Page 8 of Fat Arranged Mate
"Is that what you call this half-life you're living?Alive?" Something flickers in her expression—pity, maybe. It makes my skin crawl.
"You’re acting like a child." I step back, needing distance from her scent, her presence. "Just follow protocol next time, or I'll report it directly to the Alpha."
"Go ahead." She hitches her bag higher on her shoulder. "I'm sure he'll be fascinated to hear how his head of security is wasting time harassing medical staff instead of addressing actual threats."
"You don't know anything about actual threats."
"And you don't know anything about me." She turns to go, then pauses. "By the way, your hand is bleeding."
I glance down, noticing the reopened cuts on my knuckles from hitting the shower wall. "It's nothing."
"A medic might be able to help with that, you know." Her tone drips with sarcasm. "Enjoy your righteous anger, Zaleska. I'm sure it keeps you warm at night."
She walks away before I can respond, her back straight despite the tension I can see in her shoulders. I resist the urgeto call after her, to continue the argument that always seems to spiral when we interact. Instead, I watch her go, ignoring the way my wolf strains toward her retreating figure.
Damn woman never knows when to back down. Never seems to understand what's at stake. How quickly safety can shatter, how permanently loss can destroy everything you thought you were.
"You worry too much, Dyl," Ethan said, just weeks before the attack. "Not every shadow hides a monster."
"Better safe than sorry," I replied, checking the locks for the third time that night.
He sighed, sprawled across our couch. "You know, you never did any of those normal twenty-something things. College parties. Road trips. Dating. You were too busy making sure I had a normal life."
"And?"
"And maybe it's time you lived a little, too." He tossed a pillow at my head. "The world won't end if you let your guard down occasionally."
But it did end. For him. Because I wasn't vigilant enough.
Because I let myself believe, for one moment, that we were truly safe.
I reach my cabin, slamming the door behind me hard enough to rattle the windows. Two days off. Two days with nothing but memories and a lottery ceremony that suddenly feels like another form of punishment rather than duty.
Tomorrow, some poor female will have her name linked with mine. For her sake, I hope it's someone tough.
Anyone, really, except Sera Daley with her stubborn righteousness and her infuriating inability to see danger until it's too late.
The wolf inside me—the part that operates on instinct rather than reason—disagrees, stirring with interest at the thought of her. I push it down ruthlessly. My wolf has no say in this. Not anymore. Not since it failed to protect the one person I swore never to let down.
I strip off my shirt and drop to the floor, forcing my body through a punishing set of push-ups. Physical pain is better than thinking. Better than feeling. Better than remembering.
One. Two. Three.
Ethan's body, growing cold in my arms.
Ten. Eleven. Twelve.
"Did I get any of them?"
Twenty. Twenty-one.
"I'm scared."
Forty-two. Forty-three.
His last breath, soft against my cheek.
Sixty-eight. Sixty-nine. Seventy.
