Unwanted Luna - Chapter #6 - by Nina Soelian

[Daphne’s POV]

My knees hit the ground for the twentieth time this morning, and I tasted blood. Again.

"Pathetic." Xander's voice cut through the dawn air like a blade. "Get up."

Two weeks. Two weeks of this torture, and every muscle in my body screamed rebellion. But I pushed myself up anyway, ignoring the way my arms shook.

Because I'd rather die than prove him right. Than prove everyone right.

"Your stance is shit." His boot knocked my foot wider. "Your balance is worse"

"I'm trying—"

"Try harder."

He came at me again, and this time when his hands gripped my waist to demonstrate the counter-hold, something hot and unwanted coiled in my stomach.

His scent invaded every breath. His chest pressed against my back, one arm across my throat in a chokehold demonstration, and my traitorous body responded like he'd set it on fire.

What the hell is wrong with me?

"Break the hold," he commanded, his breath hot against my ear.

I tried to focus on the technique, but his thighs bracketed mine, his hips pressed against my ass, and Goddess help me, my insides clenched so sweetly.

This was Xander. The older brother who'd watched me mate Connor with dead eyes. The one who'd called me pathetic just minutes after defending me.

"I said break it." His arm tightened fractionally.

I twisted, using my hips the way he'd taught me, but only succeeded in grinding against him. His sharp intake of breath made heat flood between my legs, and suddenly the hold loosened.

I spun free, gasping.

"Again." His eyes had darkened to storm clouds.

This time when we grappled, when Xander took me down to the mat, I felt the hard length of him against my thigh. My body's response was immediate and mortifying.

"Focus," he snarled when I failed to break his hold for the tenth time, his weight pressing me into the mat. "Or do you enjoy being on your back beneath me, little wolf?"

The crude words should have offended me. Should have made me angry. Instead, wetness pooled between my thighs, and I had to bite my lip to keep from moaning.

Using pure desperation, I managed to slip his grip with a technique he'd drilled into me yesterday. His eyes flashed with approval, the first genuine praise in two weeks, before he took me down harder, faster.

My back hit the mat and then Xander was on me, caging me completely. His hands pinned my wrists above my head, his hips locked mine in place, and every inch of him pressed against every inch of me.

We were both breathing hard, chests heaving, and the air between us turned molten.

"You're not fighting hard enough." His voice had gone rough, gravelly. "Use your fucking instincts."

The shame burns fresh, hot and acidic in my throat. "I don't have instincts. I'm still wolfless, remember?"

His grip shifted, one hand releasing my wrists to frame my throat. Not squeezing, just holding. The dominant gesture made my whole body arch beneath him.

"You have instincts," he growled, thumb stroking the racing pulse in my throat. "At least the ones that mean something more than being my brother's pathetic toy."

And the casual cruelty in his voice shatters whatever spell held me frozen. Fury and sadness ignite inside my chest like competing flames. I shove at him, and he lets me up this time.

I scramble to my feet, tears already burning in my eyes.

"Yeah, right. You're right. He's right. Everyone's right!" The words ripped out of me, raw and bleeding. "I am the weakest. I am worthless. I couldn't even keep my mate happy. He had to find someone better..."

My voice cracked. "It was a mistake asking you to train me. It doesn't make sense anyway."

Xander loses control completely.

"For fuck's sake!" He's on his feet, closing the distance between us with predatory speed. "Connor never loved you! He never even cared about you!"

He caged me against the stone, hands braced on either side of my head.

"Every ‘kind’ piece of advice was meant to make you smaller. He played with you like a cat with a mouse, and everyone saw it! Everyone laughed at you behind your back as you thanked him for destroying you!"

Each word was a deliberate wound, but the fury in his eyes wasn't directed at me.

"He. Was. Playing. With. You." His face was inches from mine now. "And you let him."

"But... but why would he...?"

"Because he's a sadistic bastard who enjoyed watching you blame yourself for his cruelty." Xander's voice rises with each word, his control shredding. "And you chased after his scraps while I watched you choose him over and over!"

The pain in his voice caught me off guard.

"While I watched you smile at him like he hung the moon. Give yourself to him during your heat when I was the one who—"

He cut himself off, jaw clenched so tight I thought it might shatter.

"Who what?" The question comes out as a whisper.

"I found you first that night." The confession came out rough, broken. "You begged me to help you. Begged so prettily with those big hazel eyes and your hands reaching for me. Pressing against me, telling me you needed—”

He swallowed hard and shook his head. “But I didn't. I carried you to my room instead because I wanted it to be real when we... and then Connor found you, and again—you fucking thanked him!"

The last word was pure bitterness.

"You thanked him for taking what should have been—" He cut off with a growl that vibrated through my bones.

"Xander..." His name came out breathy, needy, and something in him snapped.

His mouth crashed into mine with suppressed hunger. The kiss was nothing like Connor's calculated pecks—this was possession, devastation, want condensed into the slide of tongue and teeth.

I melted against him instantly, my hands fisting in his shirt as he pressed me harder against the wall. A sound escapes my throat, something between a gasp and a moan, and he swallows it, kissing me deeper.

His pheromones crashed over me in waves—dominant, possessive, mine mine mine—and that sleeping thing inside me stretched, reaching for him. My body temperature spiked.

Skin too tight, too hot. And for the first time in my life, I felt something wild claw at my insides. He kissed down my throat, teeth scraping, and I nearly came from that alone.

"I should have been your first," he snarled against my skin, hips rolling against mine in a rhythm that had me seeing stars. "Yours only."

Before I can ask what he means, voices approached—Alpha Hector and his Beta discussing something about ceremonies.

Xander didn't release me immediately, holding my gaze with burning intensity as footsteps drew closer. His thumb stroked my bottom lip, swollen from his kisses, and I had to bite back a whimper.

Then he releases me and steps back just as Hector rounds the corner.

The Alpha's eyes narrow instantly, taking in our proximity, my flushed face, my mussed hair and training clothes askew. His gaze shifts to Xander, and something cold flashes through his expression.

"Intense training, I see," he said pleasantly, but ice crackled beneath the words. His gaze moved between us, calculating. "Don't damage my bride, Xander. She needs to be perfect for the ceremony."

The possession in his tone made Xander's entire body go rigid with barely contained violence. His hand flexed like he wanted to reach for me, claim me right there in front of his father.

As Hector walked away, I touched my tingling lips, feeling that strange stirring inside me grow stronger. Something was awakening, pulled by Xander's scent, his touch.

The promise of what we'd almost—

"Training's over."

Then he was gone, leaving me gasping against the wall. Confused, aching, and burning with a heat that had nothing to do with exercise and everything to do with the way he'd kissed me.

Something inside me howled for him to come back.

Something that sounded suspiciously like a wolf.