Prodigal (Outcast Sons Book 1) Read online

  Jon swallowed, trying to remember that he was only an omega, that he was made to give a higher-ranked wolf anything they requested of him, that he couldn’t ever demand more than a superior wolf was willing to give him. Omegas are made for fucking. With an enormous effort of will, he battled his own body into obedient stillness.

  But he could still feel Cae against him, could feel little trickles of the other man’s precome wetting them both, and his own cock twitched hard, dribbling precome onto his abdomen in hot little spurts.

  “I—I’ll be good,” he managed. “Just—just—please, Cae, please.”

  At the meek request, he heard Cae let out his breath in a gasp. Cae’s spine flexed, and the head of his cock slipped in, stretching Jon’s aching flesh, giving him what he needed so desperately. He sobbed with relief and exquisite pleasure, and threw his head back, panting for breath, as he waited for Cae to thrust further inside him.

  But Cae remained motionless.

  Why was Cae torturing him this way? he wondered frantically. What had he done wrong? Why wouldn’t Cae just take him, take his body, in any way that he wanted?

  He needed this, needed Cae, so badly that he thought he might die if the other man stopped now. He knew that he should be grateful that an alpha was willing to give him any such attention, that he should happily take whatever a superior wolf offered him, without complaint or thoughts of wanting more.

  But his body’s cravings couldn’t be reasoned away. He needed more, so much more. He needed the violent friction of a hard fucking, not this slow and deliberate torment.

  Cae rolled his hips, stroking his tight hole deliciously, and Jon forgot himself again. His nails scored their way down Cae’s back.

  “God, yes,” Cae muttered, and for the first time it dawned on Jon that Cae was turned on by his wildness, that he didn’t object to it in the least. Cae didn’t think of him as lesser, simply because he was an omega.

  Right now, the two of them were just wild animals together in the night.

  The forbidden nature of that thought, the shocking notion that an alpha and an omega really weren’t that different, thrilled him in some dark place deep inside. He clawed the other man again, and Cae slipped inside him, giving him another inch.

  An inch closer to paradise, he thought, and groaned with aching need. Cae froze.

  “Does that hurt?”

  Jon drew in a deep breath, and deliberately pushed away his omega instincts, forcing himself to speak firmly.

  “No, you idiot. Give me more.”

  Cae laughed, low and soft, and his spine flexed again. Suddenly he was inside Jon, deep inside, hot and hard and incredibly satisfying . Jon cried out as the blunt head of his cock hit him right there, setting off a burst of delicious and intense ecstasy so incredible he could hardly bear it.

  Cae withdrew, slowly, and then thrust again, hitting him in precisely the right place a second time. Jon cried out and shuddered.

  “You’re close,” Cae said in his ear. “So close.”

  “Yes—Cae—Caeden—please—”

  “No, Jon. You don’t come until I let you come. All right?”

  He thrust again, his motions leisurely yet commanding, and Jon cried out louder than before.

  “Do not come, Jon.”

  Jon bit his lip, struggling to hold back. But it was incredibly difficult to resist the breathtaking sensation of Cae moving in him, in long, steady strokes, each one of his smooth, leisurely movements culminating in a burst of pleasure as Cae struck gently against his prostate. His cock throbbed and his breath came in short gasps, and he knew the scent of a well-fucked omega was rising from his body.

  Cae’s fragrance almost overwhelmed him. The muskiness of his usual scent was almost drowned out by the scent of an alpha in the midst of sex. Beneath it all was that odd smell, the smell of Cae’s madness, but right now Jon was hardly aware of that.

  His head was filled with the odor of sex, the scent of the man he needed more than anything else on the planet.

  Cae’s movements slowly sped up, and his thrusts became more forceful, and Jon fought desperately for control. But with Cae fucking him so hard, it was almost impossible to hold himself back. His cock felt enormous now, and Jon thought with dizzy longing about how it would feel if that cock swelled even more, to the tremendous proportions an alpha was capable of when he mated with his life partner. He imagined Cae’s cock forming a hot, hard knot that would bind them together, filling him and stretching him and—

  “Don’t come,” Cae grunted, sharply.

