Keld didn’t answer, sliding a pan-fried tuna steak onto a plate. The silence stretched further as they ate.
“Is it your mom?” Grayson asked.
Keld blinked. “What?”
“You’re obviously upset… Is it because of how you reacted to your mom?”
Keld’s thoughts were a floodplain of pine sap—slow and sticky. “No. I don’t regret how I treated her. She hurt you.”
Grayson tried again. “Why did she do it? I couldn’t understand what she said.”
Keld’s facial fins stiffened and his scales prickled. “She smelled me. On you.”
When Grayson’s expression shifted to bewilderment, Keld forced himself to continue. “She wasn’t sober. She didn’t… approve of our relationship, I guess.”
Grayson scoffed. “Sounds like an understatement. Does she want you to be in a mixed-gender relationship?”
Keld laughed dryly. “No. She doesn’t have the highest opinion of humans. I don’t think she liked knowing I was getting physical with a human.”
“Oh…” Grayson fell quiet.
“Like I said, she wasn’t sober. All thetavra’s messed her up. Well, messed her up more than before.” Keld focused on the flecks in the granite countertop in front of him. He didn’t want to think about the past. “I’m sorry. That I put you in danger, and that I couldn’t get to you in time.”
Grayson shook his head. “I told you, I’m fine. I just needed some food and a nap.”
Keld rose immediately, depositing their empty plates into the sink. “Let’s get you to bed then.”
Grayson slept for hours, curled against Keld’s chest. Keld’s muscles were stiff with tension—he didn’t deserve to feel the soft heat of the Omega’s body pressed to his.
Grayson stirred. “Keld? What time is it?”
“It’s almost six,” he whispered back. “Are you hungry?”
“No,” he mumbled. “Not for food.”
Keld froze at the sensation of Grayson’s lips on his chest. “Grayson, you’re hurt.”
“Not that hurt.” Grayson pushed himself up on his elbow. “You don’t want to?”
I have no right to want to.“I just think you need food and rest right now,” he said. “You stay in bed and I’ll cook something.”
Grayson huddled back into the blankets, disappointment written in every line of his face.
The days blurred. Keld went to work, cooked for Grayson, and slept in the dry, human bed every night. Grayson’s bids for intimacy grew less frequent with each rejection, until Keld said he needed to spend a night in his pool. His scales were dehydrated, but mainly, Keld had to escape before his resolve was destroyed.
Physically, he still craved Grayson’s body against his, and his urges only became more powerful as he fought them. Sleeping in a room clouded with sweet, floral pheromones was reaching the level of torture.
That morning, Grayson left for work, his expression dull. He didn’t talk to Keld much these days, which Keld knew was what he deserved. In a haze of self-loathing, Keld finished the breakfast dishes and left the apartment. He took the stairs onefloor down and re-entered his own apartment. The blackout curtains were still drawn, his pool’s plants the only illumination that scattered the darkness.
Keld slid into the water and let himself sink to the bottom. Thekopishswarmed him, eagerly removing flaking and damaged scales from his body. He tried to focus on the sensation of their little claws, and the press of salt water into his skin. But try as he might, Grayson clung to the edges of his consciousness, unwilling or unable to let him go.
Chapter 33
Grayson
“Congratulations, it’s a female Alpha.” Grayson really did try to sound enthusiastic, but from the look Rorith shot him, he was failing. His mind kept flashing between Keld’s mother’s claws and his own mother’s stinging palm. The attack was dredging up memories Grayson didn’t know he still possessed—of his father’s fists, black eyes, and the snap of a leather belt on skin.
He didn’t understand—he was the victim, yet Keld was the one sulking. His phone vibrated in his pocket. Another phone call from the same unknown number. Grayson congratulated the new parents again and backed out of the room.
