AURORA
I excused myself from the conversation, speed-walked back to the pack house to find my phone, and dialed Elijah’s number. It was saved under my Emergency Contacts, like Jeremy had instructed me to do years ago before he was killed by that scar-faced monster.
Ares wouldn’t even give me a few moments to myself, so I had to make this quick. I hid myself in Ruffles’s room and bounced on my toes, listening to the ring.
“Aurora?”
“I can’t talk for long. Ares is going to attack your pack tonight. Be prepared,” I said.
There was some shuffling in the house, and I glanced at the door. Ares was here, trying to find me, because I wasn’t supposed to leave his damn sight and I had.
A breeze gently blew the yellow curtains against the bed.
“What do you mean? Why?”
“He’s looking for the stone.”
Elijah became deathly quiet, as if Ares were there with him and he were trying not to say a single word. “Aurora, you didn’t tell him, did you?”
“No,” I said, grasping the phone tighter.
The shuffling outside became louder. I plastered myself to the wall and scooted down it. Ruffles walked over to me, brushing herself against my legs and showing me her butt.
“But Ares knows. Someone must’ve found out somehow Did you tell anyone? Anyone at all?”
“I haven’t spoken a word about it. I’ll ask the doctor who performed the operation—”
“Aurora!” Ares shouted from somewhere in the house, his voice booming.
I ushered Ruffles into the closet and shut the door in case he decided to come into the room. If he found out about the stone and about Ruffles, Moon Goddess … he’d do more than just kill me.
“Are you with Ares?” Elijah asked.
“Yes,” I whispered.
More footsteps.
“Listen to me carefully.” He took a deep breath, and all I could imagine was him running a hand through his thick hair in an attempt to think quick. “Don’t tell him about your stone. I don’t care what he tries to do to me, but if he finds out that you have it, he will hurt you. He’s been looking for that fucking thing for years. He has killed so many people for it, and he will not have a problem doing that to you.”
I gulped and squeezed my eyes shut, inhaling Ares’s strong hazelnut scent. He had to be right outside the damn door.
“Okay,” I whispered. “I have to go.” I pressed my finger on the End Call button and stood up, my heart pounding. There were so many thoughts rushing through my head that I couldn’t keep them straight.
Ares’s scent was strong, but I couldn’t hear a single sound. And I’d bet this was what it was like to be hunted by him. Not knowing where in the damn world he was, but knowing that he was close and that he was coming for you.
I hurried to the door to get out of Ruffles’s room before he had a chance to find her. My fingers trembled as I tried to delete Elijah’s call as quickly as I could, but Ares stood outside the door with his arms crossed over his chest and a wrathful look on his face.
“I told you not to leave my fucking sight,” he said.
I fumbled with my phone, trying to stuff it into my pocket. Think positive, Aurora. Think about last night when you were sharing pretzels and cheese, when you were up until four a.m., talking about life, when he told you that he wanted you forever.
Ares glanced at my pocket. “Who were you talking to?”
I brushed past him and walked to our bedroom. Oh Goddess, I was calling it ours now.
“Nobody,” I said.
He clenched his jaw and followed me. “Who, Aurora? Who’d you tell that I was going to attack their pack tonight?” He waited as if he wanted me to admit it.
My eyes widened slightly, but I continued walking. He had heard me from all the way downstairs? I’d tried to keep myself quiet, and he’d still fucking heard me.
“Nobody.” I stepped into the room and headed right for the bathroom to take a long shower, so I could wash away all the dirt and sweat and lies.
But before I could pull the door open, he placed his hand on it, snapped it closed, and spun me around to face him. “Give me your phone.” His eyes were a dangerous kind of gold, the kind that I had only seen before—when he was about to rip out Marcel’s throat the other day for disrespecting me.
“Why?” He had to know who I called. Maybe he just wanted to see it for himself.
“I will not ask again.”
“No.”
He reached for the pocket in my leggings, and I grasped his wrist to try to stop him. But after we fumbled with each other for a few moments, he snatched the phone from me. I grabbed for it, clawed for it, hoping that it had magically deleted the call history itself, but he lifted my phone out of my reach.
I crossed my arms over my chest. “I can’t have even one bit of privacy with you. You won’t let me shower alone, you won’t let me out of your sight, and now, you want to look at my damn phone?”
He growled, reading the names in my Recents.