  “Ahhh, I can’t stop, Cae, I can’t—”

  Cae froze inside him, and Jon sobbed with desperation, forgetting himself, scoring the other man’s back with his nails.

  “Please, please—”

  Cae began moving again, very slowly, and Jon writhed, desperate for the breathtaking, punishing pace Cae had set earlier. He knew his own body was body was hot and fragrant, awash in the pheromones that marked him an omega, and he saw Cae’s nostrils flare like he’d scented prey.

  “I wish I could mate with you,” he growled in a low voice. “Forever. For the rest of time.”

  “Me too,” Jon gritted out. It was good to know that he wasn’t the only one longing for the knot, but it was something neither of them could have. Not together. And yet he craved it with a strange intensity, and if he wanted it that badly, he could hardly imagine how badly Cae wanted it.

  He wished, with a hopeless desperation, that he could be the one. The one that Cae could life-bond with.

  His body clenched around the other man’s cock in an involuntary, needy response, and Cae broke with a startling suddenness, thrusting into him hard and fast. Jon threw his head back and howled with pleasure, a sound that was more wolf than human, and Cae responded, his cock throbbing deep inside Jon. He felt Cae’s come spurting deep inside him, filling him, and the knowledge that he had pleased his alpha filled him with ecstasy on an instinctive level.

  “Come for me,” Cae grunted in his ear.

  Jon felt the pleasure build to an impossible level. He’d come so hard earlier that it hardly seemed possible he could come like that again, but if anything this was even more intense. The feel of Cae inside him, stroking him from the inside, making him sticky and wet with his come, drove him to a dizzying height of rapture he’d never before attained.

  His hips jerked frantically as he came all over himself, all over his alpha, all over the pine needles, in spurts so long and intense they seemed endless.

  Cae fucked him through it, ruthless, relentless, and when at last the rapture faded, Jon fell back against the forest floor, barely conscious.

  I’m yours. Forever.

  He held back the words, barely, knowing that if Cae said them back to him, they wouldn’t really be true. That one day Cae would find a beta who would fire his blood and bring him panting helplessly to her side. That one day, he’d forget all about Jon, and fuck a woman just as fiercely and relentlessly and passionately as he’d fucked Jon.

  As much as Jon wanted it to be… this wasn’t forever.

  It couldn’t be.

  Chapter 18

  They’d moved their campsite several times. Jon patrolled the area zealously in his wolf form, sniffing the ground and air carefully, keeping an eye out for hikers or rangers or anyone who might object to their presence there, and they moved to a new site if there was the slightest chance of discovery. More than once he smelled the distant scent of wolf on the summer breeze, and knew that the Pack was hunting them. They hiked deeper and deeper into the forest, evading humans and wolves alike.

  Every night they curled up together in the tent, Jon in his human form, warm and close and intimate, and made love with violent enthusiasm.

  Jon was almost happy. He would have been completely content if the two of them could have life-bonded, but unsurprisingly, no knotting between them occurred. Which was hardly surprising, all things considered. But he was able to look past that, and mostly didn’t worry about i
t. The problem that kept him awake at night was the dangerous gleam he sometimes saw in Cae’s eyes.

  Although Cae refused to discuss the matter, because it always led to an argument, he knew Cae was still thinking about returning to the Pack. Still thinking about taking on the enormous, grizzled wolf-form of his father, armed only with a knife and his wits.

  The thought terrified Jon. Not just because he was worried about Cae’s well-being—though that was certainly a large part of it—but because he had the sinking certainty that Cae couldn’t be trusted as Alpha.

  As long as they were together, Cae seemed much like the same man he’d always been, calm and collected and amiable. Yet every now and again, Jon would glance at him and catch a brief glimpse of that sharp, frightening edge of insanity in his eyes, something wild and reckless and angry.

  In this state of mind, Cae wasn’t fit to be Alpha. Of that he was certain.

