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I was still rubbing into things, but my movements grew languid. The songs from the playlist were nostalgic and comforting, and I worked my hips in little circles and closed my eyes and moaned and my scent was still drifting out everywhere, but it all seemed totally manageable right now.

“I should have you around for every single one of my heats,” I said.

“Hell, Leo, please don’t say things like that.”

“Oh,” I moaned. “Sorry, alpha.” Disappointing him made me feel anxious and I began to whine and undulate.

He put a hand on my thigh. “Shh, shh, didn’t mean it like that.”

“How did you mean it?”

“You smell amazing, and I’m knotted up for you, and I want you, obviously, Leona.”

“But you’re never going to touch me,” I groaned.

“Well, especially not when you’re in a surprise heat,” he said. “I’m not going to let Damian touch you either. You were very clear that you were trying to leave town and get the hell away from him, and if you’re in heat, you’re fertile, and the fuck I’m letting him knock you up. That’d be awful for both of you right now.”

A spike of worry went through me. I hadn’t thought about that, but it was true. If I was in heat, it meant my birth control pills would be useless. “Just need to shift,” I said.

“Sure,” he said.

We drove.

As we got off the highway on the exit to take us back towards Riverside, I peered out the window at the woods and trees. “Somewhere around here would be fine,” I said. “You just need to find somewhere to park.”

“This is Claworn territory,” said Vincent.

“Oh,” I said quietly. It wasn’t as if the various packs of wolves actually had real conflict with each other, at least not in my lifetime. But there were treaties and following them was what kept the peace. As I understood it, it hadn’t been so long ago that a wolf from our pack entering their territory might be shot on sight. Now, that probably wouldn’t happen. But it was best not to risk it.

“Let’s just get back to Riverside if you can handle it,” he said to me. “I’m fine over here.”

He did seem fine, and I felt better now that he was here than I had alone, so I accepted what he said. Of course, I was in heat, and I was going to accept whatever an alpha told me to do, pretty much. I was very suggestible during this time.

“Can you handle it?” said Vincent to me.

Oh, a question. “Um… I think so,” I said in a tiny voice. But then, I went into a frenzy of rubbing my cheek into the place where the seat belt attached up near the window.

Vincent reached over and squeezed my knee and called me omega again.

The rubbing stopped, but I felt as if the heat took on a different quality on the other side of it. I felt needier.

We drove.

“Vincent?” I said eventually.

“Uh huh?” He hadn’t been talking and when he did talk now, his voice was wooden.

“My clothes feel too tight,” I said.

He coughed.

I peered at him, and I remembered he said he was knotted up for me. I tried to see his erection under his clothes. “What about your clothes? Are they uncomfortable for you? Especially around your… knot?”

He groaned. “I can’t believe I told you that.”

“I was just thinking that maybe we should try to get a little more comfortable is all. Please?” I whined a little.

“You’re asking my permission to strip,” he breathed.