Betrayed by My Ex, Marked by His Alpha Emperor Brother

Chapter 17

Kaelen’s POV

“Save me,” she whispered. “Please...”

Her fingers tightened in my cravat. Her dilated ice-blue eyes locked onto mine. Empty of everything except need. Raw, aching, unnatural need that turned her pupils into black moons.

“Elara.” I kept my voice level. Barely. “We’re going to the royal hospital. The physicians will—”

“No.” The word tore out of her throat. Ragged. Almost a sob. “No physicians. No hospital. Just you.” Her other hand found my chest, pressing flat against my bare skin. Her palm burned like a brand. “It hurts, Kaelen. Everything is burning. Please.”

Mark her, Alec snarled. He was clawing at the walls of my skull. She’s asking. She needs us. MARK HER.

I shoved him down. Hard.

“Elara, listen to me. You’ve been drugged. That bastard gave you something. You’re not thinking clearly—”

She pulled on my cravat again. Harder. Her knuckles were bone-white.

“I know what I feel.” Her voice cracked on every syllable. “I know it’s you. It’s always been you. The bond. I can feel it. It’s screaming.” Tears spilled over her lashes. “It hurts so much. Make it stop.”

The scent hit me then. Not the sickly sweetness of the potion. Something underneath it. Something that had been building since the moment I’d pulled her from that room.

Her arousal.

It rolled off her skin in waves. Winter roses drenched in honey. Warm. Thick. Intoxicating. The potion had done more than cloud her mind—it had triggered a false heat, forcing her body into a state of desperate, agonizing want.

My jaw clenched so hard I thought my teeth would crack.

“Driver.” My voice came out like gravel dragged over broken glass. “Change of route. The empty training grounds near the palace. Now.”

The carriage lurched. Wheels rattled over cobblestone. I kept my hand on the back of Elara’s head, my thumb brushing circles against her scalp. Trying to soothe her. Trying to soothe myself.

You know what she needs, Alec growled. Stop pretending you don’t.

“She needs a physician.”

She needs her mate.

I said nothing. Because he was right. And I hated him for it.

The training grounds materialized through the carriage window. A wide, empty parade field surrounded by dark warehouses. No torches. No guards. Nothing but frozen dirt and silence.

The carriage stopped.

I turned back to Elara. “I’m going to carry you—”

She moved.

Fast. Faster than someone pumped full of drugs should have been able to move. She swung one leg over the bench, then the other, and suddenly she was in my lap. Straddling me. Her knees pressed against my hips. Her torn gown slipped further, baring the curve of her collarbone. Beneath the ruined silk, black lace clung to her skin like shadow against ivory.

Her hands framed my face.

“Don’t take me to a hospital,” she breathed. “Don’t hand me off to strangers. I’m your mate. Help me.”

Every rational thought I’d ever had went up in flames.

MINE, Alec roared.

Her mouth found mine. Not gentle. Not tentative. She kissed me like she was drowning and I was the last breath of air above the waterline. Her fingers raked into my hair. Her hips ground down against me with a desperate, rolling pressure that made my vision blur.

I grabbed her waist. My hands nearly spanned it entirely. I meant to push her back. To create distance. To be the rational, controlled emperor that people expected.

Instead, my fingers dug into her skin and pulled her closer.

She gasped into my mouth. The sound shattered something inside my chest.

“Off,” she panted, tugging at my ruined coat. “Take it off. All of it.”

Her hands were already working. Pulling fabric. Tearing what wouldn’t yield. My coat hit the carriage floor. She attacked the remnants of my shirt next, dragging it over my shoulders with a ferocity that left scratch marks across my collarbone.

When her palms flattened against my bare chest, she made a sound—half whimper, half growl. Primal. Hungry.

“Your skin,” she murmured. “So warm.” She pressed her face into the hollow of my throat. Inhaled. Her entire body shuddered. “You smell like home.”

Something cracked inside me. The last wall. The last excuse.

I fisted the back of her gown and pulled. The ice-blue silk split like water. It pooled around her hips, leaving nothing but black lace against ivory skin. The curves of her body glowed faintly in the dim light filtering through the carriage window. She was devastating. Fragile and fierce all at once.

She reached behind her back. Unclasped. Let the lace fall.

I stopped breathing.

“Elara—”

“Don’t talk.” She took my hand and placed it against her bare skin. Over her heart. It hammered beneath my palm like a caged animal. “Don’t think. Just feel.”

I felt. God help me, I felt everything. The silk of her skin under my calloused fingers. The heat pouring off her in waves. The way she arched into my touch like a flower turning toward sunlight.

My mouth found the hollow beneath her ear. I dragged my lips down her throat. Tasted salt and winter roses. She tilted her head back, giving me access. Offering. Surrendering.

Bite, Alec commanded. Right there. The junction of her neck and shoulder. One bite and she’s ours forever.

My teeth grazed the spot. That sacred, vulnerable junction where a mark would bind us permanently. Elara felt it. She moaned—long, low, and shaking.

“Yes,” she gasped. “There. Mark me. Make me yours.”

Every cell in my body screamed to obey. The wolf. The man. The bond itself, singing like a struck bell through every nerve.

I kissed the spot instead. Open-mouthed. Lingering. Then pulled away.

“Not tonight,” I said against her skin. My voice was wrecked.

“Kaelen—”

“You’re drugged. When I mark you, you’ll be sober. Clear-eyed. Choosing me because you want to. Not because some bastard’s poison is making you beg.”

She made a frustrated sound. Her nails dug into my shoulders.

“Then everything else,” she demanded. Her hips rolled again. Deliberately. “Everything but that.”

I answered with my hands.

I pulled her against me. Skin to skin. The contact was electric—the mate bond amplified everything tenfold. Every brush of her fingers left trails of fire. Every sound she made carved itself into my bones.

The carriage was too small. The bench too narrow. I didn’t care. She didn’t care. We moved together with a rough, graceless urgency that had nothing to do with technique and everything to do with need. Pure, screaming, bone-deep need that had been building since the first moment I’d caught her scent.

She was loud. Unrestrained. The drug had stripped away every layer of composure she usually wore like armor. She cried out my name. Begged. Demanded. Clawed at my back hard enough to draw blood. And when the first wave hit her, she screamed—a sound that rattled the carriage windows and sent Alec howling in triumph inside my skull.

I held her through it. Through the second one. Through the third. Each time, the feverish burn in her scent faded a little more, replaced by something sweeter. Something real. The bond humming between us like a plucked string.

Finally, she went still. Her forehead dropped against my shoulder. Her breathing came in ragged gulps. Tremors rolled through her body in slow, weakening waves.

Mark her now, Alec pressed. She’s calm. She’s ours. Do it.

I closed my eyes. Every instinct I possessed howled in agreement. She was here. Pliant. Warm against me. Her throat bared. The mark point flushed pink from my earlier kiss.

One bite.

“No,” I said. Out loud. To Alec. To myself.

I gathered Elara against my chest, wrapping both arms securely around her shaking frame in the afterglow of her climax.

“I will not bite you until you are entirely sober,” I told her roughly. “Not until this poison is completely out of your system.”