This time, there’s no new emptiness. No new brokenness.
Yet there might be soon.
I haven’t washed. Haven’t changed clothes. Haven’t properly warned them.
Closed in my world of misery and mourning, I don’t register my words until they’ve already left my mouth. The entire world stands stagnant, shock stealing their motion.
His voice breaks the stunned silence.
“WHAT?! You’re contagious? Sick? Lethal? Why the hell weren’t those the first goddamn words out of your mouth?”
Another sharp motion, my mind supplying the visual even if my eyes refuse to focus. Dirk’s big boot connects with Jumoke’s shoulder, kicking the kneeling Alpha over. Jumoke hits the ground only to hop to his feet.
The potent growls filling the room scatter my hold on the corporeal world, my desire to protect the fragile memories hidden in my soul too important to relax for any portion of time.
Different voices break through the chaos, changing the atmosphere, reminding me the dangers of leaving my hollow frame defenseless.
Echoes of foreign sensation snap my awareness to my body, forcing my attention to widen to the punishing floor beneath me and the discordant noises jabbing my eardrums.
My arm hurts from his hand.
Shaking begins deep in my ribcage, panic growing. Fighting through layers of pain, I demand my eyes to work, taking in the situation I shouldn’t have ignored.
Jumoke stands with clenched fists and turbulent fire in his eyes, staring at the oldest Alpha. Other individuals peer through the doorway, but only myself, Vander, and Jumoke remain in the room.
No one moves. No one speaks.
Quakes vibrate my chest, my gasps signaling the onslaught of a terrifying break down.
One thought takes hold, my constant internal tribute supporting my frantic thought.
“Shower.”
Force air in.
“Now.”
Stilted breath out.
“Jumoke.”
Jagged in and out.
“Shower.”
Broken inhale.
“NOW!”
My throat hurts with the intensity of my shout. I don’t understand why he isn’t moving.
He must wash, right now.
A tear drips down my right temple, the warm wetness something I haven’t felt in over a decade. It’s so foreign I can’t process the magnitude of its significance.
When he bursts into movement, a measure of calm returns to me.
Maybe he’ll be okay.
He’s strong. There was a barrier.
Maybe he’ll be okay.
Chapter Four
Jumoke
Uncaring of the audience, I shuck the rest of my clothes off. Her words ring through my head, and in a moment of caution, I toss my pants into the trash chute before rushing to the shower stall.
Fuck, that single tear…
Smashing the button for the harshest cycle, I grit my teeth and suffer through a disinfectant spray. As tons of soap accost me, I scrub my hands with vigor, ignoring the stinging of my cuts, hoping to stem whatever made her cry.
Her formal façade from our first meeting hid too much. She hid too much.
Dammit, I don’t like this.
The terror and sorrow in that one tear threatens to rip my heart in two.
The pull to comfort her, to gather her in my arms and shelter her from the world…
Is that from the lifemating bond? Or from me?
I’ve been resentful of the lifemating concept ever since Seeck found Nova, even though I’ve never wanted to settle down. Each new development has compounded my frustration. With the issues piling up and creating a solid defense around my heart, I thought I was prepared to deny her.
Yet seeing her sprawled on the floor, accepting what must have been excruciating pain with such a stoic expression.
I hate this.
I want to save her from everything.
How the hell am I supposed to save her from herself?
Shit, just glimpsing the shape of her legs as she slid along the floor, her gown hiked above mid-thigh from her fall, had made my cock rock hard.
The sweet feminine scent revealed along with her shape had blasted through my skull, alighting every nerve in my body. I had almost lunged forward and ripped her stockings from her, desperate for a closer sniff.
Except her agony had tainted the air.
Was there something else as well? Something I’d missed?
When I’d first barged into her cell, I hadn’t noticed any smell of sickness, but then again, the entire facility smelled of misery and decay.
I sift through my memory of her scent from just now, the pleasure lingering in my nostrils.
Astringent disinfectant. An echo of surgical equipment—harsh metallic scents and potent medicines. Acrid fear. Bitter sadness.
Pushing those aside, I pinpoint the oddity. A foul, hungry thing, unnatural and rotten.
How had I missed it?
Duh, chaos.
I’d been too wrapped up in my own shit, too worried about the bigger picture to focus on something so abstract.
She’s telling the truth.
She’s sick.
Rage roars in my soul, the tiny flicker of hope I’d harbored of getting my own lifemate shredding to pieces.
Such shit.
This feels like a trap.
One I refuse to walk away from.
When the shower finally swaps to water, I scrub until every trace of soap is gone, not daring to open my eyes until I know it’s rinsed off my face. Watching the last of the suds swirl down the drain, I can’t help but relate to the foam.
It can’t stop being pulled by gravity, sucked down the drain to be eliminated.
My gravity?
The Omega with no sense of humor. The female too dangerous to touch. The woman I’ll never walk away from.
You’d think I’d learn from my teammate's mistakes, but here I am, in the thick of it, without knowing her name.
What a dunce.
I can see why this seems to be a pattern, though.
Even though she’s done nothing but lock me out and hide from me, I feel as though I know her. As though she’s the part of me I can’t breathe without.
The water shuts off. Hot air blasts across my skin, and I don’t hold back the profanities aimed at the cursed temperature.
The desert was cooler.
Did my hair scorch and burst into flames?
No?
Sure feels like it.
Shaking out my hands when the torturous dry cycle ends, I grumble and run my fingers through my hair, trying to smooth out the frizz.
My senses snap to alertness, feeling someone approaching. Through the tempered shower glass and residual
