Page 195 of Unmarked
And I swear to god, I can still taste him on my tongue.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Rhea
Ash slips out of me without a sound.
Okay. That’s a lie. He slips out of me with a deeply awkward wet noise that no one warns you about when you sign up to be aggressively knotted by an emotionally repressed ex-military alpha. But still. No words. Just movement.
I flinch as his knot eases free - not because it hurts, but because my body reacts like someone just unplugged something from deep within me without properly ejecting it.
There should’ve been a countdown. A confirmation screen.
Possibly a prayer.
My nerves are live wires. Every inch of me is Too Much. Too awake. Too sensitive. Too...Hi, I just got run over by a truck made of alpha testosterone.
Ash, of course, moves like nothing happened. He dresses the way he does everything: efficiently and clinically, as if he’s mentally checking off a box labeleddebrief and retreat.
Shirt. Pants. Boots.
No eye contact. No lingering touch.
He's dressed and halfway out the door before I manage to blink.
And he’s gone.
I don’t call after him. I don’t ask why.
Ash is a soldier. Aliteral soldier. His whole personality runs on rules, discipline, and tactical avoidance of emotional vulnerability.
And apparently, also orgasms, which is a cool bonus.
Still, I feel him. His bond hums under my ribs like a well-behaved alarm system: not blaring, not breaking down, just existing.
Watching. Ready.
But also staying politely in its lane.
It’s not alone, though.
There are four bonds coiled around my spine like some very sexy, deeply inconvenient scarf I can’t take off.
Ash’s bond is quiet. Solid. The kind of presence that doesn’t ask anything from you but also doesn’t leave the room.
Lucian’s? Lucian’s is...heavy. Like someone dropped a velvet curtain over my entire nervous system and whispered,you belong to me now. It’s hot and coiled and deeply dramatic. Honestly, very on brand.
Kai’s is chaos. It zings through my blood like espresso shots and bad decisions. Warm. Loud. Probably wearing sunglasses indoors.
And Theo’s... Theo’s is a fireplace. Gentle. Glowing. The kind of bond that doesn’t pull; itwraps. And somehow, even when he’s not here, it feels like he’s holding me together with both hands and a steady heartbeat.
I groan and roll onto my side, limbs aching like I’ve been hit by a truck made of orgasms. My thighs are stuck together, and everything smells like sex, slick, and possibly someone’s expensive cologne.
This is my life now. I’m the girl who bonded four alphas in under twenty-four hours and lived to regret absolutely none of it...yet.
I smell like a very specific sin. My body feels like I got drunk on pheromones and made a bunch of ill-advised, deeply satisfying choices.
And now, I’m lying here marinating in it all.
