He really was that gift by my side. Hardcore. If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be breathing the air of this room, having the straw placed to my lips for me to drink the cold, sweet fizz he’d got for me because I was fed up with water and juice. Cola was the substitute for not being allowed beer.
G. My guy, my protector. My everything.
When I was done drinking, he placed the cup on the table by the bed and pulled a seat over to sit beside me.
He took my hand, our fingers curling together.
“I checked in with the others,” he said. “They’re eating right now.”
“My uncle still loving those jacket potatoes?”
He chuffed. “Nothing but butter and pepper. He had two.”
It was lunchtime, and I’d just had a beef lasagna cooked by the hospital staff. I’d been shocked to see it on the menu, and kind of, well… It’d tugged at me—that old part of me I needed to kill that still craved to go back to the times of me and Mama Rita being besties. It was so pathetic, so weak, so sickening those feelings weren’t obliterated yet. Wanker. Absolute wanker.
My attention was on the clear view of what used to be The Spire, still smoking, my eyes rarely leaving it as if my will would bring the best possible outcome. But no amount of me begging for them to be alive had done anything so far.
“Have you eaten enough?” G asked me.
“Have you?” I replied. “You’re so worried about me. Make sure you get some grub in you too.
“It’s my job to worry about you.”
“Same here when it comes to you.” I let out a really heavy sigh. “Shit, G.”
His responding hand-squeeze was more than enough.
We sat together by the window for tenshi knew how long. Speaking of which, was this their plan for me all along? Break the curse, lose an arm, and feel so trapped in limbo?
Great plan.
Cheers!
“Hello?”
G turned around. “Hi, sister.”
Nurse Julie.
“I have some news.” She sounded breathless.
G stood, turning me around in the wheelchair to face her.
“High Alpha… He’s been found.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Three hours later, I was allowed into the heavily restricted ICU unit.
No wolves allowed because of the silver risk.
Dad was alive in there but riddled with the silver sickness.
He was dying.
“Please tell him I love him,” Sarah said from her bed, which I sat beside. She wasn’t allowed to go see him.
Her and Riku weren’t infected with the sickness. The three of them had been in the tunnels beneath The Spire, ready for evacuation and my dad to come and join us in Bow for that final fight.
The Spire had come down before they could get out, burying them. Sarah and Riku had been swallowed by a hole that’d opened up, falling deeper, away from Dad. He’d been trapped under rubble, Sarah had broken her ankle. Miraculously, Riku wasn’t hurt, just dusty. Not so miraculously, silver energy had seeped through the rubble, crushing dad, poisoning him.
There was no way to hold back the tide now. Too far gone, too sick.
“I will,” I said, not able to look at her anymore.
G wheeled me away, heading to Dad’s room. We passed through two protective iron curtains, then positioned me at the bedside of the fallen ruler of the world.
I bit back a wail at the sight of him, at his emaciated face, at the bag of bones he’d turned into in five days. Even his hair had fallen out, leaving behind a field of sores on his bald head.
He was fixed up to so many machines bleeping away, an oxygen mask on his face, his body covered in gauze and stitches, his nose broken.
There were two nurses with him, one man, one woman. He was awake, his fever-bright eyes meeting mine.
The female nurse came over. “High Alpha?” she said gently. “Would you like me to take off the mask so you can talk?”
He responded with a slight nod.
“He’ll be fine for about fifteen minutes,” she said to me and did what she needed to do. “Then he’ll need it back on.”
My dad, wheezing, finally said, “It is good to see you, son.”
Whoa. His voice… His damn voice. It was full of weakness and death, a rasp I couldn’t stand listening to, but would.
“And you, Gabriel.”
G didn’t say anything.
“Dad…” I took his hand. He could barely move.
“We don’t have much time,” he said. “Gabriel? Could we be alone for a moment, please?”
“Of course, sir.” He left the room.
“Dad…” I said again. “Shit…”
“Will you let me say what I need to say, Akira?” He winced and coughed, raspy and full of agony.
This was so alien, holding my dad’s hand, this whole moment.
I nodded and let him talk.
“I made so many mistakes with you. I was wrong, a monster. Isn’t it always the case when time reaches its end for a creature like me? It is true that you should tell the people who matter to you most that they do, that you love them.”
“Dad…”
“I love you, Akira. I always have. I know I have been a terrible father, a terrible man. I did blame you for your mother’s death. I was devastated, lashing out. Whenever I looked at you, I saw her dead body, all of the blood when she finally succumbed to her injuries. She was my angel, both literally and figuratively. My heart has never healed from her loss, and I…broke yours.”
Shit. Shit! A few tears escaped my eyes. “Why, Dad?” I took his hand. “Why are you doing this now?”
“Because I’m dying, son. The silver sickness is ravaging my body.”
“I know, that’s not what… Why…” This was so damn hard. “I mean, why now? Why didn’t you say this to me before? Why couldn’t you tell me who mum was, what I was?” The floodgates opened. “All I ever wanted was for you to be proud of me, to be my dad, to tell me you loved me, to tuck me in at night. To not hate me.”
