The Pack’s Alpha, Chapter 16: The Morning After

Cyra

I wake up in the arms of my mate after having the best, deepest sleep I ever remember having in my life. His scent surrounds me, his strong arms surround me, and I feel safe and loved… and terribly sad that this isn’t the life that is meant for me.

He presses his lips to my bare shoulder. “Good morning, beautiful. How are you feeling?”

His voice is raspy, as if his subconscious, or maybe Thad, was waiting for me to wake up and jerked him awake.

“Good, I think. I’ll know better once I walk around a bit,” I tell him.

‘We’re fine,’ Rina tells me.

“Rina says we’re fine, so I guess we’re fine,” I chuckle.

“I had an amazing time last night,” he says. It’s almost as if he’s worrying that I’m having second thoughts in the early morning hours.

I look at him over my shoulder. “So did I.”

“Good. I hope… I hope I made your first time something special, something you can always remember with happiness.”

“Yes, you did,” I say, lifting my head enough to press my lips to his.

“I’m glad. Maybe we can have a repeat performance tonight. But right now, you need to get your cute ass up and go get showered so we can get to breakfast before class.”

“You think I have a cute ass?” I ask him, not moving.

“I think your ass is sexy as fuck, but I wasn’t sure you wanted to hear that,” he says softly, his nose sliding through my hair. I can feel him breathing in my scent, enjoying this moment as much as I am.

“Rina wants to sink her teeth into your ass, so I guess that means your ass is sexy as fuck too,” I tell him.

He barks a laugh as Rina begins purring loudly.

“You can bite me any time you want, my beautiful Rina,” he says. His voice is a mix of his and Thad’s, who must have pushed forward.

“I intend to,” Rina says, continuing to purr at him.

“We should let them run tonight, and if both of you are in agreement, we could let them mate tonight as well,” Yorick says.

“YES!” Rina says, pushing forward before I can answer.

I hear a low, deep chuckle behind me. Thad.

“Did my mate want me to hunt her and mate her over and over again until I’ve eased that ache inside her?” he purrs. Rina pushes our body into an arch.

“Yes,” she moans.

“Okay, you two. Save it for later. Cyra and I have classes this morning, but tonight, do you agree, Cyra? We’ll let our wolves run together?”

‘Don’t you dare deny me, Cyra,’ Rina growls in our mind.

‘I have to study, but you can have your time. Just as long as it doesn’t go all night,’ I tell her.

“Yes,” I tell Yorick. “But afterward, we have to have some study time. I’m not getting behind this early in the year,” I tell him.

“Agreed,” Yorick says, pulling back the covers and getting out of bed. He takes my hand and pulls me out of bed to stand in front of him.

We’re both naked, and the close proximity to him is doing nothing to help motivate me to leave.

“Cyra…” he growls. “Stop thinking whatever it is you’re thinking, or we’ll BOTH miss class today and probably fail the Academy in less than a week.”

I bite my lip and look up at him, feeling a desperate need that I’ve never felt before. He pulls me to him, grabbing onto my hair like it’s the only thing holding his sanity in check.

“When we’ve been together more than once, we Successfully unlocked it! I’ll give you what you need in the morning before Sparring class. But I won’t risk you not being able to take on your opponent because I couldn’t control my desire for you,” he growls.

How can you not fall in love with a man who puts aside his own needs for yours? The simple answer is, you don’t. You fall in love, hard and fast.

I lift up on my toes and kiss him, letting him deepen the kiss before he pulls away, pressing his forehead to mine.

“Time for me to shower,” I say.

He huffs a laugh. “Yeah okay. I’ll come get you for breakfast.”

I shower and get ready quickly, struggling to focus when all my mind wants to do is think about last night, remember what it felt like for Yorick to touch me. For me to feel his body, his strength, his restraint.

I’ve just started falling back into the memory when he knocks on my door.

“Ready?” he asks, smiling as if he knows exactly what I’ve been thinking since I left him.

“Ready,” I say, forcing my brain to focus.

We meet our friends for breakfast, and I see Zach give Yorick a raised eyebrow. I’m not sure exactly what that means, but for some reason, Zach knows what happened between us last night. Part of me feels a bit insecure about that, but the other part of me realizes that it’s probably impossible for us to keep something like this secret. Zach’s not acting like Yorick’s time with me was some sort of conquest, more that he’s asking if all went well.

“If you want to talk about it, I’m pretty sure that’s what friends are for,” Piper says quietly.

“Talk about what?” I ask her.

She raises her eyebrow at me. “Sweetie, you reek of Yorick. Don’t tell me the two of you didn’t sleep together last night.”

“It’s that obvious?” I whisper.

“Uh, yeah. It’s totally obvious.”

“I showered this morning,” I whisper yell.

“Did he come inside you? Or maybe on your skin and rubbed it in because you almost smell more like him than you. And let’s be honest, he’s not unhappy about that.”

I turn and look at Yorick. He’s not talking about our night last night, but he has a perma-grin on his face that says it all. Yeah, he’s very happy that I smell like him.

“Does he smell like me?” I ask her.

“Yes, but not as much. Did you stay the night with him?”

“Yeah.”

She snorts. “He probably scented you in your sleep, or his wolf did. You are mates after all.”

‘Rina?’ I ask her, wondering if Thad scented us while I slept.

“Yes?” she asks innocently. Okay, so my wolf was totally on board with us smelling like Yorick and Thad.

‘He’s our mate. Why wouldn’t I be okay with that?’

‘Uh, I don’t know. Maybe because we’re in an alliance bond with Stellan?’ I ask.

‘He is not our mate. He could never make us as happy as Yorick and Thad make us.’

Great. My wolf is totally head over heels in love with Thad.

‘He’s our mate,’ she says unapologetically.

I somehow manage to get through breakfast, and then we all head outside for Sparring class.

“Okay warriors, I hope you were paying attention yesterday, because today, we’re going to switch up the battles. And today, we really start keeping score. Our first battle is…” Alpha Leo begins.