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“She’s fine.”
Devin was anything but fine.
Chapter Ten
It took two weeks for Devin to gain some kind of control over the bond and what came through it. Everything had been chaos, sticky syrup, and screaming rage. From one moment to the next, she danced in sunshine only to be plunged below an icy ocean. She knew his every want and need. It felt like that evil voice whispered his thoughts straight into her brain. Worse was when it returned the favor, his every move calculated to counter hers. He knew just where to touch, to lick, and when to pin her to the bed with all his infuriated power.
It took some getting used to.
Rey was able to leave her side for longer periods of time, though he never strayed too far just in case. Granted, it was all in the safety of the no longer empty house, but she felt confident in her ability to strangle the glimmering strands connecting her to Rey that grew stronger with every heartbeat. Thick as knotted rope, she understood now what Beau had implied that night in the office.
She’d never survive the loss of it. She breathed Rey, and his heart controlled the rhythm of hers. Her very soul was a hopeless tangle within the confines of his. Devin wasn’t so sure he could survive her death, but she would prefer to not test either.
Sighing, she flipped the glossy page of the magazine she wasn’t interested in. He wanted her to pick out clothing, not understanding that with her size, she had to try things on. Nothing ever fit right off the rack, even the stuff designed for Omegas. The bastard that decided on measurements—and she was sure it was an Alpha—thought Omegas had no curve to them, and often Devin could find things in the smaller Beta sizes that fit better.
He wanted her in dresses and skirts, though. Upscale things, no less. Why she needed silky blouses and pencil skirts when he kept her in bed most of the time was beyond her.
“You’re brooding again.” Rey smiled as he shut the door behind him, blocking any more than a glimpse of the large, dark bodies disappearing out of the front door.
“I am not. Just trying to figure out why you need to spend money on clothes if you’re never going to let me wear them.” Devin offered up a saccharine smile to the lowering of his brows.
Things were far from perfect.
Tension rattled through the bond from both ends. A twisted, gnarled thing that seemed to quiet only with the violence of their sex. Those moments when Devin could enact her rage, let the simmering anger loose on his body. Without the consequences of a true challenge, she marked his skin with her frustrations.
Outside of that, Rey continued to control. Grinding her under his will, forcing her to become the pliant mate. Just as before, it didn’t last long. He seemed to think letting her mark him, to lay a claiming bite of her own, would settle her.
It hadn’t.
If anything, it made things so much worse. There was no way for him not to know, to understand how she felt. Wasting away with catalogs and fabric swatches, as if the color of the damned rugs meant anything at all to her. She didn’t care what this house he bought in secret looked like. Didn’t want to think about what he planned for the several rooms left unfurnished. Devin knew by the way he stroked her belly, cupping the faint swell of it.
An Alpha’s prime directive with their Omega was to breed.
“Now you’re definitely brooding,” Rey said as he settled alongside her, ruining the folds of her nest with his lumbering arms and thick legs.
“If you’re going to buy them, let me wear them. That’s all I’m asking.”
“No, it isn’t. You want to wear themout.”
“That’s why people wear clothing, Rey.” Seething, Devin threw the magazine away, the glossy pages somersaulting through the air to slap against the window overlooking the backyard. He didn’t allow her outside without him to chaperone, and those moments were few and far between. “They go out, they do things! They don’t sit in a Gods damned bed all day.”
“You’re not just anyone.” Rey closed his eyes, crossed arms pillowing his head. Not a care in the world as his mate fast approached a screaming fit.
“No, I’m not, Daniel, and the sooner you understand that, the better off we’ll be.” Devin leapt from the bed, snarling as she whirled around to fix the ragged edges of her nest. Hands furious in their work, she slapped at his legs, tugging his shoes off to fling in the general direction of the closet. “You want things to be one way between us, but then you do literally everything in your power to keep it from happening. I’m tired of it. I’m fucking done, you hear me?”
Tearing her fingers through her hair, she paced the length of the room, ignoring his malignant silence. Crossing her arms over her chest, she dug her nails deep into the soft flesh as she held on to her temper by the thinnest thread.
“I’m not one of those… I can’t do this! I don’t care about all of this,” she shouted, a wild hand careening through the air to take in the room and house beyond. “It doesn’t make up my entire world and groveling at your feet will never be something I do, Daniel Rey, so get that thought right out of your stupid head.”
“You need to calm down, sweetheart.”
“Fuck that! I’m done with being calm, too. How about that? If I wanted to be someone’s bitch, I would have stayed with my parents and let the first Alpha who sniffed in my direction do what they wanted. I didn’t though, see? I worked so damned hard to get where I was and—”
“And you wound up on your knees in a nightclub, begging for a job.”
Words died on her tongue, crawling back down her throat where they stuck hard. Swelling with a wealth of misery to choke off her breath as Devin huddled around her middle. Rey grunted, the sound faltering into a sigh as he sat up and stretched out his hand to her.
“Come here, sweetheart.”
