Blood Bonds (The Bonds That Tie, #3)

by J. Bree

“I think our bonds want to meet, but I’m not letting them have this before we do. You deserve to fuck each of your Bonds yourself before your bond takes her turn.”

I want desperate and raw. I want to know that they’ve been craving me just as badly as I’ve needed them. I want to know that the great councilman North Draven has been dreaming of what my pussy would feel like and that having it now is everything he’s ever wanted. I want to be the center of his fucking world, the only thing that matters to him.

My own bond reaches out to touch his, but not the same rough claiming it had done with Gryphon. It feels more like two halves of a soul coming together again.

Like my bond has known about him forever and been waiting to feel whole again. Like the shadows have gone feral waiting for me and now that we’re together again, maybe the storm in North’s heart will calm. I hope he can finally have some peace.

He leans down to press our foreheads together, and then his voice sounds in my head. I have been waiting ...

I waited for you too. I waited for all of you.

North turns to lie down on the sheets next to me, not caring at all that they’re a bit gross now. “You won’t. Stop thinking about it. If there’s anything that I’m sure about, Oleander, it’s that you’re not going to hurt anyone. You’re not a monster.”

“Anything you want, Bonded. You should enjoy having me at your disposal while it lasts.”

“You really want to lug me around all over again? Because my legs are out of action and not because of the healing.”

He smirks at me and scoops me up without another word.

If you need me, I’ll break down this door to come find you. I’ve been toeing the line because I didn’t want to start an argument and put you in the middle of it but, baby, if you need me, I’m coming to find you.

It’s okay. I’ve mostly been sleeping. I’ll come find you when I’m awake properly again… if I can get back out of your head, that is.

Well, while you’re here, I guess I better finish what I started, Sweetness.

She sends through a feeling of fake outrage that has me roaring with laughter like a crazy man, but then she moves my hand, stroking my dick for me, and the mechanics of it don’t mean a fucking thing. I don’t care that it’s ...

Don’t you dare make me come so fast and shame...

Her answering giggle is fucking perfection, and I want to lock the memo...

I don’t like to be kept waiting, Bond. If you want to show me how good you can...

The moment the lust clears, I can feel her hesitance and awkwardness creep in. She’s here, in the possible traitor's head, while no one else in the house knows it. I leap to reassure her. You can see everything here. Whatever you need to believe me, take it.

There is nothing in my life that I want to keep from you. There’s a lot of ugly, a lot of bad shit, and shit I’m ashamed of. But I would never hide it from you, not even if I thought you might think less of me. I’d rather you hate those parts of me and never doubt what I’m saying, than for us to live with this thing between us. Not having you and your trust isn’t an option for me, Bond. It’s not an option.

Once I’m settled, it’s clear that Oli has something she wants to say, but she stays quiet throughout the movie. I don’t want to fall asleep and miss out on her being here, but there’s something so comforting about her presence that the fatigue of countless shitty sleepless nights slowly creeps up on me.

Right before I pass out, she finally speaks. I don’t want to look. I want you to tell me yourself. I want to hear it from you.

but there’s an oddly temperature-less weight against my back. It takes me a second to realize that Brutus is back in the bed with me.

Which means that North is both awake and no longer in here with me because last night he’d been very firm on the ’no puppies in the bed’ rule, no matter how hard I’d pushed it.

There’s a rustling sound next to me and then Gryphon murmurs into my ear, “Stop frowning, Bonded. It makes me want to murder something for you.”

I squint one eye open in his direction. “What time is it, and do you have food?”

I clutch at the duvet like some scandalized maiden, only to realize that I’m once again wearing silky pinstripe pajamas. North Draven is a sneaky asshole who takes the weirdest liberties while I’m passed out.

and eye Gabe from across the room. He’s wearing a sweater that I want to steal, and when he glances up at me and notices me staring, he grins back at me.

“Fine. But you can’t keep me trapped up here forever. Once I’m back to full health, I’ll get bored and become a nightmare.”

