Page 19 of Hayden's Haven
“Fuck you,” Hayden said, increasing his stride to get away from Callen.
As they walked up the steps to Damien’s house, they heard Damien’s raised voice. He sounded pissed-off.
Even before they were fully through the door, Hayden was growling. Damien stopped talking and raised a brow as if to question why Hayden was growling.
Sometimes a shifter just wasn’t in the mood to deal with his alpha. Images of that shifter attacking Mila wouldn’t leave Hayden’s head.
“Been a long mission,” Hayden said. It wasn’t exactly an apology, but it would suffice. Hayden surveyed the room. Damien, Tess, Blade, Anna, and Mila were present. And here he had assumed Mila would go with Kate when she headed to the cookhouse.
Of all of Damien’s top tier—which apparently now included their mates—only Frank and Pryce were absent. Frank was probably on guard duty. Where was Pryce? Hayden wanted the shifter to take a look at Mila. Her wolf seemed exceedingly slow in healing her. Her one cheek was still bruised and her lip split. She had been off-balance this morning, too. She had taken kicks to the back of her legs and. . . Hell. That damn shifter had probably done more damage to her than he’d realized, overwhelming her wolf.
Mila caught his gaze and started pulling on a lock of hair. Nerves? Of course. She barely knew anyone here, and she was still recovering.
Her lush dark hair was in tangles and she certainly could use a shower. They all could. But Damien had wanted to welcome her right away, make her feel at home, as he tended to do with new shifters. It was a strength Hayden had always appreciated in Damien, one that had gone a long way toward keeping Hayden here in those first few days after he had arrived injured and emotionally broken.
“Quit staring,” Callen whispered as he leaned against the wall with his right leg bent and his foot flush with the plaster, leaving a muddy mark. Tess had put a plant there trying to force him to find a seat instead, but he had slid the plant over.
Tess sighed when she noticed. She let it go. Hayden grinned. For as much as these shifters could be a pain in the neck sometimes, they all had heart and they had never failed him.
“Glad you’re back in one piece,” Damien said as he rubbed his hands on his thighs. “I’d say it was a very successful mission. In addition to escorting Dr. Evans here, you brought Kate back from the dead.”
“Kate’s too stubborn to die,” Hayden said, watching Mila closely. No laugh. Yeah, she was over him.
“It would have been helpful knowing we were looking for a woman,” Hayden said, unable to take his eyes off of her. Even as bruised, disheveled, and dirty as she was, she was still gorgeous. Her eyes held a fire unlike no other.
“I agree,” Damien said.
“I already explained this,” Mila said, crossing her arms over her chest as she glared at Hayden. Why was she mad at him?
The tension in the room was thick until Tess jumped up and headed for the kitchen. “Who wants coffee?”
Mila raised her hand.
Hot chocolate with little marshmallows. That’s what Mila liked.
“Why didn’t your pack have the cure?” Damien asked Mila, though kept taking his eyes off of Mila and scrutinizing Hayden.
“Liam had sent messengers to my pack and a few others in eastern Montana. Along with the small amount of the cure, he provided instructions on how to replicate it. I’m not sure what went wrong exactly. I realize I’m only a medical doctor, not a virologist, but I know I followed the instructions precisely. There was no guesswork involved. And yet the end result was that the cure didn’t work. Neither did the vaccine that I had developed, even though it was based on the information your Dr. Kerns had provided. I promise you, alpha, I’m competent at what I do. All evidence points to the virus mutating.”
“Hell.” Damien ran his hands through his hair.
“I’d like to meet with your virologist as soon as possible, to go over—
“Alex is dead,” Tess said from the kitchen.
“Dead?” Hayden asked, thoroughly surprised
“Shot himself,” Damien said. “Couldn’t take the pressure probably. Hard to say.”
“He had issues,” Tess said to Mila as she handed her a cup of coffee and passed a bottle of water over to Anna. Blade stood to reach the water and he brushed up against Mila’s sore knee. She winced. Hayden growled and glared at Blade.
Damien gripped Hayden’s shoulder on his way to the kitchen and gave a slight tap, enough to distract Hayden. “Do you want a beer or something stronger?” Damien asked.
Hayden knew exactly what Damien was doing, and it wasn’t working. That kiss, that wonderful, soul-shattering kiss of Mila’s had left him on edge, and he needed a run or a good screw, neither of which he was going to get in here.
“Neither,” Hayden answered. There was that look again from Damien, the one that said they were definitely going to talk later.Shit.Best friend and alpha. . .regardless which side of Damien wanted to speak with him, Hayden simply wasn’t in the mood.
Damien grabbed a beer for himself. “Walk with me,” he said as he headed toward the door. That tone was more order than request, but Hayden didn’t care. It gave him the chance to escape, finally.
