Chapter 7
Orsen
Nix and I both stared at the door.
The haze of red that had been my vision was starting to ebb, but the tightness in my chest wasn’t going anywhere.
“I’m not fucking insane, right?” I said, unable to pry my eyes away from where she had just been standing. Part of me was giving some serious consideration to ripping the damn door off its hinges and dragging her out so I could get to her again, see her, claim her.
“You’re not. It is definitely her,” Nix confirmed. “Calm the fuck down, man. You’re acting feral.”
Emmeline’s face was etched into my memory, scarred into my very being. There was no way in hell I would ever forget that subtle peach scent, how it was so distinctly hers.
“Where the fuck has she been all these years? Did she just choose to leave us? We all assumed the worst had happened for her not to come home that day, but… she just ran off?”
“She’s fucking terrified, Orsen. There was zero love or recognition on her face.
She has no idea what’s going on. You can’t just fucking maul her!
” The smell of burned peaches was clogging my throat, drowning me.
Our mate’s fear was physically painful. No dragon should ever have to smell that.
It was so strong, quickly flooding the entire house.
But it was ridiculous. That was our Emmeline. My Emmeline.
“She’s my fucking mate, Nix!” I growled, turning to him, finally tearing my focus away from the bathroom door. “You saw the way she reacted to me.”
Nix rolled his eyes, giving me that disbelieving expression he could shove up his ass. “Yes, we can all invoke a reaction in her, Orsen—but that doesn’t mean we should, especially if we don’t know what’s going on. We need to know the facts first.”
“Oh, like, where the hell she’s been for six years?” I asked, raising my brows, my tone biting.
Nix nodded reluctantly, his stare drifting toward the door again as his brows rose. “That would be a good start. And maybe you can apologize for being such a Neanderthal?”
I clenched my jaw, not responding. As much as I hated to admit it… he was right. I wasn’t exactly thinking with my upstairs brain right now. I needed to maintain my composure and get answers. But it was pretty damn clear I was distracted.
Nix stepped up to the bathroom door, laying a hand against it as he called through the wood panel, “Hey… Rowan? We didn’t mean to scare you.
Orsen never should have grabbed you like that.
” His voice was all soft and gentle, like when he spoke to young children or injured animals.
Part of me hated him for how easily he could console, while another part was angry with him for not being as furious as I was.
“Is Griff okay?” Her voice was weak and teary, despite her efforts to sound strong. It hit me hard, harder than I wanted it to.
I’d spent years trying to make myself hate her to dull the pain, to pretend she hadn’t meant the world to me so that I could fucking get up in the morning, but I never wanted to be the reason my mate cried.
Regardless of the fury and hurt, keeping Emmeline—or Rowan, I supposed—from experiencing pain was still ingrained in my DNA.
Then again, I couldn’t help but wonder whether her tears were genuine. Though they seemed to be, the whole situation was ludicrous. Could I really trust what she was saying? From everything I could tell, she hadn’t died or been taken hostage. She’d left us… left me.
I glanced over at Nix, who narrowed his eyes at me, then turned back to the door.
As far as I knew, her precious Griffin was being seen to by other members of the horde.
He’d still been breathing when a handful of our enforcers had pulled me off him, so I assumed he was fine. Dragons healed fast, after all.
“He’s fine…” Nix went back to that gentle tone. “I have to ask; do you know me?”
Rowan growled in frustration. “No, I’ve never met any of you psychopaths. Why are you so pissed at me?”
Banging and the shuffling of feet sounded through the door, the distinctive noise of creaking hinges and cabinets. She was searching the bathroom.
Smart girl.
“We aren’t mad at you, not at all,” Nix rushed to say.
“Looked like it to me! Though it wasn’t exactly clear whether your feral friend was pissed or just horny!” Rowan shouted, her voice taking on a familiar, adorable groan.
Despite the gravity of the situation, the corner of my mouth twitched. Our mate had always been a feisty one, and I remembered liking that quite a bit. It may have dimmed the bright glare of my anger, but it wasn’t gone. She still had a hell of a lot to answer for.
Nix chuckled lightly, rolling his lips between his teeth. “Both.”
I glared at him.
“He’s… stressed. I’m sorry. We’re sorry. That won’t happen again. I promise.”
“You’re sorry? I came here to help your horde, and instead, that asshole beats up my best friend and mauls me?” Her voice was muffled by the bathroom door, but there was no mistaking the annoyance.
