Eugene continued to glare at him. While it was of benefit to the Academy if the Pack went around killing themselves off, this was… He’d much rather have taken them into custody. Killing was abominable. It was why he’d been so eager to join the Blaze Ops. Having the option to participate in a team where their mission was to save lives, to rescue people… That was what he wanted to do.
Eugene snarled at the man, making him flinch back. He turned on his heel and stalked away. “I am going back to my cell.”
“No. The Alpha—”
“Hang the Alpha!” Not a smart thing to say, not in the least, but Eugene was so worked up he didn't care. A man had just been murdered in front of him while he tried to subdue him. Did they really expect him to stick around after that? “I am done fighting today. You tell the Alpha if he wants me to continue at all, he will have to guarantee no more deaths. Sigmas or not!”
The man snarled and chased after him. “I don’t care who you are, Dragon, but—”
“Listen very carefully, Wolf,” Eugene snapped, then whirled. He grabbed the man’s throat. Force was the only thing they seemed to understand. “I will say this once more. No.”
He tossed the man away and continued on. The guards that followed him everywhere silently ghosted after him. He made his way back to his cell, where he yanked the door shut and then slammed his fist into the wall.
How long before he went the same way as that hybrid? How long until the conflicting senses in his head were too much? How long before he went crazy and attacked without seeing anybody, until he acted out in such a way that the Alpha would decide to put him down? And what would happen to Clementine when that happened?
She said that the procedure was happening to him far more quickly than it was to the others she’d seen. She didn’t know why. But the fact was, they didn’t know how much time they had.
Eugene punched the wall again. His fist dented the concrete, chipping large flakes out of it. Pain shot up his arm and he stepped back, rubbing his knuckles. That probably fractured something but—he opened and closed his hand experimentally—it was still working, so it’d heal.
He slumped onto the bed, wishing Clementine was with him already. That way, she’d be able to hold him. Right now, he wanted to feel safe. To feel like everything was going to be okay. He was trying so hard to be strong for her, to show her that he had all the faith in her. And he did.
But God… sometimes he just wanted to be the little spoon, to receive the concern and protection.
They had to get out of here. But how? Since he’d been given the serum, he hadn’t seen a single opportunity to escape. It was still months until the time they’d set for the Blaze Ops to recover them. He was stuck, they were stuck, and he didn’t know what he was going to do.
The door opened and Eugene growled. He didn’t care what the Alpha had to say, he wasn’t going back out there!
But it wasn’t the Alpha. It was Karey. Her head bent, her shoulders hunched. Karey, the lowest of the low in the Pack. An Omega. In the weeks since he’d been here, he’d heard more than once that it was the opinion of many in the Pack that all Omegas should be ousted from them, or at the very least, sterilized to keep them from breeding. Even if she was the Alpha’s daughter, Karey couldn’t have escaped those taunts.
“It’s time for your bloodwork,” Karey murmured. She glanced at the hole he’d punched in the wall, and her eyes widened. Her gaze flickered to him, and she dropped her shoulders even more.
“Close the door,” Eugene said.
The guard behind them closed the door and Karey jumped. Her eyes went wide, and she pressed herself back against the wall. She yanked a needle from her pocket and held it in front of herself, as though that would be able to protect her. Eugene sighed and didn’t move from where he was sitting. He understood her fear too well.
“B-but C-Clement-tine,” Karey rasped.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Karey. I just didn’t want those guards looking in while you drew my blood. I can’t roll the sleeves up on this damn shirt.” He demonstrated, unable to pull the long sleeve past the middle of his forearm, where the tattoo of a sailing ship was. “I’m going to have to take it off.”
Karey’s eyes widened even further, and she opened her mouth. She choked a moment before closing her mouth again and nodding.
Eugene removed his shirt, then grabbed a short-sleeved one to put on, since Karey remained looking terrified. Poor girl. He couldn’t imagine what her life was like… but with her being so put down on, always overlooked… maybe he could use that to his advantage.
