Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-four
LEON
Karl was silent, listening intently as Leon filled him in on his observations of the camp, the quiet that had reigned while dinner was being eaten, and finally the argument he’d overheard between Michael and Hailey.
Leon tried to keep his tone even, practical.
But every time Karl’s breath caught for an instant, like it hurt him to breathe, something tugged at Leon, urging him to move closer and comfort him.
It didn’t help that Karl was watching him closely, as if he was seeing Leon clearly, even through his exhaustion and pain.
Leon wasn’t used to being seen, and he shouldn’t like it. Especially not from a wolf.
When Leon finished, silence stretched between them. Karl wasn’t looking at him any longer. Instead, he seemed to be processing what he’d been told. Then he said, flat and quiet, “You need to get out of here.”
Leon blinked. Not we. You.
“Yeah, we do. How’s your leg?”
Karl sat up from where he’d been leaning back against the pillows and promptly turned white as a sheet.
But when Leon reached out to support him, he batted his hand away with a low, fierce growl.
And then that goddamn stubborn wolf threw back the blankets covering him and attempted to swing around to sit on the side of the bed.
Halfway through the movement, a sudden, helpless whimper escaped him, a sound that hurt Leon to hear.
That earlier urge to comfort him was back a hundredfold, flaring sharp and hot.
He fought it down because he didn’t do attachment, not to anyone except Luna.
Attachment always ended in rejection, and Leon wasn’t going to be gutted like that again.
He wasn’t sure there was enough of that part of him left to gut.
Karl had frozen where he sat, his forehead dotted with sweat.
Taking no notice of the ferocious frown on his face, Leon persuaded him to lie back down, tucking him in once more despite his growls.
Like a tiny feral kitten, all spitting and fury, one hundred percent fierceness to zero percent damage. Leon shouldn’t feel fond, but he did.
“So we’re not going anywhere just yet,” Leon said, keeping it matter of fact because he could see the beginnings of humiliation in the way Karl had raised a hand to rub over his face, as if to hide his expression. “We need to get you well as quickly as possible, but—”
Suddenly remembering, he leaned back in close and lowered his voice again.
“But we hide how much you’re improving. They won’t worry about me escaping because they know I won’t leave you, not when we’re mates.”
Karl tensed, and it was all Leon could do not to react to his own words. Calling himself Karl’s mate had started out as a tactic. Now it sat under his skin like a brand, and he wasn’t sure it would ever stop burning.
“There isn’t time,” Karl said, and it sounded defeated. He’d never heard that tone from Karl before.
“There is,” he insisted. “Look, even if Michael wants to crack us on the skull and dump us in the river, he doesn’t want to do that.
” He paused as he mentally replayed what he’d just said.
“What I mean is, he may feel he has to do it, but he doesn’t want to.
Which means he’ll put off the decision until he has no option but to face it. ”
“Or he’ll make it quickly so that it’s not hanging over him,” Karl pointed out.
Which, shit, yeah, good point. And he remembered how annoying Karl was, always being right. Just once, he’d like him to be wrong.
“So what do you suggest?” And maybe it came out a bit snarky, but for God’s sake—how could Karl have pushed his buttons this much already when he’d only been conscious about five minutes? The man defied the laws of nature.
“You get out now, go back to the ranch, to your sister.” Karl’s eyes were fixed on Leon’s, sincere and urgent.
The thought of walking away from Karl—leaving him—felt like tearing something vital out of himself. He swallowed, throat tight. He needed logic and a clean plan. Instead, he had a knot in his chest and the certain knowledge that if he left Karl behind, he’d never sleep soundly again.
“I’m sorry—what?” Leon tilted his head as he studied Karl’s face, smoothing his voice until it held no trace of the turmoil inside him. “You’re not seriously suggesting I waltz out of here unharmed and leave you behind. Are you?”
That last question was mild, not challenging. The kind of mild that he usually used in those last seconds before claws and teeth came out and he took someone down.
“Your sister’s going to need to know about the threat on our doorstep. Matt, too.” Karl reached out for Leon, grabbed his hand in one that was still too warm. He pressed it, pleading in his eyes. “You gotta tell Matt, warn him.”
“Yeah, okay,” he said soothingly. “We’ll get back to Matt as quickly as we can. You just need to be able to walk first.”
Karl closed his eyes for an instant, and when he opened them, they were as clear and alert as they always were. Just tired. So very tired.
“I mean it, Leon. Your duty is to get back to your sister. Now, while you still can.”
Leon’s hand was still wrapped around Karl’s, both of them breathing hard as if they’d just gone three rounds without either of them even moving.
Before Leon could work out how the hell he was going to get through to Karl, the door opened and Ruth walked in. There’d been no knock, not even a pretense of privacy.
“Time for his antibiotics,” she said.
With difficulty, Leon bit back his immediate response of hello, Ruth, how lovely to see you, why yes, we are fine, thank you for asking. This underlined that they were powerless here. Prisoners. Even Ruth, who seemed fond of Karl, at least, was treating them that way.
She poured Karl another mug of water, gave him two tablets, and watched him so closely Leon was half-expecting her to peer in his mouth and check he’d swallowed the damn things.
“Thanks,” Karl said, voice hoarse, and her eyes warmed.
She nodded at him, glanced at Leon, and her eyes lingered on the way they were—were they still holding hands? What the fuck? But Leon wasn’t going to let go when she was looking. It gave credence to the mate story.
She left, and as the door closed behind her, some of the tension went out of the room.
Karl turned over on his side and held Leon’s gaze with his, deadly serious.
“You have to get out of here while you can,” he said softly.
“If you wait until Michael makes his decision, in the hope it’s in our favor, it’ll be too late.
They’ll be ready for you to try.” He let go of Leon’s hand and drew his arm back under the blanket.
