Page 84 of Chief

That’s one fucking word for it, I suppose. “Sir, I don’t understand, sir.”

I’m just hoping this doesn’t get back to my dad. Fortunately, the colonel desperately needs secrecy even more than I do.

He finally walks around behind his desk and sits. “Last chance,” he quietly says. “We can talk about this.Allegiance.”

“Sir, I don’t understand, sir.”

I’m sweating fucking bullets, though. Because I’ve never bucked an order.

Ever.

Especiallynot from a fucking colonel.

He leans back in his chair and slowly nods. “All right, then. Dismissed.”

I nearly run out of there, because by the time I get outside, I’m puking up my breakfast into a garbage can.

* * * *

Eddie rejoins me and Kenney and Gohber for PT and chow Tuesday morning. While he pretends everything’s okay, I sense an unease in him that wasn’t there before. He assures me he’s fine, but when I wait in my room at lunch time, just in case, he doesn’t show.

Over the next two weeks, I think okay, maybe things will shake out. I’ve discovered jerking off isn’t very satisfactory anymore. It’s not as bad when I remember stuff I did to Eddie, but any time I think about the other faceless, nameless “playmates,” or being on the receiving end of things, it kills my boner.

I have more time to spend with Kenney and Gohber, but miss having Eddie around all the time. I sense a growing sadness in Eddie’s gaze when it sometimes lingers on me a little too long from across the table during chow. I notice he always stays right behind me in PT, where he can watch me but I can’t look back at him.

I keep the burner cell, just in case, but don’t really expect to hear anything. He has my regular number, too.

My immediate anger has been replaced by grief, and I mourn what I thought we had with her, what we did that I enjoyed. I mourn the dream I had built up in my head, no matter how impossible it probably was from the start.

I mourn what I gave up for Elsa while thinking she actually fucking loved me. Then I shove to the back of my mind the fact that I gave up one ofmydreams for her, and I was so easily cast aside.

Because if I spend too much time thinking aboutthataspect of allthis?

I’ll swing back into rage, and probably do something stupid like hunt her down and kill her.

I feel…stupid.

Elsa finally texts me the next Saturday morning, and I hate the elation and hope that mixes with the dread and anger.

Are you ready to come back yet, pet?

Not Alpha, but pet.

Bottom of the ladder, I suppose.

I reply.

Did you get rid of the other guy, Elsa? I don’t mind playmates, but for pets it’s just me and Eddie.

She doesn’t reply.

It’s midnight when I hear a soft tap on my door, and I get up to answer.

It’s Eddie, and he looks like shit. He’s been crying.

I pull him in and close the door behind him. Then I get him over to my bed, where we sit. He curls up with his head in my lap and cries while I stroke his head and call him my good boy over and over. He leaves about an hour later, without ever telling me what happened. All we did is sit there while he cried, sniffled, and I held him and told him he was my good boy.

That I love him.