“Do you love your father, Karey?” he asked in a low voice as she tied the rubber band around his upper arm.
“Of course,” Karey said, in an equally low voice.
“And you know that he’d never allow Clementine to develop an anti-serum the way she needs to. You know that she’s not been given the equipment she needs.”
Karey swiped the inside of his elbow with an alcohol wipe.
“The only way the Alpha is going to survive this is if you go to the Academy with the information about what that other doctor did. Utopia is the only one who can fix this, you know that.”
Karey stared at him with the needle in hand, her eyes wide and her mouth hanging open.
Eugene grimaced. “I know what that sounds like. But when I brought Clementine here, I had no idea things were this bad. I have to do everything I can to protect her, and right now, that means getting this serum fixed. You know this is our only chance.”
“I… I can’t do that,” Karey hissed in a whisper. “I can’t leave the compound. My father… I’d be killed. I’d be branded a traitor and killed. Besides, the Academy would never let me go again.”
“They would,” Eugene replied, “if they traded you for me. And then I could easily get away and come back. I’m not leaving Clementine.”
And in the meantime, the Blaze Ops would figure out something had gone wrong and extract them. Eugene felt bad about lying to Karey since there was no way the Academy would let her go, but it would be better for her, anyway. Away from this life, away from the brainwashing, away from all of this.
Karey stuck the needle into his vein and shook her head hard. “No. No, I can’t. Don’t you ever say that to me again. I’d tell the Alpha right now, only he wouldn’t believe me.”
“Karey—”
“No!” Her voice rose, then she flinched. She hurriedly took the blood she needed and gave him a glare. “No, Dragon. I am never going to betray my Pack and my family. Your mate will do as she’s told. It’s what the Alpha wants, and the Alpha always gets what he wants.”
“Even when he wants the impossible?”
Karey slammed her fist against the door. It was opened, the guard outside smirking, and she fled. The door was closed once more, and Eugene fell back over the bed. It’d been a long shot, he supposed. So he had to find another way out of here. Or pray that Clementine was able to make that anti-serum before he went mad and turned into some twisted mockery of a dragon.
Chapter Twenty-One
Clementine carefully added a drop of the new serum to the blood she’d taken from Eugene earlier that day. A spike of irritation ran through her as she quickly sealed it up, labeled it and added it to the other tubes she was working with. While she was reasonably certain that this would help slow the serum’s movements, it wasn’t going to do jack shit to actually fix the problem—because the Alpha wasn’t giving her what she needed to do that.
Compounded by the fact that she hadn’t seen Karey all day and so work was going twice as slow as it should be… she was not happy at all.
Although, there was a plus side to not seeing Karey. Whatever the Alpha had his daughter doing, he hadn’t sent anybody else to give her the blockers. In fact, she hadn’t gotten any since noon yesterday. So her mountain lion was curled up in her chest. A little groggy, perhaps, but very much there. And Clementine was very, very happy to have it back. She wasn’t looking forward to when the
y corrected their mistake.
The door slammed open and she jumped, dropping the vial of blood in her hand. It splattered over the floor as the Alpha charged in. His face was red, his lips pulled back in a terrible howl as he leapt over the desk. Equipment flew left and right.
Flipping backward, Clementine hit the floor and rolled away. The Alpha followed her, shouting and swearing. He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her hard enough to give her whiplash.
“Where is she?” he screamed in her face. “What have you done, you bitch?”
Clementine tried to fight him off, a cry bursting from her throat. The usual guards were nowhere to be seen. The Alpha’s eyes narrowed as he screamed again. He threw her to the floor, straddling her to pin her in place and wrapped his hands around her neck. Clementine clawed at his hands, but it was no use.
“I’ll kill you for this. I’ll fucking kill you.”
