Page 67 of Impossible

“We were at the Rochester Center at 0600, as assigned. I went with my Pack to manage radar threats on location. It was a routine transfer of a pre-heat omega, so we were armed and performing the expected field threat assessments. Margaret—” Joshua clears his throat.

I look down at his hands and notice they’re shaking. He clenches them in his lap. Watching his shoulders hunch fills me with a red-hued rage. Fuck this. We’ve all told them exactly what happened, there’s no need for this.

I bite back the anger fueled comment I want to make and reach out instead, putting my hand on Joshua’s thigh, stopping his nervous bouncing. He takes a deep breath.

“Margaret Knight was sitting in the backseat, between Risk and Leon,” Joshua continues. “She was de-scented but clearly only hours away from her heat, and she was deeply uncomfortable. We were doing our best to move quickly while retaining all security measures. Knight Pack was waiting at their home in the city.”

“And you don’t think that any of your pack mates were rutting?” Marcus asks.

“What? Of course not. We’ve done pre-heat transfers dozens of times, why would this be any different?”

“Well, you tell me.”

Joshua glares at Marcus.

“Go on,” Lucas prompts.

Joshua takes another deep breath. “We were about forty miles south of Rochester when we detected a large heat signature in the forest. It wasn’t a group of hikers or a picnic or anything. As is policy, we evaluated alternate routes, but the turn-off was four miles past the unknown signature. We evaluated turning back, but the tail caught up to us. They must have been lingering three or four miles behind to stay out of radar range, and didn’t close in until the forest unit was in position.”

“And you can understand why we’re dubious when you speak of supposedly feral alphas like this?” Marcus cuts in. “A tail? A forest unit? This doesn’t align with our current understanding of these feral alpha packs you Midas boys seem so leery of.”

I choke a snarl back.Boys. Like we’re children.

“Can I finish?” Joshua snaps.

“Watch yourself, Midas. There is further yet to fall.”

I know I have to be bruising Joshua with how hard I’m gripping his thigh, but I can’t stop. It’s the only thing stopping me from launching myself over the desk at Marcus.

“When we stopped, Leon and Risk exited the vehicle and assumed defensive positions. I radioed in the unknown threat. We didn’t realize at the time that they had scrambled the area. That’s when…”

Joshua fades out, something flickering in his eyes.

I can smell the paper of the old books on Wilder’s shelves. The fluorescent lights flicker slightly, always bright, with moments of increased intensity. Lucas needs a shave. I wonder how many pens in the wire basket on Wilder’s desk are dead.

Joshua’s veins are blue under his alabaster skin. A muscle in his jaw tenses. His lashes fold between his lids as he screws his eyes shut. His hand comes to rest over my own on his leg. I feel the trembling in his fingertips, the sweat in the creases of his palms.

I open the bond.

I should have been with him the whole time. Should have felt his pain, shared it.

Just like last time, the energy required to keep Leon and Risk out while allowing Joshua in is herculean. I am silly putty stretched too thin. I am not enough to fill the emptiness inside of him.

Joshua inhales sharply as our minds bleed into each other.

But something is different this time. He isn’t the black hole he was before, sucking what little I had to give until I felt myself going numb.

He is a vortex, burning with so many thoughts that for a moment I forget my own. Indie and Risk and his bed and the rut and Leon and me and the bond and the attack, all smashed together, tumbling over each other in a tangled mess.

Marcus clears his throat, and Joshua’s mind screeches to a halt, stuck on something he was trying to forget. Trying to lose in the jumble. I feel it all with him.

Terror. Confusion. Dread. The memories are splintered glass, slivers of color and the red-hot pain, feeling us fall, one by one.

Joshua speaks, his voice locked into an even, dead timbre. “That’s when they emerged from the tree line. I would estimate at least fifty, potentially more. I radioed in the red alert immediately, which, as we now know, was scrambled. We watched from the road as they approached. At this point, Hollis exited the vehicle and ordered me to lock down. I protested, not wanting to leave my packmates outside, but he ordered, so I complied. We wouldn’t have been able to escape anyway—they had barricaded the road ahead of us.

“I tried to comfort Margaret as we watched the feral alphas approach. They were running. None of them had guns. They had… knives.”

He closes his eyes, and my heart aches as I feel the echoes of panic through the bond. There’s nothing I can send back to comfort him. He watched it all. I didn’t.

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