“Akira…”
“The last thing mum said was to heal, that we could maybe be a family.” I blinked to clear fresh tears. “But now this. What the fuck is wrong with the universe? With the tenshi? It’s all too late.”
His body shivered, and he coughed again.
“Dad?”
“I am sorry, Akira. Deeply, deeply sorry. I wish… I wish I could go back and put everything right. Yet I am nothing more than a dying man full of regrets, telling his son he loves him…too late.”
“Shit…” I bowed my head and let the tears fall, the sobs racking my body. “It’s not fair…”
“I wonder… I wonder if I will see my Sakura again.”
I looked up. “Mum?”
“Yes. I would like to see her face again, even if I do not deserve to.”
Deep, unsteady breaths. My walls were caving in. “I don’t know what to say, Dad.”
“You do not have to say anything.” Another cough. “Will you sit with me for a while?”
“Yeah. Okay.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Gabriel
Aki had sat with his father for two hours, and now it was my turn to talk to him after a video link had been set up for him and Sarah to speak, for him to see his baby son sleeping.
High Alpha didn’t have much time left, the doctors said, and he needed to speak to me, his brother, and Zach. There was a translator in the room to sign back every word to Zach.
“Brother,” Uncle Ryoka said from his wheelchair in Japanese. “Oh, my brother. Why did this happen to us? Why? We should have been there for one another, no void between us. Power was never worth it.”
“No… It wasn’t,” High Alpha replied. “I am sorry. There is so much regret within me, brother.”
“You stubborn bastard. Life could have been so much better.”
“I know.”
“All we have now is this sliver of time before you succu
mb.”
“It’s more than we’ve ever had, Ryoka.”
Next he talked to Zach as Ryoka backed away, silent.
“Son, I wish we could have got to know one another. Remember this—I never wanted to have you killed. I did your mother, yes, but not you. I had you arrested because I had no choice. I… There is nothing I can do to make up for the time we didn’t have. There is nothing left for us now, no journey for us to go on. We were never meant to be. But I love you. You are my flesh and bone.” Zach took his hand. “I want you to have the best life, to be a brother, to form the family we should have been with your brothers and uncle, and my darling Sarah. Will you do that for me?”
He nodded, tears rolling down is face.
“Gabriel?”
I stepped forward. “Yes, sir?”
“I want to thank you…thank you for your service to me. I have one more request, not an order.”
This was awful, so surreal. I couldn’t accept this dying shell was High Alpha. “Anything, sir.”
“Look after him. Love him.”
Our eyes locked with understanding. “Always, sir. Always.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
I watched my dad die as the sun set that night.
His eyes were closed as he took his last breaths.
No more words.
He was done.
The High Alpha was dead.
It was at that exact moment when the nurse turned off the heart monitor that I fell apart fully, letting every emotion batter me, whip me up in a sea of fury and grief, hurl me at the rocks, and then drag me back out to churn me about again.
Rinse. Repeat.
ONE YEAR LATER…
Chapter Thirty-Six
Gabriel
I opened the patio doors, letting the morning breeze drift into the living room and stretched the sleep from my limbs with a yawn.
It was early, the golden sun blazing as it came up on the horizon. The sky was a perfect cerulean, only a dusting of clouds. It was going to be another perfect summer day.
As I did most mornings, I let the view sink in from this hillside cottage in north Wales, admired the sloping fields rolling into the distance, and the peaks shaping that horizon the sun was igniting in a golden morning glow.
Our closest neighbors were about a half-mile away. It was so serene here, nothing but birdsong and nature.
I counted my blessings every day.
“Morning.”
I turned around to greet my boyfriend, shirtless, in gray sweatpants and white sneakers, practically glowing in the sunlight pouring in from the skylight above him. His dark hair was tied up, and he held a training katana in both of his hands—flesh and bionic.
“Up for it?” he asked, wriggling his eyebrows.
“Of course.” I drank the last of my coffee. “I’ll meet you there.”
* * *
Though the cottage was small, we had quite a vast amount of land, three gardens sectioned off by hedges. One of them we had converted into a training area. It was a glass box with tinted windows, plenty of ventilation, and enough space to swing swords.
I’d slipped on some white shorts and sneakers, removed my shirt, and armed myself with training swords too.
“Sexy,” Aki said. His eyes roamed across my body hungrily.
My cock throbbed, my eyes doing the same to his slender frame. I’d like to tear those pants off him right here and now.
Training first.
He came at me in a blur of speed. We did our dance, parried, jumped, and showed off our athletic skills with flips and cartwheels—putting the flare into the sword fight.
Aki’s blue bionic arm had given him back his katana-skills. We practiced pretty much every morning, and I’d even developed some sword skills of my own. Workout and learning—an excellent combination. The added bonus was watching Aki in action half-naked and glistening with sweat.
“Keep up, Dawson,” he said, leaping off to the side, bringing the double slice.
