Page 61 of Feral

He fell silent again and I returned my attention to Zach’s sleeping form. Was Jerome right? I thought back to Dr. Urwin and what he’d said to me as he strapped me onto the breeding bench. How every beta boyfriend I’d ever had had wanted to do the same to me. But that was just a projection of his own twisted desires. Right?

“On our last mission, our squad was tasked with taking a strategic vantage point. Said it was an abandoned school. Only when we got there, it’d been turned into a fucking orphanage. Mostly it was filled with kids whose parents died in the war.Wekilled their parents, and now we were going to take their last safehouse too? Wasn’t gonna happen.

“Captain didn’t see it that way, though. Told us to get with the program or get tried for treason. When we still refused, he shot a kid. Fucking shot him right in front of the others, and said we better get our priorities straight or he’d be forced to clear them all out. ‘Cause if all the kids are dead, it’s no longer an orphanage, or some bullshit like that.

“That’s when Barnes pulled his gun and shot the captain point-blank. And the fuckers at home tried him for treason and judged him a war criminal, because otherwise it’d have gotten out what they’d tried to do. Barnes told us not to make a fuss. That we should take our dishonorable discharge and disappear or they’d try us too.Tell no one,he said. He didn’t want us to die along with him. And we didn’t, to honor his sacrifice.

“But every single one of us are willing to lay down our lives for him. Fuck what the brass calls us—he saved our honor that day. And our fucking souls, if you believe in that shit.

“I tell you this not to help you justify what you feel for him, whether you want to admit it it not. I tell you so if he truly never speaks again, if this is all that’s left of the man who saved all those kids and his squad along with it… then at least you can tell any child you bear him what he used to be.”

* * *

We parked fardown an abandoned dirt trail in a thick patch of wood. They buried Beau under an oak tree some thirty yards in, then returned to the cars to catch a few hours’ sleep. Daylight meant a much higher chance of getting caught while on the open road.

Jarl took the first shift as lookout and I climbed into the backseat of Jerome’s Jeep, where I curled up against Zach. My bond hummed with contentment as my skin touched his, my eyelids fluttering shut when the last vestige of the adrenaline that’d kept me going since we broke into SilverCorp’s compound left my body. He might have been unconscious, but my instincts still made me feel so much safer in his presence.

I’d slept fitfully, plagued by nightmares and anxiety since my first escape from the dreaded hellhole. Now, though, with the warmth of the alpha underneath me, I drifted off with nothing but relief filling my mind.

I wokeup to a rumbling sound that seemed to originate from everywhere at once. It jarred me out of the my peaceful sleep, warning signals firing in my fuzzy brain.

Groggily, I opened my eyes and tried to sit up, but an iron band kept me glued to the hot surface I’d been sleeping against.

“Lillian, can you try to calm him, please?”

I looked up at the sound of Jerome’s very quiet, calm voice, and saw him kneeling in the driver’s seat facing us, eyes locked above me. When I followed his gaze, I realized where the noise was coming from.

Zach was awake, his lip curled to show his teeth as he let out a low, continuous growl aimed at the other alpha in the car. His right arm was clasped around my body, crushing me to his side.

“Shit,” I mumbled, my brain kicking through the haze of sleep with a panicked start. None of us had thought about what might happen if Zach woke up to find another alpha so close by. “Zach. Zach?”

He didn’t respond.

“Hey, it’s okay. He’s a friend.” I gently brushed my hand up his naked side to rest it against his chest. “Zach, look at me. Everything’s okay. We’re safe.”

I wasn’t sure he understood me, but when I pressed against where his end of our bond hooked, his eyes flickered to mine.

I smiled to show him there was no threat, planting a kiss against his tensed bicep. “Calm down, big guy.”

Slowly, his growl quieted, his intense stare remaining on my face. His pupils were larger than normal, but not completely blackening his irises.

“Hey,” I whispered, petting his thickly muscled chest. “How are you feeling?”

He didn’t respond, too busy studying my every feature as if he’d forgotten what I looked like. Maybe he had—the amount of drugs they’d given him would have been enough to shut down nearly everything but his lizard brain.

“I’m gonna take watch so he can have a moment to come to terms with everything,” Jerome said. Even though his tone was still deliberately non-aggressive, Zach snapped his head around and bared his teeth. “Give us a shout if you need us.”

Zach tensed even further when Jerome moved to slip out of the car, but he didn’t lunge. When the door closed and we were alone again, his growl died, though he stared out the window at Jerome’s retreating back.

“You sent me to him,” I said, still stroking his chest to keep him calm. At this point, I was pretty sure he didn’t understand what I was saying, but my voice seemed to have a soothing effect on him. “You said he’d take care of me, and he has. He got me to you—he and the others are the reason I could get you out. And… he told me what you did, before. You’re a hero, Zach. Not a criminal. And I didn’t know. You almost died without me knowing who you truly are.”

Zach turned back to look at me, something in my voice drawing his attention from Jerome. He frowned down at me, raising a hand to clumsily paw at the single tear trickling down my cheek.

Pain lanced through my stomach and chest when I caught sight of the many scars covering his hands and fingers. I’d been there when he got them, tearing at the barbed wire until his flesh hung in grotesque strips from the bones, all so he could save me. He’d had to use his teeth to kill the soldier who’d aimed his gun at me. The doctors had done a decent job at patching them up, but they were never going to look the same again. No part of his scarred body would.

“Do they hurt?” I asked, reaching for his hand pressed against my cheek. He allowed me to take it, and I ran my fingertips along the jagged lines. They were stiff, swollen, and when I gently pressed, a little growl rolled from his throat.

“Shh, I’ll make them feel better.” There wasn’t much I could do to thank him for everything he’d sacrificed for me. I couldn’t even guarantee I could bring his mind back from the drug-induced void they’d rendered it. But this… this I could do.

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