  But despite his concerns, their life together was pleasant, almost domestic, and Jon would have been happy to live here in the woods forever, by Cae’s side.

  Unfortunately for him, that wasn’t possible. And a month after Cae arrived in the forest, it all fell apart.

  ✽✽✽

  “I’m going back, damn it!”

  Cae waved the knife in the air, his eyes ice cold. He looked just as he had back in the human city—full of rage and hatred.

  Jon didn’t like seeing all that anger aimed at him. Not only did it dismay him as an omega—because all he really wanted was to make Cae happy, and Cae was very definitely not happy right now—but it hurt him on a personal level.

  He hadn’t seen that insane gleam in Cae’s eyes for over a week now, and he’d been nursing the hope that the other man had found peace in the forest, that like Jon, he was learning to put away his dreams of leading the Pack, and to be happy in this quieter, simpler life.

  He should have known better. An alpha, even an alpha who’d never changed, couldn’t just walk away from his Pack. Cae wasn’t cut out for the Walden Pond sort of simple life. He’d been born to lead, and somewhere deep down, their isolation had obviously been rankling at him. He’d probably tried to suppress it, but in the long run… his rage couldn’t be denied.

  “Listen, Cae.” Jon spoke in a carefully gentle, nonconfrontational tone. “If you go back and challenge the Alpha, he’ll kill you.”

  “Maybe I’ll kill him instead. Survival of the fittest, right?” Cae’s grin was demonic, half-crazed, and Jon instinctively cringed away from it. Not because Cae was an alpha, but because he was obviously losing his grip on reality. “And then I’ll make them sorry. I’ll make them all sorry.”

  His lips drew back, exposing his teeth in a very canine snarl, and something inside Jon crawled with fear and loathing. The thought of Cae trying to wreak vengeance on the Pack, hurting their own people the way he’d hurt humans—well, it was terrifying. Alphas were born with the ability to command, but also with the desire to protect and guard their people. For any alpha to have the power over his people, with none of the compassion…

  That could only lead to disaster.

  “I know you’re angry,” Jon said, his voice still soft and gentle. He didn’t want to piss Cae off, not now. He trusted Cae with his life, and yet—well, this wasn’t Cae. Not quite. “And you have a right to be. After everything that happened…”

  “They treated me like a cub, Jon.” The golden eyes gleamed bright with fury. “They laughed about me, whispered about me, behind my back. They all deserve what they get. Anything they get.”

  “No.” On one level, Jon felt that Cae had a point. The strong social structure of wolf society lent itself to abuse, something a low-ranking omega knew all too well. After all, his own parents had fled Wolf Green entirely because they couldn’t bear the way they were treated, and they were far from the only ones. Anyone who didn’t fit into the expected hierarchy—even the son of the Alpha—could wind up shunned, mocked, treated like a pariah.

  He knew his friend had suffered. But that didn’t mean that Cae had the right to go back and hurt all those people. There were over five thousand wolves living in Wolf Green.

  “If you go back,” he said desperately, trying to reason with Cae despite the fact that his lover was obviously beyond reason, “then you could try to change things… make people see that you deserve better…”

  “I can’t change anything as a cub,” Cae snarled. “I have to be in charge. And if you’re even half a man, you’ll come along.”

  Jon’s hackles would have lifted, had he been in wolf form. This whole month, Cae had treated him like an equal. To have it suggested that he was less than a man made his inner wolf growl. But he spoke as calmly and reasonably as he could.

  “I can’t go back, Cae. The Alpha—”

  “I’m the Alpha!” Cae snapped.

  “Not until you take down the Alpha. And you’re not going to manage that with a knife!”

  “I don’t care.” Cae’s eyes were wild. “It’s my right to try. It’s my Pack, damn it. And I’m taking it back.”

  His teeth still bared in an expression more wolf than human, he turned toward the east and began stalking away. Jon ran around him, standing in front of him and trying pathetically to block his path.

  “Caeden. Please. Don’t do this. Don’t go.”

  “Get the fuck out of my way, Jon.”

  Jon felt the automatic tug of his instincts, demanding that he do what an alpha commanded, but he resisted. He stiffened his spine and refused to move.

