<h4>Chapter 90: Chapter 90 HOT AND DESPERATE AND HUNGRY</h4>


    SERAPHINA’S POV


    The moonlight shone brightly through my window, casting my room in a silver-drenched glow.


    I tried to meditate like Ilsa had taught me to do, grounding myself in breath and silence—hoping it would put me at ease after the rollercoaster of thest couple of days—but the full moon was oddly merciless tonight.


    It tugged at me from within, setting every nerve on edge. The steady hum of my wolf’s absence was now reced by something raw and visceral, like my soul remembered the bond even if my body couldn’t.


    And underneath that was a...tug. Towards what, I didn’t know.


    But the longer I meditated, the stronger I felt it till I could no longer sit still.


    I stretched as I uncurled from the floor cushions, trying to shake off the shimmer of restless energy coiled under my skin.


    Meditation always soothed me and put me at peace.


    This session made me want to jump off my balcony and howl at the moon.


    Is this what the normal wolves felt during the full moon?


    I shook my head, reaching for the ss of water on my bedside drawer. I groaned when I saw that it was empty.


    “Samantha, do you think you could—”


    I paused when I turned and saw that the Omega caretaker Kieran had assigned to me sat slumped in the armchair by the door, her head tilted to the side, her breathing soft and even.


    I winced, feeling a pang of guilt. She must have stayed on her feet all day, fussing over me with meals and medicines, gentle hands always at my elbow.


    The guilt stopped me from waking her. She deserved the rest—and I could get my own damn water.


    So, wrapping a robe around me, I moved alone, bare feet brushing the cool tiles as I slipped through the hall toward the kitchen, careful not to put too much pressure on my ankle.


    The night air clung heavy with salt and hibiscus, and my body felt both too light and too heavy at once.


    I pushed open the kitchen door quietly.


    And found him there.


    Kieran stood at the counter, ss in hand, broad shoulders outlined in the shadows. He turned at the sound of me, his eyes catching the moonlight—obsidian, yet somehow impossibly bright.


    For a moment, I thought the moon itself had slipped into the kitchen and taken human form.


    “What are you doing here?” His voice was low, almost harsh. Then his gaze flicked past me toward the hall. “Where’s your Omega?”


    I swallowed against the sudden lump that had formed in my throat. “Asleep. I didn’t want to wake her.”


    He set the ss down harder than he needed to. “She was supposed to take care of you. You’re not supposed to be on your feet.”


    I rolled my eyes. “C’mon, the doctor said I was fine, and I can barely feel the pain now.”


    His jaw clenched. “When I give orders, I expect them to be followed.”


    He pushed away from the counter. I lifted a hand before he could storm off and tear a new one into poor Samantha.


    “Don’t.” The word came out softer than I meant, but it stopped him. “She’s worked hard all day. I’m fine. I can walk to the kitchen for water without incident.”


    His eyes narrowed, and he looked like he wanted to argue further, but when I didn’t break eye contact, he exhaled softly, and his body rxed.


    Silence filled the kitchen, thick with the hum of the refrigerator and the steady echo of the ocean outside.


    A memory—of another kitchen in another house on another moonlit night, just me and Kieran—rose up in my mind.


    ‘I want a divorce.’


    I shoved it down, down, down.


    Kieran leaned back against the counter, and I tried to ignore his burning gaze as I filled my ss and turned to leave.


    But I’d barely taken two steps forward when my toe caught against the lip of the tile.


    The room tilted, my breath caught in my throat—


    —and suddenly I was in Kieran’s arms.


    His arm banded around my waist, pulling me tight against the unyielding strength of his chest.


    The world spun, then steadied, and suddenly all I could hear was the rapid stato of my pulse and the slow but uneven rhythm of his breath.


    My palms pressed against him, the warmth of his body sinking straight into mine.


    “Careful,” he murmured, his voice a low rasp, warm against my temple.


    I should have stepped back, should have pushed away, but...


    That damned pull between us—the one I’d tried so hard to bury with resolve and sheer force of will—surged like a live wire, coursing from his grip at my waist to every nerve in my body.


    I tilted my head back to meet his eyes, and the look there unraveled me.


    There was hunger, raw and exposed, and it mirrored the very thing I was trying to smother.


    “Kieran—” My voice cracked, no more than a whisper, half warning, half plea.


    He didn’t let me finish. His mouth found mine with a force that stole the ground out from under me.


    The kiss was searing, desperate, but threaded with something else—something that throbbed through my veins. A heat that was both alien and achingly familiar.


