Her Knotty List (MVP: Most Valuable Pack Book 4)

The wonderful, dangerous thing about Emma is her contagious spirit.

She’s just so damn hopeful… after a week or so, I started feeling like all my concerns could melt off my back. As though, maybe, she was right to be so positive and optimistic.

I really should have known better.

I did know better, damn it. But the omega’s big green eyes and the guys’ encouragement had me questioning my judgment.

I feel it the second I wake up, though.

The sensation of someone tugging at the edges of my sanity. Swiping it away, strip by strip. My blood ticks under my skin, buzzing in my dick and pounding at my pulse points.

Fucking hell.

A rut.

I haven’t had one in years. Back then, I rode them out alone, with that damn sex toy Emma found. I barely remember the last one, but afterward my bedroom was ripped half to shreds. I must have made a hell of a ruckus, too, because McKinley was in his crate downstairs and he still wouldn’t look at me for two days.

Remembering my own dog, unable to look at me, gores a corkscrew into my gut. I don’t want Emma to avoid my gaze or tremble when I come near her.

And I would never let myself rut her.

I told the guys as much last night. They all seemed convinced that they could handle me if it happened during Emma’s heat, but this is exactly why I can’t commit to being there.

My instincts are too demanding. My Alpha is too strong. And if I don’t get the hell out of here, I’m going to end up hunting the little omega down and⁠—

No.

Go.

The force expanding in my center fights me on every step. Somehow, I wrench myself forward, following familiar steps by rote.

Front closet.

Boots.

Coat.

I can’t pause. Can’t let myself think about the cinnamon soaked into the room or the purple paper with her list on it. Especially can’t let myself remember one of the lines on there.

Have an alpha during a rut.

Fuck.

Go, go, go.

I don’t have much time. The soles of my feet tingle, every cell vibrating in protest when I don’t turn for the stairs. The edges of my vision have already melted into a blur. My teeth ache to sink into the omega’s thin skin.

Painful hardness throbs against the press of my sweatpants, an answering jolt of discomfort lodged into my core. My knot is already solid and thick, begging for the press of Emma’s sweet, slick heat⁠—

Fuck.

Go.

The bracing mountain air helps for a moment. Long enough for me to haul myself away from my house, heading for a familiar hiking path.

Maybe, as long as I’m in a place I know well, I won’t wander too far.

It’s worth a shot. I refuse to be anywhere in the house when I’m like this. Not with Emma there, where she could see me or hear me or—worse—somehow get barked into doing whatever my Alpha is about to demand.

The thought makes my blood run cold. It’s a strange sensation, with my skin burning while my core smolders like a furnace.

Every staggered step is another slip of the knife in my chest. More proof that I can’t do this. Handle this. Not without turning into a beast and imposing my whims on the others.

And Emma.

God, I would strangle myself on my own leash before I ever dreamed of touching her when I’m⁠—

“Slow,” a distant voice chirps, panting. “Down!”

I freeze, fresh horror contorting my middle.

The sweet, innocent little miss trailing behind me uses the opportunity to scurry closer, until I can make out the gleam of her wide, trusting smile.

“Sheesh,” she huffs, “For someone with fifteen years on me, you can really move. We’ll have to tell Zane that ‘gramps’ isn’t a good nickname. Grinch probably still works, though.”

Hearing her happy musings, inhaling the light, creeping scent of her joy… Fear free-falls into the pit of my stomach and hits bottom, exploding in a gruesome splatter that has me wheeling on my booted heel, snarling.

“You need to leave me alone!”

Fuck.

Her face.

A thousand arrows soaked in alcohol would sting less than the way her chin wobbles when her mouth starts to tremble. And ten-thousand stab wounds would be better than the honest hurt that flashes through her eyes.

My Alpha roars, shoving me even closer to the edge, snapping at the reins. He thinks he can fix this, the stupid, senseless bastard. He thinks I’m the problem, keeping him from showing this omega how much we want her and care about her.

Jesus.

Is he right?

Emma shrinks back a step, her rosy lips furling closed like a rosebud trying to shield itself from the elements. “O-oh,” she stammers, small. “All right. I—I’m sorry. I saw you walk out from the window in your bedroom, and I just thought we could⁠—”

She thought I’d want to spend time with her. Give her my full attention, the way she seems to crave so fiercely. My poor, sweet little thing.

If walking away before felt wrong, this feels impossible. My instincts sense my weakness and lunge, nearly ripping my control away.

But her scent.

It drops past singed, or even burned. Into an absolutely horrifying… something. More burned than tinder, more sour than vinegar. Sad and embarrassed and so heartrendingly surprised. Then, ashamed.

It’s rejection.

I don’t get to think before I move. My brain blinks off until I feel her skin under my fingertips, cupping her cool hands inside the heat of mine.

“It isn’t you,” I rough out, half-growling. “I woke up on the edge of a rut. I’ll take care of it—but, please, you need to go back to the house.”

Hell and damnation, but she’s the single sweetest person in the world.

The notion of me rutting her into oblivion doesn’t even make her flinch. Instead, true eagerness fills her face while she makes a soft sound of sympathy.

“Knox,” she whispers, glancing down at the ram-pole in my pants. “That must hurt. Are you okay? Do you want me to⁠—”

I snap my palm up to cover her mouth, glaring. I don’t mean to, but some part of me knows that if I hear her offer anything specific, I won’t be able to walk away.

“No,” I rasp, swallowing painfully. “No, honey, I don’t want you to stay. It would fucking kill me if I hurt you or made you do anything you didn’t want to do. I don’t trust my Alpha like this. He could bark at you, and you wouldn’t have a choice. I’ll never allow that.”

Emma gazes up at me with all sorts of things swirling in her green eyes. Affection and trust and worry. Arousal, too, God help me.

Her pupils dilate; the faintest traces of perfume leaking through her tight leggings and tiptoeing into the frigid air. I’m thankful for the thick fabric and the way this weather suppresses her scent. Almost as relieved as I am when she steps back again.

She doesn’t go, though. Instead, her head tilts slightly, sending blonde curls over the shoulder of her pink sweatshirt. “You want to rut me?” she says slowly, “but you don’t trust yourself?”

Patience. She’s going to leave, and we can go.

“Right,” I bite out.

She rolls her lips together, the smell of her arousal flaring into something richer and warmer. Good fucking God.

“You want to chase me,” she breathes, “pin me down, and rut me… but you won’t let yourself?”

“Yes,” I practically roar, my chest heaving. “Now, you need to⁠—”

She takes off.

Just… runs.

Not toward the house and the safety of the others. But right past me, into the thick forest surrounding us. The one that’s blanketed by freezing snow and full of places for her to trip and get hurt. Full of animals, too, who could scent her and come looking for cinnamon buns for breakfast.

My brain registers the danger while my body reacts to her disobedience, getting harder and hotter. The instincts chained in my center let out a war cry, snapping the binds like dental floss.

Until I turn and chase.