Awakening (2 book series)
Awakening – Rejected Mate Chapter 24

"I'm sorry, baby. I have to." Pulling us to standing, he starts running for the nearest entrance to the courtyard. His focus intent as he scans the wall and moves us as fast as he can to the nearest gate. It's a human run, not hyper speed and he hauls a*s to get me outside the perimeter of the enclosed garden and building. I don't understand and all I can do is cling on and stiffen and sob at the movements that bring me no end of agony.

His mind syncs with mine as soon as we are free from the confines of the courtyard, I feel it. Shocked with the sudden presence of him inside my head even though he doesn't say anything at all. A change to the weight on my chest and the dull fog of my brain as he skids down to his knees, scraping across the tarmac, taking me down with him as soon as he feels the bond return so effortlessly.

"Try now. Trust me, you have to try. Focus on me, think of yourself as you were the night of your turning. The pain, the elation of your new form, will it, baby, will it! Turn!" He begs, commands and alpha tones me all at the same time. Desperation in his plea and I'm powerless to disobey him.

Something about taking me away from the house makes me feel differently, like a suppression is lifted from my soul and my head clears just enough. That internal foggy pain that held me weak moves aside, like lifting a foot from my chest and with a little effort, my body starts to tingle.

"That's it...your eyes...keep going. You can do this...it's not hard. Fight for me." He catches my hand and holds it in his loosely, waiting, watching, silently pushing me on with a look of fear in his eye that maybe it's too late. It causes chaos in my heart, to see him so afraid.

I focus all my effort on pushing, some deep inner need in me to unite with my wolf again, and as soon as I open my mouth to utter the words 'I think it's working', I arch in his arms and convulse as my body transforms me into the one thing that can save me. Right on the stroke of my human heart giving out and sucker punches me back into the land of the living in the most painful kind of way.

I gasp as I inhale loudly, coughing out, splaying my limbs and shuddering viciously as he catches me in his arms and then immediately lets me go to twist and turn onto my belly. I wretch, gag, at the same time, before vomiting a crap ton of blood and mucus right over the top of Colton's naked thighs as I've no control over aim. My wolf body ejects all that internal damage, as though somehow healing is just the process of getting rid of the messy bits I no longer need, and I'm covered in my own mess. Matting my leg fur and clinging disgustingly around me.

I scramble away from him so as not to make this worse, replaceing myself on all fours, suddenly rejuvenated as pain diminishes and I wheeze, inhaling my lungs fully. The transformation heals me as fast as it possibly. From head to foot. Cuts close up, bones crack and reform, my lungs expand fully, enabling me to breathe once more and within minutes, I stand up as though I didn't just go through hell and near death in the bloody mess I left back there. Shaken, sore all over as it fades away properly, but completely healed. I slump down on the ground and almost immediately revert to human form, as I don't have the energy or the skill to sustain my true form yet. That took so much out of my wolf to literally save my life and I'm spent. Exhaling with a strangled cry of relief and emotion as everything hits me hard. Like being in a train wreck, only it's all mental now the physical has been brushed away.

Colton scurries over to me and hauls me into his arms without hesitation, the relief evident on his face and yanks me close to his chest. Wrapping me up and smoothing his hands over my naked body to check for any sign of unhealed marks. There are none. Wolf healing is incomparable and almost always fully effective. There are only a few things in this world that wolves can't heal from and none are present tonight. He tugs my face to his throat and hugs me with less panic in his touch, exhaling heavily as he allows himself a moment of relief that warms me to my core and brings me some calm.

"The pack have them in retreat. I need to get you to safety and follow them. There are survivors and we have to stop them before we lose them." He nuzzles his face against my hair before shifting me, making it clear we can't stay her. He helps me up, pulling me to my feet and leads me bodily, keeping me close, to one of the abandoned trucks that are scattered in every street surrounding the school. I recognize them as belonging to the Santo family. They must have flooded in from every part of the mountain at a moment's notice.

