Page 3

Chapter 2

The Bungalow

Sinclair

G rinwald’s apartment has a tall sheet of plywood in place of a door. Titus’s doing, I assume. It took threatening the lazy bastard for him to fix the elevator, so I’m not surprised he hasn’t fixed his own door.

Bishop lifts his fist as if to knock but apparently decides there’s no time for pleasantries. Since it’s just resting against the doorframe, he knocks the plywood over with a light push. It lands on the floor with a loud smack and a plume of wood shavings and dust. I hear the apartment super squawk at the startling noise.

“What the fu—” he stutters.

“Stay here,” Bishop whispers, then pushes in. “I think you know who sent me.” Bishop’s voice is cold and exacting.

“I fixed the elevator!” I hear Grinwald gripe

“That’s not why I’m here. Your car keys, give them to me.”

“Wh—but—” he sputters, reluctant but clearly intimidated.

“Quickly now, Grinwald,” Bishop drawls threateningly.

I hear the jingle of keys, then Bishop adds, “And if anyone comes asking, I was never here and you have no idea what happened to your car.”

“Yeah, sure, sure,” Grinwald mumbles.

“Whatever they threaten, I assure you I’ll do ten times worse if you talk.”

“Y-Yes, I understand.”

“You better. It will be your own neck if you decide to call my bluff.”

“We’ll walk from here,” Bishop says without looking at me. Then he gets out of Grinwald’s beat up sedan. 1

We’re in the parking lot of what looks like a trailhead. It took us an hour of driving out of the city to get to this more rural, wooded area, and Bishop barely spoke three words.

It’s not like I’m in a chatty mood, but I don’t like the guilt and self-hate I see weighing him down. He’s shutting me out. If I’m going to survive whatever happens next, I need him to be my strong, confident mate. Not the little boy who blamed himself for his father’s abuse trapped in an alpha’s body.

I get out of the car and speak across the hood. “I don’t blame you.”

My voice is raw and scratchy after sobbing so hard—I feel like a hard-wrung towel. The muscle at the back of his jaw forms a tight ball and he swallows, hazel eyes boring into me wordlessly but far from silent.

I continue trying to convince him. “The only reason we got to her in time was because you weren’t with us. If you weren’t at the Estate, who knows when we would have found out.” He swallows. The light behind his eyes remains dim. “You can’t be everything, everywhere, all the time. That’s why we form packs, Bishop. You’re not Atlas; you don’t have to carry the world on your own.”

Bishop shakes his head, but not before his features soften. He walks around the front of the car and pulls me to his chest, wrapping his arms tightly around me. “Why are you the one comforting me?” he whispers into my hair with a flat, sad chuckle.

I hear his heart thump comfortingly under his warm chest and Ecker’s words return to me.

“That’s what it means to belong to someone. Your battles belong to them too.”

I tilt my head back to look into his eyes. “Because you belong to me.”

We don’t take the trail. Instead, Bishop leads me through an uncleared patch of forest in the opposite direction. His hand slips into mine at one point and stays there, even when he has to hold back brush or low-hanging limbs for me to pass under. It’s an anchor we both need.

I don’t see our destination until we’re right on top of it because the cabin in front of us isn’t built in a clearing like you’d expect. Instead, this rustic house was constructed right around the trees.

I count three trunks bisecting the simple, single-level cabin.

“What is this?” I ask, taking in the shuttered windows and low, sloped roof.

“Our escape plan,” Bishop says, dropping my hand and walking toward the small front porch. He reaches under the steps and pulls out a key attached to a small strip of Velcro. “After what happened to our parents,” he continues, walking up the short set of stairs, “we knew we needed a back-up plan, a place we could escape to if needed.”

Ten years ago, their parents were killed in a car accident after being arrested for being noble-blooded and unsuppressed. A murderous plan no doubt orchestrated by the Echelon to further sabotage their chances at the Trials. My chest tightens with rage and hopelessness, as I know they are still getting away with unchecked power, my grandma just another casualty in their evil reign.

“I hate them,” I mutter bitterly.

“Me too.” Bishop sighs.

