Page 372 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

THE CAKE.

I bolt back to the workbench where I stashed the box and come back holding it out in both hands like I'm presenting a sword to a king and not a store-bought cake to an alpha who I've never actually seen eat anything sweet in his life.

"Bro. I got you something."

Wraith looks at the box, then at me. His eyes narrow under the hood, because the last thing I presented to him this ceremoniously was my own personal fan edit of himself set to Toxic.

"Sorry, man, it isn't a kitten. Thane still says no cats. Trust me, I tried."

Wraith actually looks slightly disappointed. Keeping his head slightly downturned and shadowed, he takes the box in his huge scarred hands and lifts the lid.

He stares down at the cake.

It's round and white with blue trim the same color as his eyes, which I thought was a pretty sweet detail. There's a fondant stethoscope coiled on top, although it got slightly disturbed by the ride on the back of Hogzilla and now it kinda looks like a really long flaccid penis. Especially since when I plucked off the marzipan graduation cap, it took the ear-thingies that made the stethoscope a stethoscope.

Big piped letters spell out CONGRATULATIONS, and underneath, in janky blue gel and visibly rushed handwriting, on surviving.

Wraith stares at it.

He stares at it for a long time.

He hands the box back to me so he can sign.

What the fuck?

"It's a cake!"

Why?

"Yeah, well." I shrug. "I guess it's for people graduating medical school. I had to, uh, make a few modifications of my own."

Wraith looks down at the cake again.

He huffs, harder this time, a deep subwoofer of a broken laugh rumbling in his chest, and lifts his eyes to mine. They're warm and soft, and for a moment, I don't understand how anyone could think he's scary at all.

And he's put me through walls.

Thanks. It's the worst cake I've ever seen.

"You're welcome," I say, grinning. "I love you too, bro."

Chapter 77

Ivy

Wraith is sleeping sitting up after the BioMuzzle injection.

That was… an event.

Plague didn't waste any time getting it secured from the compounding pharmacy, and when he came home, he set the supplies on the kitchen table and got straight to work.

Wraith took one look at the syringe in Plague's gloved hand, Plague flicking it to get the bubbles out and watching the fluid beading on the tip of the needle with his light eyes narrowed above his surgical mask, and left the kitchen.

Plague followed him to the living room.

Wraith moved to the hallway.

Plague followed him there, too.