MATED TO FATHER, FAT Chapter 63: CHOICES

Chapter 63: CHOICES

AMARIS

I did not know when I fell asleep but I woke up with a headache that felt like someone was taking a hammer to the inside of my skull.

The floor was cold against my naked skin and for a second I could not figure out why I was lying on hardwood instead of my perfectly good bed. Then the memories hit me all at once and I wanted to go back to sleep and never wake up.

Ryker.

Last night.

Everything.

I dragged myself up using the doorframe for support and my legs protested the movement, sore in places I did not know could be sore. Every step toward my bed reminded me of what we had done, of how thoroughly he had used my body and how willingly I had let him.

The mirror caught my reflection and I stopped.

I looked like absolute hell.

Hair tangled and matted from sleeping on the floor, eyes swollen and red from crying, skin pale except for the marks scattered across my neck and collarbone where Ryker’s mouth had been. I looked like someone who had been thoroughly fucked and then thoroughly destroyed.

Which was accurate.

I stared at that mirror, at the same mirror where Ryker had placed me on the vanity table and spread my legs open while he buried his face between my thighs and made me come apart with just his tongue. I had gone wild, grabbing his hair and pulling him closer and making sounds I did not know I was capable of making.

Nothing in my life had ever been done to me like that, nothing had ever made me feel that way. Wanted. Desired. Like I was something worth savoring instead of something to be tolerated.

My eyes moved to the side of the bed where I had been on my knees with his hard length in my mouth, learning how to pleasure him while he groaned and told me I was a natural. I had enjoyed it in ways that should have been humiliating, had gotten wet just from the act of servicing him.

What did that say about me?

Then I looked at the bed itself and my everything came crashing down in my mind as I remembered every bit of last night.

I wish I had been drunk so I could only remember the fragments of what had happened, but everything, from how he kissed me, to the first and last peration lived rent free in my head at the moment.

There was blood stained on the sheets, proof that yes, I was no longer a virgin. Proof that I had given myself willingly to a man I knew was using me, a man who had made it very clear from the beginning that I was just a weapon in whatever war he was waging against his father. A man that right before he fucked me , he told me he would ruin me for any other man.

Those were clear red flags but I had romanticized it at the moment.

I had known that.

Known it and still let him touch me, still begged him to fuck me, still spread my legs and surrendered myself to him like some pathetic fool who thought maybe this time would be different.

Anger flooded through me as I clenched my fist at my patheticness, I yanked the bedsheets off the mattress, tears streaming down my face while I screamed at fabric that could not hear me.

"I hate him," I choked out through sobs. "I hate him, I hate him, I hate him."

But the words rang hollow because they were not entirely true.

I did not hate Ryker.

I hated myself.

I stood there staring at the empty bed stripped of its sheets and forced myself to acknowledge the truth I had been avoiding since he walked out of my bathroom last night.

It was not really his fault.

Yes, he had used me. Yes, he had taken my virginity as some twisted form of revenge against his father. Yes, he had looked at me like I was disposable the second he found out Alpha Corvin would never know the difference.

But I was the one who let him have me.

I was the one who opened the door when I smelled him outside at midnight. I was the one who stripped naked when he told me to. I was the one who got on my knees and put his cock in my mouth. I was the one who begged him to fuck me.

No one forced me to do any of that.

And if I was being completely honest with myself, brutally honest in a way that made me want to crawl out of my own skin, I did not actually feel bad about sleeping with Ryker.

I only felt bad that he rejected me afterward.

Which said something deeply fucked up about me as a person because I was supposed to be mated to his father in a matter of days and here I was upset that the son who used me did not want to keep me.

What kind of broken logic was that?

I was still wallowing in this revelation when someone knocked on my door.

My whole body went rigid because the smell hit me before the sound registered, because my wolf slammed against my chest so hard I actually gasped, because I knew exactly who was on the other side of that door.

I contemplated not opening it, just staying silent until he went away and left me to wallow in my poor life choices alone. But my hand was already moving toward my wardrobe, already pulling out a robe and wrapping it around my naked body.

I was not making the same mistake twice.

No more opening doors in thin lace that practically screamed fuck me. No more putting myself in situations where my terrible decision-making skills and complete lack of self-preservation could ruin my life further.

I walked to the door slowly and opened it but stayed planted in the doorway blocking entrance.

Rowan.

Rowan smiled and the scent of apples washed over me, clean and fresh and so different from Ryker’s fur smell. His eyes traveled over me taking in every detail of my disaster appearance and I wanted to slam the door in his face.

He was dressed in a white long-sleeved shirt and black trousers, his hair properly combed, looking like he had gotten a full night’s sleep instead of crying naked on a bathroom floor.

"Hi Amaris," he greeted, his voice warm.

I cleared my throat which was scratchy from crying all night. "Hi Rowan."

It was only through his bright eyes that I realized just how much I looked like hell. My hair was a rat’s nest, my face was probably still blotchy, and I was wearing a bathrobe at what I assumed was a completely inappropriate hour.

"Can I come in?" he asked.

"I would rather you not," I responded, putting my hand against the doorframe to block him.

His eyebrows rose. "Why not? I can’t discuss things with you out here in the hallway."

"Yes, I know that," I countered, "but I also know what happened last time I was in an enclosed space with you so no thank you."

He smirked and something about that expression made my stomach flip. "What if I give you my word that wouldn’t happen?"

"Right now I can’t even trust my own word," I shot back, "not to talk of yours."

He opened his mouth to respond then paused, his expression shifting as he actually looked at me instead of just seeing me. "What’s wrong with you? You look tired."

I smiled because at least he said tired instead of you look like someone dragged you through hell and back.

Well Rowan, your brother fucked me six ways from Sunday and then walked out the second he realized it was pointless, so I spent the night crying naked on my bathroom floor. How was your night?

"I am fine," I lied. "What do you want Rowan?"

He glanced around the hallway like he was checking for eavesdroppers. "I wanted to talk about a way we can break this bond."

I stared at him. "A way?"

"Yes," he confirmed. "Before it ruins us all."

I knew I would probably regret this but I stepped back and opened the door wider, letting him in.

What was one more terrible decision at this point?

I was already neck-deep in bad choices, might as well keep digging until I hit rock bottom or possibly the earth’s core.

Rowan walked into my room and I closed the door behind him, my hand lingering on the handle like I could still change my mind and kick him out.

His eyes went immediately to the bloodstained sheets scattered on the floor, then to the messy bed, then back to me. His whole body went rigid and when he turned to face me his expression had shifted a dark look that contrasted the bright side I knew of him.

"Ryker was just in this room."

It was not a question. He said it with certainty.