“You’re cra—”
“Don’t finish your fucking sentence.” He turned around to face me, eyes blazing. “Don’t tell me I’m fucking crazy when you were talking to Elijah. Elijah out of all fucking people.” He threw the phone to the ground and stepped closer to me.
Instead of screaming at me, he became silent. Deathly silent.
He didn’t say anything for one, two, three long moments, and I was scared.
Fucking terrified.
Ares closed his eyes, and I had the urge to jump out the second-story window and run away from him this very second. But he looked so peaceful with his eyes closed and his entire face relaxed completely.
“I am enough for you, Kitten, aren’t I?” he asked calmly.
For a moment, I thought Mars was back, that I could talk some sense into him, that he wasn’t about to explode on me. But when he opened his eyes, their wrath golden flares seemed to burn right through me.
My heart pounded in my chest, and I stepped back. I didn’t know what to do anymore. Should I tell him about the stone? Yes, but not when he was looking at me like this, not when he was angry because it’d make him even angrier.
“Yes,” I whispered. “You are enough.”
He placed his hand on my chest, right over my heart, his claws softly digging into my flesh. He could rip it right out; I knew he was strong enough to do it.
“Your heart’s beating awfully fast. Are you lying to me, Aurora?”
Help me, Goddess. Help me, please.
“No, you are enough for me.” I held my breath, hoping that it’d still my racing heart, hoping that something would calm me down because his godly stare was too intense.
He paused for a long moment, tilting his head, clenching his jaw, and touching my chest like he owned the heart inside. “You are lying to me.”
It wasn’t a question this time. It was a statement.
His voice was laced with disappointment and sorrow, yet I could feel his wolf under his skin about to come out to claim what was his. Because Ares didn’t ask for permission; he took everything and dealt with no consequences.
“I’m not lying, Mars,” I said, using the name he’d asked me to use to try to soothe him.
Another growl ripped from his throat. He stepped even closer to me and shoved me against the wall. Then, he grasped my chin and held it tightly in his hand. All I could see was brutality and barbarity in his eyes—a worshipped leader who had seen war after war, curse after curse, violent past after violent past; a man who had been trapped in a god’s body for centuries upon centuries; a boy who had been wronged one too many times.
“You didn’t want me to mark you. You didn’t want to mark me. You were talking to the man who knows exactly where to find the stone and warning him that I’m coming to find it,” he said, jaw twitching. Like a spear, every word Ares said hit hard and deep in places that I knew were hurting him just as much as they were hurting me.
“I shouldn’t have warned him.” I placed my hands on his chest. Calm down, Ares. Please calm down. “I’m sorry he knows that you’re coming for him now. It won’t happen again.”
Stepping even closer to me, he pressed his body against mine. “Let me be clear, Aurora. I don’t give a fuck that he knows I’m coming for the stone. He could prepare for war for months, and I’d still run on his pack, rip each one of his warriors piece by piece, and take what is mine.” He pushed a strand of hair behind my ear in a domineering manner. “I’m angry that you went behind my back to warn him.”
All I wanted to do was to scream at him that it was me who wasn’t enough for him, not the other way around. I wanted to tell him everything that had happened to me and hoped that he wouldn’t kill me, but I couldn’t open my mouth. My wolf whimpered, and I was getting so tired of hearing her whine about her mate not wanting her, but I felt her pain.
We felt this kind of heartbreak every fucking day, and it took a damn toll on us.
He growled, his canines emerging from under his lips. Moments … he was mere moments from marking me and making himself enough for me. “Tell me how I am not enough, so I can make sure I am.”
I parted my lips and then closed them. What do I say to that?
He slid his hand down my throat, pushed my head to the side, and grazed his canines against my neck. I shuddered against him, the feeling of his teeth on my skin making my entire body react so submissively and so innately to him.
“Will this prove it to you?” he asked, canines just barely pricking my flesh.
Heat rushed to my core, my wolf purring softly.
No, no … I couldn’t let this happen. I couldn’t …
“Maybe this?” He pushed two fingers against my clit and rubbed gently. “Does this make me enough for you?” He moved his fingers in small, torturous circles.
I grabbed on to his wrist, my knees close to buckling already.
“Or is it this?” He grasped my hand and placed it right on the front of his pants, letting me feel how hard he was for me.
Goddess, I just wanted a nice, relaxing day. Not this. Definitely … not … this …
“Answer me, Aurora.” He skimmed his lips against my ear, his breath warming my neck. “If you don’t”—he chuckled lowly, and I shivered—“I’ll keep you in this bedroom until I prove to you that I am everything you’ve ever been searching for and everything you’ll ever need.”