  “I can’t let you go back,” he said, staring up into Cae’s eyes, willing him to understand. “Not like this.”

  Cae glared at him, the sanity lost in rage and hatred and ambition. He raised the knife, holding it in an unmistakably threatening way.

  “Get out of my way,” he growled.

  Jon took a deep breath, and did the only thing he could think of. He shifted rapidly to his wolf form, lowered his head in what any wolf would recognize as a threat, and growled, letting his teeth show.

  I’m not letting you go back.

  He knew his message was clear, even without words. Cae stared at him, eyes wide with shock. For an omega to defy an alpha was unheard of. For an omega to threaten an alpha…

  Well, he deserved death, and he knew it.

  They stood there a long moment, glaring at each other. And then, slowly, Cae deflated.

  “Jon,” he said, very softly. “I know whatever’s wrong inside me is getting stronger, but trust me, it’s going to be worse if I’m without you. You—you help me, somehow. Come with me, all right? I… I need you by my side. Please.”

  Jon cocked his head on one side, studying the other man. To go back meant death, and he knew it. The Alpha had exiled him, after all, and if he returned he would be killed.

  But he also knew that he belonged by Cae’s side. Cae was—as strange as the thought might be to an omega—his responsibility. And so was the Pack, even though they’d cast him out.

  If he went with Cae, maybe he could defuse the situation somehow. Maybe he could manage to fix things. At the very least, he had an obligation to try.

  He shifted to human form, and nodded.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll come with you.”

  Chapter 19

  Caeden was aware of the eyes on them from the moment they both stepped out of the car. Jon had put on some of the clothes from Caeden’s backpack—which were too large for him, but at least made him socially acceptable enough to hitch a ride—and they’d traveled home.

  When they arrived in Wolf Green, no one spoke to them. They just stopped and stared.

  Caeden wasn’t sure what they thought was more shocking—an exiled wolf walking brazenly back into town, or the cub who’d walked away on his own returning.

  Of course, he wasn’t just a cub. He was a freak. Rage and hatred pounded inside him, just as it had pounded for every moment of the journey home. He hated these people, and their small-minded, bigoted ways. He hated his father fo
r ruling over them. He would defeat his father, slash him to pieces, hack him to bits, and then—then he’d make them all sorry.

  Somewhere deep inside, he was vaguely aware that this wasn’t a normal way for him to be thinking, but the awareness was subsumed under the fury that beat through his veins. The human who’d given them a lift drove away, blithely unaware of the drama that was about to unfold, and Caeden stalked up Main Street, toward the mansion in which he’d grown up.

  No one tried to stop him. Everyone just stood there, watching blankly.

  They were still staring, damn it. Like he was a freak.

  Jon walked by his side, his head held higher than an omega’s should be. Caeden knew he was scared, but it didn’t show. Jon looked cool, determined, his eyes narrowed, his shoulders squared, his mouth a grim line.

  They strode down Main Street together, and the townspeople began eddying behind them, following them. It was a surreal scene—the two of them walking through a perfectly normal-looking, quiet town, with a silent mob of people trailing behind them.

  Shoulder to shoulder, they stalked toward the turreted white Victorian mansion that Caeden had called home as long as he could remember. This was his house, had always been his house, and he was damn well going to rip the Alpha apart and claim it as his own. The house, and the Pack, and the town. All his.

  But before he got to the neatly manicured front yard, the Alpha appeared on the stone steps. Caeden stopped at the curb, gazing up at him. The Alpha looked down on them both, and then began clapping, slowly, sardonically.

  “I see the prodigal has returned once again,” he said, his voice dripping with contempt. “Impressive. I didn’t think the two of you would have the balls to come back, let alone to confront me here, in the midst of the Pack. Evidently you’re not quite as cowardly as I believed.”

  The old man’s voice was jeering, and Caeden felt a red mist of rage cover his vision. He’d already been angry, but the fact that his father was mocking him and his lover, his mate, in front of all their people, was more than he could take.