Heath started to lead me after Knox and the nurse, but at the first step, my injured feet screamed a protest at me. Heath flinched in sympathetic reaction, then promptly scooped me up in his arms and carried me.
I wanted to hate it... to resent this bad-tempered alpha who’d never asked to be mated to me. Instead, I curled into him and pressed my nose to his neck, breathing in the scent of aged oak barrels even though the dust on his clothes made me sneeze.
In a shockingly short time, we were taken to a large room with two futuristic-looking medical beds, a scattering of chairs, and one large, normal bed that looked like something you mightfind in a hotel room. The harried nurse dropped off a load of first aid supplies and then made a quick exit.
“Get cleaned up, you two,” Knox said. “I’m going to get a proper update on Gage and Tony, even if I have to extract it with a pair of pliers.”
He limped out again, the door swinging silently shut behind him.
Alone with me, Heath cleared his throat awkwardly. It sounded like he had gravel stuck in there. I could relate.
“There’s a bathroom with a shower,” he said. “Do you want me to look at your feet first, or...”
I shook my head. He carefully set me down.
“What you did back there in the hotel,” he went on. “It was...”
“Reckless?” I offered in a small voice.
“Awe-inspiring,” he said. “You saved them, Jez. If not for you, Gage and Tony would be dead.”
“I can’t feel Gage,” I blurted out, my voice breaking on his name. “Like,at all.”
Big hands framed my face, the familiar buzz of warmth spreading outward from the contact.
“Sweetheart,” he said. “He’s yourscent match. If he were dead, you wouldn’t be able to feel anything else except the pain of the broken bond. He’s just unconscious. Probably because they anesthetized him for surgery.”
I gave a reluctant nod. “Okay.” Now that the panic had abated a bit, something else was bothering me, though. “How did you and Knox find me? It’s a big hospital.”
Heath’s green eyes slid away from mine for a moment.
“I couldn’t feel where Gage was, like you could,” he said. “But it turns out, when I’m not blocking out the bond, I can trackyou.”
I thought about that for a few moments. “Is it... because of the scent match? You said earlier that bonds aren’t supposed to work like that.”
“I think it must be,” Heath said, with a helpless shrug. “Right now, let’s just be grateful for it, whatever the cause.”
I hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah.”
He let out a slow breath. “Go wash off the dust. You’ll feel better. There are hospital gowns with the first aid stuff. When you’re done, I’ll bandage your hands and feet.”
I poked at the empty blankness where Gage was supposed to be.
“We can both shower. It’ll be quicker.” The words were out before I could stop them.
I felt Heath’s thoughts stumble to an abrupt halt.
“Please,” I forged on. “I don’t want to be alone.”
There was no room for misunderstanding through the mental link. He knew I wasn’t talking about sex, or anything like that. I meant exactly what I said—I wasn’t sure I could hold onto my sanity if I was left alone with Gage’s emptiness. As strange as it felt to even think it, Heath was all I had left right now.
After a beat of complete stillness, a faint shudder went through him.
“All right.” He gently took my shoulder and turned me toward the bathroom door. “Come on. Let’s be quick. Knox’ll be back with news on the others before long.”