    Kieran’s nearness amplified it until I felt as though my skin was vibrating against his.


    I gasped against him, but the sound only opened me further to him. His tongue swept against mine, stealing what little air I had left, and I was lost. Completely lost.


    The ss slipped from my hand, shattering against the floor, but I barely heard it.


    My hand now free, I clutched his shoulders desperately, nails biting into muscle as every inch of me responded, traitorous and greedy.


    The taste of him filled me, and as his tongue slid against mine, I melted into it, into him, even as some frantic part of me screamed to resist.


    But it was nothing more than a muted whisper, getting quieter the longer I stayed in Kieran’s arms.


    The world narrowed—his hands framing my face, sliding down to my neck, his body pressing me back until my spine brushed the edge of the counter.


    The cool surface grounded me for half a second, but then his lips trailed lower, and my skin burned where his hands gripped my waist, where his mouth dragged down my throat, sucking bruises into skin I knew I shouldn’t let him touch.


    His hands slid to my hips, pulling me flush against him. One slipped behind, cupping the curve of my ass and pulling me against the thick, rigid length straining in his pants.


    My breath hitched at the unmistakable hardness pressing into me, and the pull roared louder, drowning reason in its wake.


    My thighs clenched, my pussy throbbing with raw want. I could feel moisture gathering just from the friction, my body betraying me with every pulse.


    “Kieran.” His name tore out of me, ragged, but it no longer sounded like resistance. It sounded like surrender.


    He groaned like it undid him, head dipping lower, teeth grazing my corbone.


    He undid the robe, and one of his hands slid beneath my night shirt, and calloused fingers skimmed my ribs, then closed greedily around my bare breast.


    He pinched my nipple hard between his thumb and forefinger, and my back arched, my pussy clenching around nothing.


    I wanted to stop. I wanted to keep going. I wanted both, at once.


    My fingers tangled in his hair, dragging him closer, deeper. His kiss turned ravenous, iming, and I matched it with a hunger that terrified me.


    His hands roamed, greedy, mapping every inch as though he needed to learn me. When he pressed me back, lowering me toward the floor, I didn’t resist.


    My legs parted instinctively, and he settled between them. His weight caged me in, his hands braced at either side of my head, but it wasn’t confining—it was consuming.


    His mouth was on mine again, then lower, teeth nipping at the tender flesh between my neck and shoulder, tongue soothing the bite until I was gasping.


    Heat pooled low in my stomach, my body aching with a want I hadn’t felt in...


    Ever. I hadn’t felt such world-tilting hunger ever.


    It raced through me, threatening to consume me with every brush of his lips, every roll of his hips against mine—grinding that massive cock against my soaked cunt through the thin barrier of cloth—making the world blur at the edges.


    I cried out, shameless, my hips rolling up to meet his thrusts.


    My back arched, and a guttural moan ripped out of me when he tore my night shirt open and fastened his lips around one of my peaked nipples.


    I felt tears at the corner of my eyes as I threaded my hands into his hair, tugging tightly while his tongue slid against my nipples.


    “Kieran!” I gasped, feeling the ache impossibly grow.


    He groaned out something I couldn’t hear, his other hand slipping down to the waistband of my shorts.


    My hips instinctively canted, chasing the heat of his touch. When he slipped his hands into my shorts and pressed his palm t against the apex between my thighs, I thought I would ck out from the sudden explosion of sensation.


    My breathing turned into a harsh, ragged sound as Kieran’s mouth found my other breast, as he slipped aside the crotch of my damp underwear and pressed a finger against my swollen clit.


    “Fuck!”


    I thought the tortured hiss came from me, but then Kieran lifted his head, and I looked into the swirling ck pools of hunger, his swollen lips parted as if in disbelief.


    “You’re so wet,” he said, his voice thick with awe.


    I could understand why he was so surprised. Kieran and I had had sex before, but not like this—not this hot and desperate and hungry.


    Never like this.


    I lifted my hips, seeking out his touch desperately. “Please,” I panted.


    Something flickered in his eyes, and then his mouth was on mine again, devouring. Each kiss was more urgent, more consuming than thest.


    I clutched at his shoulders, my fingers digging into the hard lines of muscle, as though anchoring myself against a tide I couldn’t hope to withstand.


    He swallowed my desperate gasp with his mouth, groaning like a man undone as he pressed his thumb against my clit, his forefinger, tentatively pressing against my—


    “Lady Sera?”