Sinclair scowled harder. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”
“The moment we clock off, I’m taking you to the doctor.”
Sinclair looked appalled. “I’m not a baby.”
“Then fucking tell me what’s wrong with you!” Because it was digging under Dom’s skin, not knowing. “It’s been over a week. You’re not getting any better.”
“Maybe I’m just on a diet.”
“A diet where you puke and ignore those donuts?” Dom gave him a pointed look. “You’d give anything to eat them off my body, Sinclair. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.”
Sinclair flushed redder.
That had been a wild guess. But Dom’s instincts roared when Sinclair couldn’t meet his eyes. He wanted to yank Sinclair closer, he wanted to brush his wrists over Sinclair’s skin, to mark him with blackwood. That was a crazy thought. It didn’t make it any less real.
“Look, I’ll go to the doctor myself, if it’ll make you shut up.”
“Fine.” At least, that soothed Dom’s nerves, except he wanted to be at the clinic, too. Just to make sure he knew what the doctor said. And so he could make Sinclair swallow his pills—since Sinclair wasn’t taking care of himself right now.
“You’re going to the doctor?” Nate asked behind them.
Sinclair jumped. Dom turned, irked that he hadn’t heard Nate’s approach at all—he’d been so focused on Sinclair. “Is there a surefire way to convince him?”
Nate sent Sinclair an unreadable look. “Go to the medical center in Highton. The one with your case files.”
Case files? In Highton? That was an hour away from Meadowfall.
Sinclair paled. He gripped his forearm, the tiniest frisson of uncertainty shooting across his face. It had been so long since Dom had seen him that vulnerable, that his instincts said, This is bad.
And the overwhelming urge to protect him rumbled beneath Dom’s skin.
“Fine,” Sinclair muttered, turning away. “Leave me alone, and I’ll go.”
His expression said it was the last thing he wanted to do.
Dom watched as Sinclair stalked off, his shoulders tense. Aside from the loss of appetite, he seemed to be doing okay. Just that he was moving slower than he usually would be. Nate was watching Sinclair, too.
“You know what’s wrong with him?” Dom asked.
Back when they’d hired Nate, Dom had been impressed with his resume. Not so much by his previous jobs—a large chunk of that had been classified—but by his skill sets. The man was familiar with a range of things: emergency medicine, helicopter-piloting, spyware, poisons... the list went on.
Not all of them were applicable in their day-to-day calls, but Dom liked having those skills at his disposal. It helped that Nate learned things fast, too.
And ever since Sinclair joined the station, Dom had heard whispers about how Nate had met him. He’d never asked, though. Never thought it was his business to pry.
Now, he was tempted to.
Nate sent him an assessing look. “He might need support at the medical center. You feeling up to it?”
“Support?” Dom had held Sinclair through his flashbacks. Or did Nate mean something else?
Nate chewed on the inside of his cheek, as though he was trying to decide how much to tell Dom. “You’re involved with him, aren’t you?”
Dom’s neck heated. “It’s... complicated. He’ll say there’s nothing going on.”
Nate gave an exasperated sigh. “I assume he hasn’t told you anything about his past, then.”
“A little.” Dom glanced warily at him. “Is there something I should know?”
Nate checked that no one was listening in. Then, in a lower voice, he said, “What I’ve told Gareth, Harris, and the rest, is that he came from somewhere terrible. He didn’t ask for those scars.”
“Yeah, I know that much.”
Nate studied him. “Did you know about the experimentation?”
“The what?”
“He was the subject of some human experimentation. Toxins, implants, various things. He was one of the doctors’ favorites. For years. I just wish we’d managed to put a stop to it sooner.”
A cold chill twisted through Dom’s gut. He’d seen the scars. He hadn’t thought so much about the purpose behind them, aside from what Sinclair had told him. “He only said he has a tolerance for pain and poison.”
Sinclair never said how he’d achieved that. And how else would he have, aside from being made to suffer through all of it? Dom could imagine him being tied down, he could imagine Sinclair screaming in agony. It sent a sick horror creeping through his veins.
When Nate said nothing, Dom thought over his words. “Wait, you said... years. He was twenty when he joined the station.”
“You heard right.”
Had Sinclair been just a child when he was captured? Dom swallowed, his ears ringing. He couldn’t think past the anger snarling in his chest.
“Those beads were implanted for a reason,” Nate continued. “He wasn’t supposed to remove them.”
“Or else what?”
Nate sighed, nodding toward where Sinclair had gone. “Or else this.”
Dom would’ve asked further, except Nate met his gaze straight on, his expression severe. “Whatever you hear at the medical center, you’ll have to believe it. It’s where he was sent after we extracted him.”
“Fuck.” Dom had wanted to go with Sinclair to the doctor, to just be there, but this... It was turning into something a lot darker. And he could understand why Sinclair had been refusing to seek treatment.
It didn’t make it right. Just heartbreaking.
“You have the address for that place?” Dom asked.
Nate pulled out his phone, his jaw set. “Yeah. I’ll look it up for you.”
“Thanks.”
Much later, when it was time to leave, Dom found Sinclair in the locker room. “We’ll take my truck,” he said. “It’s an hour there.”
Sinclair scowled. “I can get there on my own.”
“You look like you’re about to fall over.”
Sinclair blew out a breath, scrubbing his face. “I’m really fine.”
“Will you still be, after you get there?” Dom asked.
Surprise flitted through Sinclair’s face. Then, wariness. “Did Nate tell you something?”
Dom shrugged. This shouldn’t have been his business, either.
But he remembered Sinclair in the fire truck, snarling about being someone else’s property. He remembered Sinclair opening the donut bags with a secret smile, and his delight when he’d inhaled the treats. Dom remembered Sinclair’s uncertainty after they’d had sex. The way Sinclair all but fled, refusing to meet Dom’s eyes.
