“No, you won’t,” Cole said. “You won’t be able to walk for a week if you do. I’ll carry you.”
“There’s no way you’ll manage. I know I’m not heavy, but these woods have it out for us.”
“Not like that,” Cole said, hesitating for a split second before plowing on. “I’ll shift, and you can ride home on my back.”
Josh’s eyes found his, the omega shaking his head.
“No. You said that was the hardest thing you’d ever done when you carried Zane like that. And he was your brother-in-arms, and he was dying. It’s a sprained ankle, I’ll live.”
“I’d rather get you home in one piece,” Cole said. “It’s the safest way. Besides, you’re an omega. Carrying you will be… easier.” He reached down and helped Josh up onto his good foot. “If it had been Thorn or Brax, and not Zane, there’s a good chance I couldn’t have carried them. Another reason why it was stupid of them to give me a medal for it.”
“How do you know what you could or couldn’t have done?” Josh challenged. “Because as much as you and Thorn clash, I don’t see any situation where you’d leave him behind, no matter what.”
Cole cupped Josh’s face in his hand.
“You have far too much faith in me,” he murmured. “I’ll go down onto my knees so you can climb on. No need for acrobatics, okay?”
He moved away to get the space to shift, then returned to where Josh was waiting, going down onto his knees. A moment later, he felt Josh’s hand take a firm grip on his mane and then the omega’s weight settled over his back.
“Ready,” Josh said, sounding strained.
Cole pushed up onto his legs, surprised at how light a weight Josh was. Doing his best not to jostle the omega too much, he made for home.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Each step back toward the cottage hurt, but not half as much as it would have if Josh had been on his own two feet. There was something steady and settling about being on Cole’s back, the horse’s warm weight beneath him. But Cole clearly wasn’t okay—angry, troubled, his past eating away at him. Josh had just made the whole situation worse, pushed and pushed until he’d driven the alpha away. He could help, could make it up to him. Just as soon as they got back to the cottage.
The ground leveled off, and Cole trotted faster through the trees. The cottage finally came into view, a light still on in the kitchen window, the back door wide open. Cole went down on his knees at the back door, and Josh clambered off, hobbling until he could lean against the wall and get his weight off his ankle once more. He watched Cole shift back in front of him, and then the alpha swept him off his feet and carried him inside. He laid Josh down on the couch in the small living room.
“I’ll just throw on some clothes and get an ice pack for that ankle. Don’t go anywhere.”
Josh huffed at that.
“Where would I go?” he called after the alpha as Cole retreated from the room.
“Knowing you, anywhere,” Cole said over his shoulder.
Josh deserved that.
Cole returned a few minutes later, barefoot still but dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. He had a bandage in one hand and an ice pack in the other. Sitting on the side of the couch, he quickly and efficiently wrapped Josh’s ankle, propped a few cushions under his foot, and settled the ice pack around the injury.
“There, that should hold you for now,” he said. He went to get up again.
“Wait,” Josh said softly. “Stay for a bit, please. You’re angry, and I want to explain.”
“I’m not angry,” Cole insisted, but he did sit back down.
“Not even a little?” he nudged. “After everything I did and said today?”
“I’m not going to police your behavior,” Cole said evenly. “I don’t want to, and I don’t have the right to. Whatever that was about today, I don’t think it had anything to do with Thorn being Mr. July in the firefighter’s calendar.”
Josh let his hand cover Cole’s.
“Everyone knows Mr. July pales in comparison to Mr. March,” he said softly.
“Oh?” Cole said, leaning in. “And who would that be?”
“You, of course,” Josh said, pressing his lips to the alpha’s. See? He could turn this around.
Cole pulled back, his eyebrows drawn down in confusion. “Seriously, Josh? Now? After today, after the past few hours?”
Josh pressed his palm to the alpha’s chest. “I thought I could take your mind off things. Wouldn’t I make a good distraction?” He reached for his T-shirt, tugging it off over his head.
