Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
Kain
When I wake up the next morning, I no longer feel like I’m dying. My vision is clear, and strength pulses in my muscles.
It worked. Darius’s experimental medicine worked.
I sit up and am immediately met with the smell of breakfast. I turn my head to look and can see Anne in the kitchen, wearing pajamas.
Bacon is sizzling on the stove. Blurred memories flash in my head of her holding my head while I vomited and wiping my forehead with a wet cloth.
Of her administering the medicine every eight hours, and of the last coherent thing I said to her: that I didn’t want her to see me die.
Softness fills my heart as I watch her plate the bacon. How could I not love her? So strong in the face of all this chaos. Taking care of me despite how much I’ve hurt her. I truly don’t deserve my mate.
She turns to put the plate on the counter where a breakfast spread already sits, and she sees me watching her. She seems relieved. “You’re awake,” she says.
“I am,” I respond. I get up to go join her in the kitchen, quietly noting with relief how my body feels like my own again.
She smiles faintly. “I noticed you weren’t tensing in your sleep, and the vomiting stopped, so I was hoping the medicine finally worked. Are you okay?”
It’s taking so much willpower for me not to close the distance between us familiarly and touch her. Put my arm around her waist and kiss away the worried creases in her forehead.
“I feel great,” I say simply instead.
She exhales happily. “Alright, good.” An alarm goes off on her phone, and after looking at it, she announces, “Final dose.”
I sit on a stool at the kitchen counter, and she brings out the last vial from the case. She inserts the needle on the inside of my elbow, and this time, I don’t immediately feel any dramatic effects.
She watches my face carefully. “Any nausea?”
I smile. “No, I’m good.”
She puts the syringe away. “Great. Let’s have breakfast.”
We sit at the coffee table in the living room to eat, and I gobble up my food. It’s something Anne worked hard to prepare for me. Now that I’m not sick, I will eat whatever she makes me with gusto.
I watch her as I eat. Her bites are slower than mine, and she seems tired, although I can tell she has already showered this morning; her hair is still damp.
I’m about to say something stupid, like how beautiful I think she is, when a knock interrupts our silent meal.
Anne gets up to answer it. I recognize Darius’s voice immediately.
“How is he?”
“See for yourself,” she says, stepping aside.
Darius enters, his eyes scanning me with that assessing alpha gaze of his. I can see the moment he registers the improvement—his shoulders relax slightly, though his expression remains guarded.
“You look significantly less like death,” he observes.
“I feel significantly less like death,” I reply.
“Good. Because I need you functional.” He pulls out his phone and checks the screen. “The researchers want to see you and examine the effects of the medicine firsthand. It was part of the deal that allowed us to get it so quickly.”
My stomach clenches. “Researchers?”
“Yes. The ones I told you about yesterday. They’re healers from different packs who have been developing this antidote for years.
They need data to continue their work, and you are the first subject.
” Darius’s tone makes it clear this isn’t optional.
“I told them that this situation is top secret, and they didn’t mind coming here quietly to see you. They’re waiting at the medical center.”
I nod slowly, forcing down the instinctive panic. These are pack healers. The good guys. Not the Covenant scientists who used to—
I cut off that thought before it can fully form.
“I’ll come with you,” Anne says.
Both Darius and I turn our heads to look at her.
“You don’t have to—” I start.
“I know I don’t have to.” Her chin lifts slightly, defiantly. “I want to.”
Darius looks between us, an unreadable expression on his face, then shrugs. “Nothing says you can’t come.”
I get up slowly. “Let me go freshen up.”
Anne starts to head toward her bedroom. “I’ll get dressed.”
Darius waits till we’re ready, then we pile into his car.
The medical center is in the center of pack territory, a modern facility that smells of antiseptics and herbs. Darius leads us through the back door to a private examination room where three researchers are waiting—two women and a man, all wearing white coats and eager expressions.
“Alpha Darius.” The older woman greets him before her eyes land on me. “And you must be our patient. Please, sit.”
I sit on the examination table, my body stiffening despite my best efforts to appear calm. Anne positions herself near the door, arms crossed, watching.
They start with basic vitals—blood pressure, heart rate, temperature. Standard stuff. But when they pull out the blood draw kit, my hands clench into fists.
“Just a few vials,” the male researcher says gently. “We need to analyze how the medicine affected the poison in your system.”
I force myself to nod, to extend my arm, and not to flinch when the needle slides in.
Anne’s eyes are on me. I can sense the concern she’s trying to hide behind that neutral expression.
They fill four vials with my blood, labeling each one carefully. They run their tests while I sit there, and I watch as they point at something on a tablet with confused expressions, exchanging hushed whispers. They glance back at me, then whisper some more.
Should I be worried?
