Total pages in book: 63
Estimated words: 58365 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 292(@200wpm)___ 233(@250wpm)___ 195(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58365 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 292(@200wpm)___ 233(@250wpm)___ 195(@300wpm)
He was there to instruct her how to tend to an Alpha.
Hands still gnarled and raw from the making of her ruined fur covering, still aching from how hard he’d squeezed her against his knot, she was made to knead his shoulders. Straddling his lap, face to face in a way that felt disturbingly intimate, he coaxed her to take the soap and learn to touch him in the way men liked best.
His groans when he tossed his head back at her touch did not warm the heart. His almost gentle caress of her hips under the water did not ease her mind.
Fondly, he purred, a content mass of muscle that demanded to be stroked. Eyes shining, a lazy smile on his face, he said, “You really are beautiful. Perfect, just like I said the first time I saw you.”
When his cohort had her mother’s neck in his hands, threatening to burn her alive.
“I don’t want to think of that.” Not while she was being forced to groom the male responsible.
“I understood you.” Catching her lower lip with his thumb, Esin shook his head. He sounded far less happy when he added, “One day you will remember that moment in another light. It will have been the first time you saw the mate you adore.”
Loath maybe? Voice like sandpaper, she continued to run her hands in lazy circles over his shoulders like directed. “You are not my mate.”
Stern, he tensed, undoing all her hard work to soften his mass. “I will go to any length to ensure that I will be.”
Morgaine chose not to answer, reaching instead for more soap.
“You don’t believe me?”
She believed that she was trapped on a nameless ship, god only knew where in space, surrounded by the enemy. An enemy who had just done disgusting things to her… again.
It turned out she had more tears after all.
They began to fall, her shoulders shaking with the effort to bite back painful sobs.
Esin took pity on the overwhelmed Omega, pulling her tight to his chest. At her stiff resistance, an intense purr came from him, vibrating so close to her body she felt it rattle her bones.
The heat of his hands rose from the water. They ran over the musculature of her back, kneading too hard to be considered comfortable. Esin would find a knot and attack it while she hissed through the pain. Over long minutes, muscles released.
He touched with intent, lips at her ear as he described how greatly her softness pleased him. Telling her how comfortable her future would be. She would want for nothing. Never go hungry. Never suffer loneliness as he had while waiting to find her.
In time she went limp.
Breath soft at her ear, he asked, “Is that better?”
A raspy croak complained, “I’m hungry.”
“Good.” Her sullen words drew him to hold her a little tighter. “I brought you food I had specially prepared. A gift we might enjoy together before I must depart for duty.”
Chapter 8
Though Esin seemed optimistic with Morgaine’s behavior, Sergeant Uriel continued to press for a rapid and drastic change.
When he had come to see her upon Esin’s retreat, he shared none of the lower-ranking male’s smiles.
One sniff of the nest told a story Esin either failed to notice, or discounted out of pride.
But the astringent sting in the air spoke of much more than fear. It spoke of revulsion, of shame…
Even with direct stimulation, Morgaine failed to respond as expected. He climbed into her nest, unsettled the furs, sniffing often and growled in a ceaseless low hum of displeasure.
Damaged.
He might have muttered it under his breath, but she’d heard.
Maybe she was broken, but better to be broken than a mindless Alpha puppet. Standing where the sergeant had told her to wait, Morgaine watched him grow openly agitated. Before she might earn a lesson, she pleaded her defense. “I did everything he wanted.”
The sergeant’s slipping tolerance was been replaced with antagonism. Snapping his attention from the inadequate nest to her face, his voice came rough, angry and unforgiving. “Not only did he refrain from penetrating you for your comfort, he saw to your pleasure before his own.” Frustrated with her utter unwillingness to allow Corporal Esin to so much as smell the air around her without stinking of fear, impatient with her anger, her pleading, and her disgust, Uriel climbed from the nest, marching forward to stand over her and accuse. “I watched you enjoy it.”
It was uncanny knowing strangers had watched her scream at the top of her lungs, careless of how raw her voice had become when Esin began to rip off her furs. Morgaine had bit and scratched until sound failed her completely. She had cried for her mother when he’d forced open her legs.
The effort was for nothing.
Drawing her arms protectively around her body, Morgaine found she could not meet his gaze. She had felt unseen eyes on her from the first moments in this pretty prison—the lights, the tub, the cold air that would blast about as if there had been a change in the false forest’s wind… the images on the wall. All were coordinated by whomever was tasked with monitoring her.