“Zheng’s been dealing with … things.”
She raises a brow. “Yeah. His mom just died.”
I shake my head. “More than that. I can’t tell you the how or why. I shouldn’t be telling you any of this so don’t repeat it, not even to Rafe. Okay?”
She nods, worry crossing over her face.
“Zheng has PTSD.”
She opens her mouth to ask a question, but I raise my hand to stop her. “Like I said. I can’t tell you the why or the how. That’s his story to tell when he’s ready, but it’s been getting worse and I’m genuinely concerned he could go rogue.” She sucks in a harsh breath. “He wasn’t handling it well before his mom died and now, well, it’s not going to get any better. He’s just ignoring one problem in place of the other, and eventually the other shoe is going to drop. He doesn’t sleep enough, which makes his beast restless and irritable. He gets these night terrors where he wakes up panicked and drenched in sweat. There’ve been nights he’s shifted and mistakenly attacked furniture, or hell, even me. And loud noises can set him off. Almost like a panic attack where he feels like the walls are closing in.”
“Has he talked to anyone?”
I shake my head. “He won’t see one of the Pack therapists or healers. I’ve tried, but he refuses. I just… you need to know what to look out for because he’s getting worse, not better.”
She nods. “Okay. What do I need to know?”
Fuck. Where did I even begin? “He needs to be in a relaxed environment as much as possible. No parties. No loud, sudden noises. He tries to push it. He thinks if he exposes himself to the shit that sets him off that it’ll desensitize him to it, but that doesn’t work. Video games with shooters can be a trigger. The smell of smoke. If he doesn’t sleep for more than three days he’s got pills he’s supposed to take to help with that. They knock him out, but he wakes up feeling hungover so he doesn’t like taking them, but if he’s not sleeping he has to. It gets worse when he doesn’t.”
She nods. “Okay. I can look out for that.”
I take a breath and tell her the last thing. “If you startle him, he can lash out. Physically. He pulls himself back once he recognizes you, but he’s landed a punch a time or two. For me, that’s not a problem. With you or another chick, it will be. Don’t surprise him. If you walk in a room and he’s spacing out, call his name. Don’t touch him until he acknowledges you. And if he shifts, do not fucking run. He will give chase. Right now his tiger is fighting for dominance, so he needs to stay in his human skin as much as possible, but if he happens to shift and it isn’t intentional, know that the beast is in the driver’s seat. Don’t provoke his instincts. Got it?”
“Yeah. I got it.”
“Good. I’m gonna make a few calls and get that flight sorted out. Let me know if shit changes with him or if you need me for anything else.”
She nods and I go to my room to make the call. My parents will kill me for this. Not because they give a shit if I use the jet, but because we had an agreement I wouldn’t use Pierce assets unless I was willing to be an active member of the family—which I’m not—but it’ll take them a while to notice, and what they don’t know won’t hurt them. It’ll just bite me in the ass later.
99
Meiying
He isn’t wearing a shirt. I don’t know why I’m hung up on that, especially when I’ve seen him shirtless before a shift over a dozen times, but there he is, standing in the kitchen barefoot, wearing gray sweatpants without a shirt on.
I somehow manage to step farther into the room. He’s at the stove, spatula in hand, and he’s making … I peer around him … pancakes. Desmond is making pancakes. What twilight zone did I just walk out of? Shifters like meat on top of meat on top of more meat for breakfast, so the fact that he’s making what I can only categorize as comfort food is … well … unsettling.
“You’re up,” he says without turning around.
I clear my throat. “Yeah.”
“Have a seat. I’m almost done.”
I nod, not that he sees it, and take a seat at the kitchen island, watching the muscles in his back flex as he moves around the kitchen, grabbing syrup and peanut butter before plating the pancakes and setting everything down in front of me. The pancakes are for me? And he somehow knows I like mine slathered with peanut butter before drenching them in syrup. How? And better yet, why?
“You hungry?”
I shake my head.
“When’s the last time you ate?”
I think about it, but I don’t really remember. “How long has it been since …” I can’t say it, but he knows what I mean right away and curses softly under his breath.
“You need to eat. I brought food to your room. Why didn’t you eat any of it?”
“I’m not hungry.”
“I don’t care.” He tosses two pancakes onto a new plate, spreads peanut butter on both and then drizzles them with syrup before sliding it across the counter to me. “Eat.”
