Sacrificed To The Triplet Alpha Kings novel Chapter 176

Chapter 176: Nicholas Felt It

The moment the door closed behind her, Lilith collapsed onto the bed.

Not gracefully. Not with any kind of control or dignity. She fell forward onto the mattress like her legs had simply decided they were no longer capable of supporting her weight, her entire body still vibrating with the aftermath of the kiss, her skin still burning with the sensation of his touch.

She lay there for a moment, gasping for air, her heart hammering so hard against her ribs she thought it might break through. Her face was on fire, not just her cheeks, but her entire face, burning with embarrassment and confusion and something else, something she didn’t have a name for.

Her body was doing things she couldn’t control. Arching slightly, her hips pressing down into the mattress in a way that made her want to die of shame. Her lips were still sensitive, still tasting him, still feeling the imprint of his mouth on hers. She reached up and touched her own lips with trembling fingers, surprised to find them swollen from the intensity of it.

A small sound escaped her, something between a laugh and a cry, muffled by the bedding. She grabbed the nearest pillow and pressed it against her face, her body still arching, still responding to phantom sensations, still caught in the grip of something she didn’t understand and couldn’t control.

She could still feel him. The way he’d crouched before her, bringing himself to her level. The intensity in his dark eyes, burning with something primal and desperate and absolutely claiming. The way his hand had cupped her face, holding her in place while his mouth devoured hers like she was the only thing in the world that mattered.

The way he’d confessed that he could barely control himself, that his wolf wanted to claim her, mark her, bind her in ways that should have terrified her.

But it hadn’t terrified her. Not entirely.

Part of her had wanted him to not stop. Part of her had wanted him to continue, consequences be damned, restraint abandoned, everything that came next welcomed with open arms.

That realization made her press the pillow harder against her face, muffled sounds of embarrassment escaping into the down stuffing.

Eventually, she didn’t know how long later, She managed to pull herself together enough to sit up. She was still trembling, still burning, still unable to fully process what had happened. She moved to the window and looked out at the gardens below, at the grounds slowly being swallowed by evening darkness, and tried to breathe normally.

The taste of him was still on her lips. The scent of him was still on her skin. The feeling of his hands, his mouth, his desperate need, it was all still there, impossible to forget, impossible to ignore.

She wrapped her arms around herself and sat on the window seat, watching the light fade, replaying the kiss over and over, unable to stop herself from wanting to run back to that library and let him finish what he started.

She was so lost in the memory of it that she didn’t notice the moment evening shifted into true night, didn’t notice the staff moving through the corridors below, didn’t notice anything except the endless loop of his mouth on hers and the terrible, thrilling realization that she wanted him to do it again.

***

He thought about the curse, the generational feral nature that had plagued his family for over a century. Each generation getting worse. Each alpha losing more ground to their wolves. Their grandfather had lost three years to it before he died, locked away, letting his wolf consume him entirely. Their father had managed it with iron discipline and herbal suppressants and sheer force of will, but even he had shown signs of deterioration as he aged.

And then the triplets.

The curse had manifested in them at seventeen, the same age it manifested in every Blackwood male. But this generation, it was different. It was aggressive. It was accelerating. By the time they turned twenty-five, they were already showing signs that their father had taken years to develop.

The full moon was becoming unbearable. The restraint was becoming impossible.

And then she’d arrived.

Nicholas sat back in his chair, staring at the documents spread before him, and allowed himself to really think about Lilith. Wolfless. No power. No status. She should have been completely invisible to their instincts, should have registered as nothing more than a wolfless servant, easily forgotten and easily moved past. a payment they were meant to enjoy and then release after the arrangement.

Instead, she was the only thing that seemed to quiet the curse.