At this rate, it had to be better if I just tore the fucking door down, and we had this conversation face-to-face. This was ridiculous. She was our mate, for fuck’s sake. But then her words registered.
“Wait. You’re the healer? The one who helped Griffin?” I asked, genuinely curious.
Griffin had called us, asking to bring in a healer friend to the den to help with the sick kid. I had been against it at first, but we all knew he’d survived some pretty severe injuries when out west. If his healer had saved his life, we wanted to hear their opinion.
How in the hell could that be Emmeline, though? She had been in college to become a preschool teacher before she’d… gone missing. She loved kids and balked at the sight of blood.
“Yes, I came here to help Rory. I was told you approved that.” As she spoke, it was easy to hear her scampering around the bathroom, ripping everything open. Then metallic clattering, followed by a hiss, made my ears perk up.
“We did—umm, what was that noise, sweetheart?” Nix asked, his voice laced with concern.
“Rowan?” I pushed when she didn’t respond.
Still nothing.
My chest tightened. Instincts were flaring that had been dormant for so long.
I remembered this feeling, the need to hear her voice again, to know she was okay.
I had lost my mate once, and I was not going to let it happen again—even if she didn’t know who she was.
I reached out to grab the door handle, intent on ripping the fucking thing off its hinges, when she finally spoke.
“I stubbed my toe,” Rowan mumbled, a clear lie. So many years ago, I’d seen Emmeline walk into a piece of furniture. She’d danced around on the spot, clutching her foot and declaring the coffee table was now her sworn enemy, muttering PG curse words, like cheese and rice, over and over again.
I wasn’t sure what she was lying about, or why she’d bothered, but her defiance was unfortunately endearing. It shouldn’t have been, but that was the power a mate had over a dragon.
“You should be careful, then,” I whispered to the door, my voice unusually soft.
“I highly doubt a stubbed toe is the biggest of my concerns at present,” Rowan snarked.
Holding back a chuckle, I eyed the door. Nix crossed his arms, biting his lip as he no doubt tried to think of some reasonable solution to the situation.
“You can’t stay in there forever, healer,” I grumbled.
Nix pushed past me, speaking to the door again. “How can we assure you that you’re safe? That we won’t touch you?”
“I want a cell phone. I need to make a call,” she demanded.
Most humans would have been trembling in fear in her situation. Yet, somehow, Rowan managed to maintain her composure, speaking through the bathroom door as if she were comfortably seated at a negotiation table.
Scoffing at her, I rolled my eyes. “To who?”
No one she could contact would be a credible threat to me. I was merely curious about who she felt would actually help her out right now.
“Horde Alpha Greir, Horde Alpha Horrik, or Horde Alpha Luca,” she rattled off casually, name-dropping some of the most important Alphas in the country. My eyes widened, brows up to my hairline now. I glanced at Nix, who grinned back, shaking his head.
“And why would you be calling them?” My assumption that there was no one she could call who might be a potential threat was apparently very wrong. Crafty little thing, aren’t you?
“I’m friends with those hordes, with half of the Montana and Alaska hordes, too. I’ve healed for nearly all of them. I want them to know where I am. That way, if I don’t check in with them, they’ll rain ever-loving hell down on your doorstep. That would make me feel safe.”
I could hear the proud smile in her voice. If she truly did have working relationships with that many hordes, she had every reason to be confident in her work, even if that was annoying as hell.
“We know Luca. I’ll call him—but please, you need to come out of the bathroom,” Nix bargained with her.
“Is it just you, or is your feral friend there?” Rowan countered.
Nix stifled a laugh and looked at me. “He can go outside.”
Dropping my chin, I glared at him, a low growl rumbling out of my chest. “No, I will not.”
“Ugh. Then he will wait on the other side of the room, all right?” Nix gritted out, shooting daggers at me before hissing, “You're making this way more difficult than it has to be, Orsen.”
“I am an Alpha of this horde, not some feral animal.”
“Could have fooled me,” Rowan mumbled to herself.
Her comment wasn’t lost on me; I could hear everything going on behind that door, including the way she scoffed and shifted the weight between her feet—another familiar Emmeline move.
“And Orsen’s going to behave like an Alpha this time.”
I nearly snarled at Nix, the need to punch him tingling up my spine like it had before I’d laid into Griffin. I needed a damn drink at this rate, but there was no getting Rowan out of the bathroom without giving up a bit of something. At least it was just a cell phone.
“For fuck’s sake, fine. I’ll go over there. Just make your damn call.”
Nix smiled as I rolled my eyes. “Excellent. Now we’re getting somewhere.”