Chosen To Be The Alpha's Surrogate

** Penelope **

I jolt awake, my heart pounding and my skin damp with sweat. The nightmare clings to me like cobwebs, the images fading but the terror still sharp and real. Beside me, Malachi stirs, his arm tightening around my waist as he pulls me instinctively closer.

*This is home now...when are they going to stop..?*

I thought that the nightmares would go away once I accepted that here, Malachi's estate, is my home too, but it seems that they're only getting worse. "Penny?” His voice is rough with sleep, but I canh hear the concern threading through it. "What's wrong, sweetheart?"

I take a shuddering breath, pressing my face into the solid warmth of his chest. His scent envelops me, woodsy and masculine, and I almost instantly feel my racing pulse begin to calm. "Just a bad dream," I whisper, my hands resting on his soft skin. "I'm sorry I woke you."

A low, soothing sound emits from the back of his throat as his hand comes up to stroke my hair. "Don't apologize. I'm here for you, always." He presses a kiss to the top of my head, his lips lingering. "Do you want to talk about it?" I hesitate, the old instincts to keep my pain locked away rising up. But this is Malachi, my mate, the other half of my soul.

*If I can't trust him with the darkest parts in my mind, then who can I trust?*

"It was about the orphanage," I say softly, my voice barely above a whisper. "About the night I arrived there."

I feel him still beneath me, his breath catching in his throat. "You've never really talked about that time in your life," he murmurs, his fingers gently combing through my sleep-tangled hair. "About what it was like for you, before." I swallow hard, the old grief and loneliness welling up like a tide. "I don't like to think about it," I confess, my voice wavering. "It stings, even after all these years."

It's as though I can feel his sympathy radiating off his body in waves, his arms tightening around me. "I can't even imagine. Losing your parents so young, being sent away to a strange place... It must have been terrifying."

A lump rises in my throat, tears stinging my eyes. "I was so little," I whisper, the memories playing out behind my closed lids like an old, grainy film. "Just barely five-years-old. Old enough to know something was wrong, that my life was changing in ways I couldn't understand. But too young to really process it or make sense of the grief and fear."

Malachi is quiet for a long moment, his hand still stroking my hair in gentle, rhythmic motions. "Do you remember anything about your life before?" he asks softly. "About your parents, your childhood home?"

I shake my head, a pair of hot tears escaping my eyes. "Not really. It's all so hazy, like a half-remembered dream. I have snippets, like fleeting impressions. The smell of my mother's perfume, the sound of my father's laugh. But their faces..." My voice cracks, the grief a sharp ache in my chest. "I can barely picture them anymore. It's like they're fading away, piece by piece, and I'm powerless to stop it."

"Oh, Penny..." I can hear the pain in Malachi's voice, his arms banding around me like steel. "I'm so sorry, sweetheart. I wish there was something I could do."

I burrow closer, breathing him in, letting his strength and love wrap around me. "Just hold me," I whisper, my voice small and lost in the darkness of the room. "You make me feel so safe and loved. I...I don't feel alone anymore." "You'll never be alone again, Penelope," he vows fiercely, his lips brushing my temple. "I swear it."

I believe him. With unwavering conviction, I have faith in him.

*I love him so much... I just want...*

I don't need the light to guide me, my lips instinctively finding his. I kiss him softly, savoring the tenderness of his lips.

In the next moment, he rolls me beneath him, his body blanketing mine, his touch chasing away the chill of old sorrow. I wind my arms around his neck, pulling him closer, needing to feel him, *all* of him, skin to skin and heart to heart.

"Let me love you," he rasps, his voice rough with emotion. "Let me show you how cherished you are."

I nod, unable to speak past the lump in my throat, and I surrender myself to his hands, his mouth, his worship.

He's patient, taking his time as he maps my body with reverent touches, as if he's memorizing every curve and hollow, every secret place that makes me gasp and tremble. His lips trail wet kisses down my body, planting loving ones on my belly until he's settled between my thighs.

His breath feels hot against the sensitive flesh of my folds, and it's as though there's a fog in my mind, my body aching with need, my hips lifting in silent a plea.

A shaky breath parts my lips as I cling onto anticipation, and before I can utter a sound, his mouth is on me. I'm lost, drowning in bliss as he licks and sucks and nibbles, his fingers finding my entrance and joining the delicious torment until I'm writhing beneath him, my hands fisted in his hair and my voice a broken litany of his name.

His fingers curl inside me, massaging the perfect, dangerous spot as his mouth makes love to my sensitive, swollen clit. He brings me to the edge again and again, backing off just before I shatter until I'm mindless with need, my body burning and my soul laid bare.

"Please..." I cry breathlessly. "Please, don't stop..."

I can practically feel him smirking against me, and once he's had his fill of toying with me, of making me beg, he lets me fall, his fingers buried deep, his tongue flicking over that bundle of nerves, wringing out my pleasure until I'm boneless and spent, drifting in a haze of bliss.

*I want more... I want him.*

He kisses his way back up my body, his lips praising every inch of my skin, each freckle, scar, and curve. When he finally settles over me, the hard length of him nestling against my slick folds, I'm more than ready, aching to be filled. "Please," I breathe, my nails digging into the flexing muscles of his back. "I need you, Malachi. I need to feel you inside me."

He groans, a sound of pure masculine satisfaction, and he pushes into me, inch by inch, until he's seated to the hilt, stretching me, completing me in the most primal way.

"Fuck, Penny," he grits out, his forehead falling to rest against mine. "You feel so good... Like you were made for me, just for me."

I arch into him, gasping as the change in angle sends sparks of pleasure skittering down my spine. "I'm yours," I manage, my voice thready and desperate. "Always and only yours."

Something fierce and possessive flares in his eyes, a flickering, silver blue glow piercing the darkness of the room. With an animalistic purr, he thrusts in and out of me, deep and deliberate, stroking the fire in my veins to an inferno. He hitches my leg higher, around his waist and the next stroke hits a hidden spot inside me, making me cry out, my head tipping back and my body bowing into him.

"That's it, sweetheart," he urges, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that shoots straight to my core. "Take what you need. Milk me dry. I want to feel you come apart on my

cock."

His words shred the last of my control, and I'm soaring, my orgasm crashing over me like a tidal wave. I dimly hear him curse, feel his rhythm falter and then turn erratic as my walls clench around him, pulling him deeper, harder. "Fuck, I can't... I'm going to..."

He buries his face in my neck, muffing his shout as he pulses inside me, his seed flooding me in long, fierce spurts. The sensation sends me spirling into another peak, my every nerve firing with ecstasy as the bond between us flares incandescent, the mate mark on my neck throbbing in sweet, perfect time.

In this moment, I swear I can feel him in my very soul, our hearts beating in sync, our breaths mingling as we tremble in the aftermath. It's a communion of body and spirit, a merging so profound it steals the air from my lungs and the strength from my limbs.

Slowly, reluctantly, he lifts his head, his expression soft, his eyes flickering to a dim as his gaze finds mine. "I love you," he murmurs, brushing a tender kiss to my lips. "More than my own life, more than anything in this world or the next. You're everything to me, Penelope."

Tears blur my vision, my heart so full it aches. "I love you too," I whisper, cupping his face in my palms. "With all that I am, all that I ever will be. You're my heart, Malachi. My home."

Softly, reverently, he kisses me once more. He kisses me and in this moment, it's as though we're eternal.