That put Morgan on high alert, and he stared hard at the young
man’s face, searching for any signs of distress.
Mated to the Wild Omega 21
Then, with a slight groan and a twitch in his body, Morgan’s
mystery mate opened his eyes and looked right at him.
22 Marcy Jacks
Chapter Three
He had green eyes with flecks of light brown closer to the irises. It reminded Morgan of earth colors. He liked it. He would probably like everything about this man.
It took him a couple of seconds to note how they were still staring at each other, neither speaking, and how cloudy those earth-colored
eyes were.
Morgan reached out his hand to push some of that golden hair out of his eyes when the other man flinched away.
Morgan pulled his hand back quickly. Right. The poor kid was freezing and naked in a bathtub with a complete stranger kneeling next to him. That was definitely the opening to a horror story somewhere.
Morgan cleared his throat. “My name is Morgan Dane. A friend and I found you just along the river. Your body was half in that freezing water. We brought you here to warm up.”
The kid still didn’t say anything. He just looked at Morgan with those glazed eyes, as though he were hypnotized by something.
“Can you understand me?” Morgan asked. He didn’t ask it slowly, since he didn’t think there was anything mentally wrong with the guy, but he didn’t exactly speak at the normal speed he otherwise would have used. “Did you come from Phillip’s pack?”
Again, he just stared and blinked. Yeah, he was definitely a wild wolf. The only question was, how wild was he?
“Can you speak?” Morgan asked.
The boy swallowed then wet his lips. “I…” His voice came out cracked and raspy, and he had to try again. “No one’s spoken to
Mated to the Wild Omega 23
me…in a long time,” he finally said.
This was good. It meant that he wasn’t so far gone to the wild side that he couldn’t be brought back to the land of almost civilization along with the rest of the werewolves who lived on DeWitt’s pack.
“Did you understand everything I just told you?” Morgan asked.
Another swallow that looked pained, and then a nod.
“What were you doing in the water?” Morgan had to ask.
“Fish,” the boy replied simply.
Morgan looked back down at that sunken stomach. Oh. Right.
“I’ll make sure you get something to eat, but right now I’m going to fill the tub back up with water.”
The kid panicked and tried to get out of the tub, but there were still traces of soap from when Morgan had washed him, and he did little else but slip and slide around awkwardly.
“Warm water. Warm water,” Morgan assured him, keeping one hand on the young man’s chest, holding him down, while he turned the water taps back on with the other.
“No more!” the kid yelled.
Morgan would have liked nothing better than to give in to the shout that was half-demanding and half-pleading, but he couldn’t. The were’s temperature was still low, he was back to shivering and shaking, and he was still dirty.
He needed to warm up and get clean.
“Not the water! I hate it!”
“You’ll be okay. I won’t let it hurt you,” Morgan said.
The kid thrashed harder when the water poured from the spout, but then, thankfully, he started to relax when it touched down on his feet, and he realized that the water was indeed warm on his toes and
legs.
He relaxed, his entire body practically melting as the water filled the tub. His eyes began to sink shut again. He looked like he was being tucked in with a warm blanket in a soft bed, not like he was sitting in a stranger’s bathtub.
24 Marcy Jacks
Morgan started cleaning him again, showing those half-open eyes the soap and washcloth and, this time, asking permission to use them.
He nodded and let Morgan do pretty much whatever he wanted with him.
It looked like he was about to fall asleep, and Morgan really wanted a name to put with the face, so before he could drift off, he had to ask him.
“What’s your name?”
Morgan shook his shoulder gently when he didn’t answer.
The kid blinked owlishly at him. “Hmm?”
“Your name? Tell me your name?” Maybe that would help him to figure out where he came from. He was going to have to ask Nick if he recognized the guy’s scent.
The kid thought about it for so long it made Morgan’s heart bleed a little for him, but then he finally came up with an answer. “Terry.”
“Okay, good, that’s very nice,” Morgan said, meaning it. He liked the name Terry. It kind of suited him. “Do you have a surname? What’s your last name?”
Terry thought about it again, this time for much longer than he had when asked for his first name.
Finally, he released a breath. “Don’t know.”
Now Morgan’s heart really did bleed for him.
“How old are you? Can you tell me that?”
Again with the thinking, then Terry lifted both of his hands out of the water. He held up a few fingers on one hand and a couple on the other, which, unless Terry just lost the ability to speak or something, meant absolutely nothing to Morgan.
“We’ll work on that one later.”
“Someone’s outside,” Terry said, his eyes suddenly going wide. His hands gripped the tub, as though he was going to try and get out. His head turning this way and that as he searched for the exit. “They’re coming!”
“Relax! Relax!” Morgan said, grabbing him by the shoulders, but
Mated to the Wild Omega 25
it seemed to only freak out the younger man all the more. Maybe it was the way Morgan was trying to get him to sit back down in the tub. He probably thought that Morgan was trying
