“What happened to your shirt?” I ask, my heartbeat racing as I gasp out a sob. It’s as if my nervous system is screaming along with my soul.
“I tore it off to provide pressure on Lore’s wound,” Wilder says simply. “We didn’t have a lot of options. Lean against my skin, Marie. You’re freezing.”
The unspoken words that he’s very warm ring loudly in my ears as I shift so I can feel his skin against my body. My chest heaves with exertion, as I try to get my lungs to relax for long enough to allow more oxygen into them. However, it appears my stubbornness is ingrained much deeper than I thought possible.
“We’re here,” Storm murmurs, cutting the engine. “Let’s get inside before people think we’re kidnapping you, Marie.”
The very thought is vaguely amusing, and I can feel Wilder’s lips curve up slightly as he presses them against my temple. He pushes open the back door, carrying me effortlessly as he steps out. Storm comes around the vehicle and shuts the door behind us, and then they’re moving quickly inside the brownstone. It still feels as cozy as ever inside, which makes me sob harder.
This is wrong. The world should be screaming and in pain right along with us, yet few people will know who Lore is because that’s how he wanted it.
“Why am I so sad?” I ask, starting to hyperventilate as I panic. “This is what it’s like to have Stockholm syndrome, isn’t it?”
“If it makes you feel better, sure,” Wilder says, walking up the stairs to the giant bed in what I think of as the pack bedroom. I haven’t slept inside it before, and the house is still in the beginning stages of becoming a home.
Laying me down on the mattress, he and Storm pull off my shoes and clothes, and then a large sweatshirt is thrown over my body. Ignoring them for a moment, I lift the material to my nose and scream.
Leather and raspberries will never smell the same to me again. The sound is dark and guttural, and one I’ve never made before. It speaks of the frustration I’ve never given life to, the lack of time I’ve had with these alphas because they left me behind the first time they met me, and the lost experiences I’ll never have with Lore.
Right now, it doesn’t matter how much I hated them for taking my choices away from me. The storm of emotions is tossing me around, and all I can do is curl into a ball, wrapped in Lore’s scent and cry.
“Fuck, I shouldn’t have said that,” Wilder mutters, pulling off his clothes and getting onto the bed to wrap me in his arms. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing without him.”
“Me either,” Storm admits, crawling in after him to push my legs away from my chest. “Let us hold you, Kitty. You’re not alone anymore. It may not be much, but we’re here. No more fighting. It’s not worth it.”
Once my leg is hooked over his naked hip, he cuddles up closer until my head is on his chest. I’m the omega between a sad alpha sandwich, and they purr as they hold me. If a tear drops onto my shoulder or my hair, none of us bring attention to it.
“It doesn’t feel like I’m allowed to miss him,” I finally say, tears and snot thick in my voice. “You’ve known him for so much longer than me, and we’ve fought more than anything else.”
“He left with promises and romance in his wake,” Wilder whispers, his cheek laying against my back. I can feel him breathe Lore’s and my scents in, and I shudder at what could have been. “Fighting is foreplay for him…waslike foreplay. Anyway, he lived for games of dominance and submission. It took us longer than any of us care to admit, but women are different from men. We punch each other to show we love each other. We obviously can’t do the same with you. When men like us love, it takes a very special kind of woman to show us how to treat them.”
“Road life is hard,” Storm adds. “The women have been through some shit, the weather conditions are deplorable and disgusting, and life is uncertain. We’ve been talking about settling in one place, as you know. Lore wanted to take care of his loose ends before he could allow himself that luxury.”
“Criminal life,” I mutter bitterly. “This is exactly why I’ve been fighting this.”
“I know,” Storm sighs, his fingers pulling my hair tie out of my hair to thread his finger through it.
Wilder’s big hand squeezes my bare thigh where it’s hooked over Storm’s hip, and somehow it helps my very dysregulated body.
“It won’t always be safe,” Wilder rumbles in my ear, making me shiver. “Technically, I am now the interim president for our chapter. I don’t want to have this conversation with you while we’re all so raw. It feels wrong…”
“Life goes on,” I whimper. “I’m a nurse, I know this. Death happens, and the world continues to turn. I want the world to stop, the birds to stop chirping, and the sun to stop shining, because that means the universe will mourn with us. That’s not how it works though.”
“Fuck, you’re perfect,” Wilder sighs, relaxing completely against my back. It means his weight is heavy along the length of my body, and he shoves his leg on top of the leg not draped over Storm’ body.
In a way, this is a claiming, and a reminder we’re still pack, despite missing an important member of it. I still need to figure out how I feel about all of this, but my soul is exhausted. It’s as if I’ve been wrung dry after being fucked by the dildo of life without slick, and I still know it’ll continue to hurt as tears continue to drip from my swollen eyes.
“Lay it on me,” I say, though my lashes brush my cheeks.
“Marie—”
“Yes, I’m tired, I know. This isn’t the kind of exhaustion that’ll be fixed after a few hours of sleep though. Stop protecting me from your life. If I’m in it, then I need to know all the different aspects of it. I’m tired of being in the dark,” I snap.
“Whatever you want,” Storm says, reaching over and boxing Wilder’s ear.
“Fuck. Okay. This is weird. We don’t talk about things like this with people unless they’re patched in,” Wilder hisses.
“It’s the twenty-first century, I can vote, and I will not ask you for permission before I want to do something,” I reply. “Get with the present times.”
