I Still Don’t Fucking Know Where I Am
I Still Don’t Fucking Know Where I Am
Tansy
I’m floating through the dark, soft moonlight seeps through the back of my eyelids.
The air smells different. Gone are the aromas of wet canvas, sweat, and sedatives. Now, everything smells warm. Clean. The faint scent of sandalwood, pine, and soap drifts in the air around me.
My body shifts, suspended in air. I’m weightless. The world sways with each step someone takes, and it takes a long, fuzzy moment to realize it isn’t the world moving. I am.
I’m being carried.
Cold night air brushes my bare legs, sharp and needling, but then it’s gone, swallowed by heavy warmth. The shift makes my skin prickle, instincts curling tight in my gut.
We’re inside somewhere.
A house?
A building?
Another tent?
I can’t tell. Everything is muffled, drug-soft, my thoughts dragging like they’re stuck in honey. I don’t even know how much time has passed…
“You’re home.” A soft voice lets out a sigh of relief.
“Hey, Beck,” the alpha carrying me whispers. Warren. His name drifts up from the fog in my head.
The soft voice answers him, threaded with worry this time. “Is she…okay?” He brushes close, light footsteps and a smaller frame. He smells of clean linen and rain-soaked cedar.
Gentle, quiet, soft.
Beta.
Safe.
My muscles loosen just a fraction as I breathe him in.
“She’s asleep,” Warren says, adjusting his hold on me. His chest vibrates with the words. “Sedated. Heavily.”
A pause. Then a rough swallow from the beta.
“How’s Cassian?” the tall alpha asks, his voice sounding scared of the answer. What was his name again? Gray? I think…
The beta, Beck, lets out a shaky breath. “He woke up briefly this morning, but it was just for a minute.” The beta’s voice trembles. “His fever’s still really bad, and the swelling hasn’t gone down at all.”
Something shifts in Warren’s chest beneath my cheek—tightening, like his whole body is bracing around the news. Grief? Fear?
“He asked for both of you,” Beck whispers, and I swear I can smell tears in the air. “But then he passed out again.”
Warren exhales through his nose, shaky but controlled. “It’s okay, babe,” he rasps, and my body absorbs the sound through the rise and fall of his breathing.
I should open my eyes.
I should demand to know where I am and what they want from me, but the drugs tug everything out of focus again.
The voices fade as Warren starts walking.
My body sways and scents blur.
Then I sink back into the dark.
I surface slowly.
Not all at once, just a thin crack in the dark at first, then a widening bloom of awareness. The fog in my head is still heavy, but something nudges me upward. A shift in temperature. The impression of stillness. The faint weight of a blanket tucked under my chin.
I’m lying in a bed. My lashes twitch, sticky from sleep, and I force one eye open. I’m in a bedroom.
A real one.
The air smells…different. Clean. Familiar in a way I can’t place. Wood polish, cotton, something earthy and warm that clings to the sheets. The mattress is firm beneath me, the pillow cool against my cheek.
How long have I been here?
My lashes lift a fraction more.
I can’t see much, only a window on the far side of the room. Faint gray light spills through it, the kind that comes right before dawn. Soft. Cold. Everything else is wrapped in shadows.
Slowly, I turn my head, letting my eyes sweep the dark room. Shapes blur into each other. A dresser. Pictures on the wall. A door cracked just enough to hint at a dark hallway beyond. And then I see a shape right beside me.
A big one.
My breath catches hard as my vision sharpens enough to make sense of what I’m seeing.
An alpha.
Sound asleep right beside me. He’s not touching me, but he’s so close I could reach out and brush his arm if I wanted to.
He’s big with broad shoulders and heavy muscle.
A soft smattering of dark hair covers his chest, trailing down over large, defined pecs.
The kind of size you can’t mistake even in the dim gray light.
And he’s warm, radiating so much heat in slow, steady breaths.
I squint, my sluggish mind scrambling to identify him. For one fragile second, I convince myself he’s one of the men from the tent. It takes me a second to remember their names. Warren and Gray.
But then my eyes adjust.
And it’s not them.
Not Warren’s sharp, clean lines.
Not Gray’s towering bulk or dark curls.
This alpha is older.
A stranger.
Swift pain rips through my abs and my back aches as I sit up too fast. A small sound slips out of me before I can swallow it, and I quickly slap a hand over my mouth. I stare at the stranger with wide, panicked eyes, praying he didn’t hear me.
But he stays perfectly still. Not moving, chest rising in slow, measured breaths.
Swallowing hard, I sit a little taller, scanning him head to foot.
