Page 20

twenty

ENZO

My mate was in a hospital bed.

The girl beside her was curled up in a ball next to her.

In her new wolf form.

She was a tiny, dark blonde wolf. Much smaller than Aspen’s.

The scent they shared was so thick, so powerful, that no one had dared separate them.

Both were connected to bags of IV fluids. Medicine. Who knew what else.

I couldn’t stop pacing.

“Tell me again,” I growled at James, my enforcer. He was slumped over in a chair, exhausted but unsurprised by the order.

We were both covered in dried blood.

Someone had handed us clean clothes, and I’d only bothered with the shorts.

“Aspen said she was going to try to change the girl. That if she succeeded, the girl would become a werewolf. She told me to tell you to protect Noah if she didn’t make it. Then she bit the girl, and she passed out.”

That had gone down nearly twenty-four hours ago.

I hadn’t known she was at the hospital until multiple hours after it had happened. I’d still been in the forest, hunting down rogues.

While my mate was in the hospital, suffering.

Possibly dying.

If James wasn’t the last one to talk to her, I would’ve already ripped his throat out. This wasn’t a broken leg—it was her fucking life .

Clay strode into the room and handed me a bag of takeout food. “Eat this.”

“Who the hell is Noah?” I growled.

“We’ve got two of them in the pack, but they’re both fine,” Clay said, for at least the third time.

Fletcher was in a chair next to his sister, his eyes dark and his hair mussed.

He’d been informed of her condition before I was. He was the one who told me.

Fletcher refused to say a word about whatever he knew as far as his sister’s ability to turn humans into wolves. He hadn’t been surprised that she did it, though. Not when James told her about the nineteen-year-old woman bleeding out on her lap.

My rage flared.

I clenched my fists harder.

“No one else could’ve taken down that rabid before it killed someone,” Clay said, setting a hand on my shoulder. I shook him off. “She made her decision. There was nothing else you could’ve done.”

My entire body shook.

“Eat the sandwich. It’ll help,” my brother added.

I wanted to break his fucking nose.

The pack’s doctor came in and looked at the women’s vitals. Checked the fluid bags hanging. Read something on a screen nearby. “The girl’s vitals are strong. She’s healing much faster than she should be. Faster than a male werewolf.”

“Female werewolves heal faster,” Fletcher said.

I glowered at him.

I’d already known that, but what other information was he keeping from me?

“She’s going to make it,” he told me, though his expression was grim. “She’d be dead by now if she wasn’t. We’re going to have a bigger problem on our hands soon.”

No fucking kidding.

If Aspen could turn women into werewolves, the entire city would be at my gates, demanding that she change their mates. Their cousins. Their sisters. Their kids.

And it obviously wasn’t a trick she could repeat infinitely. Her heartbeat was so weak, Fletcher was the only one who seemed sure she would pull through at all.

“Eat the sandwich,” Clay said, and stepped away again. His phone rang, and I saw Hunter’s name on the screen before he lifted it to his ear. “Did you figure out which Noah needs protecting?”

“No, but I found a name for the girl. Sydney Lawrence. We have another problem, though. There’s a small crowd gathering at the hospital doors. They’ve got cameras. I’m sending more of our men in to keep things from escalating, but they want to know what’s going on too.”

Fletcher caught my gaze again. “She’s not going to be able to stay here.”

“Unless you make a statement,” Clay told me. “With none of your usual personality. They need someone to calm them down, not threaten them.”

“Then you do it.”

He shook his head. “It has to be you.”

I snarled again.

I didn’t want to walk away from her… but if the alternative was to put her more at risk, I’d go.

Striding up to Aspen’s side, I put a hand on her forehead. The blood on my skin was dry, and I ignored it.

Her heartbeat picked up a little with my touch. It was so slow and weak, that was a good thing.

I lowered my face toward her head, setting my free hand on her hip before I said into her ear, “If you die, I’ll have to kill your brother, Princess. Don’t even think about it.”