Her mountain lion sprang to the front. She shifted, earning a bit of breathing room as the Alpha jerked in surprise. She unsheathed her claws, swiping them across his face. Blood spurted onto her fur as the Alpha reeled back, howling. She scrambled out from under him and grabbed the nearest heavy object she could find; she swung it hard into his head, sending him down, and then raced out the door.
A half-dozen of the Alpha’s guards raced toward the building. Clementine shifted again and dodged around them. Her only thought was to find Eugene. She heard a dragon’s roar and turned on a dime, heading for him. Her heart slammed into her ribs as shouts and howls followed her.
She found him facing off a dozen wolves. They jumped all over him, tearing at his wings and face as he let out burst after burst of fire. He’d ripped a hole in the chain-link fence behind him. Clementine dove for a gun on the ground, shifting back to human form as she grabbed it. Rolling to her back, she pulled the trigger, aiming wildly at the wolves that were attacking him.
They jumped away, putting some distance between them and Eugene. He turned, ripping the hole bigger, and let out a roar.
Run.
Clementine pulled her mountain lion back, shifting smoothly to its form, and took off. She ran as hard and fast as she could, dodging trees, through bushes, over rocks. She didn’t let anything slow her.
Until she realized Eugene wasn’t with her.
Clementine skidded to a stop. In the distance, she heard sounds of gunfire and roaring. No sound of pursuit. No indication that Eugene was anywhere near her. Her heart froze inside of her. Had he… had he stayed behind on purpose? Trying to give her the chance to run away?
She turned, fully intending to go back to him. But as she did, the scent of a wolf caught her nose. She whirled again as someone came through the trees. Without even thinking, she attacked. The wolf let out a pained howl and cowered before her, not even moving to defend itself. And that was how she knew.
Clementine backed away, still trembling with adrenaline, and shifted. “Karey?”
Karey shifted to human, hunched in on herself, blood dribbling from the wounds Clementine had just inflicted. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I thought… I thought you were here to meet me. I thought you got my note.”
“Note?”
Karey shuddered as the sounds of fighting cut off abruptly. “Your mate. He said… he said I needed to go to the Academy. To take the research that Utopia never had, so she could make an anti-serum to save my father. But I knew he’d blame you if I disappeared, so I left a note, telling you how to get out and how to get here.”
“I didn’t see any note. The Alpha just attacked me. He’s going to kill Eugene; I have to go back.”
“No!” Karey seized her wrist and yanked her hard in the opposite direction. “He won’t kill his dragon. But he will kill you.”
“I can’t leave him!”
“What would he want you to do? Die going back when you can’t do anything?” Karey’s nails bit into her wrist. “Kill yourself and your unborn child?”
Clementine froze. She turned on Karey so suddenly that the girl flinched and shrank back from her. She didn’t release Clementine’s wrist, though she stopped tugging at her. How did she know? How could she have possibly known about that?
The question must have been clear in Clementine’s eyes because Karey muttered, “We took tests. My father wanted to know. If you go back now, he won’t remember that he has plans for that baby. He will kill you.”
“Plans?”
Karey resumed pulling her, and this time Clementine allowed her to pull her through the foliage. “He was excited when he learned you were pregnant. He said it had to be a dragon, and he wanted to know more about the process of how a dragon develops. He was waiting until you and your mate were too fully enveloped in the Pack to ever leave. But he wanted to experiment on your baby. He was going to make you agree.”
“I never would—”
“You know you wouldn’t have been allowed the choice!”
Clementine had to believe that. Her free hand dropped to her stomach. The Alpha knew. Would he tell Eugene? Would Eugene believe him? Would he be angry she didn’t tell him? Would their baby even live long enough to meet their father… would he live long enough to meet his baby?
“They’ll be coming after us,” Karey said, pulling harder. “We have to move. We have to get out of here before the others find us. The Alpha will kill us both. Hurry!”
“But what are we going to do?”
Karey shook her head, looking overwhelmed and bewildered. “The Academy. We go to the Academy, work with them for the anti-serum. Find a way to save my father and your mate and all the others. And then they offer to trade us in exchange for Eugene. It’s the only thing we can do.”
