Page 13 of The Forbidden Alpha

I sat cross-legged next to him, a hysterical, drunken giggle bubbling up in my throat. “No, Gabe! It’s just me!” I slapped his arm, the room spinning in a slow, sickening carousel.

“Scared me for a second, Ady. Thought the whole house was coming down,” he slurred, a goofy grin plastered on his face.

I fell back next to him, the laughter dying as the darkness of the room pressed in. My room was small—a cage I’d decorated with glow-in-the-dark stars—but with the lights off, they were my only exit. I felt the tension finally start to leak out of my muscles, replaced by a fuzzy, numbing static.

The silence was heavy now, broken only by the synchronized pull of our breathing.

“Are you okay, Ady?” Gabe whispered, the humor completely gone from his voice.

I turned my head. Even in the dark, I couldn’t escape the weight of his gaze. His blond hair caught the faint glow from the moon, making him look younger, more vulnerable. Gabe had always been the one who saw straight through me. He knew me better than I knew myself.

A single tear escaped, hot and silent, tracking a path down my temple and soaking into the pillow.

“Shh, shh,” he murmured, rolling onto his side to face me. “It’s okay, baby. It’s okay.”

He pulled me into another hug—not with the territorial heat of an Alpha, but with a steady warmth that carried the scent of home and didn’t make me shiver. He stroked my hair, his fingers soothing, a stark contrast to the things Shane’s fingers made me feel. I closed my eyes, letting the darkness and the vodka take over, moored only by his comforting whispers as I drifted into a hollow sleep.

Chapter 6

Shane

“Good morning, Alpha.”

The she-wolf under my sheets purred around my length. She worked beneath the thin layer, a desperate heat between my legs. I didn’t bother removing the covers—I didn’t care to see her. It was more pleasurable when I didn’t.

My skull was silent. My beast had retreated again to that cold, hollow place he went whenever I touched someone who wasn’t her. Beka had been around two years before any of this—her presence wasn’t the problem. She stopped being enough. I still didn’t have a word for what that was. I didn’t want one.

He wouldn’t share this skin with a stranger; he was waiting for a ghost.

I needed this. After I had lost control and given into my need for her—I was starving. I could still taste her on my tongue. Beka was just the stand-in for a void that had Adea’s name carved into the bottom.

I closed my eyes and forced the image to form. I imagined Adea’s long brown hair tangled in my hands, her soft cheek pressed against my thighs. In the dark of my mind, it was her lips around me, her throat squeezing my tip until the pressure was unbearable. I reached down, gripping her head through the fabric, and thrust my hips to force her deeper.

She gagged around my length, tears spilling down her cheeks onto my pelvic bone for my own twisted pleasure.

“Yes,” I hissed as her tongue lapped at the thickening ridge of my knot. I chased the high, envisioning Adea swallowing me down, taking every drop of the poison I carried. I tipped my head back against the headboard and moaned her name as I came.

“Adea.”

Hands gripped my thighs, nails digging into my skin in a sharp, sudden protest, but I held her head down until I was empty.

When I finally let go, Beka shot upright, sheets falling away to reveal her flushed, appalled face. I kept my eyes on the ceiling, refusing to grant her a glance. Her gaze burned holes into the side of my head.

“You’re such an ass,” she seethed, her voice trembling with a mix of arousal and stinging humiliation.

She had a small scar below her left ear—barely visible, silver-white against her skin. I’d never asked where it came from. It had been two years, and I still didn’t know a single thing about her that she hadn’t offered up trying to keep my attention.

“You’re dismissed,” I said, already done with her.

She reeled back, stung. “You moaned another’s name as you spilled down my throat! Are you fucking serious right now, Shane?”

I sighed, sitting up and brushing a stray blond hair from Beka’s face. I’d been using her for two years. The only reason I kept her around was because she was a good lay, and she had feelings for me—which made her easy to manipulate—but she was a quick fix for a chronic problem.

She wasn’t the one I saw when I closed my eyes.

Adea was everything I’d ever wanted. Beka was nothing more than a placeholder.

“You’ve pleased your Alpha,” I said, my voice dismissive. “Now get out.”