"Way to change the subject from the horrible deaths we might experience in a few hours." Lonnie rolled his eyes, but then his gaze settled on me. "He really is pregnant, huh."
Sebastian spoke for me. "Our wolves say the babies are coming." With each stroke of his hand over my fur, I relaxed a little more, which only made my cramps worse. He gripped his side, like he had sympathy pains. "We need to get out of here."
Amber nodded. "Let's move. His body will protect the pups from the radiation. Once they're born, it'll be harder to tell, and I don't want to test my serum on … babies?"
"They'll be wolves, too," Sebastian said. "Won't that protect them?"
"I'm not taking any chances. You said babies?" Amber repeated.
"Twins," he confirmed, stroking his hand down my side again. My flank still burned from where Ivan had jabbed me with the butt of his assault rifle.
Amber noticed my flinch and kneeled beside me. "Is he hurt?"
"We heal fast," Sebastian said. "Let's go."
Sebastian's wolf called to mine, and I lifted my headfrom his lap. He squirmed into a squat and shifted back into his wolf.
"Well, that helps," Lonnie said. "I wondered where we would find clothes to fit you."
Sebastian growled at his friend, who only laughed. I rubbed along my mate's side, nudging my head against his. My back pain worsened again, and it hadn't been many minutes since it had let up. As far as contractions went, these were nothing, but this was only the beginning.
CHAPTER 19
SEBASTIAN
Lonnie pickedup as many assault rifles as he could find, a total of four. He draped their straps over both shoulders and pocketed a service pistol lifted from the guard without a rifle. He looked ridiculous with all that hardware, but I didn't have a human mouth to tell him.
Amber took the lead. pulling the door open with her own pistol cocked. The hallway was clear, and in the room on the opposite side, we found the scientists and guards that they had taken care of.
Until I saw the bodies, this whole thing had seemed surreal. How were Lonnie and Amber here? Did they really attempt to rescue us, or was this still part of an elaborate plan my father had constructed?
They were here now, wearing forest camouflage fatigues instead of my dad's lab uniforms. That was all that mattered. I no longer had to worry about delivering our babies alone. Amber was a doctor, and Lonnie had been an EMT before I turned him into a hotelier.
Voices echoed down the hallway Amber identified as our way out. "Fuck, we missed some," she said.
"On it." Lonnie grabbed one assault rifle in each hand and pretended to shake them around like a cartel kingpin making his final showdown. Amber shook her head, and he dropped the second gun and held the first like he knew what he was doing, thank fuck.
He slipped through the door, closing it behind him. Amber grabbed the handle before it clicked shut, and I listened with my ear to the opening. It didn't take long before four shots echoed and the hall went deathly silent.
Amber nudged the door open. "Lonnie, are you okay?"
"All good, Princess. We're home free. If you count walking two hundred yards through radiated forest 'home free.'"
I nudged Gunnar to follow Amber into the hallway. He walked with a slight limp, but a swell of pride nearly overwhelmed me. We'd survived my dad's plan to turn our children into super soldiers. Gunnar had single-handedly, or single-mouth-edly, protected us from doctors, lab workers, guards, and my dad. I'd barely done anything while he ripped through their ranks. My wolf wanted to wrap around him and hold him for as many days as we'd been forced apart. Later, when we were safe.
I fell in line at the rear, grateful for my wolf's ability to see in the dark. When we found Lonnie fifty yards ahead, he looked haunted. This trip would cost us all something. If not our lives, then our innocence. Myfriends and I spent a lot of time contemplating what we would do in high conflict situations, but surviving this encounter would be worse than any horror story we'd told ourselves over campus bonfires.
Gunnar whined softly, and his sides clenched. Was that what his contractions looked like?
"Are you okay?"I asked.
"Need to hurry."
I yipped a bark, and Amber grabbed Lonnie's arm. "We need to go. I don't want to learn how male wolves give birth in the middle of a dead zone."
Lonnie nodded. They ran up the incline, and we loped behind them. Gunnar still limped on his back right leg, but he kept up with the humans.
At the top of the rise, a hatch in the ceiling opened when Lonnie shoved at it. A broken chain lay off to the side, a sign of forced entry. I relaxed a little more. It was another sign my friends had told us the truth. Trust came hard for me, but my college friends hadn't let me down in the twelve years since we met.
