Chapter 168
Ragnar
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Sophia looks tired. She’s fresh out of the shower and brushing her hair in front of the floor-length mirror. There’s something hypnotizing about the way she lashes out. She’s smaller than most girls of our race and the high ranks around us. But it turns out that my little omega can be vicious when she puts her mind to it, and tonight, it’s the only place her mind has been.
“Is it always like this?” she asks, coming over to me. “I am so tired.”
“No,” I answer honestly, and I pick her up, wrapping her legs around me.
She relaxes against me, and I feel the moment she finally lets her guard down. I wrap my arms around her, needing us to be still for a bit. So much has happened in the last forty-eight hours. A part of me wants nothing more than to take her away from the danger, but the realist in me loves the way she’s dealing with everything in front of us.
“I think I want to sleep in tomorrow,” she whispers.
“I’m really proud of the way you’ve been handling everything, Soph,” I say, leaning back to push the strands of wet hair out of her face. “I don’t know how far we would have gotten without you.”
“I wouldn’t have done any of that if you weren’t right there holding my hand,” she leans back into me, pressing her forehead against mine.
I have so much more to say, so much to thank her for, but she’s not at all interested in words. Her lips are on mine, keeping me from saying anything else. I lose this battle and lift her up to get on the bed. She smiles when I set her down.
“This is a lot needier than usual,” I say, pulling the buttons on her little PJs apart. She pulls me closer to kiss me again.
“I thought I was going to lose you,” she whispers.
She lies back and looks up at me with all the concern I’ve seen in her eyes these past couple of days. I want to be touching her all the time, but I can’t right now because I know she’s hurting. She’s not used to all of this
yet.
“I’m sorry, but if a little cut to my stomach killed me, I wouldn’t be much of a King now, would I?”
“Don’t joke,” she scoots in closer when I lie down beside her. I slip my hand through the part I made in her top and continue to unbutton the rest.
“I’m not. It’ll take more than that to get me. It would have taken longer to heal if you weren’t around,” I decide I want to feel more of her on me, so I take my t-shirt off. She doesn’t hesitate to lie over my bare skin, and I feel a bit more relaxed.
“How are you feeling?” she asks after a while. The question makes my skin rise with goosebumps. I don’t get asked that question often, and I rarely know how to answer it.
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Chapter 168
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“I have to be honest,” I admit. “I feel a little high on you, right now.”
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“What?” she sits up to look at me. Her top falls open, and I reach out to touch her. “What does that mean?”
“You just threatened all the Kings and showed them exactly what you’ll do to them if they don’t comply with my demands. You have the craziest tracking ability we’ve ever encountered, and it looks like whenever you add your DNA to the water we use on others, they become-” I pause, not knowing how to finish that.
“Subservient,” she finishes for me. She pulls away, closing her top much to my disappointment.
“It’s not a bad thing,” I push her hair off her shoulder and pull her onto my lap.
“It is for someone who has been subservient her entire life. I know it’s different here, but I’m an omega. Serving a master is what I do. I don’t need any of this,” she says, turning enough to rest her head on my shoulder. “But you do, and if I have to do these things to be close to you, I will.”
“That’s not what this is,” I shake my head. “You don’t need to do anything to keep me close. I belong to you.”
Her fingertips trace my face, and she smiles. The way she looks at me has always made me nervous. There’s this kind of devotion in it that I’ve never had before. Maybe she’s right. Maybe it’s because she’s an omega. I don’t want her or expect her to be the rank those filthy dogs dragged her down to. She’s so much more than
that.
“This is the only way I know how to love,” she whispers.
With those ten little words, something inside me shifts. I’ve seen all the humiliating videos posted about the girl who was to become Luna. She was treated like shit her entire life away from us, and she never once complained. She did what she had to because her mating was exactly that. She was serving her mate. And it looks like it was the only way she got what she thought she wanted from him.
I understand the betrayal she felt a little more now. She wasn’t just betrayed by the man who was supposed to love her, but by the master she had chosen to serve. I guess I’ve only ever thought of it through my eyes.
As the former heir to the throne and now as its king. I never would have endured what she did. I would have burned the place down. I did. I lift her up so she can straddle me. When her eyes meet mine once more, I want nothing more than to make this all go away so she can find some kind of peace in our mating.
“You can stay home if you want,” I tell her as I hold her head from moving away. I press my lips to hers and shake my head, not knowing how to deal with this. “You don’t serve me, Sophia. You’re my mate. I would love you even if you just hung out here if that’s what you wanted.”
“I know,” she places her hands over mine. “I want to do this. For you. For us. I-” she pauses, taking a deep breath, struggling to find the words. “I love it here,” she swallows hard. “I guess I figured that as long as Santiago and I were happy, nothing else mattered.
“But being here has taught me that things should never have been that way. I love my life here and being with you. I want what you want because I already have everything I need. Besides, we’re mated now. I have as much duty to our people as you do. Also, I like doing all of this. I’m scared shitless all the time, but you’re right here. You make me better.”
A knock at the door stops me from pinning her to this bed and giving her exactly what she deserves. I groan as she climbs off me and fumbles with her buttons. Her face is bright red, and I can’t help the smile on my
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Chapter 168
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face. Zara is standing in the doorway when I pull it open. She comes in without an invitation and looks
between us.
“What the hell are you two up to?” she demands.
“You’d think we’d get more privacy from the woman who has been demanding grandbabies from day one,” Sophie scoffs. I press my lips together when Zara’s mouth falls open with disbelief.
“Not, right now. Right now. You two shouldn’t be trying for an heir when all the kings are under our roof. These circumstances are not ideal for a baby,” she crosses her arms over her chest.
“What do you need?” I ask her. She lets out a huff and sits at the vanity.
“How are you keeping them so calm? The Kings are not known to be cooperative.”
“The water in their system,” Sophie says. “I’m keeping them calm so I can get some rest. They’ve been in prison for a long time. I think they deserve some air without their wolves ripping at their souls.”
“You can do that?” she asks. Sophie nods and sits at the edge of the bed.
“Do you need some sleep?” she asks her.
“Does it hurt?”
“You won’t feel a thing,” Sophie says and stands to take her hand. She looks over at me and mouths, I’ll be back. I follow them out and walk through the house to find that she, in fact, put everyone to sleep.
When I get back to our bedroom, she’s sitting on the bed again. I notice that she likes to sit in front of the mirror here. She’s done that since she arrived. It makes me wonder what she sees.
“We should get to bed,” I tell her. She smiles and turns back to me. I look between her and the reflection to see that the two of them are looking back at me. When she turns back to the mirror, it’s the reflection again. “Look at me.”
It happens again, the two of them turn to look at me. The back of her head isn’t in the reflection.
“What?” Sophia asks.
I walk over to the mirror and look back at Sophia. I’m making eye contact with it.
“What the fuck?” I reach up to the glass, and it does too. Sophia stands up, staring at it as if it were the first time she’s ever seen it do that. “You didn’t know?”
“No, what the hell is that?” she asks, pulling me away from it. The reflection smiles, looking between the two of us, and then vanishes. Sophia is the first to recover. She takes a towel and covers the mirror. “I’m not dealing with that on top of everything else. I am way too tired for this.”
