She nodded. “That’s… a good idea.” She was fading. I could see it. Waves of pain becoming her whole world as she fought off the agony of a heat I knew she’d already put off so many times.
It meant she didn’t clock the weakness of the excuse.
When I let her go, she all but collapsed, and I had to help her to the metal floor, where she hugged her knees to her chest, tearsfinally glittering in eyes that were becoming more blank by the second.
“I’m going to keep you safe, Little Firefly,” I whispered. “That’s my job.”
When I got to my feet, I had to pull my wrist from her rigid grip, but I don’t know if she’d heard those words.
It was better if she didn’t. Better she didn’t hear the shake in them—the doubt at what I was about to do.
When I stepped out of the rut box, I turned back around. Crescent was curled up, shivering.
Myperfectomega.
I loved her so fucking much. More than I’d known I was capable of.
So it was the hardest thing I’d ever done, closing my fist around the door handle.
I never should have hesitated. I never should have given her a chance to look up. I’d locked my end of the bond down, but maybe I slipped in the moment.
Piercing, glittering, golden eyes met mine for just a moment, before I knew if I didn’t do it right now, I’d be too late.
Her lips parted in shock, terror hitting her expression like a bolt of lightning. We were suspended for a moment as her sweet roses and cacao scent turned bitter, her pupils shaking back and forth rapidly. Then she let out a whine of fear, scrambling toward me?—
Slam!
My heart broke and my breath caught as the huge metal door crashed closed on her. I almost undid it that second, panic crashing into me as she lost control of her end of the bond, too.
Her terror tried to drown me, but I kept the door shut. She was so small, and these rut boxes were designed for huge alphas with auras. It was strangely eerie in the room alone.
I hated this place.
I hated what it forced me to become.
She was mine, and I should be able to take care of her. And instead, this was what I was forced to do.
I shut the window that showed into the rut box. She wasn’t tall enough to look through it, but I couldn’t risk it.
With ears ringing, I searched the room quickly, but Finnian carried his knife around with him, and I had no luck finding spare weapons.
Unsuccessful, I sank down onto the bed we’d been on together and waited.
My hands were shaking, which was good.
I needed to burn through my scent blockers—and so many hours had passed, I might have already. There was only a trace of her scent in this room from opening the rut box for a moment, so mine might drown it out.
I stared numbly at the door as the seconds ticked by.
One day she’d forgive me. I knew she’d hate me if I was wrong—for locking her in alone when our pack was just minutes away.
I wouldn’t risk it, though.
The truth was, my instincts had never been wrong before, even when I doubted them.
And as the door to the cell creaked open, the lock unlatching for our last day in Anarchy, my heart sank.
Today wasn’t the day that streak was broken.