She didn’t stir, but some part of me felt like she had heard me.

I slid my hand over her forehead and said without looking away, “I’ll be right back.”

It took a few more minutes before I finally convinced myself to leave her side, but I eventually strode out of the room and into the hallway.

Clay fell into pace with me. “They’ll listen better if you wash your hands. And your chest. And your face.”

“I don’t want them to listen. I want them to be too afraid of me to come anywhere near her.”

Clay made a noise of disagreement. “Fear isn’t the best route here. They fear losing the women they love to old age and death more than they fear losing their lives.”

“I’m aware. Every wolf and woman in this city are going to want her to use that magic on them, their mate, or someone they’re related to. They all need to be more afraid of me than they are hopeful.”

Clay sighed. “Alright. Just?—”

“No justs .”

The hospital’s doors slid open.

I stepped through them, and the bumbling crowd outside went silent.

Phones lifted to take pictures or videos. That was good. I wanted the images of me covered in blood to circulate.

“Anyone who prevents those or their loved ones in actual need from getting into the hospital will spend the next month in jail,” I said, glowering at the crowd.

A lot of the people in it took a large step back.

Male werewolves stepped in front of female humans, as if they could protect the women from me.

If I wanted them dead, they couldn’t.

“The rumors are right,” I said flatly. “My mate somehow turned a dying human woman into a werewolf. We don’t know how. We don’t know why. Her life is currently hanging on the edge, and we don’t know if she’ll make it. Yet here I am. Forced to talk to you.”

As a whole, they took a few more steps back.

It wasn’t far enough.

“If Aspen can make more wolves without killing herself, she’ll want to do it. And if this is the cost every time, I will not allow it, and I will enthusiastically tear into anyone who would try to make her. If you want to challenge me over something that could kill my mate, go ahead.” I spread my arms wide, dominance pouring off of me. “I’ll enjoy watching every one of you bleed.”

I stalked back into the hospital.

If any of them spoke back to me, I’d have to kill them to make a statement.

Thankfully, none of them did.

When I stepped back into Aspen’s room, I made sure she was still stable before I finally stepped into the bathroom and scrubbed my hands.

It took longer than it should’ve.

I shouldn’t have let the blood dry for that long.

When they were clean, I finally went back to my mate’s side and put my hand on her face.

Her heartbeat grew slightly stronger again.

She wanted me close.

Fletcher leaned forward, his eyes on the heart monitor’s screen. The doctor had told us what to watch for so we would know if she was going downhill—and the opposite was happening.

“Your touch helps her,” Fletcher said, both surprised and urgent. “Get in bed with her.”

I already had her blankets and tubes lifted, but there was a bunch of medical crap connected to her.

He and Clay both came over and helped me lift things. A moment later, I was on my back on the tiny hospital mattress, with my mate’s fragile body on top of mine.

My neck contorted as I watched the screen and listened to her heartbeat.

Slowly, it grew stronger.

“Holy shit.” Fletcher’s palms were on the bed as he leaned over us, watching Aspen’s face.

The doctor stepped into the room, stopping in the doorway and taking in the scene. “Her wolf must recognize your scent.”

“Of course her wolf recognizes me,” I said quietly, trying not to disturb her.

“Male wolves don’t respond to a human female’s scent, even if they’ve been mated to them for decades,” he said. “You haven’t even sealed a bond yet.”

“There hasn’t been a full moon.” Mate bonds could only be sealed beneath a full moon. That was one of the few things my father had ever bothered to teach me. I didn’t see why it mattered, but he had insisted, and even humans only mated beneath the full moon because of it.

“Of course.” The doctor stepped closer, and my wolf rumbled menacingly.

Aspen moved, just a little. Just a crease between her brows and the flinch of her hand on my chest.

My growl cut off immediately.

“Her vitals are well on their way to normal,” the doctor said. “She has no internal or external injuries. At this point, it seems safe to assume she’ll recover. If we knew how the process worked, we’d have a better idea of how long it would take, but…”

I looked at Fletcher, my eyes narrowing.

