A Howling Heart
Chapter seventeen

She's not having that. How can I trust him? This is insane.

"Matias! No way. You-You cannot feed my mother that!"

Matias huffs, his eyes shut briefly. "Fae, just let me do what I know to be right."

He says the words like this is the easiest decision. It is as if, in his world, people are ingesting the blood of others on a regular basis.

"Blood? Whose blood!" I'm shaking as I demand answers.

He glares at my hand before he reaches for it and pries my fingers off his wrist.

"Esai's blood."

Esai? As if I know who that is...

My mind is blank as I try and put a face to the name.

"Who the hell is that?" I stand, moving in front of him. My intense gaze is unwavering on him. I jab my finger in his chest. "You're not going to just give her some random person's blood."

"This again?" His frustration is shown by his tense shoulders, and my naivety irks him. His nostrils flare, jaw ticking with agitation.

I hate how attractive he looks, even when he is annoyed with me.

"Who's blood is that, Matias? Who's Esai?"

"My uncle. The man your mother is bloodbound to. She needs this... now are you going to step aside and let me give it to her?" He looks me up and down. There's anger mixed with desire in his eyes, but he remains compliant with his anger. "Do I have to move you out of the way?"

"You'd hurt me to get to her?"

He growls. "You think I'd have to hurt you to move you?"

My jaw tenses. "We are getting off subject. This is the only way?"

"Bring her to a hospital, Fae. You'll see that nothing will be done for her. Nothing! Now, can you trust me for once? Haven't I come to you every time you've needed me?"

He's not wrong, but ever since he entered my life, things have been insane.

Who am I kidding? It's been this way for a while. I haven't had a normal life since Mom got sick.

I let him give her the blood. I swallow, hoping my nausea doesn't force me to vomit in his living room as the dark liquid paints her lips. I imagine the copper taste of it sliding down her throat.

I literally can't believe this is really happening... my mother is drinking blood. The blood of a strange man. I've just put all my faith in a man I barely know and -

"You are a quiet one. Innocent even. Yet completely frustrating." He grunts before he pulls the glass from her lips and stands. "That should help her for now."

"For now?" I examine my mom, noting how her color is slowly returning.

Oh wow... is it really working?

"Yes, it's working. Like I said... there's a lot you need to understand."

"I'm not sure I want to be enlightened."

"You will have no choice."

"I have no choice? So I get no say if I join this world of monsters and blood?" It's a cruel fate. Look at the state of his Uncle. Look at the state of my mother. This world they are bound to isn't kind, and it isn't unforgiving. It demands blood and compliance, and any defiance twists, breaks, and kills the one who wields it.

I don't think I can submit to it. I'm scared. I'm terribly frightened.

He growls low in his throat, stepping toward me, an intimidating, monstrous man. Yet, the closer he gets, the deeper my longing becomes. It starts as a warm sensation that spreads from my toes to my head, igniting my desire until it's all that I can focus on.

"I desire you too, Fae," Matias says.

"Get out of my head," I demand, but my body betrays my words. A blush creeps over my cheeks.

"I enjoy your mind."

I huff angrily, glancing one more time at my mother before I storm out of the room and toward the front door, but there is no real destination.

"Fae! Stop!" He calls after me, his booming authority making me shiver laced within his tone. A growing need to obey and submit to him fills me, but I bite my lip, unwilling to succumb.

I'm almost in his car when I stop.

Matias intimidatingly presses himself against me.

"Why? Why me?"

"Because it was always you." His arms tighten around me, and those words ring on repeat in my ears.

It was always me.

"Regardless if you want to deny it, your body will always betray your stubborn mind. This body."

He moves his hand over my chest. "This heart. You've been destined for me... That's why the pain is gone when you're near me. Why, I'm all you can think about. Hell, I can smell how aroused you are every time I enter a fucking room, anima mea. So potent. So eager for me."

He presses his nose against my hair and inhales. "So mine." His fingers stroke my back. In his arms, I feel like I've always belonged.

I don't understand how you can meet someone and desire them so completely in such a short amount of time.

"You have always been destined for me. I could feel it in my bones. When you arrived, the wolf inside me, the Alpha, was awakened. Don't fight the Luna inside you, Fae. You're mine." Those words are growled.

I hate how the thought of being his excites my body... No man has made me feel the things I've been feeling.

I've never wanted anyone as badly as I want him.

"Oh... Fae."

How every time I see his mouth and watch him lick his lips, I imagine that soft tongue swirling around my hardened bud.

"Yes." He hisses the word, and I find my resolve dissipating into nothing but pure lust.

He wraps his arms around my waist and tugs me into him, lowering his head until my lips are almost touching, and the longer I stand in his hold, the more my defiance ebbs away, and I'm left panting with need. "And when it is time..." He grabs my hand and places it on his neck before gently squeezing my waist. "You will submit to me completely."