Page 70 of Fight or Fly

Flynn mumbled something unintelligible and threw a possessive arm over my legs. Jax shifted position until his head rested on my thigh rather than next to it. With that, I settled back and closed my eyes, relieved to let the cares of the day fall away.

TWENTY-SIX

Kameron

MY BODY WAS only partlymy own, most of the time—but Leo had been right that when I was exercising it, I found a sort of freedom that was hard to come by in other circumstances. It was not the body I’d been born with, but in the gym, it did my bidding and I settled into my skin in a way that was often difficult to achieve otherwise.

I thought maybe sex would eventually become another such conduit to self-acceptance—at least, the kind of sex I’d had during those intense days of Leo’s last heat. I prodded at the idea of Alex, who’d understood so much about me without being told, reuniting with the mate she’d thought lost for so long.

I was happy for her, truly. And also honest enough to grieve a bit on my own behalf, in case this meant she wouldn’t want anyone else besides Irina. We wouldn’t know that until we all had a chance to talk—and unfortunately, talking didn’t seem to be Alex’s forte. I hoped Irina balanced her in that regard, but the omega woman’s cool demeanor when she’d come to us in the infirmary didn’t bode well. Honestly, I was worried for Alex... though I doubted she’d appreciate the sentiment.

For now, though, I intended to put everything out of my mind for a bit in favor of exhausting myself.

The gym in the medical building was geared toward patient rehabilitation, but it would work just fine for my purposes with its weights, treadmills, and elliptical machines. The guard at the door waved me in, and one of the nurses I recognized from the overnight vigil with our alphas gave me a pleasant nod of greeting.

No one questioned my presence as I headed deeper into the building. The gym was exactly as I remembered it from our brief visit, when one of the doctors showed it to us and suggested Jax make use of the facility once his wound was a bit more stable.

I entered with my towel thrown over one shoulder and let my eyes wander over the handful of other people present, all of whom seemed to be looking in one direction rather than using the exercise machines. Following their gazes, I froze in place at the sight of a tall, sleek-muscled figure pummeling the ever loving shit out of a punching bag—one-handed.

“Oh, no,” I whispered, my heart sinking.

Alex’s shoulders were hunched, her weight balanced lightly on the balls of her feet. Her hair was loose, hanging in lank, sweaty strands. Blood streaked the back of the simple hospital clothing she wore as the unhealed whip marks on her back bled through the bandages—the wounds no doubt reopened thanks to the violent punches she was throwing right-handed. Her left arm still appeared to be in its sling, thank god, but there was no way the doctors had cleared her for this kind of activity. The sound of the heavy, thumping blows echoed through the gymnasium.

“Alex,” I said, appalled. And then, louder. “Alex!”

She didn’t hear me, or she was ignoring me. With a feral cry of frustration, she redoubled her efforts to reduce the punching bag to a torn mass of leather and stuffing.Christ—her knuckles weren’t even wrapped. I dragged my eyes away long enough to look at the others in the gym. They seemed at as much of a loss as I was.

“You know her, right? Should we try to stop her?” asked a beta man with a bandaged shoulder.

A sudden, crushing sense of my inability to deal with this situation on my own assaulted me. But I could only imagine what would happen to any beta stranger who dared to get between Alex’s fist and that punching bag.

“No,” I said. “Just, uh... give her some space and keep an eye on things, please? I’ll be back as fast as I can with help.”

The guy shot me an ‘are you kidding’look as I turned to leave. I couldn’t really blame him, but I was already jogging rapidly through the medical building, toward the front entrance. Maybe I should have flagged down some doctors, but the vision of half a dozen orderlies tackling Alex to the ground and holding her down while someone injected her with a sedative made me want to vomit.

I ignored the startled questions directed at me by the staff as I charged outside and hared back to the main house. I was breathless when I barged into the nest and skidded to a halt just inside the door. Leo jerked awake from a light doze, her gaze turning frightened when she saw the state I was in. Jax and Flynn, fast asleep on either side of her, didn’t stir.

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