CHAPTER EIGHTEEN - BIRDIE
Paper crinkles under me and I freeze, because I know that sound.
Reeves never bothered with it in the lab, but Marcus, the compound doctor, used rolls of the blue paper in his clinic.
It was really just an old tack room next to the stables, but I’m pretty sure Marcus wasn’t a real doctor, either.
He really seemed to enjoy the annual checkups he forced on the compound’s omegas, though.
I open my lashes a fraction, taking stock of my body.
My legs ache, and my throat feels raw and scratchy, but it’s nothing I can’t handle.
The good news is that I’m not tied down, and while I’m wearing a hospital gown, I can see my boots and clothes sitting on a chair in a neat pile.
I try to sit up, but there’s a loud beep next to my ear and something pinches the back of my hand.
I frown down at the IV as the door opens and two women walk in, their faces set in cautious lines.
The woman at the back is Maggie, but my gaze is rooted on her companion.
She’s close to six feet tall with a shiny black bob and quick, alert eyes.
I don’t need to smell her to know that she’s an alpha, and I freeze for a second time, every instinct on high alert.
There weren’t any female alphas at the compound, since according to my stepfather, they were unnatural, and prone to feral rages.
The woman in front of me definitely looks pissed, but her gaze softens as she crosses the room.
“Hello, Birdie. My name is Carla. I’m a doctor and Maggie’s mate. How are you feeling?”
I just stare at her, and she pauses. “Is my designation a problem for you, Birdie?”
There’s a window only a few feet away, weak sunlight spilling through the blinds.
Could I yank the IV out and reach it before she got her hands on me?
Unlikely, but then, she doesn’t look like she’s in a feral rage.
Maybe trying to escape will trigger her, and she’ll forget the do-no-harm part of her profession.
I’ve had plenty of experience with doctors like that.
“No,” I say cautiously, my voice like sandpaper fed through a shredder. “You’re my first, though.”
Surprise flashes in her eyes, and she exchanges a quick glance with Maggie.
Her mate takes that as her cue to step forward, and she reaches out to gently pat my shoulder.
“You can trust Carla, Birdie. She’s a very good doctor, but she’s an even better listener.
If you want to tell us anything about your situation, we’ll both do everything we can to help you. ”
I shake my head, because even if I could talk, what would be the point? Therapy is for people who have survived their trauma, while I’m still slogging through mine every day.
“I have some concerns about your long-term health,” Carla says, stepping up beside her mate.
She doesn’t touch me, but she’s close enough that I can see the stress lines around her eyes and smell her metallic scent.
It burns the back of my throat, and I watch her warily as she says, “According to what Maggie’s told me, your condition hasn’t improved since she treated you up at the cabin a week ago.
Did the Lawson Pack deny you food and water, Birdie? ”
I blink at her, because her scent has sharpened, like hot sparks off a grinder. Maggie has stiffened at her side, but I’m pretty sure her mate’s dominance has their bond in an iron grip, because she doesn’t jump to the pack’s defense like she clearly wants to.
“They offered,” I rasp, reaching up to touch my throat.
My fingers tingle as they skim over the strip of gauze wrapped around my neck, and I vaguely remember clawing at my throat.
I wince as I picture the mess I made, but I’m distracted as Carla holds up a plastic baggie.
It glints in the bright light, and I lean away from it, my heart fluttering uneasily. “What’s that?”
“A speech inhibitor,” she says, her voice tight with disapproval. “It was implanted under your scent gland.”
I stare at the device, my stomach flipping.
I’m glad the thing is out of my neck, and Reeves’ hold on me has loosened another notch, but I have to brace myself as I reach forward and take the baggie from her hand.
The device is about the size of a dollar with a couple of wires sticking out of each end.
It looks like a high-tech battery, and I wince at the thought of it humming under my skin.