The bastard looked exhausted.

Maybe Aspen was right about letting someone else trade him places at night.

Everyone else looked at him too.

He grunted. “It’s her story to tell.”

“She’s unconscious in a hospital, Etch,” James said, just as wiped out as her brother. “Her privacy isn’t worth a damn anymore.”

My wolf snapped internally.

He wanted her privacy to matter.

But James was right. The most important thing was getting her healthy. We could figure out where to go from there. She had already been weak and unconscious for too long. Almost a whole day.

Fletcher let out a slow, heavy breath. I knew he’d been keeping their family updated on her condition. Their parents, and Silas. None of them had tried to come visit, so I knew they were in on this secret. He must’ve told them to stay away, assuming I’d kill them for keeping it from me.

I wouldn’t.

I would’ve kept it quiet too, if I’d been in on the secret. Letting the city know what she could do was a risk to her life, and I wouldn’t have taken that risk no matter what it could mean for everyone else.

Why didn’t she know that?

Fletcher closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, they were darker. “It’s an energy transfer. The process. We’ve theorized as much, at least. We were infants the only other time it happened. Our birth father was the only one who saw what happened. According to him, Aspen bit our birth mother, and the transformation started immediately. She was shifting, her body growing fur and contorting, but it was failing. Aspen turned blue, and she stopped breathing. Our birth mother made him take her life to save Aspen. He did, then took us to our adopted parents, and made our adopted father kill him because he couldn’t live with what he’d done.”

Fuck.

Just… fuck.

“So we think it’s an energy transfer,” Fletcher finished, his gaze dark as it lingered on my mate. His sister. “We never knew if it was one she could actually survive. Until now.”

The doctor looked intrigued.

“I’ll need to run tests on her blood and saliva. I doubt we can recreate that in a lab, but it’s worth a try. I?—“

“Not until she’s healed. And not unless she gives permission,” I growled.

He lowered his chin to his chest, agreeing. “Of course.”

“How much longer?” Fletcher asked.

“If she’s truly just resting and her vitals remain where they are, I would assume she’ll wake up soon. There’s no guarantee, though.”

She might never wake up.

But if the ability to turn human women was naturally a part of her, I had to believe she would survive it.

I’d lose my mind if she didn’t.

The doctor checked on Sydney. When he adjusted one of the tubes connected to her, his fingers brushed her fur, and she jerked backward. Her wolf gave a weak growl.

Clay crossed the room and squatted next to her, lowering his voice. “Hey, Sydney. It’s alright. You’re okay. You’ve become a werewolf, but our pack is here to help you through it.”

She saw fur, and moved a little. Then yelped.

“You were fading,” Clay said gently. “The king’s mate bit you. She’s a female werewolf. Her bite changed you into one of us, and saved your life.”

Sydney growled weakly, but seemed to calm down a little.

Clay rubbed her fur lightly. “It’s going to be okay. Keep resting.”

He murmured to her for a few more minutes before her breathing leveled out again. The plastic armrests on the side of the bed prevented us from touching, which I appreciated. I didn’t want the other woman’s scent on my skin when Aspen woke up.

Another few hours passed.

The girl shifted back to her human form, and Clay helped her into a hospital gown. When he offered to have James and Arthur take her to the Lodge, she whispered that she wanted to stay until Aspen woke up.

People brought her food.

Spoke with her in hushed whispers.

Aspen stirred a few more times, but didn’t truly wake up.

I waited.

A few hours later, my mate finally opened her eyes.

It was dark outside.

Most people in the room were asleep.

The second hospital bed had been wheeled out, and Sydney was asleep on top of Clay, in an uncomfortable-looking chair. She’d been given the all-clear, and her wounds were gone completely. My brother was snoring, completely out too.

Hunter had come with dinner for everyone and was typing on his phone in the corner.

Fletcher dozed on and off. More on than off, but he woke up to stare at the screens showing Aspen’s vitals every now and then before he dozed again.