Cole stood up abruptly, staring down at him. “We are not doing this,” he said sharply and stalked from the room.
The rejection stung. Josh was left alone, T-shirt in hand, feeling every bit as pathetic as he looked. Once again, he’d messed things up. On top of pissing Cole off, and hurting him by dragging up the past, he’d also brought upon himself the rejection he’d been fearing. Cole would ask him to leave, probably the next day. He’d tell Oliver not to help him, and the pack wouldn’t want any more to do with him, and…
Panic surged through his chest, and he couldn’t draw in a deep breath. He sat forward, trying to relieve the sudden burning pain, but it didn’t work. Ducking his head down, he tried to focus on his next breath, but the overwhelming sense of failure, of the walls closing in on him, just wouldn’t loosen its grip.
“Here, I brought you some tea— Shit, Josh?”
There was the sound of a cup thumping onto a hard surface and then a hand touched his arm. Josh’s flinch was instinct and adrenaline, nothing more. But Cole didn’t know that.
“Hey, no. It’s okay. It’s just me.” He was silent for a moment as Josh struggled to drag in another lungful of air. “I can hear you’re having trouble breathing. Can you sit up a little for me? Do you have asthma? Is there an inhaler in your bag?”
He shook his head at that, lifting his tear-streaked face to peer miserably at Cole. The alpha looked worried, not angry, as his fingers wrapped lightly around Josh’s wrist.
“Okay, not asthma. Good. But your heart’s going a mile a minute. Is this a panic attack?”
Josh nodded his head, a few tears slipping free, feeling his face heat with the embarrassment of it all.
“Hey, we’ve all been there. You’ve seen me in full flight, remember? Middle of the night, stark naked, patting my chest like a moron, looking for a bullet wound that wasn’t there.”
That just made Josh feel worse. Cole had real fears to panic over. All Josh had was his own stupidity. He closed his eyes and shook his head, feeling his nose start to run. Great, now he was pathetic and disgusting.
“Josh, tell me how to help. Do you need space? Air? I could open a window.”
Josh sniffled loudly and hid his face again. He didn’t know what he needed. This had only ever happened when he was alone, and he’d just curled up and waited for it to pass.
“Hold on a sec,” Cole said, and his warm presence moved away. He was back seconds later. “Here.”
Josh peeked his eyes open and accepted the bunch of tissues Cole held out. He wiped his face, blew his nose, and ruined it all by sobbing again as soon as he’d finished, fresh tears rolling down his cheeks. His chest ached as he forced another breath of air inside him.
Cole’s quiet voice reached him. “Later, we might talk about what brought all this on. Right now, I think we just need to get you comfortable. How does your bed sound?”
Huddling under the covers and hiding away from the world sounded like heaven right then. So he nodded and tried to swing his legs to the floor.
“None of that,” Cole said firmly. “You’re not walking on that ankle until morning. I won’t have anyone, horse or not, winding up lame at my stables.”
One arm went under Josh’s knees and the other around his back, and Cole lifted him easily into the air.
Josh hid his face against the alpha’s chest, knowing it wasn’t fair to take comfort from Cole but seeking it all the same. A few shallows breaths of the alpha’
s scent, and he could feel himself starting to calm. But as soon as Cole set him down and stepped away, the panic welled to the surface again. He reached out blindly for the alpha’s hand, clinging to it.
“Let me just go get the ice pack and some cushions to prop your foot up,” Cole said. “I’ll be right back.”
He squeezed Josh’s hand gently before letting go.
Josh rolled into his side and curled up, trying to make himself small. That always helped before. He liked to think that was part and parcel of being a hedgehog shifter. Except, in his shifter form, he at least had spines to protect him. It got hard to breathe again, and he closed his eyes and tried to focus on just that, nothing else. Not the panic or the fear or the fact that he was making a complete fool of himself and ruining everything…
“Here we go,” Cole said, and Josh felt the alpha’s hands gently lift his foot and set in on top of a stack of cushions. The ice pack followed, cool against his hot, throbbing skin.