Nox scoffs as he heads for the door. “You’re already there, Poison.”

Gabe falls asleep on me and we spend most of the afternoon napping with Brutus between us, after he’d slowly inched Gabe away from me and taken his place.

“Thirty-three people were taken. Thirty-three came home. Only one was injured, and the reports said that thanks to Nox’s creature protecting Kyrie and shutting down the showers, only one woman was assaulted in that time. That has never happened before, Oleander. You’re the farthest thing from a liability.”

It finally occurs to me that I don’t know how to do relationships. I barely know how to function as a Central Bond, and having both of my Bonded, very alpha men here together is literally overwhelming for my poor brain.

“I deserve it. I told your bond I’d regain your trust, and now I’m saying it to you too. I’m under no illusions that Bonding with you was a magic cure, it’ll take some time for me to prove myself to you.

“He’s feeling guilty because it was the first time he had to think about the choice between his family and his Bonded. If he had to choose between saving the two of you… He’s never had to think about it before and, like most men in his position, he always assumed he’d be able to stop there ever being a choice. You running after Kyrie made him aware that he’d rather you be safe here. That wasn’t such a terrible thing until she told him about Brutus saving her in the showers. If you weren’t there, she would have been assaulted.”

It strikes me somewhere in the back of my mind that I’ll have to think about later, that this feels different than when my bond was with North’s.

I should not enjoy the feel of North’s eyes on my body this much, watching everything that Gryphon is doing, but when our eyes collide, a whimper tumbles out of my lips at the flare of heat I find there. He’s enjoying the show we’re putting on for him, not an ounce of jealousy in him, but a need that’s building up instead. A need to have me under him as well.

Gryphon moves us both, just enough that he can look at the expression on my face, and his eyes twinkle as he grins. “You wanna be watched? You want him seeing you come all over my cock, gushing down my legs and screaming my name, baby? I thought I was pushing your boundaries here, but you need it… Don’t you, Bonded?”

North’s bond strokes my hair away from my face, his fingers gentle until he grabs a fistful and tugs my head back to look up at him. The black voids of his eyes are addictive to stare into, so easy to get lost in the depths of them, and my pussy clenches around Gryphon instinctively.

I want to come again. I want to take him down my throat and taste him; I want to swallow every last drop of his cum and—

“If you don’t fuck her throat right now, she’s going to come without you just thinking about it, so hurry th...

“Dogs do not belong on the bed, even ones made out of shadows,” Gryphon grumbles, and I scoff at him.

I speak in my puppy-love voice as I reply, “And for that, August can sleep on your side and you can cuddle with him instead of me. You love cuddles, don’t you, baby? Yes, you do. Let’s get your brother out too, let him have some snugs too.”

When I lift Brutus out of my hair, he doesn’t snap or fight with August for my attention, both of them now very secure in my love because they kn...

Neither North or Gryphon argue about me having the creatures wrapped around my legs, and August even rests his head against North’s thigh in the most affectionate gesture I’ve ever seen between the two of them.

Maybe I can fix whatever issue North has with his creatures.

“Well then, teach me how to stop mind yelling at you. I should be allowed a little privacy, right?”

“I would say yes, but I just found out you’ve somehow managed to astral project and weren’t going to tell me, so maybe we’ll keep you like this until you learn to trust me a little more.”

Gryphon glances towards the bathroom door and then murmurs back to me quietly, “If you have any control over the ability at all, don’t ever try it with Nox. If you never listen to another word I say, Bonded, just listen to this; stay out of Nox Draven’s head.”

I struggle to sit up, careful not to disturb August from where he’s lying on his back with his paws in the air and snuffling in his sleep. Brutus is tucked into his side and even though he’s awake, he’s not moving or disturbing his brother. It’s very sweet, and I fish around under my pillow until I can grab my phone and attempt to take a photo of them both. The photo comes out black.

Home, for me, is always going to be wherever Oli is.