81. Be Brave 🌶️

A/N: Another longer chapter! It's worth it~
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*And the night got me thinking*
*Thinking about lying in bed in the dark in the warm and we're naked*
*I want you for so long*
*Tell me is it so wrong*
*Even if we fall in love*
*Fall in love*
*I don't wanna hold you down, dear*
*Trying to make it so clear*
*Hoping that we fall in love*
*It's getting hard not to take it*
*I wanna ask but I don't*
*But it's time for me to face it*
*Keep telling myself run away, run away, run away, don't chase it*
*Don't give up on me, baby*
*When I stumble along*
*When I act a little crazy*
*Remember my love for you won't fade, won't fade, you keep it blazing*
*I want you for so long*
*Tell me is it so wrong*
*Even if we fall in love*
*When you hold on to me*
*When you let me in*
*You better know that I got you*
*Under my skin*
*Ooh, you got me restless*
*I can't sleep alone*
*You better be waiting*
*'Til I get home*

*- Fall in Love*, Barcelona
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After Kiran gave yet another excuse, slamming the door behind him, Seff collapsed onto the pile of pillows with tears burning her eyes and throat. She was torn between simmering in her misery or embracing her rage by shredding the pillows into nothing but a cloud of feathers.
Either way, she cried. For her—and for Allium, who redeemed herself, gaining Seff’s friendship back but potentially losing her own pups…which might just circle her emotions around to hate again—and for Hawthorn, who had been bleeding out next to her.
What topped it off was that she didn’t know if either of them were alive, and Kiran drained her so much she had no mental strength to even get out of bed.
Sienna had enough for both of them.
She burst through the door as if she had a score to settle. Seff flinched, but the Delta didn’t have a single fuck to give. “Get up, Omega. You don’t deserve to cower in Kiran’s sheets. Go mope in your own room.”
The command in her Alpha voice was so strong that Seff automatically obeyed. The moment her bare feet touched the cold floor, Sienna tossed her new bolts of silks and a rope-belt with panties that Seff hastily dressed herself in. Then Sienna grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the room, shoving her forward to stumble through the harem living space, eliciting a grunt from both of them.
Each footstep sent a jolt of pain up Seff’s spine. *I had to have healed completely,* she thought, but something wasn’t right. She shouldn’t feel any more pain. Maybe her werewolf healing didn’t recover the nerves aiding the spinal cord. At least she paid attention to the health part of her schooling. *Just please don’t be bad enough to cause paralysis.*
“Is it fixed?” she asked.
“Shut up and keep walking.”
Maybe the misery would influence the rage. As they transversed the hallways to her room, Seff snapped, “Why do you hate me so much? I haven’t done anything to you.”
She yelped when Sienna seized her by the back of the neck and hissed in her ear, “You have no idea how *difficult* you’ve made my life, do you? The number of times I delivered letter after letter to Selene, running back and forth like a trained rat. I’ve been forced to watch the Alpha I’ve sworn my life to spiral into obsession with you. He used to be untouchable, vicious—and you’ve made him into some hindbrain fool chasing you around just so you’ll satisfy his broken heart.”
Her nails lengthened to claws that pierced skin. Seff felt blood bloom and trickle warm down her throat. Sienna started to apply pressure. “I can crush your windpipe right here. It won’t heal the shatters of his soul, but he can be back to his old self, fucking Omegas and having pups to rub it in Selene’s face. Instead of watching you grow old, he can live in pleasure.”
Seff’s jaw clenched. *I’m done feeling helpless*. “Are you just jealous he won’t fuck *you*?”
She was sure Sienna would kill her then and there if it wasn’t for a door opening and a familiar voice asking, “What’s going on out here?”
In the second that Sienna was distracted, Seff freed herself—not without scratch marks—and crashed into Hawthorn’s embrace, pressing her back into his chest as his arms looped around her front. “I knew the Sun pack was bloodthirsty, but I thought they didn’t threaten to kill each other.”
Sienna’s gold eyes flashed. “There’s plenty of threatening, Magnolia. Including mine to work on your comebacks.” She looked at Seff and licked her middle finger. “And there is plenty of blood. Yours tastes stale.”
She stalked past them across the courtyard. Before she disappeared, Hawthorn pulled Seff into the safety of her room—which they locked and barricaded with the vanity desk. After that, he wrapped his arms around her again so they could fall onto her bed.
“Ow,” they groaned together, and then laughed.
Hawthorn chuckled. “Still sore? Me too.”
Though their wounds healed, it seemed they both still felt ghost pain. “We’re not used to violence, are we?” Seff murmured, brushing Hawthorn’s mussed hair out of his eyes so she could search them. She found only what she could define as longing.
“At least we’re alive.”
He pulled her closer so they were flush against each other. Buried in all that was him—his touch and his scent and his breathing and his heartbeat—Seff allowed herself to release a sigh that felt like it had been building in her lungs for the past month. It felt so natural to be with him. She didn’t feel fear or anger or confusion—nothing she felt when she was with Kiran or Selene. Only comfort.
And yet guilt started to grow in her chest as the silence between them stretched with all the things left unsaid. “Hawthorn…I have to tell you something.”
His body encompassed hers, and his cheek was pressed to the top of her head. “Anything.”
She drew away gently. He quirked a smile to show he was okay. Oh, his face, Seff thought. It was so familiar. And it was so easy to speak to him. So she did. She told him not *something*, but *everything*.
