LOGIN"He's been fast," Alaric said quietly. "Crane left this hall last night. It's been less than a day.""The Old Compact," Elara said. She turned to Thorne. "Is that real?"Thorne rubbed his beard. "It is real. It is also thoroughly ancient and has not been invoked in two hundred years. The Compact was written when the last Breeder's line produced heirs for every pack. It gave the packs a say in how those heirs were raised." He paused. "It was meant to prevent one House from hoarding a gift that belonged to the whole nation.""And that's how Garrett reads it.""That is how Garrett would like to read it.""And how do the rest of you read it?"Silence passed across the room.Elara waited. She had learned in the Fae court that silence was never empty. It was where people decided who they were going to be.It was Rourke who spoke first, blunt as a hammer. "I'll be honest with you, Luna. Half of what I felt at the borders was hope, and half was fear. I want to see this thing succeed. But some
She leaned back against him for a moment. He wrapped his arms around her waist, and the two of them stood there in the quiet, listening to Kieran and Caspian bicker over a missing cufflink."Do I look like a woman who just got thoroughly fucked?" she asked."Yes.""Is it very obvious?""Painfully." There was a smile in his voice. "I'm told the Alphas are very observant.""Wonderful.""Mm." He turned her gently to face him and tucked a stray curl behind her ear. His eyes searched her face. "You are all right? You're not tired? Nothing hurts?""I'm fine." She caught his hand and squeezed it. "I promise. I'd tell you.""You'd better.""I would.""Good." He lifted her hand and brushed his lips across her knuckles. Then his expression sharpened into something cooler and more focused, the Alpha King returning behind his eyes. "Three days are up today. Aldric will have his answer for you. And Garrett's envoy has had the night to run to his master.""I know.""Whatever comes in that room, we
He growled against her skin, and the vibration shuddered through her. His other hand moved to her back, holding her close, and he took her deeper, his tongue working slow, devastating strokes across the tender flesh.She felt him through his trousers. Hard. Thick. Unbearably close. She ground against him without thinking, and his whole body shuddered."Elara," he warned against her breast."I don't care.""You will.""I need....."Someone knocked on the door.Three sharp raps. Then, from the other side of the wood, in the clipped, careful tones of a man trying very hard not to know what was happening in the room:"Alpha Alaric?"Everyone froze."Alpha Alaric, I'm very sorry." It was Marcus. "The council has assembled. Three Alphas, the Fae envoy, and the pack elders. They are asking for you. And for the Luna." A pause. "They are asking quite insistently."On the bed, Kieran buried his face in the pillow. His shoulders began to shake.Caspian lay on his back with one arm flung across h
Nobody answered him.Elara lay between her two mates with her cheek against Kieran's shoulder and her breath still ragged in her throat, and she could only look at Alaric. He stood at the foot of the bed in black from collar to boot, every button fastened, every inch of him controlled, the second cuff folded back over his scarred forearm. The room was thick with the smell of sex and sweat and warm skin, and he walked through it as if he owned every breath of air.Which, in a way, he did."Don't you think so, tesoro?" he asked again, softer.The bond flared. She felt it in her chest first, a slow, heavy heat that spread outward, and underneath it, the thing she knew best about him: the want he kept chained and leashed and aimed entirely at her. It had been building through all of this, through every sound she'd made for his brothers. He'd stood outside that door and felt every second of it."I think so," she whispered."Good."He came around the side of the bed and stopped beside her.
A second finger joined the first. She trembled. Kieran grunted, holding himself absolutely still beneath her, though she could feel him straining, every muscle quivering with restraint."You're doing perfectly," Caspian said. "Tell me how it feels.""Full," she gasped. "So full. It's....it's so much....""Do you want me to stop?""No." She arched into his hand. "Please don't stop."He worked her gently, scissoring his fingers, stretching her, until the sensation melted into a deep, rolling pleasure she couldn't have named. When he finally withdrew, she whimpered, and he pressed a kiss between her shoulder blades."Ready?""Yes.""Tell me if it's too much.""I will."She felt the head of his cock press against her. A slow, firm pressure, thick and hot. She bit her lip."Breathe out," Caspian said. "Now."He pushed in.Elara cried out, high and sharp, her whole body locking. It stretched her unbearably, a burning fullness that bordered on pain and shaded rapidly into something she had n
She was still shaking. She didn't care. She slid off Caspian's lap and rolled over, dropping onto her hands and knees in the middle of the mattress, her ass high, her head bowed between her shoulders.Kieran's hands closed on her hips."Wait," Caspian said.Kieran growled. "Cas....""One moment." Caspian moved up in front of Elara, and she lifted her head to find his cock inches from her face, hard and wet and gleaming. He cupped her chin gently. "I would like her mouth.""Take it," Kieran bit out. "Just let me...""Go ahead."Kieran drove into her.One brutal, perfect stroke, and Elara cried out, but the sound was muffled as Caspian slid his cock between her lips. She took him in, tasting herself on him, and the sound he made, low and strangled and utterly undone, sent a thrill through her whole body.Behind her, Kieran began to fuck her.It was nothing like before. There was no patience, no pretense, no technique. It was raw, pounding, relentless, his hips snapping against her ass w
Alaric:Alaric had faced down rival packs, survived assassination attempts, and watched his father die in his arms.But sitting across from this tiny human woman who was glaring at him like she wanted to set him on fire was somehow more unsettling than all of that combined.The cottage was small, t
The words hung in the air like a death sentence.Elara's lungs forgot how to work."What?" she managed."The mate bond," Kieran said from behind Alaric. He sounded almost... apologetic? "When you touched me....when the bond snapped into place....it bound you to all three of us. You're our mate, Ela
Elara:Elara's brain had officially stopped working.There was no other explanation for why she was standing in her grandmother's backyard, pressed against the naked chest of a man who had been a wolf sixty seconds ago, while more howls echoed through the forest like something out of a nightmare.T
The mate bond, which had been humming quietly in the background since he'd caught her scent, suddenly snapped into place with the force of a lightning strike. It roared through him, white-hot and all-consuming, burning away every thought that wasn't her her her MINE.Kieran's vision went white.His