Both Maggie and Carla look equally appalled. “Birdie, I’ve only seen devices like this on the black market or coming out of illegal labs,” the doctor says. “Can you tell me who did this to you?”
I shake my head again, because as angry as she sounds about my situation, her mate is military, and Reeves is the general’s pet doctor.
“Maggie,” Carla says in that same tight voice, “can you please step outside while I talk to Birdie in private?”
Her mate’s face falls, but she gives my shoulder another quick squeeze and retreats.
Carla waits until the door shuts behind her before she pulls up a stool and settles beside me.
“As soon as I realized what it was, I wanted to call the sheriff, but Maggie convinced me to wait until I spoke to you.” I raise a brow at her and she sighs.
“She’s very close to the Lawson Pack, but if I had to guess, I’d say that inhibitor is either military or developed by a clandestine government agency.
Either way, it’s a torture device, and if those men out there are responsible… ”
I look at the door, startled. “They’re here?”
“They brought you in at about five am this morning.”
I blink, my jumbled memories struggling to settle into any kind of order.
I remember Hog plucking me out of a snowdrift, and the whine of a snowmobile as he held me tight to his chest. I don’t know if the rattling purr I remember was real, but I know that his scent wrapped around me, warmer and more comforting than any coat…
“Have they hurt you, Birdie?” Carla demands, leaning forward. “If they are in any way responsible for your injuries, I’ll call Sheriff Tate right now.”
“No.” I tug the sleeves of the hospital gown down, even though she’s probably already seen everything I’d want to hide. “Most of my scars are old. The Lawson Pack had nothing to do with any of them.”
“And this?” She snatches the baggie out of my hand, her face grim. “Can you tell me anything about where it came from?”
I study the device, which winks at me like a silver eye in the sunlight from the window. “No.” I turn my head away. “I don’t know anything about it.”
She makes a frustrated sound, but before she can grill me some more, the door flies open and Hog storms in.
I don’t know why my heart jumps, but just the sight of his craggy face and honey-brown eyes makes me sit up straighter.
The closer he gets, the more his scent floods over me, and every inch of my body leans towards his, searching for more, more, more…
But then I have to remind myself that as good as he looks – and as perfect as he smells – he’s the kind of alpha who would trap an omega by claiming she’s his scent match.
Not me. Never me.
Whatever small scraps of myself that are left, they won’t be used against me, like the broken, helpless shell of my mother...
“Mr. Lawson!” Carla snaps, rising to her feet in a rush. “What do you think you are doing, storming in here?”
He barely gives her a glance, his focus fixed on me. I can see the snarl he’s trying to hold back, but he can’t stop his hands from curling into giant, throbbing fists. “Who?” His voice is all bark, but there’s no dominance behind it, only a lethal rage. “Who the fuck did this to you, Omega?”
I guess that means Maggie told them about the speech inhibitor.
Instead of cowing me, his anger makes something curl in my belly.
It’s warm and tingly, and I have to clamp my thighs together to stop a trickle of slick from escaping.
Mortified at my reaction, I sit up straighter and glare back at him.
“You think yelling at me is going to get me to talk to you, Alpha?”
He flinches - maybe at the sound of my own ravaged voice, or at the way I spit his designation in his face - and his mouth twists unhappily under his beard.
“I can’t believe I gave you a fucking wafer when you were suffering like that.
” His gaze brushes over the bandage on my throat, his regret bleeding through his scent.
“I should've done something more to help you. I shouldn’t have just walked out.”
I shake my head, because if he’s going to be remorseful, it should be about trying to trap me as a scent match. “I threw you out, remember?”
He frowns. “I thought that was because of what I said. About our connection…”
I shift uneasily, wishing I’d kept my mouth shut. “I don’t want to talk about that now.”
“You need to leave, Mr. Lawson,” Carla interrupts in her no-nonsense way, but the door opens again and the rest of the Lawson Pack troops in, a contrite Maggie in the rear. “Mr. Lawsons!” Carla exclaims. “You can’t all just come in here when I’m treating a patient!”
