention? I swallowed hard as my eyes travelled all over her skin, her shapely legs, her dripping hair, her soft legs. Damn, I was so drawn to her, it was incredible. But I also knew I needed to control myself and explain why I was here. It wasn’t normal for me to just be standing in Maeve’s bedroom half naked.

“I…I spilled some ketchup,” I stammered. “It covered my t-shirt and pants, and this was the only free room in the house. I didn’t think…”

A smile curled Maeve’s lips as she nodded toward my phone. Shit, her Instagram account was there for all to see. I’d been caught spying, which only made this even more embarrassing. “You have been checking me out,” she whispered.

No point in denying it since she could see it right there in front of her. I nodded slowly. She could probably see from here how intensely attracted to her I was. I couldn’t really understand it myself, because Inevergot like this about a woman. No one ever truly impacted on me. I dated women, sure, but I got bored quickly. It was why I focused more on the ranch and my career. I didn’t see myself as the relationship type. I never had a woman on my mind all the time like I did with Maeve ever since I first laid eyes on her. I just knew she was the type of woman I would not be able to forget.

She stepped closer, entering my personal space, and practically pressed her body up against me. Heat burned through me, and I could hardly stand it, which was made so much worse by the fact that I didn’t know what was going to happen next. There was just no telling with Maeve. She could throw me down on the bed and strip me naked to ravish me, or she could grab my arm and have me down on the floor in a heartbeat, just like she did that asshole at the meet and greet.

I couldn’t breathe, I was absolutely swimming in desire. Just looking at Maeve and drinking in the desire dancing in her eyes made the rest of the world simply melt away into nothingness. It was only Maeve and me, she was the only thing I could see and feel. The temptation to kiss her, the urge to take this one step further, was overwhelming. The only thing that stopped me was the fear that I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from wanting more. Maeve made me primal and animalistic.

“Well, you’d better be a bit more careful,” Maeve finally purred as she shattered the magic of the moment and pulled away from me. It seemed to be just as hard for her as it was for me, which was the only thing that made her movement bearable. “You don’t want to keep getting caught like that.”

She dug into her wardrobe and found a t-shirt that must have been absolutely massive on her, but would barely fit me. She tossed it to me anyway so I didn’t have to be topless anymore. I squeezed myself into it and buckled my belt before Maeve burst out laughing.

“You look like an overstuffed bear,” she howled, like it was the most hilarious thing in the world. “Pardon the pun.”

I glanced down at myself, about to say something back, but I just couldn’t help myself. I chuckled hard as well. We must have laughed so hard that the bubble really burst and we attracted the attention of someone else. TJ. He leaned up against the doorframe and hungrily ran his eyes all over Maeve’s body. He wasn’t even being shy about it. Even Maeve had to see that he wanted to eat her alive. This was the moment where I should have felt an odd pang of jealousy, right? I mean, I had just realized that I liked Maeve more than anyone else I’d dated before, and TJ, who was so different to me but hot as hell in his own way, wanted her too. Yet I didn’t feel that way. I wasn’t jealous. I kind of liked watching TJ eye her up. It all feltright.

What did that mean? If there wasn’t so much thick sexual tension in the air, I might have braved asking this question, but I didn’t want to do anything to ruin the moment.

“So, we ordered you some more pizza, Maeve,” TJ finally said, almost smirking as he did. “We figured you might be starving after the day you’ve had and we ate all the ones we had before. Sorry about that.”

“Thanks. Let me just get dressed first,” she replied pointedly, which was an indication that it was time to go.

I followed TJ into the living room to find Matt glued to the TV and Atlas desperately scrolling through his phone. It seemed that the news of Princess Azariyah being kidnapped had finally been made public. I wondered what the update was.

“Oh my God.” But Matt turned to face me before I could really get involved in the unfolding story. “You look like an overstuffed—”

“Bear,” I finished for him. “I know, I know. What’s going on with this? Have they said that it’s Sly yet?”

“Not on TV,” Atlas replied. “But the rumours are rife online. They are officially saying there is a suspect due to security footage, but that nothing will be released yet. But it’s stupid because everyone already knows it’s Sly. It’s no secret that he’s the only one who won’t play by the rules. He’s the only one who would do something like this. We just need to take this asshole and the whole Unaligned Clan down already.”

