Page 46 of Wolf Found

Even when he’d been disturbed by the alpha lying to him and what it might imply, Graham had never in his darkest moment expected anything like this. He’d never thought anyone was going to kill him.

He considered that.

What if he did it? If somehow, despite the fact that Graham didn’t know he could even do it, he broke his bonds to the Kismet wolves. To Ash. If the old bonds to the Martingale pack managed to regrow somehow, unlikely as that seemed.

If everything went back to how it had been before Hannah and Paige had come.

He would wake up before dawn to make breakfast. He’d take a break when he was done to eat a little before getting started on lunch. He’d do inventory and start planning the meals for the next week. He’d make dinner. He’d go to bed. Once a week, he’d be allowed a few hours of computer time to order groceries.

That was his life, before.

No friends, since Hannah had gone and he was alone in the kitchen but for a few people he barely knew who weren’t even always there. No family, since his own had never had any interest in him.

Hell, Joseph seemed more concerned for him than his own parents ever had, and the man had hardly spoken to him in their whole lives.

Graham loved cooking. He had even loved the enclave kitchen, and the tiny bit of freedom he got by being allowed to order the groceries every week. It had been how he’d found Ash, after all.

But despite the fact that he hadn’t realized it at the time, it had been an empty life. He’d been going through the motions, waiting for the next day and the next and the next. There had been nothing to hope or strive for, nothing to look forward to, and no one who would have noticed he’d even gone, if not for the lack of food.

The Martingales didn’t want him, they wanted a restaurant. Quick, inexpensive, and more a nameless, faceless organization than a person who required acknowledgement.

He’d known before deciding to stop and think about it, but everything kept proving him right. He would not, could not, go back to the life he’d lived before. Not now that he knew what life could be like.

Ash would come for him. There was no doubt about that. Graham just had to hope he’d do it in a sensible way, not driving his car through the gates and demanding that they turn him over.

The Martingale alpha had always been a distant figure, but for most of Graham’s life, he’d been omniscient and benevolent, above them all. The man who had hit Graham for the crime of knowing his worth... that was not the man he’d been raised to believe in.

He wondered what might have happened to make the alpha grow violent and unpredictable. Even Joey had been shocked. He’d thought he was bringing Graham home to safety, and the first thing that had happened was the opposite of that.

Graham couldn’t bring himself to feel too bad for the man. Joseph had drugged and kidnapped him; his prevailing thought wasn’t a charitable one. Besides, with the kind of logic that thrived in the Martingale pack, no doubt Joseph would tell him it was his own fault for talking back.

Never mind the fact that Graham could have said precisely the same thing to any member of the Kismet pack, could have shouted it in their faces, and they wouldn’t have struck him. He knew that without a single doubt.

He wouldn’t have needed to do it there, though.

The Kismet wolves valued Graham even more than he valued himself. They would be pleased to hear he did so at all.

When the footsteps had retreated completely and his legs stopped feeling like Jell-O, he pushed himself up. He was still shaking, his heart hammering, but he was in control of his own body.

There was a mirror attached to the dresser, so he stumbled over to that to see the damage. It was ugly, a bloody stripe across his face, a whole layer of skin taken away by the ring. It was already starting to heal, but it didn’t look good, and it was going to take days to get better. It might even leave a scar, since he couldn’t properly clean it.

Had the man turned the rough part of the ring to the inside of his hand before hitting Graham? He had at least pretended that he’d acted in anger and not calculation.

Graham just didn’t know what the truth was anymore when it came to the Martingale alpha. He wasn’t sure the alpha knew either.

There was no sink, no bathroom—he really hoped they didn’t intend to leave him in the room for days on end—so the best he could do was dab at the cut with a tissue and make sure it left as little mess as possible.

What he wouldn’t have given for access to running water.

He glanced at the door, but he didn’t even bother trying it. He was no weakling, but knocking a door down seemed on the far side of too much. Plus someone would hear, and then he’d end up in even more trouble, and without the water he wanted.

So he sighed and threw himself back on the bed.

He didn’t have his clothes. Didn’t have his recipe book, either the one in his own hand or the one Ash had bought him. The alpha had been right; he was alone with his thoughts, and it stunk.

It didn’t change his mind about anything he’d said, but it wasn’t good.

What if Joseph was right about everything?his traitorous brain wondered.What if Ash doesn’t care about you, and he was just filling a hole in his life with the most convenient person? What if he isn’t coming, and you’re stuck here forever?

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