Not too long into her recap that she began spewing out as if she couldn’t hold it in anymore, they sat up, their legs over the edge of the bed. He took it all in stride: every embarrassing detail, all the terrible things Seff and others endured, each secret not revealed. She didn’t even lie about having sex with Selene or making out with Kiran. She was only told lies; she didn’t want to tell them.
When she finished, she felt squeezed dry. Hawthorn didn’t speak. She couldn’t even read his expression, and it scared her because he wore his heart on his sleeve. *Oh gods, I’ve pushed him away. But I have to be brave*. “Do you still love me?” she chanced. “I don’t even recognize myself—I feel like I’m supposed to be someone else—someone else others hope or expect me to be.” Hawthorn only held her gaze. Her voice cracked on, “I won’t blame you if—”
Hawthorn took her face between his hands and kissed her gently.
Instantly she was transported back through the years, all the times they spent together, either sitting on the couch or under the sheets. He tasted just like she remembered. It wasn’t as ethereal as Selene or Kiran’s tastes, but plain and sweet, and Seff realized she never had the palate for lavishness. She missed everything that meant home to her.
Hawthorn was her home. Her place was in his arms.
It was all so clear. How could she have been so blind?
They groaned into each other’s mouths. Their bodies went taut as he laid her onto her back with him looming over her with arms braced on either side of her head. She suddenly felt as if she hadn’t been fulfilled in months, and the ash in her core was kindled simply by Hawthorn’s hand cupping her breast, palming it under the silk as their kisses deepened.
Using a sudden renewed strength, Seff rolled Hawthorn onto his back so she could sit on him, already moving her hips in minuscule movements with her sex over his hardening one.
Her hands slipped under his white shirt; with his aid, it slipped up and off and his upper body was bared. Seff sucked in a breath. He was no Kiran, but he certainly wasn’t a disappointment. She explored the planes of his torso, the slopes and ridges of his abdomen muscles, across his ribs, up to his peaked nipples, and finally sliding to his shoulders so she could lean forward and kiss him again.
A shiver went through him and he recovered by catching her lower lip between his teeth with a purr. She hummed and tried to smile, feeling playful now. Her hand slid back down to the waistband of his pants.
At the same time, Hawthorn was quick in smacking her ass with both hands with a definitive *slap*. Seff retracted with a gasp at the sudden force. She stuck her tongue out at him when he chuckled and apologized silently by massaging the soreness.
“Hawthorn…” she tried to mumble, now nuzzling his neck, but he interrupted,
“No speaking. Just fucking.”
Her “But,” was cut off by switching their positions again. His mouth found her throat, where her heart jumped into when he began licking her own blood away from Sienna’s claws. The rasp of his tongue made her moan. She locked her legs over his lower back, her fingers tangling into his white hair, a familiar coarse and knotted obstacle. “At least you showered.”
“You wouldn’t prefer me covered in blood, sweat, and grass?”
“I like you the way you are,” she murmured, turning her head to grant him access to more of her neck, even as she opened her eyes. Hawthorn lifted his head to look at her; his green eyes were glazed and his smile was lazy. He was no Sun or Moon Alpha—he wasn’t beautiful enough to make her breathless, but he wasn’t pursuing her like a conquest… He was treating her with sincere love.
His hand tucked in her hair, matching in its lack of color and state of being unbrushed, behind her ear. The featherlight brush of his fingertips on her skin made her shiver. Hawthorn’s gaze sparked when they flicked down to see her peaked breasts now fully exposed. How many times they’d been together, he was still enamored with her. And she was pleased that her reaction made him pleased.
They sat up together, Seff in his lap with legs straddling his waist. Their lips met again, brief and light, Seff drawing her arms around his broad shoulders. Sharing the heated air between them, they listened to their hearts beat in a lovely cadence, the things keeping them alive, keeping them together.
Hawthorn seemed to subdue despite highly anticipated sex, taking in the sight of her panties, up the short length of her torso, her breasts, her licked-clean throat, lingering on her mouth, before finally settling on her eyes. His hands encompassed her hipbones, thumbs pressing into the flesh just over them. At last he said quietly, “Of course I still love you, Seff. Nothing could make me stop loving you. I just… Do *you* love *me*?”
The second presenting of the question made her so nervous that she felt the sudden need to deflect. “Let’s fuck and we’ll find out,” she laughed, stroking his hair.
He wasn’t amused. Seff dropped her hand and her smile faded. *I’m such an idiot*, she thought miserably. *Why am I so afraid to answer?*
She inhaled deeply; on the exhale, she whispered, “I’m afraid to say anything. I’m afraid that if I do…things will go wrong. I don’t want to jinx something so good. Love…” Her mind ran through all the things “love” made her and others do.
Love was the heart of hate. Or fear was the heart of love. Whatever fucked-up emotions wolves felt, in Seff’s experience, it rarely led to a happy ending.
“Love,” she continued even quieter, “makes me afraid.”
Hawthorn’s brows knitted and he squeezed her hips. He murmured, “You don’t need to be afraid with me.”
Tears sprang to the corners of Seff’s eyes because of that truth. Hawthorn would stand by her side through good and bad. And she knew she would do the same, even if her tiny Omega body could never match the power of an Alpha’s. But it was the strength of the soul that truly mattered.
*I have to be brave*.
It was now or never.
Seff took Hawthorn's face between her hands just as he did, wiping away her tears with his rough thumbprints. “Hawthorn Henbane…yes. Yes, I love you.”