Chapter 16
GUNNAR
The scenery outside the train window passed in a blur from Lausanne to Vevey. Like the train, my life seemed to be moving too fast.
Sebastian and Bettina spoke softly about blood tests and lab results while my mind reeled.
The old man's nose had to be mistaken. I couldn't be pregnant!
The shifter creation story sounded as unrealistic as any other fable from the past. Dark times led to partnership with wolves, ending with a pregnant human omega.
They must have been mistaken. The first omega must have been intersex or trans. Except I wasn't, at least, not that I knew of, and my sudden illness this morning seemed oddly like the hormone fluctuations one of my foster mothers displayed during her first trimester.
I couldn't remember the last time I'd gotten sick. I'd survived the aeronautical gravity tests and pressure checks without a hint of bile at the back of my throat. Why this morning had I thrown up Bettina's perfectly cooked eggs?
How could I argue with the old man's paranormal explanation when the events of the past month had changed my entire worldview? Paranormal creatures existed, and I was one.
I wasn't ready to make the leap from one impossible possibility to the next, though. I needed to speak to my wolf, but he trembled in the far reaches of my mind. Only shifting would bring him to the surface.
Through our bond, I felt Sebastian's joy. He was much quicker to believe the old man's ridiculous story. What did that mean for me? Would he keep me locked away from the rest of the world, sequestered in the ski resort, until our pups arrived?
None of this seemed possible. Worse, they made monster movies like this. A poor man falls for a hot billionaire, only to find himself locked away in a dungeon while mad scientists perform horrendous tests on him.
I wouldn't wait to be locked up. On that, my wolf and I agreed.
With my hat and gloves tucked into my coat pockets, I removed the puffy garment when Bettina pulled into the resort's driveway. Then, I toed off my shoes and tucked my socks into the open holes. It took me a little longer to remove my jeans and sweater.
By the time the car jerked to a stop in the hotel parking lot and Bettina yelled, "What the hell are you doing?" I was naked except for my boxer briefs. The snow crunched beneath my bare feet, and the cold burned my toes. I hopped on one leg to yank the briefs down and off.
Sebastian came around the back of the car, but I was too fast for him in my wolf form. I darted into the frozen comfort of the thick forest.
The shadows grew darker as I ran. Some of them smelled wrong, but I didn't have time to investigate. I had to get out of there, to clear my head, to speak to my wolf, who still seemed so far away.
"Run. Run. Not safe," Sebastian's wolf called to me. Did he know of Sebastian's sinister plans to lock me up and experiment on me? The thought bristled every hair along my spine and stiffened my tail.
I was still new to this wolf thing, though. I tripped over a fallen log buried under the soft snow and tumbled into a shallow depression.
A giant man-smelling spider descended from the tree above me, hanging from a black cable. I freaked the fuck out. I thrashed in the snow, trying to regain my footing. Finally, my claws snagged on the frozen earth and I tore out of there, snow flying behind me as I dove into a thicket.
Pushing through the underbrush, I found a game trail we'd followed earlier in the week. It still smelled like Sebastian, but it also had that same putrid scent of wrongness. Who were these men in the woods?
"Run," my wolf answered Sebastian's.
"Trapped." I sensed his panic through our bond. Something had happened back at the car. If I hadn't bolted, maybe I could have helped him and Bettina, or maybe I would have been captured, too.
I scampered up the side of the mountain, my claws scraping along the exposed outcroppings where they jutted above the snow.
"Must protect pups," my wolf said. "Then rescue mate."
The matter-of-fact statement startled me so much, I slid sideways down the next rock.
I jumped wrong and landed on my back in deep, fluffy snow.
I thrashed, trying to get my feet beneath me to run again, but it was too late.
More of the wrong-smelling men in black tactical gear approached from above.
Soon, the ones behind me caught up, surrounding me.
One tapped me with a stun gun, and another wrapped a thick collar around my neck.
When it snapped into place, something sharp pierced between my vertebrae, and I collapsed.
As the world faded around me, Sebastian's wolf howled.
I woke in a bundle of netting inside a gray tube-shaped room, surrounded by the men in black gear and face masks.
From the way the netting rocked from side to side and the deep rumble of an engine filled the compartment, I assumed we were on a cargo plane.
My consciousness lasted only long enough for the nearest captor to tap the tablet beside him.
I felt the sharp prick at my nape again.
This time, I tried to fight the drowsiness, but it was no use.
That was all my mind registered before my vision faded to the inside of my eyelids and everything went dark.
"Where are you taking us?"
Sebastian's voice was overloud in my muzzy head.
I couldn't open my eyes yet, but I was no longer swaying in the netting.
When I tried to stand, metal bars knocked against my spine, and I fell back to the wooden platform, stirring up sawdust. I sneezed, knocking my snout against the board beneath me.
My teeth ached from the impact, and the taste of coppery blood filled my mouth.
Sebastian shouted inside my head again, and his wolf whined nearby. My eyelids refused to work. I sank into the darkness again.
The next time I came to, the world had brightened to white, much like the snowy landscape we'd left. The air was almost as cold, but sterile with the scent of bleach.
When I opened my eyes, the white intensified, thanks to the overhead fluorescents and the walls shining like I'd ascended to heaven.
In my wolf form, the padded floor felt spongy beneath my feet.
When I tried to stand, I sank against the wall and found it only possible to lean.
I was so tired. The heavy collar weighed my head down.
After what felt like minutes, but was probably less than one, I dropped to the floor, resting my head on my front paws.
"Gunnar!"
I felt rather than heard Sebastian's call. Frantic desperation came through our bond.
"Sebastian."
"Where are you?"
"In a padded room."
Fright ebbed from our bond, replaced with frustration. "So am I." Through our bond, I sensed him a few feet outside my cell. Close, but he might as well have been a continent away.