But Axel strides across the room, his eyes darkening as they land on the baggie in Carla’s hand. He snatches it off her and when he holds it up to examine the device, his dominance fills the room so fast it makes my head spin. “What the fuck is this thing, Birdie?”
I try to keep my mouth shut, but his anger is a physical thing, pulling a response from my raw throat. “It kept me quiet.”
His nostrils flare, outrage plastered across his face.
There’s a hint of the unraveling soldier I met at the train station, but there’s also a darkness in his eyes that’s new.
He suddenly looks a lot less like a boy scout and more like a predator on the trail of prey.
“You spoke and it was triggered to hurt you?”
“Spoke, screamed...” My voice cracks and I grimace at the ragged sound. “Sometimes I just had to breathe too hard and it zapped me.”
“Fucking hell, Baggage,” Colt groans, stepping past his incensed packmates and taking my hand. He cradles it like I’m made of glass, his eyes glossy with tears. “That’s some twisted bullshit. I’m so sorry you had to deal with that on your own.”
For some reason, the sight of his misery makes me feel a little better, but Axel isn’t done. “That’s what caused all the twitching when you first arrived...”
“I wasn’t used to it yet.”
“And you couldn’t tell me what was wrong.”
It’s a statement, not a question, but I nod anyway. “I couldn’t control it, and in the end, it was easier just not to talk at all.”
I catch Hog’s gaze. He’s backed up against the wall, his arms wrapped tight around his body, but my words throb between us. If anyone understands my silence, it’s him, and I feel a pinch of pity at the devastated look on his face.
Colt squeezes my hand, but Axel steps up to my bedside, commanding my attention. “I thought it was drugs. I thought you had the tremors because you were coming off a high.”
“I don’t…” My wounded pride makes my voice catch in my throat, and I have to cough to clear it. “I don’t do drugs!”
“I know. I should’ve given you the benefit of the doubt, but instead I locked you in the basement…” Carla makes a disgusted sound and he grimaces. “I fucked up. I assumed all the wrong things. I’m so sorry, Birdie.”
I give a small nod, because it’s obvious that his remorse is sincere.
But Carla is still eyeing Axel like he’s a bug that crawled along her pristine countertop.
“You sure this is the first you’re hearing about this, Captain?
That device reeks of the black market. Maybe it was even engineered in a military lab. ”
Axel’s hand flexes around the baggie, his anger rippling through the room as he meets her gaze. “What’s your point, doctor?”
“My point is that I can see it being used on a prisoner of war, maybe even as an interrogation tool. Is that something your pack would know anything about, Captain?”
Colt turns towards her, spluttering with horror. “You think this is us?” His nails scratch at a raw patch near his hairline. “What the actual fuck, doc? You really think we put that torture device in her throat?”
His scent is so distressed, I almost jump to his defense myself, but Axel says in a calm voice, “If it was an interrogation tool, doctor, wouldn’t we want it to make her talk instead of punishing her for it?”
You can’t really argue with that logic. Not that Carla is in the mood to encourage further discussion. “Whatever its origin, it’s taken a damaging toll, and she needs to rest.”
Hog pushes away from the wall where he’s been standing like a grim sentinel. “We’re not leaving. She’s our responsibility.”
“I’m my own responsibility,” I counter, but my voice sounds thin and strained.
Carla is right; I’m exhausted, and as much as I know I should be thinking about my next move, I can’t seem to keep my eyes open.
Everything hurts, not least of all my heart, and all I want to do is bury myself under the scratchy blanket.
“We’ll stay here until you’re better, Birdie,” Axel says, and I realize my eyelids have slid closed. I try to peel them open, but my thoughts are fracturing, and the room is drifting away from me.
The last thing I hear is Carla saying in a grim voice, “Come with me, Captain. You and I have a lot to talk about.”