The Omega's rebellion

Primal possession

"If it isn't our little sheep, bleating her way back to the flock."

Celine's mocking taunt rang out the moment I stepped through the cottage door.

She reclined with studied indolence on a tattered divan, flashing me a predatory grin as Dionne emerged from the shadows to flank her.

"Off cavorting with your woodland nymphs again?" Dionne sneered. "I can smell their filthy essence all over you, Evie."

My jaw clenched at the childhood slight, even as shame heated my cheeks.

They couldn't possibly have detected the lingering scent of pine and earth and something richer, headier...

"What concerns me more," Celine continued in a deceptively conversational tone, "is this sudden ritual of virility Blackwood has announced." She allowed her gaze to drag over me in an openly appraising leer. "Surely a delicate little flower like you wouldn't deign to sully yourself by competing like some feral bitch."

"Of course she will!" Dionne crowed with harsh laughter. "Our pathetic little sheep would do anything for a taste of real power, even debase herself completely."

I opened my mouth, a biting retort trembling on my lips, but Celine was already speaking again in that carefully modulated purr.

"We just want to make sure you understand your...limitations, Eyvie." A cruel smile curved her full lips as her gaze met mine with naked malice. "This ritual is no mere game. It will require endurance, ferocity,savagery, qualities you've never had the stomach for."

Dionne nodded in vehement agreement. "A delicate little thing like you wouldn't last a single round against real she-wolves like us."

My nails bit into my palms as that familiar, seething ire coiled through me like smoldering embers fanned to life.

I wanted nothing more than to unleash my fury upon these two pathetic excuses for wolves, to rend and tear until they understood just how savage this delicate little flower could be.

But I knew from painful experience that taking their taunting bait would only invite further degradation and abuse from the vicious pair.

"You can spare me the lecture," I ground out through gritted teeth. "I'm well aware of my limitations."

"Are you?" Celine straightened from her indolent sprawl, eyes glittering with malicious intent. "Because something tells me you still harbor delusions of grandeur, little sheep. You'd do well to remember your place."

Then, so suddenly I didn't have time to react, she launched herself from the divan, slamming into me with the force of a freight train.

My breath escaped in a harsh wheeze as my back impacted the wall, and stars exploded across my vision from the ringing blow.

"This is how a real she-wolf moves," Celine hissed against my ear as I writhed weakly in her unforgiving grasp. "With power and grace and lethal intent."

Vicious nails scored down the vulnerable flesh of my forearms, raising burning lines of agony in their wake. I cried out, my throat constricted by panic and shock, and immediately hands were twisting in my hair, wrenching my head back at a brutal angle.

"Listen here, Eyvie," Dionne growled right in my face as Celine's fingers cinched like manacles at my throat. "This little ritual is your one chance to prove you're worthy of being more than a diseased blight on our pack."

My lungs burned from the lack of air, my struggles growing weaker and weaker.

Just as the world began to blur at the edges, that merciless grip finally relented and I collapsed in a gasping heap at their feet.

"Remember this," Celine snarled as she straightened her clothing. "You're a lamb playing among wolves. Know your place, or we'll be more than happy to remind you—again and again."

The two she-beasts exited as suddenly as they'd struck, leaving me trembling and wheezing on the floor, every inch of me screaming with humiliation and defiance in equal measure.

I would not submit so easily.

No matter what savagery this ritual demanded, I would persevere.

I would unleash every ounce of primal ferocity within me, not to prove my worth to that arrogant bastard Blackwood, but to show Celine and Dionne once and for all that I was no mere lamb to be cowed and slaughtered.

I was a wolf. And I would make the whole bloody pack recognize it.

A soft step outside the cottage had me instinctively stilling my ragged breaths.

Perhaps the harpies had returned to gloat over their victory.

But then an achingly familiar voice caressed over me like a lovers' caress.

"Evelyn?"

My heart stuttered at the sound, even as shame licked through me anew.

Of course Ethan would find me like this, a bruised, cowering mess sprawled at his feet.