When I didn’t answer Ares, he snatched my chin and forced me to look up at him. There it was again … that same look I had only heard rumors about. Glowering with valor and strength, vengeance and cruelty, he curled his lip into an ugly smirk. And I thought it was the end for me. I thought he knew my secret. I thought he’d kill me.
“Take off your clothes.”
My eyes widened. “Ares, I—”
“It wasn’t a request.” He released my chin and stepped back, watching me. “It was a command. You can follow commands, can’t you, Kitten?”
I gulped and glanced at my feet. Well, okay, not exactly what I’d thought was going to happen. I took a deep breath and tried hard to ignore the pressure building in my core already. What the hell was wrong with me?
He crossed his big arms over his chest. “Look at me.”
Moon Goddess. My pussy was pulsing, and he hadn’t even touched me. I was supposed to be afraid of him; I was supposed to be thinking of a way to stop him from going to Elijah’s and killing him. Not this.
Before he could ask again, I found myself tearing off my shirt and pushing my leggings to the ground. My nipples were pressed hard against my cupless sports bra, and the breeze from the window didn’t make it any better.
“All of it,” Ares said.
My wolf purred inside of me, loving the attention from our mate. It didn’t make me feel any better that my wolf couldn’t make up her damn mind about him. One minute, she didn’t want him to know our secret. The next, she was willing to let him have us like he had last night.
Anything for his acceptance.
Anything to feel loved again.
I tugged off my bra and underwear, standing naked in front of him. He glanced down at my body, taking in all of me, and then stepped toward me, fingers hovering above my clit but not touching me yet.
“I bet you’re clenching for me right now, aren’t you?” he asked, staring into my eyes. “Thinking about my cock thrusting into your pussy, about your mate filling you with his cum again, about him making sure you know that you’re his and his only.”
A wave of pleasure coursed through my body. I seized his wrist and tried so desperately to pull it toward me.
“Kitten, is that enough for you already?” he asked in such a degrading manner that it actually turned me on even more. “I haven’t even started.” With his other hand, he drew his fingernails up the center of my chest and over my nipple.
I cried out and stared up at him, begging with my eyes for him to touch me more.
“You know, Kitten, I think a lot about claiming you … about taking you in the forest in the middle of the day and letting everyone within miles listen to you moan because of me. About taking you here, in the pack house, when everyone is downstairs and listening to you try to muffle those precious little whimpers of yours so nobody can hear you.”
My pussy clenched hard. “Ares, please.”
“I think about ruining you for anyone else, about you kneeling for me when I come home from war …” He grabbed my hand and placed it on his cock. “About you taking my cock all the way down your throat again, about throat-fucking you until I finally make you my perfect little Kitten.”
I gulped and grasped him through his shorts, aching for him to be inside of me.
He held me by a fistful of my hair and pulled me toward him. “Tell me, Aurora, do you need more than that?”
To hold in my moans, I pressed my lips together. All I wanted was for him to plunge himself inside of me like he had last night, but I didn’t foresee that happening anytime soon. Ares wanted to punish me for calling Elijah, and I didn’t blame him.
And because I wanted him to prove to me that he wouldn’t hurt me, that despite me going behind his back, he would love me for me and he wouldn’t hate me for my secret, I said, “That’s not enough.”
He growled, picked me up, and tossed me onto the bed with ease. Crawling up with me and pushing me to the headboard, he grabbed my thighs and spread them, so every fold of my pussy was bare and on full display to him. Before I could even react, he pressed his tongue against my clit, making my body jerk.
I drew my knees together to ease the tension, but he forced my legs apart again and slapped my pussy hard.
“Mine.”
He rested my thighs on his shoulders and stuck a finger inside of me, thrusting in and out as he ate me. I squirmed in his hold, trying to pull my knees together again, but he refused to let me go and hit my clit again.
“Mine.”
Fingers thrusting in and out. Tongue flicking against my sensitive clit. Stubble tickling my inner thighs. A wave of heat warmed my core and made me tighten on him.
“Ares …”
“Alpha,” he corrected.
It was one simple word but was nothing more than a statement of dominance. He slid his hand around my throat and squeezed lightly, and I knew I was moments away from releasing on him.
“Say it, Aurora.” He moved his fingers faster inside of me, hitting my G-spot every single time.
