Page 45 of Racing the Storm

“Knowing what I know about him—knowing what kind of fighter he is, knowing what Kasher put him through?” Mikael shrugged. “Without question.”

“But not if he was a stranger,” I said. I felt defensive of my brother, but my logic understood. It was impossible for me to separate that from Zane, though. He had been there from my birth, and I had never known a world without him. I didn’t want to know a world without him or Talia. And it didn’t matter what he had done, or what he might do. I would follow him to the ends of the earth.

“I will be there to support him,” Mikael said, clearly reading my face. “Unless he chooses to step down, he has my loyalty.”

I stared at him a long time, trying to reconcile this man with the indifferent one whose gaze had passed over me like I was nothing. I had already lost the war trying to forget the Alpha in a rut that had made me feel like I had ascended to the heavens, but he was not that Wolf now.

He felt even stranger to me than before.

Mikael pulled the meat from the skewer. It was rare, but it appealed to the animal side of me, and it was oddly comforting to eat with my hands, to allow my fangs to drop and tear the flesh with them, and know the man watching me wouldn’t think I was a beast.

I was allowed to exist as both sides of my shift, and to Mikael—for all that he had rejected me as a mate—I was still whole.

“I’m sorry you suffered,” he said when his plate was clear.

I looked up at him in surprise, but I nodded all the same. There was no point in telling him that I could have suffered much worse—that other Wolves around me had. I knew I would feel the effects of my capture soon, once I was safe again.

There was a long road again. This was no more than the calm before the storm.

Chapter

Fifteen

MIKAEL

Iknew it wouldn’t be long before I cracked and bared my soul to Danyal. Every single instinct in me was screaming to take him into my arms, to hold him, to lick his metaphorical wounds. I wanted to drag fingers and claws over every inch of his body until he was comforted and maybe a little bit desperate for me.

I wanted to smell his slick again.

I wanted to feel him tight around me.

I woke up hard, my dick aching, and I rolled away from where Danyal was quietly slumbering. Pushing to my feet, I stumbled toward the mouth of the cave to relieve myself, then stared out at the glowing dawn on the horizon. It was strange to be free like this, but trapped. To know the world was out there and no one was holding us in place, but there was no sanctuary outside of these cave walls.

Not yet.

I’d checked the phone before dropping off, but it was still out of service. I wondered if Kor would ever activate it, or if things had gone so wrong, he never would. Danyal and I both agreed we could wait a little while, but not forever. Our people needed us, and we had to find a way to get back home. I had no real faith that any of those people—those Wolves, apparently—were still at the Paris flat.

It was likely they had accomplished their mission and moved on. Arturo had been my only means of escape without Kor, and he and his sister were long gone. If it came down to it, I’d steal a car and we’d get as close to a private airstrip as we could. If we could cross the border into Switzerland, we’d be able to charter a flight to Canada, and from there, we could cross the border at night as Wolves.

Alexei Kasher probably had eyes in the sky, but it was early days, and we had a chance to make it back to our little stronghold before sanctions took place. It would be a year before the election, and I didn’t think the current human president was in a hurry to start changing laws.

Not so close to the treaty.

Marion was another matter. I had never met him in person, though I had seen him enough to know he was an opportunist. When Zane told me he was inviting Lior onto the council, I knew that Wolf was in Marion’s pocket. Or perhaps the other way around. Whatever the case, I didn’t want those eyes on us.

“Keep the enemy close,” Zane muttered the night I had protested. I didn’t want to agree with him, but everyone else had, and I had been outvoted.

I’d been tempted to walk away after that, but then I’d seen Danyal—my Omega—and I couldn’t bring myself to go. I wondered what life would have been like if I’d done it, but fate had decided for me all those years ago when I held Danyal in my arms and knotted him.

The bond had faded, but that didn’t matter.

We could bring it back.

Sighing, I moved back into the cave, listening for Danyal’s breath first before heading to the spring. The soapy water had long since cleared, so I refilled our containers, then dragged them back to the fire pit in the second cove. It only took a moment to restoke the fire, then I poured them through the filter and set them in a pot to boil.

I had lived like this before—on the front, when First War was just beginning. We would be in the middle of nowhere for weeks, waiting for orders, waiting for any sign of the human army. Things would be calm, enough to throw the entire company into a false sense of security.

And just when we could all breathe a little easier, sleep a little easier, we were picked off. I swore to myself the day I took off my uniform for the last time, I would never let it happen again. And now, here I was, entirely alone except the one Wolf who should never forgive me.

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