The mattress dipped as Cole sat on the bed behind him.
“Do you want me to stay?” the alpha asked softly, sounding almost sad. “Or would you feel safer alone?”
“Stay,” Josh said immediately. “Please.”
“Not going anywhere,” Cole said. “Not if you don’t want me to. And even then, I’d probably just wind up camped on the floor outside your room for the night.”
“Why?” Why was the alpha bothering with him after everything?
“Because you’re scared, and you’re hurting, and I don’t want you to be alone right now.”
“Me neither,” Josh agreed softly. “Not if I can be with you.”
There was a heavy silence as both their words sunk in.
“Is it alright if I move a little closer?” Cole asked.
“Please,” Josh said, and tried to explain. “I feel… exposed… like this. When I’m a hedgehog, I’ve got my spines to protect me. But when I’m not…”
“You’ve got me,” Cole said, settling against his back. His arm came up around Josh’s waist, a loose hold that felt comforting, not confining.
“I don’t deserve you,” Josh mumbled. “I’m such an idiot.”
“Hey,” Cole said. “It takes two to have this bad a day. We’re both idiots.”
The alpha’s breath was a warm puff against his neck, sending a shiver through Josh.
“I can live with that,” he said. “Idiocy loves company.”
“I thought that was misery.”
“That, too.”
For a while, neither of them spoke, and Josh’s heartbeat slowly settled, his breathing easing.
“What was that, back at the packhouse?” Cole asked gently. “You were trying to make me jealous, I gather, but why?”
Josh turned his head into the blankets and mumbled his answer, hoping Cole would let it go. He hadn’t counted on the alpha’s superior hearing.
“You thought it would stop me bringing you to the house? Why? I thought you liked going there?”
“I do, I guess. It’s just…”
“Just what?” Cole nudged, resting his chin against Josh’s shoulder.
Josh wasn’t ready to answer that, so he turned the tables on the alpha. “What did you mean before, about not being able to protect your pack? What happened to Dutchy and Andy?”
The alpha went very still against him, and Josh thought he’d made a mistake, his heart rate kicking up again.
“Shh,” Cole murmured. “Not angry, just thinking. That’s a Pandora’s box of a question you’ve just asked.”
“Forget I asked it,” Josh said quickly. It wasn’t worth upsetting the alpha again.
“No. You deserve an answer, especially after tonight.”
Josh decided the fairest thing was a trade.
“I’ll go first. It’s not that I don’t like being around your pack,” he admitted. “It’s that I really do. I’ve always had this… urge to care for other people, especially alphas. It kicks into gear when I’m around you all.”
“Sounds like a useful thing to have,” Cole said, his voice a little odd.
Josh tried to turn to look at him but the alpha stilled his movements with a gentle hand. “So why the avoidance?”
Josh shrugged. “I worry people will see it, will try to use it against me. Alphas always seem to know my weak points.”
Cole hugged him lightly. “I understand that, I do. But you don’t have to worry about that with us. With me. What you see is what you get.”
Josh was beginning to believe that might be true.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Cole hadn’t expected Josh to come right out and admit to his Keeper nature. He didn’t give it a name, so he didn’t know what it was, but it proved to Cole that he knew he was doing it. He just didn’t know how or why. And he worried it would be used to manipulate him, which wasn’t an unreasonable fear, given Josh’s history.
“My turn,” he said softly. “Dutchy and Andy were two members of our pack—our omega anchor and our beta linker. They were killed alongside Jackson in that mission I told you about. Jackson was our leader, and he was an alpha. He called the shots, took his own chances. But Dutchy and Andy… my role was to protect them, to allow them to do their jobs safely.”
“What happened?”
Cole swallowed hard and forced the words out.
“They were in a bunker, a sealed chamber, underground. I was at the entrance, keeping it clear, and watching their backs. I… I can’t share the details, but the simple truth is, we had to blow the place up. My job was to seal the door, to protect the structure above us that was full of civilians. Jackson stayed behind to make sure it went up, sent Dutchy and Andy out… but they got caught in a firefight on the way. They didn’t make it in time. They were ten feet away when I had to seal the door. They reached it just before the place went up.”