So close … I was so close. All he had to do was—
“Now.”
He tightened his hand around my throat, his tongue hitting my clit just where I liked it.
“Alpha!” I screamed it for him, my back arching hard, my fingers grasping the bedsheets. Wave after wave of pleasure was pumping through me, making me feel so good, so wanted, so needed that I never wanted to come down from this high.
Ares slid his fingers out of me and slapped my pussy again. “Good girl.”
I drew my legs together, unable to take any more pressure, and whined, “Ares, please.”
He pinned them against the mattress and buried his face back between my legs. “Tell me what I want to hear, Aurora.”
“Oh, Moon Goddess … Ares, you’re enough for me.” My toes curled, and I waited for him to flick his tongue against my clit, so I could unravel under him yet again, but he pulled himself away from me, his breath warming my pussy.
“I don’t believe you.” He slowed his fingers and tightened his grip around my neck. “Convince me, Kitten. Beg for me. Beg me to eat your tight, wet pussy. Beg me to thrust my fingers in and out of it. Beg me to make you come over and over and over until you’re trembling in my bed and begging me to stop.”
I raised my hips, scrambling and shuffling around to try to get him to touch me again. I was so close, so fucking close to just coming on command for him. “Please, Ares.”
He slapped my pussy hard. “I said, beg.”
“Please,” I whimpered, brows furrowing.
“Louder,” he said, fingers pressing against my entrance but not into me.
“Please.” I sounded desperate, and I was.
“I want everyone in this fucking pack to hear it.”
He pinched my nipple between two of his fingers, and my body jerked up.
“Please, Ares!” I cried.
He shoved his fingers inside of me, thrusting them wildly and sending me into a heaven of bliss. Tingles shot up and down my arms. Heat rushed to my core. I tightened on him, riding out my orgasm.
So many feelings raced through me. Rapture. Ecstasy. A want to submit.
After a few moments, I lay back against the pillows and sank into the sheets. My pussy was hurting—with both pleasure and pain. I could still feel his hand smacking down on my swollen clit. Time after time after time.
I expected Ares to storm out of the room, to slam the door so hard that it fell off its hinges, to lock himself in his office to cool down, but he rested his head on my bare chest.
For a moment, I thought he’d change back into Mars. But Mars would’ve drawn his fingers in circles on my hip bone. Ares just pressed them into my side, as if he were holding on for dear life.
“I shouldn’t have been rough with you, but I’m not going to apologize for it. I can’t control myself since I got to taste you last night.”
Last night when he’d claimed my body.
“I want to mark you.”
Ares had been close to doing it, not once, but twice now. He could have sunk his teeth into my neck and claimed me or ruined me far worse than he had already. But he’d controlled himself, which surprised me.
He continued to surprise me.
A part of me believed that if I told him about my stone, he wouldn’t hurt me. Mars would hold Ares back from destroying every inch of my body to find it. But … I needed to be sure. I couldn’t just tell him without preparing for the worst.
“And what does Mars want?” I asked, running my fingers through his hair.
“Mars wants you to be happy.” His voice was quiet. “He wants you to feel safe. He doesn’t like that you … called Elijah, but he knows that you were only contacting him because it is your job as an alpha to protect your allies.”
I sighed deeply. “I’m not an alpha anymore. Thanks to you.”
It was supposed to have come out lighthearted, but instead, it had come out harsh. It was a cruel reality for me though. Mom and Tony had just thrown me to the most vicious pack without caring that I had been training to be an alpha since Jeremy died. Everything had been taken away from me in a fraction of a second because of the hounds and then again because of Ares.
He pressed his lips to my chest. “You’re still an alpha, Aurora.” Pressed them to my neck. “You’re still strong.” Pressed them to my jaw. “And you’re still going to lead with me.” Pressed them right against my lips. “Because you’re mine.”
I grasped the sides of his head, breathing deeply, and brushed my fingers against his cheekbones. His beautiful eyes seemed to lead right into his soul, and I was taken aback. On the verge of tears. The emotions were almost too much.
“Ares,” I whispered, “would you ever hurt me?”
Ares—the man who’d do anything for that stone—looked me right in the eye with so much sincerity that I was tricked into believing anything that came out of his mouth. “No.”
No.
No, he wouldn’t hurt me now. Because he thought that I was innocent. Because he thought that I didn’t know where the stone was. Because he didn’t know that I had it.