I deflected both, spun, and trapped his neck between my blunt blades. “You were saying?”
He was panting. The golden flecks in his brown eyes were tiny fires. Lustful shadows seemed to play across the planes of his face.
Aki dropped his katanas.
I did the same, and we crashed into one another, lips crushing, hands going everywhere until we found ourselves naked.
I scooped him up into my arms. “I know where we’re going.”
The training was over.
* * *
I twisted his nipples as he rode me. He loved that. It always elicited the best moans of pleasure from him when I played there.
He was fully in charge, though, me his sexual slave. Aki knew how to work my cock, to ride me to ecstasy. Being inside him was an intensity I’d never experienced before, his ferocity mind-blowing.
“Yes, G. Yes… Tug them harder… Tug ‘em…”
I thrust into him, giving it to him hard, my balls slapping the underside of his ass, our bodies both shimmering with sweat.
“Oh, baby,” I breathed. “Oh, fuck.”
I shot my load into him, balls tightening, letting loose several hot jets into that delicious ass of his.
Panting, he climbed off me. “Flip over.”
I did, getting myself onto all fours. He was in a particularly frisky mood this morning.
He lubed me up, teasing me with my fingers. I was out of breath but greedy for him. I could do this all day.
“You want it?” he asked.
“I so want it.”
“I’m gonna give it to ya, bruv. So fucking hard.”
He entered me, and I gasped.
“You like that, G?”
“Shut up and fuck me. Give me the…erm…sausage.”
He laughed. “Gladly.”
Hard and fast, he pounded me, spanking me.
“I love this booty,” he whispered several times as he unleashed his sexual desire into me. He even grabbed my dick, beating it with the same ferocity of his thrusting.
He lowered across my back, not breaking his speed, lips on my neck. He nipped and sucked and licked and fucked me until I came again.
“Yes…” he whispered, driving into me even harder.
Fuck. He really knew how to hit the sweet spot.
He came inside me with a roar, and we collapsed together in a sweaty tangle on the bed, legs locking together, his sticky cock resting on my thigh.
“Sorry about the sausage part,” I said. “Seemed like a good idea in my head.”
“I liked it. It was a whole thinking outside the box thing.”
“Or I’m just a complete freak.”
“Or that.”
I touched his nose with mine. “You love the freaky side.”
“Hell, yeah.”
The Aki of now compared to a year ago was so different. Yes, he was still himself but enveloped in a greater sense of calm. It’d been a long journey, one of terrible pain, of him being hospitalized for two months shortly after his father’s death with a nervous breakdown. He hadn’t been able to cope with anything—the loss of his arm, his father, the guilt over what’d happened in that Tokyo safehouse. It’d all completely shattered him.
But now the pieces were back together, and he was so radiant, so beautiful, so new, a true inspiration. He’d overcome his affliction, embraced his bionic arm, and learned a whole new way to live both mentally and physically.
I was so proud of him.
I ran my fingers through his silky, dark hair. “Ready for the big day tomorrow?”
“I can’t wait. Talking of which, I’d better get out of this bed if I’m gonna make those brownies.”
Dark chocolate brownies with raspberry crystals—his masterpiece—and he was also making a birthday cake. His love of baking was more intense than before. Last week, he’d finally made that Croquembouche.
I smacked his backside gently as he climbed over me. “Are you getting a shower?”
“I am. Wanna join me?”<
br />
How could I say no to that?
Chapter Thirty-Seven
It was Saturday morning and sunny with a lush breeze. Proper perfect autumn day. Not mega hot, not freezing. Awesome.
“Ready?” G said as I foil-wrapped the brownies.
“Let’s do this.” I picked up the tray and followed him out to the car, him carrying the birthday cake.
I loved the shit out of my bionic arm. It was mega clever, responding to my brain like the rest of my body. Super technology that’d saved me, that’d let me pick up a katana again, carry trays of brownies, and even hold the book on Henry the VIII with both hands—which I’d finally finished reading last night.
Placing the tray on the backseat of the car, I slid in the passenger seat next to G, blowing a kiss over to my covered-up Cindy a few feet away.
G shook his head, smiling. “This is definitely a three-way relationship.”
“You know it!”
I was so proud of my man. Every minute of the day. He’d embraced being human with bells on. Sometimes it did get to him. It would. A massive loss. But most of the time, he was this force of pure fucking awesomeness I loved harder and harder with each sunrise.
I drank in the morning. The spiderwebs shimmering in the bushes and trees around our cottage, the rolling hills everywhere you looked, the cute cottage and flowers and rose garden with the stone wolf head at the heart of it. A tribute to my dad.
This was my haven, our sanctuary. Our lives now. Together, living a quiet life of baking and sex and book collecting. Well, G collected the books—rare books which he’d built an online business selling and buying and all the good stuff.
My katanas were still with me, but I didn’t use them. I’d retired at twenty-five. Ha! The hunter life was way back that way. I was over here now, cheers.
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