Page 65 of Why Cruise

Theo popped up on his toes and craned his neck. Mackenzie’s beautiful face dotted in and out of the crowd. She dragged Justice behind her.

“Theo!”

Fear drained everything from me.

“Hey! How were the ATVs?”

Justice was not okay.

“We’re late.”

It was his eyes. Black and bottomless.

“We have to go.”

A death grip on her hand.

“It’s first come, first served, remember?”

She turned back to Justice, kissed him on the cheek. The connection only broke when the distance between them got too great.

Then Justice snapped.

“Just.”

I knew he heard me say his name, but he wasn’t even hyperventilating. I didn’t think he was breathing. I tugged him through the staff door and down the hallway Tommy and I had cased earlier.

A CEO having a panic attack in public was one thing. Justice’s ego would survive that. An alpha having a panic attack was something else.

He staggered, spun his head in all directions, and then reached up to touch the ceiling. His fingers barely grazed it.

Shit. This was a bad idea.

“Just. Can you come back to me?” His breathing was so shallow, I didn’t even know if he was breathing.

I caressed the back of his hand with my knuckle. He looked down at our hands and then back up at me and punched me in both shoulders. I flew back a dozen feet.

He turned to get away from me and wrenched the first door he saw.

Fuck. That was worse.

We had thirty seconds before he realized he’d just walked into a closet.

I tossed his back against the wall and pinned him with my body. That forced air out of him and he gasped for breath. He fought me blindly, with normal strength, no alpha weight behind it. I leaned into him and wrapped my hand around his neck. My hold was light, not at all restricting, but he clawed at my hand and fought to breathe. Breathing was the point here. Focusing on not being in a closet was the point here.

I lightly smacked his head into the wall. “Say it, Justice.” I did it again, and a third time. On the last, he heard me. He kept his eyes down, unblinking as logical thought fought the panic to come upstream.

We had done this a hundred times, a million, before either one of us was old enough to know what a panic attack or CPTSD was. The first time we were hiding in the closet of the music room. He couldn’t reach the ceiling then. I had full bodied him, wrapping my arms and legs around him and covering his mouth until he stopped screaming. The last time was at a Lunar Rift concert. The mosh pit turned into a riot. Crowd control had us wedged up by the stage. I had to use other methods that time.

“Say it.”

He remembered the game, the rules of it all. His fingers stilled, and he nodded once.

“Fell. Blood everywhere. My fault.” It came out staccato and rough.

Blood? Fuck. She hadn’t looked hurt. I locked down my emotions right damn quick. My alpha protectiveness for an omega I could never have was not a value add right now.

“Again.” I gave his head another gentle thud.

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