Page 89 of Healed in the Alpha's Embrace
“Jesus, Noah...”
She took in the scene—the two men groaning on the ground, and me, her supposed protector, looking more like the monster she feared.
24
ZOEY
The container slipped out of my hands, and I barely registered it hitting the ground.
Kyler had called me earlier, hinting not very subtly that Noah needed cheering up. So I cooked steak and potatoes. We hadn’t shared enough meals for me to be sure it was his favorite, but the man liked red meat, so I figured it was a safe choice. And I made a lava cake. Because chocolate fixed everything, right?
The flashback hit with such force that the world around me blurred and receded, leaving me in a tunnel of memories and utter silence. George’s face loomed over me, his sneer etched deep into my memory. White-hot pain exploded in my jaw that had me reeling, even though the moment was long past. I could almost taste the copper tang of blood, my tongue seeking out the gap where my back molar used to be before he’d knocked it out.
“Shit, Zoey!” Kyler’s voice broke through the fog invading my mind.
“Ky, call the cops,” Noah said.
“Already on it.”
I watched Noah move closer, but my feet retreated of their own accord. When I pulled away, his eyes filled with hurt. The sting of that expression was even worse than the memory of the blow I’d just witnessed. But I couldn’t stop shaking, couldn’t stop the cold dread that wrapped around me.
The two men on the ground were moaning, one clutching his face where a trickle of blood seeped through his fingers. They looked like they couldn’t even throw a decent punch, yet Noah had just decked one with a force that spoke of raw power and barely controlled rage. My heart stuttered at the sight. That was not the Noah I knew.
Noah wasn’t a monster. Was he?
“Police are on their way!” Kyler called as he paced with his phone pressed to his ear. The tight tension in his words was so different from his usual easygoing charm.
“Talk to me,” Noah pleaded, his blue eyes searching mine for something I wasn’t sure I could give. There was a desperation in his tone that reached me even through the static filling my ears and turning his words into an indecipherable buzz.
“Can’t,” I choked out. It was all too much—the violence, the blood. It all culminated in one massive flashback. Noah needed answers I couldn’t provide, comfort I couldn’t offer. Not when my mind was a scrambled mess, fighting to escape a past that refused to let go.
Time passed in inconsistent blasts rather than a smooth transition. I stood out in the parking lot, the food cooling at my feet. I sat in my still-parked car, knuckles tight on the steering wheel. Noah watched me from a careful distance.
Tremors racked through me. The car door was still open, a gaping maw that seemed as confused by my frozen state as I was.
Sam and Christian arrived. Their figures seemed to materialize from the blurred boundaries of reality, further distorting the already erratic passage of time.
Christian made his way across the lot to where Noah was speaking to the cops. The alpha was listening to Noah, but he never took his steady gaze from me.
Sam pulled me away from Christian’s intense stare when he called my name, his tone laced with worry. I felt the vehicle dip as he leaned into it, assessing my condition with a quick glance.
“Ky phoned,” Sam said. “He said Noah told him to get me. Are you okay to talk?”
I shook my head. Words were strangers to me now, slipping through my grasp like wraiths of smoke.
“Okay, you don’t have to say anything,” Sam said calmly. “I’m going to drive you back to Heather’s. You’re safe, sweetheart.”
He strode over to Noah and Noah’s father. Even from this distance, I could see their exchange was brief. Noah nodded, his gaze never detaching from me. He seemed to be seeking a lifeline across an ocean of turmoil. Coping with my own emotional state was difficult; there was no way I could handle his as well.
“Let’s go,” Sam said, returning to the car with purpose. He guided me from the driver’s seat into the passenger side, murmuring soothing words the whole time.
As we pulled away, I could feel Noah’s eyes on me.
Sam’s grip on the steering wheel was tight, his jaw set in a grim line as he navigated through the streets. “Those men you saw? George sent them. They came for Noah with a gun. Those weren’t good men, Zoey. Noah didn’t hit a defenseless man.”
I gasped, the sound sharp and painful in my throat. Tears blurred my vision as a tidal wave of frustration crashed over me. George’s relentless pursuit, his refusal to let me find peace, was suffocating.
“Zoey, I’m sorry,” Sam added, his voice thick with emotion.