He took a deep, shuddering breath at that, remembering the thump of hands hitting the door, their shouts. A hundred times, he’d imagined their faces—the horror and betrayal in their eyes in that split second before the explosion raged.
“What would have happened if you’d waited for them?”
“I’d never have gotten the door sealed on time. We’d all have died. The floor above us would have collapsed, killed a bunch of other people.” And what was in that bunker might have become airborne, and the world as they knew it would have ended. That part, he could never, ever say out loud. The world could never know how close it came to disaster.
“Sounds like you were a hero,” Josh murmured. “Isn’t that what heroes do? Make the hard choices, sacrifice the few for the many?”
“I felt like a fraud when they pinned another medal to my chest,” Cole admitted. “I should have gone in after them when they ran into trouble, helped get them out.”
“But then who would have been there to seal the door?”
Josh posed the question Cole always asked himself when the doubts grew too big.
“We might have gotten out in time.”
“And you might not. I don’t have much experience with making the hard decisions, but this sounds like one of those. I know you feel you had choices, could have done things differently. But I think maybe you didn’t, you know?”
“Yeah,” Cole said, tired of it all but craving the absolution Josh’s words offered. “Maybe I didn’t.”
He pressed his face to Josh’s back and tried not to think too hard.
“Sleep, Josh. You’re safe. I’ve got your back.”
He was a Protector. Though he sometimes lost sight of that, it was still who he was, inside and out.
They woke to the sound of a phone ringing. Cole lifted his head and peered around, on alert but his mind fuzzy. Where…? Oh, right. Josh’s room.
The events of the night before came back to him as Josh pushed free from his arms and reached for his phone on the nightstand, silencing it. After a moment, he picked it up, blinking at the screen before groaning.
“Problem?” Cole asked.
&n
bsp; “Stewart. That party he wants me to go to is on tonight. That’s why he’s calling.”
Cole settled back down on the bed behind Josh, wrapping his arm loosely around the omega’s waist. “You’re not thinking of going, are you?”
Josh hesitated. “No… but I don’t want to force Stewart into action before Oliver’s friend has had time to look through the contract. Maybe if I went, it would get him off my back for a bit?”
Just the thought of Josh at Simon’s mercy made Cole tense.
“That’s no kind of plan, Joshua.”
The omega glanced at him over his shoulder, appearing amused at the use of his full name.
“What do you suggest, then?”
“Let’s call Oliver and ask his opinion. I guarantee you, he won’t think going to that party is the answer, but he may have another idea.”
Josh rolled onto his back and smiled tentatively up at him. “Yeah, maybe he will.”
“I’ll call him,” Cole said, sitting up. “Then head out and check on the horses. Chores first, then breakfast. How does that sound?”
“Sure, I’ll fill the—”
Cole had to lunge for Josh, catching the omega around the waist and tugging him back onto the bed.
Josh let out a yelp of surprise. “Cole!”
“Sprained ankle, remember,” he murmured in Josh’s ear.
“Oh, fuck,” Josh said, adding a few more colorful swear words in there. “I really can’t go clubbing tonight, can I?”
“Nope. I’ll take another look at that ankle. We might need a second opinion. Good thing a doctor is only a phone call away.”
Josh flopped back onto the bed with a groan. “Do you think he’ll write me a note for Stewart? You know, ‘Please excuse this omega from this evening’s party. He has a severely sprained ankle—dancing is not recommended.’?”
“I’m sure he would. Would Stewart buy that or think it was an excuse?”
Josh looked thoughtful. “He’d say I could do all the entertaining I needed to do flat on my back. No dancing required.” The omega rolled over and hid his face in his pillow. “And he’d probably be right,” he added, his voice muffled.
Keeper (The Lost Pack Book 2) Page 11