He lets us into the cabin and explains, “It’s completely off-grid and not tied to any of us. I beat the landowner in a game and instead of paying out, he let us build. All off the books, so our names aren’t connected in any way. He doesn’t even know who we really are.”

He lights an old gas lantern, and I look around the space. It’s clear by the mismatched lumber that most of the building materials were salvaged. The kitchen consists of a small steel sink and a free-standing cabinet with a cutting board and portable camping stone

“Is there electricity?” I ask, noticing a mini fridge and lamp.

“A generator. I just need to turn it on. I’ll be right back.” He dips down to kiss my forehead and gives my hand a quick squeeze.

He disappears out the front door, and I stand in awe at what these men—probably just boys when they built it—have accomplished. It’s nothing fancy, but they did all of this on their own. I’m continually impressed as I explore.

A ratty, but thick knit rug in the front room separates the kitchen from a humble but cozy area with a couch, reading chair, and a bookshelf full of well-worn books.

I wonder if these are their most cherished stories, the ones they would pick for the end of the world, or are they unread tales they reserved to carry them through whatever dark times would force them here. There’s a few old Hot Wheels cars dotting the shelves, and I wonder which of them brought those.

I find the bathroom next, just a toilet and shower with a concrete base. No mirror. I laugh to myself, knowing that wasn’t Ecker’s choice.

“Are you hungry?” I jump at Bishop’s voice and realize I can now hear the hum of a generator under us. I shake my head. He nods to the shower behind me. “I relit the pilot light so we’ll have hot water.”

I look down at my white tank covered in my grandmother’s blood. It’s caked on my hands too, flaking and cracked along my palm lines.

Overcome with sudden nausea, I dash to the toilet a few steps away.

Pain bites at my knees as I clumsily drop to the floor. I retch, but nothing comes up, my stomach empty. Bishop’s fingertips are cool on my neck as he wordlessly gathers my hair back. The garish contrast of my red hands on the white porcelain rim sends my stomach heaving again, and Bishop’s palm rubs light circles on my back. His tenderness is what finally breaks me.

I curl my knees into my chest and sob. It’s hard to breathe past the splinters of my heart that have lodged themselves into my lungs.

Bishop wraps his arms tentatively around me at first, like he doesn’t know what I want or need right now. I feel so fragile and pathetic in his big arms. The feeling of uselessness only makes me cry harder.

This time, when he tightens his hold, there’s no hesitancy. I feel his confidence through the bond, his alpha instincts overriding his overthinking. My shoulders shake, and he just keeps rocking us. My nose runs, and he offers me his sleeve. My hair falls into my eyes, and he automatically puts it up in a ponytail for me.

Once my tears turn to hiccuping sniffles, he gently extricates me from his grip and stands, but he keeps a hand on my shoulder. Never breaking that contact, he reaches his long arm to turn on the shower.

He crouches back down to where I’m still sitting on the floor and teases my blood-stained shirt over my head. My bikini top follows.

He rises, holding out his hand. “Stand for me, Omega.” His voice is soft despite the alpha growl, just like when he used it to get me to leave my grandmother. The command is the only thing that gives me the strength to pull myself to my feet.

Light steam now billows from the shower, and he shimmies my bottoms off before leading me under the stream of water. I turn to face him, the water cascading down my back, and help him out of his clothes just like he did for me.

I pull him under the water with me. Drops gather on his thick eyelashes and sluices down the defined, golden canvas of his body. “You’re so beautiful,” I whisper, and he wraps me in his arms, the hot water beating soothingly down on us.

Any comfort found in this moment is quickly followed by guilt.

How can I feel anything but pain?

I shouldn’t be able to, not when my grandmother is on some back alley operating table fighting for her life . . . if she’s even still alive. The thought makes me begin to shake as if to cry again, but I have no tears left.

“I’m going to clean you up now,” Bishop says softly and steadies my shoulders. Then he gently tips my chin up. I expect him to brush my lips with his, but he only presses a light, chaste kiss to my cheekbone then whispers, “I can’t promise everything will be okay. But I can promise to be by your side no matter what.”

1. “Time Stands” by Nathaniel Rateliff