"How did you know to come?" I ask weakly as he slides me into the nearest vehicle, pulling a blanket from the rear and draping it over my naked body as I begin to shiver insanely. I may be healed but my body and mind are going into shock from all that has just taken place and I suddenly feel as though I'm in some sort of a dream. Fully aware his taking control is necessity as I don't have the presence of mind to do anything for myself.

"Your link was broken, and I couldn't reach you. I knew something was wrong. I could feel your confusion, and then your fear. Your pain almost ended me, and I didn't think I would get here in time... They did something to the house. Soon as I got near it, my wolf form struggled to stay. There's some sort of noise or frequency around it. It stops us. I could feel it in the garden, but I couldn't hear it." He closes my door, jumping in the front of the truck and scrambles around for keys, replaceing them still in the ignition, thankfully. Wasting no time in putting it in gear, reversing us at screeching speed as though we're in pursuit of something and high tailing us towards the south road out of this part of the mountain valley. Getting me away from here, even if the threat is being chased off in the other direction.

"Where are we going? Why aren't you saving anyone else? There are more of us, it's not only me in that home! You can't leave them behind!" I sit up, panic stricken and sudden concern for the others left behind, hitting me in the chest like a freight train as my tears return with a passion and I half sob, half choke the words out. My reject pack are back there, they're the only family I know, whether I liked them or not and there are so many innocents among them.

Colton catches my eyes in the rear-view mirror and looks away quickly, a sadness hitting me right in the heart as his emotion silences me with a swift shunt of my stomach. I immediately know what the pain and sorrow is in what he doesn't say. He avoids my eye as I stare at the back of his head, feeling him, reading him as he overcomes my own senses. Tasting his hesitation and sorrow.

"There is no one else is there?" I state blankly, numb shock weaving through me and hitting me with the gravity of this situation. The weight of reality settling on my shoulders to drag me back down to numb calm. He's in constant link with his pack, they would know about survivors, and I'm guessing the fact they're chasing down the vampires who ran, and no one but Colton is shepherding one of us away, means they already checked.

He shakes his head, unable to look at me and I catch his furrowed brow and the gleam of moisture glazing his eyes in the mirror over his head. He ups a gear, pushing the truck to dangerous speeds as we head out of the valley and up onto the main road that takes us around the perimeter and out to the south.

"We weren't fast enough.... I almost didn't get to you in time. We just weren't ready for something like this. I wasted time assembling the pack, when I knew you needed me." He sounds almost ashamed, but without the pack, he wouldn't have been able to fight all of them himself and save me at all. They would have taken him down too, as soon as he lost his wolf form in the gardens.

"All of them... the unwanted..... the guardians. They're all gone." It's not really a question but more of a dazed reaction as my mind pushes me into shock at what's happened, verbalizing the truth, and I slump down across the back seat as silent tears begin to fall down my face, diagonally across my cheek like sobering cold smears and soak the cold leather of the truck.

"I'm sorry, Lorey. I know they were all you had. We never knew this was coming." Colton's voice is shaky and low. Shame and regret tainting his normally sexy huskiness. We share the agony, but it doesn't lighten the load. Insides twisting in cruel heartache as it sinks in fully.

In the blink of an eye...... they're all gone. Just like ten years ago.

The sad thing was, until this moment, I hadn't thought they were what I had at all. We were never a pack, or a family in my mind before, but now, those others, they matter more than I ever gave them credit for. Even Vanka, my roommate of ten lonely years, and I would give anything right now to have her get in this truck and blow smoke in my face.

My heart crashes inside my chest as the most painful debilitating heaviness hits me hard, and I let out a mournful sob that turns to a howl as my body turns without my trying. I lie on the back seat breaking inside all over again. My body reverting to my wolf form in a bid to heal me from the agony my heart's in. A defense mechanism, because my instincts think I'm dying all over again, how ironic.

The most heart wrenching howl I've ever heard, leaves my own body, fills my ears and echoes into the eeriest silence of the dark world around us.

First my blood family, then my pack, and now my unwanteds.

Is there nowhere to run where fate won't deliver me the worst kind of blow and take everyone from me?