Before I could lift my head or even force a reassuring murmur past my battered lips, he was there, cradling me in his powerful embrace with a tenderness that threatened to shatter my already fractured composure.

"Who...?" The words emerged as little more than a rasped whisper, my body going boneless and pliant against the scorching heat of his.

"Does it matter?" He rumbled, every syllable resonating in that rich timbre that could unravel me so effortlessly. "You're safe now. That's all that matters."

His hands cradled my face, tilting it up until I was pinned by the lambent ferocity in those jade eyes.

"Let me take care of you, Eyvie." He breathed the childhood endearment like a sacred invocation against my lips. "Let me show you my strength."

Then his mouth was on mine, hot and punishing and utterly indifferent to the startled moan that wrenched free of me.

His tongue swept into the velvet haven, commanding and rapacious.

Somehow I wound up sprawled under the exquisite arrogance of his body as the storm of his passion obliterated all resistance.

Teeth nipped at my swollen lower lip with sweet possession, drawing forth a gasp and a strangled whimper, followed by the hungry rasp of his tongue soothing over the tingling flesh.

His clever fingers threaded through my hair, tilting my head at just the right angle to plunder and pillage my mouth with searing ownership.

Heat scorched along every inch of me where our bodies aligned in perfect blasphemous union.

Ethan's calloused hands mapped every curve and hollow with reverent avarice, palming the tender weighs of my breasts through the thin barrier of my gown until I arched into that sinful touch with a desperate moan.

Just when I thought I might combust from the sensory onslaught, from the exquisite pressure of his masculine weight pressing me into the cottages's woven rugs, everything came to a crashing halt.

One heartbeat we were a tangle of thrashing limbs and ravenous kisses, and the next Ethan tore his mouth from mine with a ragged, visceral groan.

We lay there for endless pulsebeats in the deafening silence, our harsh pants the only sound as our bodies thrummed in resonant ecstasy.

Finally, Ethan lifted himself onto his elbows, propping his upper body away from mine while subtly shifting his hips to keep our lower bodies fused.

"Ethan..." I uttered his name like a sacred entreaty, my hands sliding up the taut slabs of his abdomen in a silent plea.

"Hush now," he rumbled, brushing the pad of his thumb along the tender seam of my lips, already swollen from the ferocity of his possession. "We should return to the village before—"

A low, resonant growl from beyond the ruined doorway cleaved through the air, shattering the intimate shroud around us like a bolt of lightning.

Ethan stiffened above me, his entire body going rigid as he slowly lifted his head.

"Well now," that rich, arrogant timbre seemed to permeate my very bones with visceral promise. "Isn't this a pretty tableau?"

Lucas Blackwood slid into the cottage with predatory grace, his intense amber gaze missing nothing as it traced over our entwined forms.

The sinful curve of one dark brow arched in cool amusement.

"My my, Ethan. I had no idea my omegas were such...accomplished performers off the stage too."

Lucas flashed me a lazy, lopsided grin that fairly simmered with sardonic heat a grin that promised delicious carnalities just beyond the veil of propriety.

"Your omegas?" Ethan ground out, his body still rigid above mine in an unconscious shield.

That penetrating amber stare slid to him, hooding with undisguised challenge. "Indeed. Including this lovely little spitfire."

A low, rumbling chuckle reverberated straight through me, stoking the smoldering coals of some forbidden yearning.

"Though she seems to have forgotten that particular fact during your...intimate greeting."

Ethan's growl vibrated through that iron-hewn frame in palpable menace. "Evelyn is my mate by ancestral rites."

The cruel curve of Lucas's mouth deepened with dark promise. "Is that so? Because if memory serves, she very much belongs to me now."

He prowled closer, body rippling with leonine grace.

I couldn't tear my gaze away, utterly mesmerized by the bold power radiating from him in seething waves.

"Shall I remind the pair of you just how thoroughly I plan to stake my claim?"

My pulse thundered in my ears, throat gone leaden with visceral anticipation.

