Page 49 of Freed

She tilts her head, looking slightly confused. “Gone? No, dear. Not gone.”

The hope those words bring has my body tightening.

“It’s there,” she says, tapping a finger lightly against her own chest. “Just quiet. Buried under your shock, grief, and fear.”

My throat tightens. “I don’t understand,” I say, trying to hold myself together instead of sobbing like my body aches to do every time I think about our missing bond. “I can’t feel anything.”

“Because you’re waiting for it to come back on its own,” she replies before tilting her head again. “Or you’re scared.” Then she shakes her head. “That’s not how it works.”

I blink, forcing the tears back, my voice filled with hope as I lean forward and ask, “Then how does it work?”

Her lips smile with amusement before she tells me, “The same way it did the first time.”

Understanding flickers, and my cheeks start to heat.

“We just have to… mate?” I say, whispering the last word. My heart starts to pound. It can’t be that simple, can it?

She nods, once. “Just claim each other the same way you did the first time.”

“A-are you sure?” I ask, hope filling every part of me as my skin starts to prickle. “How do you know it will come back?”

“Because it’s not gone,” she says simply. “It was… interrupted. You just need to reconnect it.”

A breath I didn’t realize I was holding slips out. Relief crashes into me so suddenly it almost hurts.

“If you want it back,” she continues, “then stop being afraid of failing and start doing something about it.”

A new determination fills me, and as I glance at my mates, I’m determined that by the end of the day, we will fix our broken bond. I already spent so much of our time together stuck as a wolf; I refuse to wait any longer.

Glancing at Lillian, another question comes to mind, and before I can stop myself, the next question slips out.

“There’s something else,” I say, moving to the edge of my seat as I look at her. “About shifting.”

She nods, telling me to go on.

“I couldn’t shift for over five years,” I explain. “I was stuck in my wolf form, and when I finally did… it only worked when all five of them were touching me.”

Her brows lift slightly at that. “And now?” she asks.

“I can do it on my own now,” I tell her. “But for a while, they all had to touch me, then slowly, I did it with only a few of them at a time until I could fully control it again. But I still don’t understand it.”

Silence stretches for a beat as she studies me again, deeper this time. “I believe you repressed yourself,” she says plainly.

I frown and she continues. “You chose one form and buried the rest,” she continues. “For survival, I assume.”

I hesitate, then nod. “That kind of choice doesn’t just disappear when it’s no longer needed,” she says. “It lingers. Becomes habit. Then instinct.”

“So why couldn’t I shift back?” I press.

“Because you weren’t just shifting,” she says. “You were forcing open something you’d kept sealed for years.”

My chest tightens remembering all the time I spent trapped at the facility.

“And when it finally opened, and your human side came out,” she adds, her gaze flicking briefly toward the guys, “You needed the power from all five of your alphas to keep you tethered."

I swallow. “That’s why I needed all of them?”

“Yes. Five bonds. Five sources of power. More than enough to tear through what you’d built.”