Someone was There

+ Kaz

"The least you can do is be nice, Kaz."

Kenzo lingered in the doorway of my study, leaning against the frame. His jaw was set, his posture practically begging for an argument. He wanted me to justify how I'd spoken to the Omega yesterday, to explain why I had treated her like a transaction instead of a person.

I didn't give him the satisfaction. Keeping my eyes anchored to the shipping manifest on my desk, I let the heavy silence stretch out until it choked the air right out of the room.

With a loud, useless sigh that scraped against the quiet walls, Kenzo finally pushed off the doorframe. He turned on his heel and walked out, the heavy door clicking firmly shut behind him.

The absolute stillness returned. I dropped my pen onto the desk, watching my own hand. It wasn't entirely steady. I stared at my knuckles, the pale skin pulled tight over the bone.

Medora.

The exact second she had stepped onto the porch yesterday, my chest locked up. My blood thickened into boiling lead as the mate bond snapped into place like an iron bear trap. It didn't ask for permission or attempt to negotiate; it simply claimed me.

She was my mate.

I had absolutely no idea what to do with that information. Mates were a massive liability, a fatal weakness you couldn't train away, a permanent target painted squarely on your back. Up here in the mountains, we ran an unforgiving territory where soft things simply didn't survive.

Desperate for a way out, I had buzzed Marcus, my best private guard, demanding he pull her background. Every medical file, every minor pack incident since the day she was born. I needed a flaw. I needed a concrete reason to send her back down the mountain.

Twenty minutes later, he had knocked on my door and handed me a single, alarmingly thin manila folder.

I opened it to find completely empty pages.

"A blank slate," Marcus had said, keeping his hands professionally clasped behind his back. "Nothing on her. Just a birth certificate and the transfer papers her father signed."

I had slapped the cardboard folder shut against the desk. An Omega with no history was highly dangerous. It meant her old pack had intentionally erased her, treating her like a ghost, or she was hiding something massive. Either way, she was a threat.

Standing up, I walked over to the tall window. The morning sun glared blindly off the fresh snow outside. A black SUV idled by the front steps, its exhaust pluming like thick smoke in the freezing air while the driver waited by the back door.

Then, Medora walked out of the house.

She wore a heavy winter coat, moving with agonising care down the icy stairs. She took up a lot of physical space, but she tried so desperately to pretend she didn't, her wide shoulders hunched forward in a tragic bid for invisibility. She climbed into the back seat, and the door slammed shut.

She was going to cause deep trouble for us. The bond alone was enough to rip this pack apart if my brothers ever found out. 

Then I paused.

Could they have also felt it and been thinking what I was thinking?

"Follow her," I told Marcus, my eyes never leaving the glass. "Don't let her see you. Report back the second she gets home."

Marcus nodded once and slipped out of the room.

I needed to freeze the heat out of my blood.

Heading down to the basement level, I stripped off my clothes and dove straight into the indoor pool. We kept it at a punishing forty degrees, which gave a grounding effect for when our wolf goes feral. Usually, the sheer shock of it forced my brain into blessed silence, killing the endless noise of running a pack.

But not today.

I swam laps until my lungs burned for oxygen and my muscles screamed, but it was useless. The icy water couldn't numb a single nerve.

I only saw her.

Pushing off the slick tiled wall, her face flashed directly behind my eyelids. Her wide shoulders. Her thick thighs. She wasn't delicate at all, not some fragile little bird easily broken by the wind. She had serious meat on her bones. She didn't look fat to me; she looked solid. Unbreakable. She looked fed enough to carry my babies, built to survive a monster exactly like me.

Breaking the surface with a violent gasp, I gripped the steel ladder and dragged my heavy, aching body out of the water. Freezing drops fell from my chest, pooling on the floor.

Something was fundamentally wrong with me.

Two hours later, the pack gathered in the main dining room for a meeting.

