Page 32

CHAPTER

SIXTEEN

Avery

Three days pass without any word from Sascha.

The first day, Avery received a text from Petra telling him Sascha had crashed her car due to a vertigo episode. She also informed him that Sascha’s phone was taken away by his dad like he’s some unruly teenager, but that she’d keep Avery updated on Sascha’s healing.

It wasn’t that bad , she’d written, seeming completely blasé about the fact that Avery’s boyfriend was so exhausted from tending to him that he got into a fucking car accident.

Hit a goddamn tree when he could have been safe at home instead.

Could’ve died. The only person in the world who loves Avery, wrapped around a fucking tree trunk.

But he didn’t die, and is healing quickly from the crash.

Mostly bruises, Petra said, sending him a few pictures of Sascha’s bare chest, painted purple and yellow from the airbag impact.

No trace of the bite marks Avery covered him with before they’d left the hotel a day earlier.

The memory had felt like so far in the past, when it’d only been a little over twenty-four hours .

Now, it feels like the hotel was an eternity away, and Avery has run out of the food rations Sascha bought for him. Sascha had left his emergency credit card so Avery could buy whatever he needed, but that would require getting to a store, and Avery has been too scared to leave the cave.

Last night, while trying to charge his phone with the solar battery, it sustained some water damage that quickly infiltrated through its shattered screen.

The device had already been on rocky ground after his time in the drainage ditch.

Avery prayed that leaving it alone would dry it enough to turn back on, but it didn’t.

While Avery doesn’t want Sascha to leave his safe bed in his safe house where he’s recovering from injuries sustained while protecting Avery, being alone in a cave for three days is starting to get to him.

If Petra texts him any further updates, he won’t see them, nor will he be able to answer any calls if Sascha gets his phone back.

Because Sascha would call—a text wouldn’t be enough.

The thought of hearing his voice is almost enough to make Avery smile, but his stomach is a heavy, hollow pit that’s keeping him from feeling much other than emptiness.

Werecreature bodies weren’t built to survive on so few calories, and Avery hasn’t had any in…

he doesn’t know how long it’s been anymore, not without his phone to track the hours.

By nightfall, desperation sets in.

Avery doesn’t know where to go and doesn’t have a car, and if he even partially transforms, things could get ugly really fast. He could lose control and shift fully.

Not to mention the Madisons, along with any Wilderness wolves lurking on Madison land, would know Avery’s scent immediately because it was all over Sascha when he was dragged away from Avery on Dennings Farm.

The memory gives Avery nightmares. Even when he’s not asleep, the sight of the stocky woman choking Sascha out plays over and over again behind his eyelids. Trapped behind a wall thick with wolves and werecreatures, there was no way Avery could have reached him.

So Avery had run, only to feel deeply suspicious when no one followed on his heels—not even Beryl.

By now, Avery’s choices have dwindled. He needs to get off Madison pack lands to find food, but even without the wards immediately giving him away when he hops the fence, he’s certain there will be enforcers patrolling the perimeter.

He might be spotted before he can reach the road.

It’s not likely they’d let him escape as easily as Celeste’s wolves did.

Would they kill him on the spot, or capture him, drag him to their alpha, and execute him in front of Sascha to make a point?

Avery stuffs a water-resistant backpack with everything he can fit.

Sascha also bought waterproof storage envelopes much more secure than the layered freezer bags Avery used to get his phone and wallet into the cave unscathed.

Not that it made a big difference for the phone, but he packs it anyway, in case his SIM card can be salvaged.

Once packed, Avery takes the raft and its weak little oar, paddling until he can stagger onto the sloping shore.

He ties off the raft and mechanically climbs the fence, wheezing under the backpack’s weight.

Not a good sign for basic survival supplies to tire out a whole werecreature.

The ursine is unnervingly dormant within him.

Once on the other side of the fence, he stares through trees he has no idea how to navigate. Avery is so fucking tired of not knowing where he is or where to go.

A few steps toward the road, an abrupt yank stops Avery in his tracks.

It feels as if there’s thorns wrapped around his heart, and they tighten when he attempts walking again, only easing when he shifts differently.

Suddenly the ursine rouses, wasting no time unleashing a bellow that makes Avery’s eyes ache.

