Page 19 of Scapegoat

“Everything, huh?” She toyed with her ice cream and suddenly I wanted to be covered in chocolate and cream, so she’d do the same with me. “OK.” Kai nodded slowly. “I want that. Everything.”

“Fuck this for dessert,” Jay said, shoving his bowl away. “I don’t want this on my tongue. I want something much sweeter.”

I was about to tell him to shut the fuck up and keep his filthy comments to himself, but then we all froze. The floral sweetness of Kaia’s arousal filled the air, turning each one of us to stone.

“Yeah…” She breathed out a gasp for air. “I think I want that too.”

Chapter 13

We left our sundae bowls on the truck stop counter, but Melva didn’t take us to task for not eating much, nodding at the four of us with a knowing look. She knew—the whole world had to know—what was coming next. It felt like the boys and I had been on this path since the moment we were babies, not realising what the hell it would mean, this bond between us, not until we were old enough to understand what sex, mating, bonding was.

But we knew that now.

I was escorted back to the car. Xavier opened the front passenger side door and put me in the seat, Atlas leaned over to do up my seatbelt, but then Jay reached around, turning my head to face him. We kissed then, just a brush of lips that was enough to set my body on fire, as Atlas drove.

“Where is this?” I asked, as we rumbled along a dirt track.

“An old lookout,” Atlas replied. “You’d never get out here without a four-wheel drive and, even then, you have to know it’s here.”

The place was somewhere halfway between Stanthorpe and Granville, between wolf lands and human, but when he stopped, killing the lights, it was wholly ours. Jay opened my door and then pulled me out, letting my body slide slowly against his.

“You sure you’re ready for this?” he asked me in a low whisper. “I’ll fight the others off if you’re not.”

“I’m ready,” I replied, not entirely sure that was true, but I wanted it to be.

“Yeah?”

His voice was so much lower, huskier as he moved closer, slowly, slowly, so I could pull away if I wanted to, but when my hands went to his hair, he let out a low grunt, right before I kissed him.

Jayden moved at speed, pinning me to the side of the car, the cool metal and the heat of his body creating a special kind of frisson inside me. Our mouths opened, because this was not time for coy or teasing kisses, and every single thing I surrendered, Jay took. His mouth plundered mine, his tongue flicking out, his fangs raking across my bottom lip until I jerked back at the feel of a bright spot of pain.

“You fucking bit her?” Xavier shoved his brother away, moving in to take Jay’s place. Those clever fingers that fixed my bike tyres, helped me across river crossings and grabbed a hold of my hand when I was scared as a kid, they tipped my head up for him to inspect, his eyes almost as bright as the moon above. But him dipping forward, sucking my bottom lip softly at first, then with long pulls, as if he would draw out all the blood in my body, right before he pulled away? I hadn’t expected that. “You good, Kai?”

I answered him the only way I could, wrapping my arms around his neck and drawing him back down.

We weren’t the first teenagers to sneak off and do something forbidden, but it was different with us. In a week we’d be able to stand before the entire pack and claim each other. Just not now. But like a whole lot of other young people, the idea of waiting that time felt too hard, too long, impossible. I touched one of them then the other, not fuelled by beer or freedom or the rush of having three men I’d fantasised about my whole life finally acknowledge what we all now knew to be true, but by something more.

We were meant to be together.

And I was claiming them because, in my first act as a woman independent of my mother’s control, I was going to acknowledge that truth with mind, soul and body.

“Kai…” Jay tried to pull away but I clawed him closer. “Wait, Kai…”

I finally acknowledged what he was saying, my flush concealed by the darkness as he opened the back door and then pulled out a rolled-up mattress.

“You brought a swag?” Xavier asked.

“The dads would’ve lost their shit if they knew,” Jay replied. “But Mum…” He stared at me for a second, then walked around to the tray of the ute, unwrapping the mattress and letting it unfurl in the back of the car. The big broad cargo area was now an open-air bed. “She suggested it.”

“Jenny…” I shook my head at this tacit adult approval, it was apparently all I needed to do this.

I dropped to one knee to undo my shoes, and the guys stepped in around me.

“Let me,” Atlas told me, taking over.

“And I’ll make short work of this damn dress,” Jayden muttered under his breath, his fingers going to the zipper down the back.

“Hang on.” Xavier tipped my face his way. “You sure this is what you want, Kai? We don’t have to—”

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