One researcher continues working on the blood, and the other two come back over to me for more tests—reflex checks, strength assessments, and examining the scars on my wrists and back.
Four hours pass with me being pricked and prodded.
“Fascinating,” the younger woman murmurs, making notes. “The healing acceleration is remarkable. Cuts are closing right as they’re being made.”
“And the poison?” Darius asks. “Did your medicine work to counteract it?”
The three researchers exchange glances.
“That’s the interesting part,” the older woman says slowly. She pulls up something on a tablet and shows it to Darius. “According to our analysis, he was never poisoned.”
The words don’t register at first. They don’t make sense.
“What do you mean?” Darius’s voice sharpens, his eyes cutting to me with suspicion.
“Wait—” I start, but the male researcher continues.
“The state of his body is…severe,” he says carefully. “Significant damage, evidence of long-term trauma. But it’s not from poison. Not in the traditional sense.”
“Then what?” Darius demands.
The older woman taps her tablet, pulling up a molecular diagram. “We found trace amounts of a synthetic compound in his system. After running it through our database, we identified it as a designer drug—highly addictive, with some very specific properties.”
My heart is pounding now, blood rushing in my ears.
“The drug itself has minimal active effects,” she continues. “But when an addict misses their regular dose, the withdrawal symptoms are catastrophic. Fever, pain, nausea, organ failure. The body essentially attacks itself, convinced it’s dying.”
“And in some cases,” the younger woman adds quietly, “it does die. The withdrawal can be fatal if left untreated.”
The room spins.
Not poison. An addiction.
Another lie. Another manipulation. Another way they controlled us, made us believe we were on a leash, when really, what they’d done was condition our bodies to need them.
Anne’s voice cuts through the roaring in my ears. “You didn’t know.” It’s not a question.
I shake my head, unable to speak.
“That is so messed up. How could they be so evil?” Anger colors her voice.
Darius is watching me with his calculating alpha eyes, probably trying to determine if this is another deception. But he must see the genuine shock on my face because his expression softens slightly.
“They told you it was poison,” he says.
“They showed us.” My voice comes out hoarse. “Made us watch what happened to operatives who didn’t get the ‘antidote’ in time. The suffering. The death. They said it was poison working through our systems. Told us that only they had the cure.”
“It was actually withdrawal,” the male researcher says. “Severe, potentially fatal withdrawal, but not poison.”
The brutality of it hits me all over again.
They didn’t need poison. They just needed to make our bodies dependent on a substance only they could provide. Make us suffer enough that we’d do anything, hurt anyone, to get our next dose.
And every operative who got their next dose, thinking it was the antidote, was simply becoming more and more addicted.
How much more insidious could these people be?
Darius thanks the researchers, and we leave the medical center in silence. The three of us get into his car again—Anne in the back, me in the passenger seat—and the tension is thick enough to choke on.
My hands are shaking, but not from poison or withdrawal. From rage.
All of it—every moment of suffering, every desperate plea for the antidote, every mission completed out of fear of dying—all of it was built on lies.
I want to hit something so badly. My hand clenches into a fist, but there’s nowhere to direct my rage.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. The burner that Darius gave back to me. The one I’ve been carrying since the mission started, always waiting for Rick’s next check-in.
My hand grabs it automatically, fury making my movements sharp. I want to answer the call and curse Rick out, let him know that I am no longer their puppet and that I’ll put my hand through his chest the next time I see him.
“Calm down,” Darius says, his voice cutting through the red haze and stopping me. “Remember not to blow your cover.”
I pound my clenched fist against my knee three times to release some of my rage and force Darius’s words to take purchase in my mind.
My cover. I need to maintain my cover.
I take a deep breath. Another. Force the anger down to a manageable level.
Then, I tap the phone to answer the call, putting it on speaker.
“Kain.” Rick’s voice fills the car, cold and clinical as always. “You missed your last check-in.”
I tell myself to act like I’m still desperate. “I’ve been busy trying to move the mission forward. Hard to do that when I’m dying, don’t you think?”
A pause. When Rick speaks again, there’s a hint of amusement in his tone. “Ah. Still playing that card. Are the symptoms very bad?”
“What do you think?” I inject bitterness into my words. It’s not hard—the emotion is real, just redirected. “I can barely function. But I’m close. The hybrid is—”
“You’ve taken too long.” Rick cuts me off, and the change in his voice makes my blood run cold. “We’re going with Plan B. We’ll be there in two days.”
My chest tightens. “What?”
“Fall back and await further instructions. Do not attempt contact with the target anymore. You are now assigned to support duties. Do not deviate from protocol. Understood?”
Every muscle in my body goes rigid. “Understood.”
The line goes dead.
Darius, Anne, and I all look at each other, understanding without speaking.
They’re coming for Violet.