Chapter 126: My own...

Maria.

I was really fed up with his attitude.

What the hell was wrong with the quadruplet? 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

Why did he think he had the right to dictate who I could kiss and who I couldn’t?

The arrogance in his tone, the certainty in his commands, it made my blood boil. One minute he was accusing me of going around kissing other Alphas, the next he was demanding I share his bed as if I were some possession to summon at will.

Sleep on the same bed with him?

Someone who could easily accuse me of anything at any moment?

The irony almost made me laugh.

Who knows what story would spread if someone saw me leaving his room at dawn? Who would they believe? The Alpha—or the girl already accused once before?

The thought alone made my stomach twist.

And as if trying to buttress his point—prove his dominance—he leaned in again without warning, stealing my breath away.

His lips crashed against mine, forceful and uninvited.

I tried pulling away, pushing at his chest, but he held onto me firmly. His fingers tightened around my arms, anchoring me in place as though my resistance meant nothing.

My heart pounded wildly, anger and something far more dangerous tangling together inside me.

And my traitorous body....It responded.

The warmth of him, the strength in his grip, the familiarity of his scent wrapping around me.

I hated it.

I hated how I felt toward them.

All of them.

The pull I didn’t ask for.

The bond I hadn’t even confirmed.

As far as I was concerned, I hadn’t agreed to anything. I hadn’t accepted them as mates. What if they had been lying all along? What if this so-called bond was nothing more than a strategy to keep me bound to them?

To control me?

The thought made my chest tighten.

But it wasn’t just the kiss that angered me.

It was his words.

"Tell me," he demanded after pulling back slightly, his voice rough with restrained fury. "What did Noah really give you?"

His eyes searched mine desperately, almost frantically.

What did Noah give me?

The answer came instantly.

Love.

Respect.

Consideration.

Noah cared for me. He valued my feelings so much that he apologized for stealing a kiss. He pulled away because he didn’t want to hurt me. He didn’t bark commands or claim ownership over my body.

He asked.

He waited.

He chose me.

But Adrien?

He couldn’t give me that.

"Is it his body?" he asked, bitterness dripping from his voice.

For a moment, I couldn’t even process the insult.

His body?

Was he serious?

Was that truly how he saw me?

As someone swayed by flesh alone?

As someone so shallow that I would choose between them based on whose body felt better?

Anger consumed me whole.

It surged through my veins like wildfire, burning away the last traces of confusion or softness.

"Answer me!" he yelled, his hands gripping my shoulders as he shook me.

My head moved slightly from the force, but my eyes remained wide.

Shocked.

Not because I was afraid.

But because I couldn’t believe this was him.

This was the Alpha who claimed I belonged to him.

The one who insisted I share his bed.

The one who accused me of kissing other Alphas.

"Fine," he spat when I didn’t respond immediately. "It seems it is his body, right? Alright then, I will give you mine."

What?

The word repeated itself in my mind, echoing louder with every passing second, like a hammer pounding against the walls of my skull. His words, the command, the tone, the intensity, felt like a slap across my chest. It wasn’t just a slap of indignation; it was the kind of shock that sent your whole body reeling, leaving your stomach hollow and your thoughts scattered like leaves in a storm.

He was offering himself like some kind of bargain. As if my heart could be won in some twisted competition of flesh, as though loyalty and love could be bartered for with nothing but desire and domination. The audacity, the raw, unsettling confidence, it left me reeling.

I stared at him, eyes wide, disbelief settling heavily across my features. My mind tried to process what I had just heard, what I had just felt in the seconds since he had spoken, but it faltered under the weight of reality.

Was that really what this had come to?

A contest?

A claim?

A transaction?

Because it certainly felt like it. His words, his stance, his fire, it was all about possession, about a challenge to stake his claim.

He stood there, his chest rising and falling as he breathed hard, and I could see the raw emotion in his eyes. They weren’t soft. They weren’t warm. They weren’t filled with understanding or care. They were alight with something dangerous, something jagged: wounded pride, jealousy, hunger. His gaze was unyielding, fierce, and unrelenting, like he could burn right through me if I dared to blink.

And in that moment, the difference between him and Noah became painfully, achingly clear.

Noah had always been gentle, careful, aware of my boundaries, even when it came to our fleeting, stolen moments. He had asked, he had waited, he had shown me love in ways that required patience, trust, and respect.

Adrien? Adrien wanted to take. He wanted to claim. He wanted to bend reality to his will and make me part of it, whether I wanted to or not. His approach was raw, primal, demanding, and it terrified me, terrified me not because I didn’t feel something stirring within me, but because I could see how easily he could consume me without pause, without thought.

Then he spoke again, his voice low, demanding, full of that same tension that made my body quake even as my mind screamed at me to resist.

"Undress me, Maria," he commanded.

The words were a physical blow. They slammed into my chest, knocking the air out of my lungs and leaving a cold panic in their wake. My mind spun. My heart pounded. My pulse raced as if my veins were pumping fire instead of blood.

I still hadn’t processed anything, and already he was asking me to undress him.

I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I would never bring myself so low, not like this. Not under these circumstances, not when my thoughts were still tangled in anger, shock, and confusion.

"What—don’t you want to?" His voice sharpened, and suddenly he was close again, grabbing my hands, placing them against the fabric of his shorts with an audacity that made my stomach twist and my knees threaten to buckle. "Pull it! That’s what you want, right? Why hesitate now?"

His words, his presence, his confidence, it all made no sense. It made no sense that someone could be so demanding, so possessive, yet somehow so tantalizing, so utterly magnetic. I didn’t understand what had come over him, why he thought I would obey, why he assumed my body would follow the desires of his words.

I opened my mouth, trying to find some rational response, some way to deflect, to stop him from crossing a line I wasn’t willing to cross.

"Alpha Adrien... can you just..." I began, voice shaking as I tried to steady my racing heart.

But before I could finish, he leaned in, and once again, stole my breath with a kiss.

A kiss that demanded my attention. A kiss that refused to give me a moment to think. A kiss that wrapped around me, locking me in his presence, forcing my senses to abandon logic and surrender, if only for a fleeting second.

I froze, overwhelmed. My body betrayed me, responding despite every fiber of my mind screaming resistance. The warmth of his lips against mine was electric, invasive, pulling every ounce of control from my body. I could feel the tension in his hands, the heat radiating from him, and even as panic rose in my chest, a small, involuntary shiver ran down my spine.

The audacity, the possessiveness, the sheer force of his will, it was intoxicating. Dangerous. Infuriating. Yet I couldn’t pull myself away, not entirely.

And in that moment, my mind raced. Questions collided with feelings I didn’t dare to admit aloud: Why does he act like this? Why do I feel...something despite myself? Why does my pulse betray me even as my instincts scream to resist?

His lips pressed harder, demanding, claiming, and I realized with a jolt that no matter how much I wanted to resist, I was caught. Trapped in the storm of him, of his power, of his unrelenting presence.

And still, even as my body responded, even as I shivered against him, even as my mind tried to cling to reason, a part of me recoiled. A part of me refused to surrender fully.

Because I wouldn’t give him all of me, not yet.

Not when so much of this, everything, felt like a test.

Not when I wasn’t sure where his desires ended and where his respect for me began.

I gasped softly as he finally pulled back slightly, his lips hovering close to mine, his eyes burning into mine, waiting for compliance, waiting for submission, waiting for me to obey.

I took a shallow breath, trying to regain control of the whirlwind he’d unleashed in me, silently vowing that while my body might betray me, my mind would remain my own.