I should have been terrified.

Should have felt violated by the unmitigated arrogance of his words and that scorching look of possession leveled my way.

But I didn't.

Instead, some traitorous part of me craved nothing more than for Lucas Blackwood to demonstrate in exquisite, wicked detail exactly how he intended to stake that claim.

And judging by the ruthless intent burning in those smoldering depths, his reminder would be nothing short of utterly cataclysmic.

Before my lust-fevered imaginings could conjure what fresh carnalities Lucas surely had in store, he moved with soughing swiftness, closing the distance and wrenching Ethan off me in a blur.

My mate went sailing across the cottage to crash into the far wall with enough force to crater the sturdy timber.

I didn't have a chance to even process what was happening before Lucas had me pinned in the same position Ethan had so thoroughly ravaged me only moments before.

His weight was pure, unyielding masculine power blanketing me on all sides.

For one fractional breath, his amber gaze held mine, burning with a searing intensity that robbed me of reason and speech alike.

Then his mouth slanted over mine in a searing, punishing brand of possession that seared me to my very marrow.

This wasn't a kiss. It was a brutal ravaging, a plundering of the senses as his tongue swept past my lips in a bold tasting that obliterated any hint of resistance.

His calloused hands fisted in my hair, tilting my head with merciless dominance as his hips ground against me in a sinuous rhythm of pure male demand.

I surrendered on a desperate, keening whimper, opening for him with shameless abandon.

My hands mapped the unyielding slabs of his back and shoulders through his shirt, reveling in the pure masculine power coiled in every tensed muscle and sinew.

My senses were overwhelmed with the smoldering musk of his skin and heady, ancient magic of his touch.

This was how a true alpha claimed his mate not with soft words or gentle caresses, but with an uncompromising ferocity that branded onto the very soul.

Just when I thought those searing, merciless strokes of his tongue might undo me completely, Lucas tore his mouth from mine with a harsh growl of pure masculine potency.

I whimpered at the loss, head lolling weakly against the floor as pleasure and sheer disbelief held me immobile.

With one last parting look of blistering possession blazing in those amber depths, Lucas prowled back toward the ruined doorway, straightening his shirt with casual indifference.

As if he hadn't just shattered my entire world with a single, incendiary kiss.

"Not to worry, Ethan," he tossed over one broad shoulder, every syllable dripping arrogant menace. "I'm more than willing to share my conquest with you—under the proper circumstances."

A shudder traced my spine at that dark promise, leaving me limp in its wake even as Ethan launched himself from the floor, fists clenched and fangs bared in blatant challenge.

"You arrogant son of a—"

Lucas didn't even bother turning as he simply uttered two words that severed Ethan's threat off like a scythe.

"Earn it."

Then he was gone, melting into the shadows like some ancient, elemental specter born of the darkness itself.

I somehow found the strength to lever myself upright, propping my back against the wall as a torrent of recrimination roiled through me in the aftermath of Lucas's possession.

How dare he? How dare he invade my sanctuary and simply take whatever he wanted with nary a thought to propriety or consent?

The anger was there, smoldering beneath the surface.

But even as I fought to stoke its flames into a righteous inferno, my treacherous body could only keen for that punishing onslaught of his mouth and touch and scent and taste.

Ethan was at my side now, his expression twisted with mingled outrage and something darker...bitterer.

"He can't do this, Eyvie," he rasped hoarsely. "I won't let that bastard claim you like some rutting prize to be won."

His palm cradled my cheek, tilting my face up until our gazes locked with searing intensity.

In his jade-green depths, I saw a ferocious promise of possession that should have reassured me, should have chased away every lingering phantom of Lucas's scorching brand.

But I couldn't quite muster the same sense of surety at his vow.

Because even as that ancient legacy bond hummed between Ethan and I, thrumming with the weight of generations upon generations of predestined mates...

I knew with soul-corroding certainty that some part of me was already utterly, irrevocably claimed by the arrogant specter that was Alpha Lucas Blackwood.