The Rejected Elemental

[24]

The last red rays of the sun finally disappeared from the dark sky as I glanced out of my window worriedly. Cole promised me he would be home by sunset. There's no sign of him or Cyril.

"Still waiting for your boyfriend?" Nina asked me, a teasing glint in her eyes as she passed me sitting on a chair in Hayley's room.

I felt my cheeks color as I glared at her, "Not my boy-"

"Whatevs," the redhead Healer shrugged before grabbing a mocha and collapsing into the chair beside me, groaning loudly. "Its been a long day."

"Yeah," I agreed, not really in the mood for talking, for some strange reason. I love talking.

Nina must have sensed my mood, because she didn't attempt to make conversation after that, sipping her warm drink and scrolling through her phone. We sat in comfortable silence for about half an hour before her cell pinged, signaling a notification.

"Text from Cyril," Nina frowned as she opened the message, before her eyes widened in alarm and her head shot up to give me an anxious look.

"What happened?" I asked her, my paranoia getting the better of me as I tried to imagine the worst case scenario possible.

Cole could be dead. Cyril could be dead. My cover could be blown. I would be hunted down by Alpha Francis.

No, that can't possibly happen. How can Cole die? Impossible.

"The meeting went bad, as expected," Nina informed me as she pulled on her coat, pulled my arm and rushed out of the tower. "Cyril just wants me in the hospital wing to do some bandaging up."

"Bandaging up?" My voice shot an octave higher as my wolf began making a racket inside my head and howling for her mate. I had to stop myself several times from panicking.

Calm down, I tried to soothe my wolf. I've laughed uproariously at Mike once for smashing his nose on a glass door, and I cared for him back then, before he abandoned me. I can handle my mate being a little bruised up.

My self-calming thoughts turned into a jumble, however, when I strode into the hospital wing behind Nina and the addicting, masculine scent of my Alpha hit my highly-sensitive nostrils. I immediately barreled in, nearly knocking over one of Nina's helpers.

Cole was sitting in a chair, his nose broken and a bandage on his hand. On closer inspection, I could see a dark, painful-looking bruise on his jaw.

"What the fuck happened?" I asked, my voice shooting higher. "Did you fight...oh my god, do the other Alphas know? What happened?"

Cole gave me an apologetic look.

"They know, Mia."

I stared at him for a long while, letting his words and their implication sink in. The hospital wing had fallen completely silent. Even Nina was holding her breath as she gave me a nervous look, moving away from Cole's bandages.

"Fuck," I eloquently said, a minute later. "Fan-fucking-tastic, really."

"Francis told them," Cyril told me, his yellow eyes boring into mine. "He announced it at the meeting, and then they demanded that you be passed around, and Cole and I said no, so everything went absolutely mental."

"I swear to god, like ten Alphas pounced on me all at once," Cole whined, poking his bandage. "Do they have no sense of privacy at all?"

I forced a smile that came out as more of a grimace as a sick feeling twisted itself into my stomach, nauseating me.

They wanted me passed around. Like a fucking whore.

"Mia?" Nina's concerned voice flooded over, but my vision had gone hazy, and my knees felt weak. "Are you dizzy? Look at me!"

I tried to focus, but I couldn't. My legs gave out, and the last thing I felt before passing out was a pair of strong arms holding me and the musky scent of my mate.