Sitting across from me at the massive black timber table, Kai remained entirely silent. Kenzo paced restlessly near the stone fireplace, perpetually burning off excess energy, while Kol leaned against the far wall, cloaked in deep shadows. They debated new logging contracts and northern border disputes, just the usual, grating pack noise.

I just stared at the swirling wood grain on the table.

I couldn't hear a single word they were saying. My mind kept tracing the exact shape of Medora's mouth. Her soft, supple lips. The way she had responded her yesterday. She hadn't flinched at all; she had just accepted her predicament, genuinely believing she was nothing more than a transaction.

Beneath the table, I dug my nails brutally into my own thigh. The sharp bite of pain grounded me for exactly two seconds before the phantom scent of her returned. Strawberry mixed with something entirely dark and rich. Something that tasted exclusively like mine.

"Kaz."

Kol's low, rough voice cut straight through the thick fog suffocating my brain.

I looked up. Kol was watching me intently, his dark eyes narrowed. He didn't ask if I was okay; he never asked stupid questions, but as he studied my face, I knew he saw the total distraction and was silently noting it down.

"The logging trucks," Kai prompted, tapping a thick, calloused finger against his map. "Do we authorise the northern route?"

"Yes," I barked, my voice flat and hard. "Authorise it. The meeting is adjourned."

I stood up and walked out before they could even draw breath to argue.

I couldn't afford this obsession. She was brought here to be a breeder, a simple biological arrangement, and I was hell-bent on keeping it exactly that way. If I acknowledged the mate bond, she instantly became a target. 

My attention would only bring her absolute pain; I broke things, inevitably destroying everything I touched. It was much safer for her to stay a complete stranger, far better that she never knew I was her mate at all.

Night finally fell. The house plunged into darkness as the main generator cut out right on schedule at midnight.

I locked myself in my study, refusing to turn on the battery lamp. The only light was the pale, ghostly moon shining through the tall window glass, casting long, sharp shadows across the floorboards.

Sitting behind my heavy oak desk, I breathed in the incredibly stale air. The room smelled heavily of old copper and rust, yet underneath that metallic rot, the ghost of her scent lingered. It crawled straight down into my lungs, digging its claws deep into my brain.

I unbuckled my belt. The heavy leather strap hit the back of the chair with a dull thud.

I unzipped my pants.

I didn't want to do this. It was a massive, humiliating loss of control, and I hated losing control more than anything else in this world. I ruled this mountain with absolute, iron-clad discipline. Now, a single Omega was tearing that discipline to bloody pieces.

Wrapping my hand around my own cock, I gritted my teeth. I was completely, painfully hard, a state I had been trapped in since she stepped out of that black SUV hours ago.

I knew she was back, but I dreaded going to her. I squeezed tight, my jaw clenching so hard my teeth ground together.

I started to stroke myself in a slow, punishing rhythm. I refused to close my eyes, forcing myself to stare blindly into the pitch-black corner of the room. But my treacherous mind took over anyway.

I imagined her right here, bent over this desk. I imagined sweeping the useless paperwork onto the floor, my hands gripping those thick thighs, pinning her down against the rough wood and spreading her wide open.

"Medora," I rasped.

Her name tore right out of my throat, a raw, ugly sound that I barely recognised as my own.

I stroked harder, my breathing turning shallow and harsh. The fierce friction burned my skin, but I liked the pain. It matched the total fire raging in my blood. I pushed my hips up into my own grip, utterly lost to the fantasy.

I pictured my teeth sinking deep into the soft flesh of her neck, marking her skin to claim the bond she didn't even know existed. I imagined the exact, desperate sound she'd make when I completely ruined her.

My eyes rolled back. The heavy, aching pressure of release built up at the base of my spine, a dark, violent wave of pure instinct ready to crash. Gripping the edge of the desk with my free hand, the sharp wood digging into my palm, I pumped my fist faster. I couldn't stop it.

Hovering right at the absolute peak, the jagged edge of the cliff, my eyes suddenly snapped open.

I locked my gaze directly on the dark gap of the doorframe.

Someone was there.