I took a deep breath and hugged his head to my chest, unable to even look him in the eyes anymore.
I needed to be honest with him.
“I didn’t shift either times the rogues attacked because I’m terrified of them,” I said honestly. “They killed my brother.”
It was so hard to admit this to him. I had never said it aloud before. Not to Mom, especially after Jeremy’s death, because I wanted her to trust that I could handle them. Not to Jeremy’s gravestone because I didn’t want to seem like a weak alpha. Not to myself because I was ashamed.
When Ares turned to look up at me, I held him in place and squeezed my eyes shut. “Let me continue.” I gnawed on the inside of my lip. “I didn’t shift because my wolf—”
Someone banged on the door, and Ares ignored it, still pressing his fingers into my hip bone. The knock came again. When Ares didn’t even move for it, Liam peeked his head into the room.
Ares growled and pulled the blankets up my body. “What’re you doing, Liam?”
“The warriors are ready. If we want to get there before nightfall, for an attack at midnight, then we must leave now.”
Ares growled. “Leave us. I’ll be there in a moment.”
When Liam shut the door, Ares stood up from the bed and grasped my face in his hands. “You and your wolf are safe with me. The hounds won’t hurt you. Your wolf doesn’t have to be scared of anything.” He kissed me. “Tell her that when we get back, my wolf and she will run freely through the woods together under the moon. I’ll make sure to have the forest guarded.”
My heart hurt. I should’ve told him.
“I can’t wait to meet her.” He handed me some clothes from the dressers that he must’ve put away for me because I surely hadn’t planned on unpacking and staying here with him.
I pulled on the T-shirt and pants that he had given me and jumped off the bed, trying not to make eye contact with him.
It was getting harder and harder to tell him my secret. Every time that it came up, I either chickened out or was interrupted. Maybe it was the Moon Goddess telling me that now wasn’t the right time, that I should wait, that I should run when he tried to find that damn stone. It would be my only chance.
“Come here, Kitten.” Ares opened the door and held out his hand.
I wanted an us … but this secret was too big. And though he’d said he wouldn’t hurt me, I didn’t believe him. Not when the universe was set on me not telling him. Not when I knew he could destroy me in seconds. Not when I didn’t trust myself to stop him from ruining me.
“Ares, that’s not what I—”
“Ares,” Liam said from down the hall, hands stuffed into his pockets. “Marcel wants to know which group he’s commanding.”
Ares took my hand and walked with me to the front door.
Standing outside, Marcel was leaning against a running SUV with his arms crossed over his chest, smirking at a furious Charolette. “That’s not my fault, Princess.”
“It’s always your fault, Marcel.”
“Says the woman who—”
Ares growled, and they stopped bickering. He stepped forward and handed Marcel the keys to the car. “You’ll be escorting Charolette and Aurora.”
My eyes widened. So, now, I was going with them to watch Elijah get tortured to fucking death, ruining my chances of ever escaping? This wasn’t what I had planned. I was meant to—
“Again?” Marcel said with an overexaggerated sigh. “I did it last time.”
“Oh, come on!” Charolette said. “You’re going to make me sit in the car with that asshole again? I can’t stand another second of—”
“Ares, I can’t go with them. I thought you said you wouldn’t let me out of your sight.”
“Enough,” Ares said.
We all fell silent, and I cursed myself for what I had said. All I wanted was to get out of his sight for a few moments, so I could think about all of this logically. Figure out my best course of action when Ares found out about me. Maybe decide who would get Ruffles once I was dead.
“You’re all going. You”—he looked at Charolette—“nor you”—he looked at me—“are staying here alone, where I can’t get to you within a minute. And you’re definitely not running through Hound Territory with us. Marcel will drive you to Elijah’s and then will drive you back once he has given us what we need.”
Liam stepped forward, jaw clenched, and glared at Marcel. “You fucking touch her, and I will kill you.”
“Ooh, boyfriend is mad.” Marcel waved his hands in the air, acting scared. Then, he hopped into the car and slammed the door shut.
He watched through the window with an ugly scowl as Liam hugged Charolette to his chest and placed a kiss on her forehead. Charolette slid into the car.
“You’ll be safe with him,” Ares said to me one last time. “The only reason that you’re going with him is because I don’t leave Charolette—or you—here when I hunt. And”—he brushed his fingers up the side of my neck, making me shiver—“this pretty little neck of yours doesn’t have my mark. I’m not going to risk someone trying to take you while I’m gone.”