He’s lying on top of a thick blanket, not under it. One leg is propped up with a pillow, the knee wrapped in thick bandages. His skin looks pale in the faint dawn light, almost gray around the edges. Sweat beads along his forehead, and his breathing is shallow, uneven.
He looks sick.
He smells sick. Sour and acidic at the same time.
My gaze drags upward.
His hair is dark with streaks of salt-and-pepper threaded through it. A rough beard shadows his jaw, uneven, like he hasn’t shaved in days. Lines fan around his eyes and crease lightly at his mouth.
Forties…maybe even fifties.
And I have no idea who he is.
Moving carefully, I shift my weight and slide one leg over the edge of the mattress. The frame dips with my movement, but the alpha doesn’t stir. He simply exhales a ragged breath that makes my skin prickle.
I slip off the bed entirely, feet hitting a soft rug. My knees wobble, but I stay upright, gripping the edge of the mattress until the room stops tilting.
Only then do I realize that I’m not wearing that awful corset anymore. I’m in an oversized T-shirt. It’s thin and worn, the hem brushing mid-thigh, and the collar loose against my collarbone.
I lift the fabric to my nose, sniffing before I even think about it.
Smoked amber.
Leather.
Warm and dark and undeniably alpha.
But it’s not Warren or Gray.
Did they already get rid of me? Did they give me to another pack as some kind of form of payment, or was I snatched again?
Fear buzzes under my ribs, sharp and electric as I lift the hem of the shirt. Relief hits me just as fast as I find the same lacy black panties from the black market still there. I take that as a sign that I wasn't violated, but the relief is thin, since I don't really know for sure.
Still, there's no sense dwelling on what I can't remember.
The room around me is dim, dawn starting to bleed through the edges of the soft yellow curtains. I pad across the floor, every step careful, my bare feet barely whispering against the rug. The door is cracked open, teasing me with the promise of escape.
I hook my fingers around the edge and ease it open a fraction more.
Then I freeze.
Gray is sitting in a kitchen chair in the hallway, angled crookedly against the wall. His head is tipped back, throat exposed, stubble shadowing his jaw. His thick arms are crossed over his chest. Long legs stretched out, one boot kicked off, the other still on.
Dead asleep.
Relief washes over me, followed by swift rage.
It’s clear my omega senses are already kicking in, latching on to the first non-familial alpha I’ve ever been this close to. It’s a pull. A bond forming on instinct alone.
And it fucking horrifies me.
At least I’m not spiraling into my heat. I can only assume they dosed me with something in that tent to keep my body from betraying me outright.
Taking a deep breath, I open the door a bit more, staring intensely at Gray’s face.
I’m so close to him, I can see the faint crease between his brows even in sleep and the slow rise and fall of his chest. He’s still wearing the same clothes he had on at the black market.
Forest green shirt and dark gray slacks.
I hesitate, weighing if I can slip past him. While I don’t know where I’m trying to go, I do know I can’t stay in this tiny room. Not with the thick scent of the strange, sick alpha pressing in on me from every angle.
I take half a step forward, just enough for my shoulder to slip through the crack in the door.
The hinge creaks. It’s barely a sound, but Gray stirs.
His head shifts. His jaw tightens. One arm loosens from his chest.
My body jerks back, the movement sharp and panicked, and the door swings shut behind me with a soft click that sounds deafening in my ears.
Fuck!
For one awful moment, I stay frozen, hand clamped over my mouth, lungs burning as I fight the urge to bolt, to sob, to do anything that would give me away. In the hallway, I hear Gray resettle. The chair scrapes softly as he adjusts, breath evening out again.
Still asleep…I think.
I gotta find another way out.
My gaze drifts to the window.
It’s tall, framed in heavy wood with the curtains pulled most of the way shut. I ease toward it, every step deliberate, terrified of the floor creaking beneath my weight. When I reach it, I pause, listening again. Nothing but the house settling. Nothing but my own pulse roaring in my ears.
Slowly, I pinch the edge of the curtain and draw it back. Morning spills in.
The sun is cresting the horizon, pale and washed-out through a blanket of fog that hangs low over the ground. The world outside feels unreal, muted and distant, like I’m looking at it through glass underwater.
In the distance, I can make out the faint silhouettes of mountains, dark smudges against the brightening sky. Closer, a handful of houses sit on the other side of the property.
Big ones.
Wide, sprawling, all sharp lines and clean angles, even through the haze. Expensive.
My fingers curl around the cold window frame. I test it gently, barely breathing, already picturing myself easing it open, slipping out into the fog. But it doesn't move.