There’s something tugging him away from the road, deeper into Madison territory.

The ursine demands Avery follow that trail, filling him with a familiar sensation.

Exactly how he felt when he had no choice but to leave his boyfriend in the grasp of an unknown threat.

Is this punishment for that abandonment? Does Sascha need him?

Despite the urge otherwise, Avery knows that looking for Sascha on pack land will endanger them both, harming more than helping. So with the absolute last of his self-control, Avery painfully continues dragging his feet toward what he hopes will be a clean escape.

Hopes of that evaporate a second after the thought completes.

After so long trying to navigate his inconsistent senses, Avery’s mad fight for survival must have improved. He senses the feather-soft footsteps before they break the line of forest in which they were stalking him, and unless the cloaking spell is in effect, they’re alone.

“I’m so tired, Beryl,” Avery tells the trees. “Don’t you ever get tired?”

Beryl creeps into sight, head tilted so deep brown waves of hair fall over their piercing eyes. “Everyone gets tired.”

“In your bones, though. Where every joint cries when you use it.” Avery sighs. “I feel like I could sit down and never move again, and my body would thank me regardless of the consequences.”

“Don’t…” Beryl shifts, discomfort visible in every line of their body. “Don’t do that.”

Avery doesn’t say anything in response; he just stands there, staring into the distance with unfocused eyes. Past Beryl, along the weird aetheric thread pulling him toward what can only be Sascha .

Beryl steps into his field of vision. “If you’re really that tired, this is your last chance for protection against the Madison pack. Celeste is still willing to take you.”

“It’s not the life I want to live,” Avery says quietly. Since he can’t see past Beryl, he closes his eyes and tries to feel through the unknown distance. Has Sascha healed yet? Does he sense Avery, too?

“You prefer being hunted?”

“It’s not an issue of preference. I wouldn’t survive the way you would.”

“Is that an insult?”

“No, it’s a compliment.” Avery finally fights to focus his attention on Beryl, ignoring the way he yearns for nothing but Sascha.

“You do what you have to do. That bitch tells you to sit, to fight, and you do it, and you do it well. I wouldn’t be able to force compliance, even if it was in my better interest. Celeste would probably kill me while I’m at my lowest because even that wouldn’t be low enough for her. ”

Beryl considers him. “How long have you been a werecreature?”

“Nine months, give or take.”

“Ah. Fresh meat.” They suck their teeth. “I was born one.”

That grabs Avery’s attention. “How old are you?”

“I’m thirty-two,” Beryl says with a grim chuckle.

“My dad was unfaithful and fucked the wrong bitch. He hid it because who wouldn’t?

But it didn’t stop him from fucking my mom, too.

The virus didn’t infect her, but it transferred to the baby.

Surprising no one, she didn’t want it. Neither did he.

” A pause follows, during which genuine resentment flashes across Beryl’s expression.

“I hate Celeste almost as much as I need her. Since neither of my parents would care for me, I was raised within a government facility—part of a research program studying how the werevirus affects puberty and adolescence. She nabbed me when I was eighteen and had just aged out of the program. Don’t know if I’d have survived otherwise.

It was a good move for a new alpha because her rivals were intimidated by the presence of a shifter who could ‘tame’ a wild animal like me.

Celeste might be an opportunistic bitch, but she’s clever about it.

Usually. Sometimes, she doesn’t know when to pull out. ”

Avery snort-laughs, then claps a hand over his mouth. Beryl smirks, and when he narrows his eyes at them, they snort a laugh of their own.

“So, what’re we doing now?” he asks. “I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble on my account.”

As if summoned, a howl pierces the night sky.

Beryl purses their lips. “We’re out of time.

Since you can’t give me a ‘yes,’ you should prioritize getting the fuck out of here.

But I hope you understand I can’t just let you run.

” They heave an irritated sigh, then begin to undress.

Scars—faint, but visible—stripe their belly, muscular chest, and shoulders, all from a life of being used as a glorified guard dog.

Avery lets his gaze continue down, curious only about the wounds too deep for Beryl’s strain of werevirus to fully repair, only for his face to burst into flames when he catches a glance at their dick.

Averting his eyes, Avery asks, “What’s happening now?”