Page 49 of Her Eternal Mate

“But we’ve never met before.”

“Sure. We’ve never met before. I was a little kid, and my dad, Morgan, told me stories about the brave werewolf who saved the entire Grimm pack by moving us to America. You were my hero. Hell, with all the shit unfolding around us, you’re still my hero.”

“You know what? Dr. Munroe, if you can find out what’s wrong with me, you’ll be my hero,” I said.

“Right you are,” Dr. Munroe said. He pricked my finger and squeezed it, causing a massive blood droplet to form at the tip. He then took a swab and rubbed the blood off, applying it on a glass plate that he put under a microscope.

For the next five minutes, he didn’t say anything, which made me more suspenseful. But after a long pause, he looked up from the microscope and shook his head.

“Will, there’s grave news,” Dr. Munroe said, putting aside his stethoscope and looking at me morosely.

“I’ve already been in a grave once before, doctor. I’m not afraid of dying. Tell me what it is,” I said, clenching my fists.

“These soldiers that you fought…were they different from the rest?”

“Yes. They were a lot more aggressive, and all their moves were synchronized, making it very challenging for me to take on all of them at once. Did I mention that they sort of died at the same time?”

“That may be because of the mutagens in their body. But from what I’ve inferred from your blood sample, these soldiers have affected your DNA. This sort of anomaly is only possible in one case, and that is if these soldiers were imbued with your blood, rendering you weak against it,” Dr. Munroe said. “So those injuries will take a lot longer to heal.”

I knew it. Dr. Munroe had confirmed what I’d already suspected. Blair had taken his father’s research and had made these soldiers with the specific purpose of bringing me down.

“What can be done?” I asked.

“For now, rest. Rest is all you can do. You have to let these injuries heal the old-fashioned way. In time, I will bring my surgeon friend from Bangor and have him see the scars. It’s going to be some basic epithelial surgery that can fix those scars up in no time.”

“No. Don’t do anything about the scars,” I said. “A wolf bears the scars he receives. It is the way of the warrior.”

“Suit yourself, but for now, don’t go looking for any more fights.”

“Could there be a correlation between these injuries and my anger flaring?”

“Let’s just say that your old DNA was mixed up in these soldiers to make them stronger against you in a battle. When they attacked you, it woke up dormant parts of you that you had been controlling for some time now,” the doctor said.

“And how do I get those parts to be dormant again?” I asked.

“I am afraid,” the doctor said, shaking his head once more. “I do not have an answer for that.”

That only left one more thing for me to do.

I needed to seek Alexis and apologize for how I had lost my cool with her.

Chapter 23

Alexis

I didn’t go back to Will’s house. Instead, I went back to mine, choosing to sulk in my old room. It felt like I’d stepped back in time. As bitter as this feeling was, it made me reminisce about the time when I’d just met Will for the first time. It had been an onerous challenge to come to terms with him back then. After he had learned to tame himself down, there came a time when I had entirely forgotten that Will had been capable of anger.

Until tonight.

Tonight was a reminder that Will had been holding back his anger all this time.

Knowing that did not lessen the pain I was feeling. I’d thought that after all this time, after everything that had happened between us, Will would respect me enough not to lose his cool with me.

There was a knock at the door. I already knew who it was going to be. I had no plans to open the door. Being alone felt like the better option. It wasn’t just Will who had been rattled by recent events. I was quite shaken as well. After all, I’d gone and faced Blair on my own. It was akin to walking into the open maws of death itself.

“Alexis, please open up,” Will said from the other side of the door. I remembered that Will had never asked for the keys to my home. We had never sought it fit to live in both houses. We were engaged, after all. If I didn’t go and open the door for him, he’d be stuck out there all night.

“Go away, Will,” I said, not really wanting to talk to him right now. I needed some time to process everything that had happened.

---