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“They need to be separated and locked up until we can work out what the hell is going on.”
A lot of things were being shouted, but it was that which had me shouldering through my men. My nudity didn’t matter anymore, not when I heard that. My fists tightened, my jaw squaring as I thrust myself forward, glaring at every single person there who seemed to think right now, after what we’d all just gone through, was an excuse to make decisions about my life. I’d ballsed out shitty customers and overbearing Karens many a time in my working career, and I was about to do the same here, but then they saw it.
Gasps went around the group as they saw the bleeding mark on my neck, my fingers finding the wound.
“Who bit you?”
The girl with the wild tangle of brown hair, Jules, they’d called her, she stepped forward, frowning, her eyes wild as she scanned the guys, but when Shaun’s arms went around me, pulling me close, they became laser focussed.
“You? You did this to someone who was going through the first day of her heat? Jesus, Shaun. How fucking low are you prepared to go?”
Which seemed to open the floodgates, people shouting, waving hands around, stabbing fingers into the air, the noise getting louder and louder.
“Enough!” I snapped, using my biggest, best crowd control voice, but this time, it was augmented. A hollow, echoey roar coloured my words, creating instant order, and from that, I made my decision. I grabbed Shaun’s arm, gave the other men grateful looks and said, “Let’s go back to the cabin.”
Which I thought was the end of that.
“Not so fast,” a voice said, and I saw several older women step forward. “Dress the girl in something and then bring her to the alpha residence. We need to get to the bottom of this.”
Chapter 20
So this was how we came to be ushered into a massive compound, instructed to shower and dress by a tense-looking Ophelia. We did so like chastened children. Well, they did. I was well and truly still in rebellious teenager mode.
“We didn’t do anything wrong,” I insisted. “Everyone there was a consenting adult.”
“In the club? Yeah,” Shaun said grimly, towelling himself off with rough motions that made me step in and take the towel from him. He went very still as I reached up, drying off that body, that beautiful fall of blond hair, much more gently. When I pulled it away, his hand whipped out, holding my wrist and pulling me close. “Things run to plan here, always stay the same. Usually, it’s comforting, but… The focus of Sanctuary is on the safety of the women.”
“And somehow we’ve threatened that?” I asked, incredulous.
“You… We made them feel what we felt. Every damn adult in the town, I think.”
“Which was insanely hot,” Axel said. “I’ve fucked and been fucked, but I never knew that’s what it felt like for women.” He tossed his head back, looking somewhat shell-shocked. “That was…transcendent.”
“But we didn’t have their permission,” Ethan said grimly. He st
ood a distance away from us, then pulled on the provided shorts and T-shirt.
“You… You don’t have to stay.” I had to force the words out, everything inside me screaming the opposite, but I had to say this. “Like, I don’t want you getting into shit because of me. I have a job to get back to, a friend who’s probably rung the cops, thinking Shaun kidnapped me. I can GTFO once this blows over and—”
“No.”
Arms went around me, and I was tugged up against Shaun’s body, his lips finding the mark he’d left on me with unerring ease, but it wasn’t pain I felt when he brushed it, more an echo of that former pleasure.
Axel, on the other hand, looked a little shaken.
“Your heat is broken?” I nodded, because it was, sort of. It’d been remarkably short, but I felt like I was in the driver’s seat right now. “The agreement is that we stay until your heat is done, unless you wish otherwise.” His eyebrow slid up slowly in question. “What do you want us to do, Bec?”
Stay. That was definite, I felt it beating hard in my chest, but for some reason, it caught there. Axel watched me struggle, swallow, my head twisting, before he reached out and placed a big hand on my sternum.
“What do you want? This is Sanctuary. It’s safe to ask for what you need. Just tell us. You were so fucking brave before, reaching for what you want.”
I might have infected the whole town with the equivalent of spiritual Viagra, but Axel, there was something different about him. When he spoke, he cast spells, drawing my answer out of me before my inhibitions could hold me back any more.
“Stay. Please. If you want to. I mean…”
“I’m not going anywhere, ever,” Shaun assured me, holding me close, and that same rush, of warmth, of sweetness, of feeling like I was home after being so long out in the cold, had my eyes closing.
“I’m in.”
