Alpha Brat: A Tale Of Five Hot Wolves

Chapter 20: Memories

I run until my lungs are flayed open.

One second I’m under the deck staring at something impossible disappearing into the trees with familiar golden eyes, and the next my body is moving before my brain catches up, pure animal panic ripping through me hard enough to burn.

Every breath scrapes through me raw while branches lash against my skin hard enough to leave welts. Twigs snap under my feet while damp earth slides dangerously beneath me, but I keep going anyway, lungs dragging in ragged breaths that never feel big enough. I barely register the pain because my brain is drowning under one impossible thought after another.

Wolf.

Wolf.

Wolf.

A fucking wolf.

A giant animal with blood on its teeth and human eyes.

My thoughts slam against each other violently.

Not possible.

Not fucking possible.

Except I saw it.

I saw it.

The forest blurs around me in violent smears of green and gold as I shove through thick undergrowth, barefoot because at no point this morning did I think I’d need shoes. Wet mud squelches between my toes. Stones cut into my feet, the thin branches continue to claw at my arms like they’re trying to drag me back.

Every step away from the compound feels wrong. Physically wrong.

Darkness buried under my ribs hooked directly into those men, stretching tighter and tighter the farther I get. My chest hurts with it. My stomach twists violently. Some horrible instinct keeps screaming at me to turn around before I break something vital.

Go back.

Go back.

GO BACK.

"No!" I scream hoarsely at nobody. My voice cracks apart in the trees.

Birds explode upward somewhere overhead. I keep running.

Sweat drenches the back of my neck, soaking straight through my sports bra until fabric clings to my skin uncomfortably. My hair sticks to my face. My pulse is so loud it drowns everything else out.

"They’re drugging you," I gasp aloud to nobody, stumbling through dense undergrowth. "You knew it. You fucking knew it."

There’s no other explanation.

No sane woman sees a giant wolf and immediately thinks about the way one of the men there held her while she cried.

No sane woman runs from danger and still misses the smell of them.

No sober woman suddenly starts smelling emotions or wanting to climb all five of her attractive employers.

My foot catches on a root and I pitch forward hard, barely managing to throw my hands out before my face slams into the dirt. Pain bursts through my palms, but I scramble upright and keep running.

Corrian’s warmth.

Leo’s strong hands.

River’s quiet voice.

Ezra’s intelligence.

Jax’s stupid fucking grin.

My stomach lurches so hard I nearly topple again.

"No," I whisper again, stumbling through a patch of brambles that tear straight through my leggings. "No, no, no..."

Tears stream down my face hot and constant now, mixing with sweat while terror pumps so hard through my bloodstream it feels chemical.

The further I get from the compound, the worse it becomes. Because underneath the terror something worse is happening. I want them. Even now. Even terrified.

My body is betraying me in the most humiliating way possible.

The farther I run, the hotter I get. Heat floods through my bloodstream thick and dizzying until it feels like my bones are glowing under my skin. My senses sharpen painfully. I can smell damp moss. Tree sap. Blood where my feet split open against rocks.

And them.

Still.

Impossible.

A pressure builds low in my chest, tightening painfully with every step, an invisible rope wrapped around my ribs. The farther I run, the tighter it pulls until nausea twists violently through me.

The scent of them clings inside my head like fingerprints.

My body screams at me to turn around. Every instinct split straight down the middle.

Run.

Go back.

Run.

Go back.

I slam through another patch of branches and cry out as something sharp slices across my ankle. Warm blood immediately slicks down my heel, but I barely feel it over the boiling heat consuming me from the inside out.

My skin burns.

My lungs ache.

Something howls.

Inside me.

"No no no no no," I whisper frantically.

The forest stretches endlessly around me, dense and green and suffocating. Creatures explode upward, somewhere overhead as I crash blindly through brush, prey being hunted.

Horrifyingly, as if to torture me while my psyche is cracked wide open, memories start to surface.

Violent flashes slam into me. Snippets of childhood memories long repressed. More vivid than they’ve ever been. I’m unsure if they’re real or a manifestation of utter fear.

Usually treated to flashes of my earliest memories, these are whole pieces.

My mother screaming. Blood, so much blood. My chest caves inward around the memory while panic spirals violently through me.

I was little.

So little.

Our house smelled like cinnamon that night because my mom had been baking something. My brother was crying because he’d dropped a plate. My dad was laughing.

Then—

Growling. Inhuman and deep. My father shoved all of us backward so hard my sister hit the floor.

"Run."

Blood.

So much blood.

My brain locked it away after, burying it beneath survival and grief. I choke on a sob as another memory crashes into place.

It’s all clawing back up.

Something huge smashing through the kitchen. My mother screaming my name. Red eyes in the dark.

I slam into a tree hard enough to bruise my shoulder because I can’t fucking see through the tears any more.