“But the police have to keep it quiet, right?” I asked Atlas since he was a cop himself. “They can’t release too many details too quickly.”

“Yeah,” Atlas agreed, disheartened. “I’m sure the Bear King has ordered things to be presented in a certain way as well. It just pisses me off, that’s all.”

I was pretty sure we all felt the same way. We all wanted to do something to get the princess out of the shitty situation she was in. Being stuck with Sly couldn’t be fun for anyone, but I was also very aware that we couldn’t hinder the investigation. It all just sucked.

Well, it did until Maeve entered the room, now dressed after her shower. The sight of her changed everything. It didn’t matter that I had just seen her half naked a moment ago, she still stole the oxygen from me with her effortless beauty in her oversized t-shirt, her nipples poking against the thin material. The collective hush in the room let me know it wasn’t just TJ and me who wanted Maeve badly, it was all of us. But there wasn’t a competitive energy in the new energy surge. Sure, we were all pining for her attention, but I could sense that we were happy to share. Like it was part of the fun. I didn’t necessarily know what that meant, but I was more than excited to find out.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Maeve purred as she plopped on the couch, stretching out her shapely legs. “Have they found the princess yet?”

Atlas filled Maeve in on the news report while Matt began to massage her feet as if it was the most natural thing to do in the world. She was like a siren who had us all willingly under her spell.

“They haven’t caught Sly yet?” She frowned, unimpressed. “I don’t like that one bit. I feel really sorry for the princess. It must be so horrible. Why do you think Sly has her in the first place?”

“My only guess is that it’s linked to the rumors about Jason,” I said, because it was the only theory I could come up with. “He clearly wants Drew to marry the princess and become the next Bear King.”

The idea of the Unaligned Clan tearing apart the Zodiac Empire was terrible. I hated the fact that we were getting closer to that possibility by the day. What if Sly made the wedding happen without the games? There was no telling how things would spiral at this point. It was scary. The future of the games wasn’t the only thing hanging in the balance here, it was the future of everything.

The doorbell rang, and Maeve jumped off the couch excitedly. “Pizza is here!” she exclaimed before running toward the door. I couldn’t be sure if she was aware that she had all of us transfixed, but a little part of me felt like she enjoyed it. She was getting off on it, which thrilled me to the core. A shudder of sheer excitement tore down my spine. It really did feel like there was something in the air tonight, that something was going to happen, and I truly enjoyed that sensation.

“Mmm, the pizza smells delicious,” she said with a giggle as she entered the living room once more. “Oops, I just dropped the change.”

She bent forward to pick up the coins she had dropped and showed me a small peak of her treasure. Fuck, I felt like my heart stopped beating, but also that burning hot blood was bursting through my veins. All the control I once had over myself vanished. I had to grab my knees to stop myself from reacting without thinking. Ineededto think. This could be an innocent thing and I didn’t want to completely misread it. But then Maeve turned and winked at me. Not just me, all of us. Shit, low growls bounced off all the walls, not just coming from me. Maeve knew exactly what she was doing, and just like I suspected, she was loving it. She really was getting some kind of pleasure from this. I liked thata lot.

I had been really focused on the games because I knew it was my duty to my Scorpio Clan to win if I could. The Scorpios really wanted one of their own to be the next Bear King, and I shared that feeling. It was why I felt blessed that Jude and I were accepted to the games out of all the Scorpios. We promised one another that we would give it our all and do what we could to make our clan proud. I had intended to keep to that promise. Especially when we both made it through the motorbike round of the competition, but now I didn’t know what I wanted. It was going to be really hard for me to keep my concentration. The parkour section of the Astro Games wasn’t done, we would have more challenges to come, and I really needed to do what was expected of me and keep giving it my all so I wasn’t eliminated, so I didn’t let everyone down.

But how was I supposed to concentrate on the games when Maeve was making me feel like this? Holy fuck, my heart was racing, my whole body was throbbing, my head was thick with a heady lust, and I was tingling in a way I never had before.

Much as I knew I should be focusing on parkour, I couldn’t stop myself from focusing on this woman. Worse than that, I didn’t want to stop myself. I wanted to crawl closer to her, I wanted to finally taste her after what felt like a lifetime. I didn’t know how much longer I could keep myself away from her, and judging by the energy in the room, I wasn’t the only one. This was a pressure cooker, and soon everything was about to explode. There would be no stopping this volcano once it erupted.

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