Separating them. “Wait until they’re asleep tonight, then go. ”
“I heard you the first time,” he said, voice quiet. “I’m just not doing it.”
Karl closed his eyes, exhaustion in his face. “You’re not listening.”
“I am,” Leon said. “You just don’t like what I’m saying.”
Karl breathed out sharply. It could’ve been a laugh, if it hadn’t sounded so close to a sob.
“You think this is a joke? You think I don’t know what they’ll do to you when the decision gets made?” His voice was rough, scraping at the edges. “I’ve seen what people like Michael do when they decide someone’s a threat. You think I could watch that happen to you?”
Leon’s mouth twitched, not quite a smile. “You’re making a lot of assumptions about me letting them.”
Karl slammed his hand down onto the mattress. Not hard, but with enough force that his whole body jolted.
“This isn’t a game, Leon!” His voice cracked, ragged and raw. “You think I can live with that? Knowing you had a chance to get out and I—God—I stopped you?”
Karl’s chest rose and fell like he couldn’t get a full breath in, and he’d bared his throat without realizing, wolf instinct surrendering under the weight of helplessness. Leon had never seen him like this. Never thought he could look like this—exposed and desperate.
“If you could shove me out of here yourself, you would, wouldn’t you?” Leon’s voice was low. “You’d take the choice out of my hands. And you hate that you can’t.”
Karl didn’t answer. He just pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead, hard, like he could control his feelings by force alone.
“I can’t protect you,” he said again, barely audible now. “I can’t move. I can’t fight. I can’t even fucking stand up. I can’t stop them. And if they hurt you—if they even touch you—”
His voice gave out completely.
Leon sat for a moment, watching him. Karl would throw himself between them if it came to that—would bleed for him, would die for him.
And he thought he might finally be starting to understand why.
Not because he didn’t trust Leon to fight, but because Karl didn’t know how to let anyone else carry the burden.
Something in him drove him to be the one to protect, no matter what it cost him.
“You know, I’m not helpless,” Leon said quietly. “They come for us, I’ll make them pay.”
Karl rolled his head on the pillow, his eyes blazing. “You don’t fucking get it, do you? I know you’re dangerous. But you don’t have to be here. You should never have come after me in the first place. Get out, and stay safe.”
Leon hoped to hell no one was lurking outside listening, because Karl had almost shouted that, his voice cracking at the end.
“No.”
He let it hang there in the air a moment, let Karl see that was his final answer, before continuing. “You can order me around all you want. I’m still not leaving. I’ve got work to do, and so do you—yours is to get better.”
Karl breathed out sharply, promptly winced at the effect of that on his ribs, and stared at the ceiling, jaw tight and strained. Just as Leon was beginning to relax, to think Karl had accepted—however unwillingly—his decision, Karl turned his head to look at him again.
His eyes were bright and painful. “Please,” he said hoarsely .
Just one word, but one he never thought he’d hear from Karl.
“What?” he asked, ready to go digging for those pills in his pocket, to run for Ruth, to do whatever it was Karl needed.
Karl reached out, and when Leon leaned in, his warm, dry hand clumsily rested on his cheek. “Go,” he said. “Be safe.”
KARL
It took everything he had to say it. Karl didn’t plead. But he had no other options. He was trapped in this bed, and he had no leverage over Leon, not even pack loyalty to call on. All he could do was beg him to run .
Tobias hadn’t run. Tobias had laughed, darted just a little farther into the road, and then—
Karl’s breath hitched. He clamped his teeth shut against the rest of the memory.
He hadn’t begged then. He was begging now. Please had slipped out, low and ragged, and Leon was looking at him like he’d never seen him before.
Karl turned his face toward the wall, away from Leon. He didn’t want to see the refusal already forming in Leon’s gaze, because they were his decisions, bad choice after bad choice, that had brought them here. For him to be the reason, his failure to be the cause of someone being hurt…
And it wasn’t just someone. It was Leon. He had no idea when that had happened, or how it had happened. He just knew that it had.
The chair creaked as Leon stood, and Karl watched the wall and prayed with everything in him that Leon had listened, that the next sound he’d hear would be the door closing behind him.
Instead, the mattress moved, dipping as someone’s weight came down on it behind him. Then warmth pressed lightly against him, and a hand stroked back the hair that had fallen over Karl’s face.
“Karl?” It was gentle, and so unlike Leon that for an instant he thought he’d fallen asleep, that it was a dream.
But if he were dreaming, he wouldn’t feel like this—draggingly empty, with nothing left inside him.
No strength, not even a flicker of energy.
Only pain, over and over washing him in waves from his leg.
Karl’s throat tightened. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t be this—weak, broken, letting others get hurt on his watch. He’d spent his whole life making sure that would never happen again.
He hadn’t been fast enough or strong enough. And Tobias had died.
He swallowed hard, but the words crawled up his throat like they’d been waiting for years. Maybe they had—he hadn’t told this to a soul.
“I was supposed to watch him.” His voice didn’t sound like his own. Rough and low, like it had been sanded down to the barest parts.
Leon shifted slightly behind him, but stayed silent.
Karl blinked, vision going hot. He didn’t try to stop it.
“We were playing in the street. I was the older one. I should have watched him.” He dragged in a breath and it hurt. “He chased a ball into the road.”
Simple words, but they tore something open deep inside him, and shame flooded out, thick and heavy.
“I should’ve stopped him. I should’ve—”
He broke off. Couldn’t finish it. Couldn’t even breathe.
Leon was still and silent beside him. As his heart pounded and his throat burned and everything in him curled in on itself, a hand came to rest on his shoulder, steady, strong, and there.
And Karl, finally, let himself grieve. For his brother, for the boy he’d been, and for everything that came after.