"Oh my God," I gasp.

I thought they were monsters. That’s what I told myself for years because the alternative was impossible. Easier to believe in monsters than whatever the truth actually was.

My little brother crying. My sister pulling me toward the back door. The smell. Oh God, the smell. Copper and smoke.

People. Men shouting.

My mother shoving me backward while blood poured from her throat.

Someone yelled, "Get the pup out!"

Pup.

The word detonates inside my skull and I scream as my knees buckle completely.

I trip again and this time crunch into the ground hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs entirely. Dirt scrapes across my cheek while my stomach convulses violently.

I’m so fucking hot. My bones are boiling beneath my skin .Every inch of me aches with this horrible tearing pressure, my body’s trying to split itself open from the inside.

I claw at my shirt desperately.

"I want to go home," I sob.

But I don’t know where home is. Nowhere feels real. Nothing feels real.

I force myself upright on shaking legs and keep moving because stopping feels impossible. Because if I stop, the memories catch up completely and I’m terrified of what they’ll show me.

The invisible line inside me stretches tighter.

Tighter.

Tighter.

Until pain spears through my chest so hard I cry out and my entire body jerks violently in the direction of the compound.

"No!" I scream at myself. "Fuck you!"

I run harder.

Tears blur my vision completely now.

My bare feet are shredded, I can smell earth, trees, blood.

I hate it.

I hate them for making me feel like this.

I hate myself more for wanting to go back anyway.

The trees thin ahead and I crash through, collapsing onto my hands and knees at the edge of the road. My stomach heaves, the world tilts violently and finally, I empty my stomach. Each convulsion sends more and more vomit beneath me. A purge so hard I’m seeing stars, unable to take a breath round the rot I’m expelling.

Acid burns my throat and the cramping finally abates. Nothing else left to bring up. I curl forward once my stomach rests, forehead touching the asphalt and puke while sobs tear through me hard enough to bruise ribs.

Curled under the morning sun, sweat pours off me in sheets and tears drip from my chin. My hair hangs in filthy damp strands around my face. Stinking, and sobbing, and stretched too thin, a distant sound cuts through the haze. An engine.

Sweat pours off me in sheets while tears drip from my chin. My hair hangs in filthy damp strands around my face.

I can’t stop shaking, or stop the screaming voice begging me to go back.

"I don’t understand," I sob brokenly into the pavement. The sound that leaves me barely human any more.

The engine grows louder fast.

Panic flickers weakly through me, but my body’s done. Completely done. My limbs heavy and useless, trembling uncontrollably beneath me while black spots dance at the edges of my vision.

The bike skids to a stop somewhere nearby. Boots hit pavement. Arms wrap around me carefully.

Huge arms.

Warm.

"Frankie."

Leo. Relief crashes through me. I stretch toward him, recognizing safety before my brain can protest.

"Shh I’m here," he murmurs hoarsely, gathering me against his chest. "Fuck. Baby, look at me."

I can’t.

He lifts me effortlessly off the ground, cradling me against him while I sob weakly into his shirt. He smells like rain and smoke and home and my traitorous body relaxes despite the screaming panic still clawing through my head.

"You’re okay," he says roughly, kissing my forehead. "You’re okay."

"I saw—"

"I know."

"No no no no—"

"I know." His voice sounds scared, wrecked.

He presses another frantic kiss to my hair while his huge hand cradles the back of my head.

"You scared the fucking life out of us," he mutters.

More voices explode somewhere nearby.

"She crossed the boundary line–"

"Impossible–"

"Move–"

Jax.

Ezra.

Corrian.

River.

They’re all here.

Any and all emotion now moves sluggishly as more hands touch me carefully, checking injuries, brushing dirt and leaves from my skin.

"She’s burning up," Corrian snaps.

"I’m sorry," Jax blurts somewhere near my shoulder, voice cracking with guilt. "I didn’t mean to scare you," he says hoarsely against my temple. "I swear to God, Frankie, we were trying to do this slow."

"Jax," River says quietly.

The single word stills him instantly.

Leo adjusts me higher against his chest while I drift in and out around the edges of consciousness. I catch pieces of conversation through the haze. freewёbn૦νeɭ.com

"...triggered too early..."

"...memories resurfacing..."

"...bond strain..."

"...shouldn’t be happening yet..."

My head pounds. None of the words make sense. I try to lift my head.

Corrian appears in my blurry vision, his jaw clenched tight enough to crack teeth. His hands cup my face carefully, eyes scanning me with open panic he’s not even attempting to hide.

"Sweetheart," he says softly. "Stay with me."

I stare at him, have so many questions bubbling right there. But I can’t speak anymore, everything goes dark around the edges.

The last thing I feel before unconsciousness drags me under is River’s cool hand against my burning forehead.

And Leo holding me so tightly it almost feels like he’s afraid I’ll disappear.