Claimed by the Demon Alpha

Chapter 8: The Claim

Rex POV

Her scent crashes over me the instant she crosses the threshold.

Vanilla. Jasmine. That same moonlight warmth that clung to my skin all night and refused to let me sleep.

It's her.

I close the distance in two strides.

She's smaller than I expected. Golden eyes huge with terror, pupils blown wide, chest rising and falling too fast. She looks up at me and for one suspended moment neither of us moves.

This is the part where it's supposed to happen.

I know how the mate bond works. Every wolf does. The moment you're close enough, close enough to touch---it hits like a key turning in a lock. Recognition. Certainty. Something deep in your chest that says: this one. Only this one. Always this one.

I wait for it.

"Just---" she begins.

I bury my face in the curve of her neck and inhale. Her pulse slams against my lips. I drag my tongue along it, tasting salt and fear and something underneath that makes the dragon go very, very still.

I wait.

The recognition doesn't come.

Not the way it's supposed to. Not that clean, absolute certainty. What hits me instead is something rawer. Darker. A hunger so violent it surprises even me---a need to pull her closer, to press her against the wall and keep her there, to make sure she cannot leave. Possessiveness like a fist around my throat.

But not recognition.

Something is wrong.

"It's you," I say. The words come out strange. I meant them as a statement. They land like a question.

Her palm cracks across my cheek---sharp and fearless.

The sting snaps me out of my own head. A growl rips from my chest before I can stop it.

No one has dared strike me in twelve years.

And yet this trembling girl is still standing her ground, hand raised, golden eyes blazing with defiance through the fear. Not running. Not collapsing. Staring at me like I'm something she intends to survive.

I seize her wrists and slam them against the stone wall.

Her body arches. Her curves press into my chest and the dragon surges forward, hungry, demanding. I press closer, letting her feel exactly what she's doing to me.

"You belong to me." The words come out before I think them. Low. Dangerous. And confused, somewhere underneath, in a place I refuse to examine. "My beast knew the second you walked in."

"I don't---" Her breath fractures. "I don't belong to anyone."

She's right that the bond isn't what I expected. She's wrong that it means nothing.

I don't understand what this is. I've never felt it before. But whatever it is---this thing that made the dragon go quiet, this pull that has had me pacing since last night, this violence in my chest every time I look at her---I am not letting it go.

Mine. Mate or not.

I'll figure out what she is later.

Right now, I need her closer.

Selene POV

This is the danger they feared?

I slapped him. I actually slapped the Alpha King across the face. I should be dead.

Instead his hands are pinning my wrists to cold stone and his body is pressed so close I can feel his heartbeat through his chest. It pounds against mine like something trying to break free.

And his scent.

It's the same one from when I walked in. That deep forest-and-iron smell that made my feet want to stop moving, that wrapped around my chest like a hand. I thought it would fade when I got close enough to see him clearly. To see the danger in his face and feel appropriately terrified.

It doesn't fade. It gets worse.

"You belong to me." His voice is low and controlled and furious. "My beast knew the second you walked in."

"I don't belong to anyone," I say. My voice comes out steadier than I feel.

His eyes are blue. Intensely, impossibly blue, and they're looking at me like I'm something he's already decided to keep. It makes something in my chest pull toward him in a way I immediately want to bury.

I don't understand it. I'm not going to think about it.

His mouth claims mine before I can decide what to do next.

It's brutal. Devouring. Nothing like anything I've imagined. His teeth scrape down my throat and bite hard enough that I gasp, and my fingers find his hair before I can stop them and I hate myself for it. He tears my dress apart. The fabric falls away. Cool air hits my bare skin and then his hands are everywhere and the scent of him fills every breath I take and I stop being able to think clearly.

He shoves me onto the bed. Silk sheets cool against my back as his hands force my thighs apart.

I should fight. I know I should fight.

I can't make myself want to.

"Already soaked," he says. His gaze drags over me like I'm something he owns. "Dripping for the man who caged you."

Shame burns through me. He's not wrong. I hate that he's not wrong.

His head drops and his mouth seals over me without warning and without mercy. A flat stroke of his tongue from entrance to c**t, then hard suction that makes me buck off the bed. He pins my hips down with bruising strength.

"Stay still." The growl vibrates straight through my core.

Two thick fingers push inside without preamble. Deep. Curling. Finding a spot that whites out my vision and makes me forget every reason I had to be angry. His tongue works my c**t in rapid, merciless rhythm.

I'm shaking. I'm burning. The sounds echoing off the stone walls are obscene and I can't stop making them.

"Come on my fingers," he snarls against me. "Now."

I shatter.

The orgasm rips through me so violently my spine arches off the mattress. A raw scream tears from my throat. My whole body convulses, my thighs clamping around his head, my fingers knotting in the sheets.

He doesn't stop.

He keeps sucking, keeps thrusting, forces me through every aftershock until I'm crying and oversensitive and begging brokenly.

"Too much---please---stop---"

He lifts his head. His lips are wet. His eyes are still that devastating blue, watching me fall apart with an expression that looks more like fury than satisfaction.

"Not even close," he says.

Three fingers this time. The stretch burns and the pleasure obliterates everything and his thumb grinds hard circles over my c**t and I can't fight it, I can't think, the only thing I can smell is him---

Another climax detonates. Harder than the first. My walls clamp down on his fingers and my vision goes black and a sound comes out of my throat that I've never made before.

He draws it out until I'm sobbing. Then his fingers slip free and he brings them to his mouth and licks them clean without breaking eye contact, slow and deliberate, and I feel that look everywhere.

"Sweet little wolf." His voice is rough. Something moves behind his eyes---satisfaction, yes, but underneath it something less certain. Something almost unsettled. "Soaking my hand like you were born for it."

He leans down. His mouth brushes my ear.

"But I'm not inside you yet..."

His palm cups me possessively. One firm press against my oversensitive core that makes me jerk and whimper.

"Now," he rasps, voice dark and final. "I'm going to f**k you properly."