"Can you shift?" he asked.
"Too tired." Bone-deep exhaustion threatened to pull me under once again.
"I don't think we can," he said. "Something's up with these collars."
His words spurred me to action. Being unable to shift to my human form was unthinkable. I tried to shove my wolf back into his place in my mind, to will the shift to happen. I clenched my jaw so tight that something popped, but it was no use.
"I can't," I confirmed.
"Thank you for trying," he said. "Go back to sleep. We need to conserve our strength."
All the sleep in the world couldn't have prepared me for the surprise that walked through the door of my padded room.
Dr. Bunting's deep brown eyes regarded me as though I were a prized animal.
He examined me like a veterinarian. After he checked my teeth and paws and listened to my heart, he stepped aside.
Mr. Paska entered the cell and bent down to examine my collar. I lay groggy and listless, unable to do much more than open my eyes, find the lids far too heavy, and close them again.
"When will the sedation wear off?"
"We still have a few hours," the doctor said. "I'll run the blood sample we took against the lab results from LA, to confirm the match. Then, we can run our own tests."
"You think we've finally found an omega?" Mr. Paska asked.
"The data will tell." Dr. Bunting's smug tone sent a shiver down my spine. I wanted to leap to my feet and rip his throat out. The growl I mustered sounded more like a whine, and so soft I doubted they heard me.
It was the opposite when they entered the room next door. Sebastian growled, low and menacing. I heard him plainly. Either the duct systems carried sound or the door wasn't as airtight as it looked.
I would test it later, when I had the strength. Now, I listened as Sebastian's growls and barks turned ferocious in response to the calm human voices.
"I shouldn't have sent that email to Lonnie. I'm so sorry, Gunnar."
"Nothing we can do about it now," I answered.
I still felt bad for running. I'd needed space to clear my head and talk to my wolf, but I should have known his loyalty lay with Sebastian.
Sebastian's menacing growls ended in a yip.
"Fuckers got me again," he said through our bond before he slipped into unconsciousness. Without our connection, I would have feared the worst, but through it, I sensed him breathing, drifting, and sleeping.
The next time my door opened, Bunting entered alone. Without preamble, he tapped the tablet in his hand. Electric shocks radiated from the collar before the sharp needle poked me. Then, the world faded to black.
When I woke, I was in another place entirely. Gone were the padded walls and floor, replaced with an elevated dog bed and a bowl of water. The room had glass on three sides. The wall to my right was frosted glass, but the other two were clear.
The front wall faced out into a medical facility with state-of-the-art equipment. The room appeared empty. Gently, I struggled to my feet, my muscles aching from the long sedation, and padded to the wall for a better look.
The lab extended beyond what I could see from the confines of my cell. It reminded me of Dr. Bunting's lab, but this was far bigger than the one where he'd run my tests for the space program.
A high-pitched yip echoed through my enclosure.
I looked to the right, the direction I thought it had come from, and saw Sebastian's wolf up on his back haunches, his front paws up on the glass wall between us.
Ignoring my aches and pains, I ran to him, placing my paws over his with only the three-paned barrier between us.
"Mate," my wolf said. "Alpha. Sire of our pups." The words stunned me. The drugs had kept my wolf at bay, but now, he was at the surface of my thoughts.
"Are you all right?" Sebastian asked when I dropped back to my feet.
"The old man was right. We're going to be parents," I said.
My wolf had mentioned pups before, but it didn't sink in until now.
Me, a father. I'd thanked all my lucky stars I was attracted to men because I didn't want to end up like my deadbeat dad.
Mother Nature, fate, or maybe even science was laughing at me now.
"You're feeling all right, though?" Sebastian's wolf whined, and I looked up. The glass between our enclosures ended a foot or so beneath the ceiling. They wouldn't be able to gas us, but they still had the sedative injections through our collars.
I touched my nose to the wall between us, and he booped me through the glass. "My wolf wants to be closer to you."
"I want to be closer to you," he said with a snarl. "All those times you were scared, it was because you thought I would abandon you!"
"Me and our pups." Through my wolf, I sensed I carried more than one, and that they were all right, even after all the drugs. Despite my fears of being a father, they would always have me, even if Sebastian left us.
"I would never! What we have is far too important to give up on it now."
"You're only saying that because of the pups."
His snarl was downright terrifying. He snapped his teeth at the glass. "No. I'm saying it because you're my mate."
Through our bond, I sensed Sebastian's emotions beneath his frustrated thoughts. The affection he had for me reciprocated how I was starting to feel toward him. While we hadn't said it aloud, it felt a lot like love.
"My wolf wants … I want … to protect you at all costs," Sebastian said.
He didn't say the words I desperately wanted to hear, but his emotions through our bond overwhelmed my trauma-addled brain in a good way. I wasn't ready to admit or accept big emotions yet, but my wolf already preened with joy.
Sebastian turned toward the sound of a heavy door opening on the opposite side of the lab. A person in a white lab coat entered with Dr. Bunting and Ivan Paska.
"I'll kill them." Not the three words every guy wanted to hear, but they sounded romantic to me.
Gooey emotions wouldn't free us from our cages.
I shifted my gaze from Sebastian to the collar around his neck.
It was a shock collar of sorts, with a magnetic clasp to keep us from tearing them off with our hind paws.
They had used the tablet to control it on the plane, so it must run on batteries.
Whether single use or rechargeable, they would be our chance to escape.
Until then, I would force our captors to discipline me. The collar's shocks couldn't hurt our pups, and they would drain the battery faster than injections.
Now that Sebastian wanted to be with me as much as I wanted him, I would do anything for our safety and freedom. I looked forward to showing Dr. Bunting how much I appreciated his experiments. If they wanted a monster in a cage, they would have one.