All Chapters of Marked by the Alpha: Blood Oath: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The heat strikes without warning. One moment I'm moving feed sacks in the shed's half-light, lungs full of cold air and dust. The next, fire races beneath my skin, sudden and consuming, settling deep with liquid intensity. My legs give out. I catch myself against the workbench, breath coming in sharp bursts. A hot wetness blooms between my thighs, shocking enough that I look down and find dark patches soaking through my jeans. Not sweat. Slick. My wolf curls tight in my head, confused and aching, instincts it doesn't understand clawing to the surface.“No,” I whisper, panicked. My hands shake as I press them to my thighs, shocked at the dampness of the fabric. My body’s burning, trembling. My scent spikes, heavy and sweet, and the bond roars awake, a bright thread between me and him.He’ll smell you.I stagger away from the table, heartbeat frantic. I can’t stay here. The other wolves will pick it up. He will pick it up. Shame burns hotter than the heat itself as I shove the door o

EliI wake to gray light and the scent of him.The wool blanket is warm against my cheek. My my body feels heavy, but the burn is gone, leaving only a deep ache between my thighs and a raw pull where his mouth bruised my neck. Not only where the bite is. He left purple marks blooming all over me.The air itself remembers him. Smoke and iron mixed with cedar, threaded through with something primal and entirely Ronan. It's embedded in every surface, every fiber, every inch of me. I can still taste the ghost of him when my tongue darts out. My stomach twists. Fury claws up my chest before I can stop it. Fury and something worse. Fear. Disgust. Craving.He broke me.I wanted it.I can’t stay here.I push upright, gasping as my muscles protest. Every movement hurts in ways that make me remember his hands, his teeth, his voice in my ear. The euphoria as I found release. That’s never happened to me before. Ronan Vale gave me my first fucking orgasm and I despise him for it.My jeans are go

EliThe dream drags me under like deep water.At first it’s only shadows and the tang of rust and sweat. The low growl of male voices. Then the torch light flares, harsh against the concrete walls of the pens, and I’m nineteen again. Bare‑chested and chained, skin raw from the whip. The air reeks of slick, blood, and the hopeless, hungry scent of other omegas penned like cattle.“Heat,” someone snarls behind me. “We need him in heat or he can’t be fertilized.”I fight when they come, teeth bared, nails raking flesh. They laugh, pressing me down, hands pinning my shoulders as another yanks my head back by my hair. I bite, taste blood. A fist splits my lip. The sting of leather whips across my back, again and again, until fire blooms under my skin and the sound of my own scream fills my ears.But the fever never comes. Not for them. Never enough to give them what they want.“Broken bitch,” one growls, shoving me aside. “Can’t even breed.”They leave me bleeding on the concrete, breathle

EliDarkness has teeth here.I know that and still I find myself slipping between cabins after midnight, for the third night in row.The cold biting at my cheeks, every shadow feeling alive. Most of the pack sleeps, but a few lanterns still glow faintly, sending thin ribbons of light over the snow. My wolf’s ears flatten low as I move, instincts whispering to turn back. But I don’t. I have to keep working on my ability to fight the pull of the bond. Ronan doesn’t seem to know about my nightly wandering. If he did he would have appeared out of the shadows by now.Maybe he’s a very sound sleeper.For a moment I picture him in bed. Harsh expression relaxed for once. His bare, tattooed chest moving up and down slowly. The image is warm and edged with intimacy. A crunch of boots ahead snaps me back to reality and I flatten myself against the side of the supply shed. Voices drift through the stillness, low and intense.“…told you. Redmaw won’t wait forever,” one says. “If they see he’s di

EliI crouch in the shadows by the supply shed, heartbeat too loud in my ears. Frost bites through the thin soles of my boots. My makeshift satchel, a square of stolen canvas patched with leather, rests against my thigh, weighed down with the few things I’ve hoarded.Patrol lights sweep the far side of camp. I wait, breath held, until the beams drift away, until I hear the low murmur of bored wolves and the crunch of boots fading toward the western path. It’s just after midnight. Patrols are thinner now, the gaps between watch points wide enough to slip through if you’re desperate… or crazy.