Alessia Stocklin and Ezra Withers are polar opposites, but they can certainly agree on one thing: their mutual hate for each other.
He's an Alpha deadset on killing every rogue he comes across, while she's a vigilante - known as Nightshade - intent...
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Silently withholding my bubbling rage, I pushed my emotions to the wayside to take a more calculated approach. Instead of hastily lashing out at Ezra, I followed a couple steps behind him and the doctor.
At Ezra's unexpected proclamation of our mate bond, the doctor's eyes dilated into giant moons. She then promptly extended her hand out in welcome. Her chapped lips twitched like she had wanted to say something. Yet, she refrained from uttering a word. I could only assume the scowl on my face warded off any unwanted questions the doctor might have about the bond between her Alpha and me.
Why had Ezra blurted out our connection without so much as a heads-up? We had barely talked about our bond; why did he think he could make a unilateral decision for the both of us?
For the first time in a couple of days, my fingers twitched and ached to hold the blade Elias had given me not too long before. I longed to thrust the shiny metal blade square into Ezra's heart. After today (and after the threat on my friends and family's lives), I struggled to conjure enough reasons to postpone this edging desire. However, for the time being, I subdued my murderous thoughts.
Ezra's potential death would have to wait; it would have to wait until I could know my brother was good and well.
With each step closer to Apollo, my heart fluttered, and my urge to run away spiked. Many months ago, the aching desire to run away had been replaced with the desire to have Ezra's head on a silver platter. Despite the lapse in time, my incoming desire to run was familiar, but it also felt foreign; this time, it felt different.
Rather than being reminiscent of a simple calling, it manifested in a darker way — in a darker memory. It was much like how I felt when Apollo and I were called into a stuffy office in order to identify if two of the bodies found in the wake of the Ferals' carnage were Mom and Dad.
The instant Beta Ichabod asked me to take a look at the potential decomposing bodies of my parents, my head whipped around, looking for an escape route. I felt the same urge slink its way into my thoughts. Even though every rational bone in my body told me Apollo was alive, I couldn't help but picture his dead, pale face.
I imagined his chocolate eyes glazed over, his mouth slightly ajar. He'd look like Dad. Despite these horrific images popping into my mind, I knew running away was not the answer to my problems. Apollo would not get better in my absence, running would only delay the inevitable.
Even though I was no stranger to seeing Apollo injured on occasion, I couldn't help my body from tensing at the sight of him. He did, after all, have a knack for putting himself in precarious situations, but he had never been injured to such an extent before. He had never needed the assistance of a pack doctor in all the time I had known him.
When the doctor opened the door to room 307, Ezra walked right in. I lingered in the hallway for a moment — long enough for Ezra to pop his head out and ask, "You coming?"
