Todos los capítulos de TEMPORARY MATES, PERMANENT CRAVINGS : Capítulo 21 - Capítulo 30

LISA POVI lay awake staring at the ceiling, replaying last night in my head on an endless loop. The pain. The shame. The transaction notification lighting up my phone at 2:47 a.m.When Sasha’s name flashed across the screen, I almost let it ring out. She would keep calling until I answered, though, so I accepted and pressed the phone to my ear.“Hey.”“Lisa.” Her voice carried tight worry. “You didn’t answer last night. I’ve been losing my mind.”“I’m fine.”“Bullshit. What happened? Did he…?”I didn’t answer.Silence stretched between us.“Oh god,” Sasha said. “He did.”“Can we not do this right now?” The sharpness in my voice surprised even me. “I don’t want to talk about it.”“Too bad,” Sasha shot back. “Because we’re talking about it. First of all, I still don’t understand why any woman would willingly subject herself to that. The vagina was not designed for that. It was designed for softness, pleasure, another woman’s touch, not some man’s—”“Sasha.”“I’m just saying!” She huffed

LISA POVI was already in bed when Cameron’s footsteps reached my door.Nine o’clock exactly. He kept a schedule, and I had learned that quickly. I bathed earlier, applied the lubricant, removed my clothes, and lay back on the bed waiting.Earlier that afternoon I stood at my window and watched Evangeline return from the hospital. Cameron helped her out of the car, one arm around her waist while she leaned heavily against him. The pale blue dress she wore made her look fragile.The sight twisted something in my chest. It hurt knowing I was sleeping with her mate, even if she had agreed to it.Nadia and Franklin were waiting at the entrance. Nadia kissed Evangeline’s cheek while Franklin carried her bags inside. I closed the curtains and stepped away from the window.Now Cameron stood outside my door.I took a breath and forced myself to relax.The door opened. He stepped inside and shut it behind him without looking at me.No greeting. No acknowledgment.He started unbuckling his belt

CAMERON POVI slept eight hours last night.Eight uninterrupted hours, the longest stretch I’d managed in months. I woke clear-headed in a way I hadn’t felt in years. It should have been a relief, yet the feeling unsettled me because I knew exactly why I’d slept so well.The knotting. The satisfaction my body found in Lisa’s bed.I pushed the thought aside and focused on work.The morning was consumed by resource distribution meetings, one of the few Alpha duties I actually tolerated. Unlike the Council of Elders, who spent every session questioning my authority, allocation was simple. Numbers. Decisions. Results.We reviewed crop yields from the southern farms, timber production from the northern forests, and water rights along the eastern tributaries. Silver Creek controlled over eight hundred square miles of land that required constant management.“The harvest projections are up fifteen percent from last year,” my agriculture minister said, sliding a chart across the table. “But we

LISA POVCameron’s statement left a sour weight in my chest. Not because he was wrong about what I was doing, but because he said it so easily to his mate after spilling himself inside me.The thought settled heavy in my stomach. I didn’t cry. I lay back and stared at the ceiling instead, trying to convince myself he was right.So what if he used degrading words? He was paying for my service.Then a different thought struck.I should ask for a few days off.Just a few nights. Tell him my body needed time to recover.We had been doing this every night. He had knotted inside me more than once, and even though he barely spoke to me outside the act, I knew he enjoyed it more than he would ever admit.His cock left my body aching in places I didn’t know could ache.The worst part was that I was starting to want it. Not just tolerate it or endure it.That made my stomach turn. If I didn’t force myself to think clearly, I would start believing things that weren’t real. His words from the nig

CAMERON POVI stood under the shower with the water scalding hot, trying to wash away the restlessness crawling under my skin.It didn’t work.Nothing worked.Evangeline was my mate. The woman the Moon Goddess had chosen for me. The woman I had sworn my life to. Lisa meant nothing. She was a contract, a temporary solution to a permanent problem.So why the fuck did I feel guilty?Her words from earlier kept replaying in my head.My body is exhausted. I need a few days to recover.I should have been annoyed and reminded her she had signed a contract and didn’t get to make demands.Instead, I felt concern when she said she was hurt, and then relief when she asked for a break, as if some part of me had been waiting for an excuse to stop.I braced my hands against the tile and let the water pound across my shoulders.The past week had blurred into nightly encounters. I told myself it was about maximizing the chances of conception.That was a lie.I was craving her.The sex. The way her bo