The Academy. Where most of them still thought she was a traitor. But the Blaze Ops... She could tell them what had happened. They could get in there and save Eugene. That’s what the Blaze Ops specialized in, after all. Rescue and recovery.
She nodded. No matter what else happened, the Blaze Ops would believe her. They’d be able to save Eugene.
“Okay. Okay, let’s keep moving.” Clementine strode forward confidently, only for her barefoot to land on a twig. A bolt of pain shot up her leg, and she stumbled. The cry she let out was more frustration than pain. “We’ll have to stay in our shifted forms.”
Karey, peering at her anxiously, nodded.
The two of them shifted back to their mountain lion and wolf. They stayed close together as they trotted further and further from the Pack’s compound. At one point, Clementine thought they were being followed and so indicated for Karey to follow her. She put the wolf through the wringer, scrambling every which way, up hills, down hills, along a river, doubling back. Several hours later, Clementine was satisfied that the wolves would have a difficult time following them and so fell back to let Karey take the lead again.
But Karey stared at her, not moving.
Clementine sighed as she shifted back to human form. “You know where we’re going. You need to take the lead.”
Karey shifted back as well. “No, I don’t.”
Clementine’s knees gave out. She didn’t care if it did hurt to collapse onto the forest floor. She pressed her hands to her eyes. Eugene could be dead already and for what? So she and Karey could wander around the forest forever until they starved to death or ended up back in the Pack’s clutches.
“I thought you knew where you were going,” Karey shrieked. “I followed you because I thought… but I don’t know where we are anymore!”
So that was it. She’d been an idiot to assume that Karey knew the woods around the compound like she knew the woods around her old home. So now what were they going to do? What could they do? Not go back. They couldn’t do that. Not now, not ever.
Karey moaned as she sank onto the ground as well, hiding her curvy frame as she tucked her knees to her chest. “This is all my fault.”
“How is this your fault?” Clementine mumbled, too numb to think.
“Because… for the first time in my life, I decided to g
o against my father. I decided not to do as I was told. I decided to trust what I thought was the right thing. To try to make things better. And look where it got me? He was right, I’m stupid and worthless and—”
“No.” Clementine grasped her wrist. Things might have been awkward since they were both naked, but they were shifters. Nudity was no big deal. “No, you are not stupid nor are you worthless. You were right. This is the only way we’re going to be able to save him.”
“But he wouldn’t have been in such a rage if I hadn’t run away.”
Clementine shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. He’s unstable, and you did what you had to in order to protect him. Not that he deserves your love.”
Karey breathed in a sharp breath. “But he’s my father!”
“That doesn’t mean you have to love him when he has piled so much emotional and physical abuse on you.” Clementine bit back the rest of what she would have liked to have said. Now was not the time, not when Karey was barely able to think of a way other than her father’s way. She deserved the time to be able to come to that conclusion herself, not trade one bully for another. Clementine patted her shoulder. “We will get there. Don’t worry. I know woods. We just have to figure out where we are, and we can go from there. We’ve been moving mostly east. So we stay east. That way, we don’t accidentally return to the compound.”
Karey looked at her with trusting eyes and nodded.
Clementine sighed as she got back to her feet. “Let’s go. We can’t just sit around all day. They’ll still be hunting us.”
She shifted and started out again, Karey close on her heels. Even though doubts continued to swirl, Clementine didn’t let them overcome her. They would get back to the Academy. She would make damn sure of that. Eugene was counting on her.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Eugene thought the eight by eight cell was small. It was nothing compared to this one. It wasn’t big enough to lie down in, nor big enough to stand. He truly felt like he was in a cage. The walls pressed in on him in his cramped position. His fires flared hot and then burned low. Sweat dripped down his brow. There wasn’t enough air in this box; he felt like he was suffocating.
Dragon's Pride (Dragon Blaze Ops Book 3) Page 13