“Did you find out who Noah is?” I asked Hunter, my voice low and my grip tightening on Aspen. If Noah was a lover she’d lied to me about, he would die. Painfully.

“Still going through all of the registered Noah’s. Haven’t found anything concrete. None with connections to her.”

“Fucking Noah.” My chest vibrated more than it should’ve.

“Who’s Noah, and what did he ever do to you?” Aspen whispered.

My heart stopped abruptly when the gorgeous female peeled her head weakly off my chest.

“Princess?” I cupped her face with my hand, taking the weight of her head to ease her pain. If she was in pain.

“Is the girl?—”

“Sydney is alive, and furry. Back in her human skin for the moment, but very much a wolf,” I said.

Relief crossed her face.

Then worry.

“Does the city know?”

“They do. I won’t let them come for you.”

“What about Nova?”

No va ?

My forehead creased.

Ahh.

Fuck.

She wanted us to protect Nova . James heard her wrong.

“Pack females are never at risk,” Hunter said, his tapping coming to an end.

Aspen’s worried eyes met mine. “I might have misled you about something important.”

I waited.

I was too relieved she was okay to care about being lied to.

“I told you I would know if Nova was a wolf. I do know. She is. Silas has been protecting her, but she has a stalker. Someone else who knows what she is. Nova and Silas don’t know who. If that person realizes she could turn humans...”

“I need a last name,” Hunter said.

His voice was too calm. Too measured. He didn’t know what we knew.

“Jacobs. She’s a tattoo artist.” Aspen’s gaze was locked with mine.

“She smells like coffee and ink,” I said.

Hunter was out the door a heartbeat later.

“You can’t be mad at me. You told me not to leave the truck, and I didn’t,” she whispered, her eyelids drooping over her eyes.

“I know, Princess.” I helped her lower her head back to my chest. “Are you in pain?”

“No. Just tired.” A moment passed. “Can we go home? We’re both covered in dried blood, and this bed is really uncomfortable.”

I barked out a laugh.

Fletcher was at our side a moment later. His hand was on her arm, and I didn’t snap at him for it. Even though I wanted to.

“Aspen?”

She tipped her head to the side and gave him a small, sleepy smile. “Hey, Fletch. I’m okay.”

Emotion welled in his eyes. I averted mine to give them a little more privacy. It was as much as they were going to get, because I wasn’t letting go of her.

“Don’t fucking do that again.” His voice cracked.

“I won’t.”

I smelled the lie in her voice. My grip tightened, but I didn’t tell him. I was going to be the first one to argue about that with my mate.

And I knew her well enough to be damn sure there would be many of us arguing with her over it. When she cared about something, she was as stubborn as she was gorgeous.

“You look like shit,” she mumbled to him, and he gave her a small smile.

“You look worse.”

She laughed softly. “How long have I been out?”

“A day and a half.”

“Guess I missed our birthday. Oops.”

“We can celebrate when you’re healed.”

“Okay.” Her eyelids lowered again. She was clearly exhausted. “Can you make Enzo take me home?”

He glanced at me. “I don’t think I can make your mate do anything.”

Damn straight.

I would get her home, though. After the doctor said it was safe to move her.

“I think I need to sleep,” she mumbled.

“Good call.” Fletcher ruffled her hair lightly. “Love you.”

“Love you too.”

Something about the words made my chest tighten.

She had never said them to me.

I had never given her a reason to.

Did I want her to?

Maybe I did.

But if I wanted that, I was going to have to work my ass off to make it possible. She had clearly been pissed at me in the bar. And during that day, before she made me grilled cheese.

I’d forgotten to ask Hunter to add her to the enforcers’ group chat, too.

Shit.

Maybe I’d messed everything up.

That might’ve happened the first day I told her she was going to live in my room and be my mate, though.

Aspen fell back asleep in my arms, and something in my throat thickened.

Yeah.

Maybe I wanted her to love me.

Fuck.