Page 79 of Ready or Knot

He grunts, whispering, “No bonding without talking about it, Red.”

I don’t like that answer.

At. All.

I cling to him, trying to get him closer to me, my tears falling faster. The bed shakes from the force of his movements, and he buries his hands in my hair, keeping me from being moved up the bed with each thrust. He bites my neck as he comes, sucking on the skin, making my back bow as I cry out. His knot triggers another orgasm, and I jerk under him, my hands tightening in his hair again, my nails breaking his skin. He doesn’t seem to mind, licking the spot of my neck he sucked, making me shiver. My body relaxes, exhaustion sweeping over me, and Logan presses gentle kisses across my jaw, the corner of my mouth, my cheekbone.

“Good job, Red,” he murmurs even as my eyes flutter shut. “Love you.”

I’m asleep in the next moment, the words following me into my dreams, and part of me wishes they hadn’t been my imagination.

Thirty-One

CARTER

Logan tosses another blanket into the ensuite, and I nudge it out of the way, swapping the loads already running in the machines, folding the newly dried sheet and putting it in the closet behind the bathroom door. The smacking sounds of Jude fucking Faedra grow muffled when Logan closes the door behind him. He leans back against it, his eyes falling shut as he tilts his head back. Dark circles stand in stark contrast to his fair complexion. He blows out a hard sigh, and I press my palms into my eyes to keep from saying anything.

“This is worse than I expected,” he admits after a bit.

I grunt. “It’s definitely more extreme than normal,” I say, making sure the sound is turned off on the washer before starting it. “It’s been six days. Typically they’ve already surfaced by this point.”

Faedra’s keening moan cuts through the closed door, and we both relax at the sound.

“I can’t imagine how this would have gone if there weren’t all three of us,” he mutters. “I’m a fucking athlete, and I can barely keep up.”

“One of the reasons the Council has a minimum pack size, I imagine,” I mutter, moving some of the dirty linens around to get the last soft fleece blanket out of the closet. Faedra’s been demanding them after every knotting, growing distraught if there isn’t one clean. It’s something we’ll need to make sure we have more of for the next time she drops into her heat.

Jude curses a moment before the noises of sex stop altogether. Logan takes the blanket from me and opens the door. We step into the bedroom without comment, trying to stay quiet so Faedra doesn’t worry about keeping us satisfied, too. She panicked yesterday when Jude and Logan brought her a bit of food and we were still knotted, crying about how she didn’t want to disappoint them by being with me.

Heats are something else.

Jude nuzzles her neck, running his lips down her throat, and she hums, arching into him, her eyes fluttering shut. There’s a stillness to her this time that has me cautiously optimistic that she’s nearing the end of her heat. Her breathing evens out, and Jude glances back at us, still locked with her.

“You find one?” he asks. When I hold up the blanket, he nods, dropping his forehead to rest on her shoulder, his weight held carefully off of her. It takes a few more minutes for his knot to release, and then he’s walking to the bathroom, closing the door without any comment toward us. The shower turns on. Logan blows out another breath.

“Think it’ll get less weird for her to fall asleep during it?” he asks, carefully wiping down her legs.

I shake my head as I cross the room, spreading the blanket over her. “Not for me.”

He pulls his phone from his pocket, tapping a few times. “What do you want from JJ’s? I’m going to order us dinner.”

* * *

Jude runs a hand over his beard, pushing away what’s left of the dinner Logan ordered, his frown deep. He glances up toward the loft and freezes. I follow his gaze and cock an eyebrow when I see Faedra sitting at the top of the stairs. She’s put on a slip from the dresser in her nest room, and her hair is braided around her head into a makeshift crown like when we were hiking.

“You alright, Red?” Logan doesn’t miss a beat, standing up and heading for the stairs.

Faedra’s blush is as swift as it is deep, and the heavy weight in my stomach loosens.

She’s out of her heat.

Jude relaxes next to me, his gaze still fixed on her.

“Just dying of mortification,” she says, leaning against the railing, her fingers running along the edge of the stair.

That has me pushing off the island and heading towards her, flanking Logan as we climb the flight of stairs. She traces the edge of her slip, biting her lip. Logan sits next to her while I crouch in front of her, taking her hands in mine. Her eyes flutter closed as she leans into me, resting her forehead against my sternum, and I drop her hands in favor of wrapping my arms around her and pulling her tight against me. Logan traces the hoop in her ear, and she shivers—though she doesn’t scent.

“How long?” she asks, pressing her cheek to my chest so she can see Logan. When he tells her, she grimaces. “Definitely dying of mortification,” she whispers. “That was…” She blows out a breath. “I don’t even know.”

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