Sinclair was so self-conscious, Dom realized. And so... human. Still lost, even now.
Dom shouldn’t be seeing these things about him, but he couldn’t help it. “Want a hug?” he asked.
Sinclair frowned, looking askance at him. “What for?”
“Just asking. In case you wanted one.” Dom changed out of his station clothes, pulling on a clean set—no telling how long the trip to Highton would take.
When he looked up, he found Sinclair watching him. Despite his illness, interest still lingered in his expression.
“You’re also welcome to crash at my place,” Dom offered. “After we get back.”
Sinclair scowled. “Quit being nice.”
That made Dom smile. “Or else what?”
“Or else.”
Sinclair followed him reluctantly to the truck. His nostrils flared when he climbed in—all Dom smelled was his own scent. But Sinclair didn’t roll down the windows to get rid of it. He just breathed, in and out, like he was trying to calm down.
“You don’t want to go there?” Dom asked.
“Fuck, no.” Sinclair buckled his seat belt, closing his eyes. “I don’t ever want to go back.”
“Why not?”
Sinclair shrugged jerkily. He looked so u
neasy that Dom reached over, lightly grasping his hand. Sinclair jumped, glancing down. He didn’t pull away, though. So Dom squeezed Sinclair’s hand lightly—a comforting gesture.
It felt strange, holding an alpha’s hand. Sinclair’s fingers were callused, thick. They’d seen some rough work at the station. They certainly didn’t feel like an omega’s, but Dom appreciated that.
“If there’s someone you don’t want to see, tell me,” Dom said. “I’ll make them go away.”
Sinclair scoffed. “You think I’m a kid?”
“No. But the offer stands anyway.”’
“I don’t get why you’re being so damn nice,” Sinclair muttered.
“Because.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Neither is ‘Or else.’”
At that, Sinclair cracked a tiny smile. It was the first time he’d smiled these past couple weeks. Dom decided that he wanted to see Sinclair smile more. And he also decided that he wasn’t going to question why he thought that way. Bad enough that he’d gotten into a rut with Sinclair.
He wasn’t... emotionally attached.
They sat in silence through the first half of the drive. “Want some music going?” Dom asked.
Sinclair glanced at the radio. Then he reached up, flipping through the stations.
Music from ten years ago came on. Sinclair listened for a bit, then stiffened when the song changed. He turned the radio off, breathing fast.
“Bad?” Dom asked.
Sinclair was silent for a long time. “It was—” He swallowed. “It was playing in the van. When they took me.”
Fuck. Dom’s arm tensed; the truck swerved. “Sorry. Want me to pull over?”
Sinclair shook his head. “Keep going.”
Dom held Sinclair’s hand again, this time so he wouldn’t be tempted to punch something. The more he discovered about Sinclair’s past, the more it felt like needles under his skin.
Sinclair was young enough to be Dom’s son. Dom had been alive when all that had happened. It felt like he should’ve done something when Sinclair had been in so much pain, except he didn’t know what.
Sinclair stiffened when they pulled up at the Highton Veterans’ Medical Center. Dom wasn’t sure why they’d put Sinclair in a center for vets—his PTSD?—but he wasn’t about to question it. “C’mon. The sooner we get this over with, the sooner we get to go home.”
Sinclair steeled himself, overtaking Dom to lead the way.
He seemed to know where he was going. He led them to the Urgent Care department, and handed an identity card to the receptionist. The whole time, his gaze darted everywhere, to every doorway and corner like he expected something to jump out at him.
At the waiting area, Sinclair sat with his back against the wall. Dom sat with him; it seemed that Sinclair didn’t mind.
From the corner of his eye, Dom studied the angular grooves carved into Sinclair’s head, the deliberate incisions that someone had made down the side of his neck.
“Haven’t you seen enough of these?” Sinclair muttered.
Dom hesitated. “I didn’t understand until now.” When Sinclair didn’t answer, Dom asked, “Were you awake for most of it?”
Sinclair looked away, nodding.
Dom breathed out the violence that tried to explode in his chest. He closed his hand around Sinclair’s again—seemed like a good enough reason not to hit something.
The nurse called Sinclair’s name. Dom stood when he did; Sinclair sent him an uncertain look. “You’re not gonna like this.”
“I want to be there,” Dom said. “Please.”
Sinclair looked surprised. After some hesitation, he nodded. Dom followed him into the doctor’s office, taking the empty seat next to his.
“Hi, Jesse,” the doctor said brightly. She was a beta, thin but sunny. “How can we help you today?”
Sinclair fidgeted, glancing at Dom. “I lost my appetite. Been puking for the past couple weeks.”
He’d been throwing up for that long? And he’d hidden it from Dom? Dom narrowed his eyes, filing away his irritation for later.
The doctor kept her smile. “Is there anything else?”
Sinclair paused. “I removed the beads.”
He laid his arms out on the desk—the stitches were gone, and the skin where the beads used to be was now scarred with silvery lines. Dom wanted to smack him, but he understood why Sinclair had done it.
To be honest, he’d probably have done the same.
“Did you leave any beads behind?” the doctor asked.
“No.”
“Have you been supplementing them with any medications?”
“No.”
The doctor’s smile faltered. “Okay, right. Just a few more questions, and I’ll send you for a test.” Sinclair nodded, so she asked, “Do you have any other symptoms? Bloatedness? Fatigue?”
Sinclair hesitated. “Some exhaustion.”
He’d been exhausted? While on duty? Dom glanced at Sinclair, remembering his eyebags, and how he’d been moving slower. He should’ve seen it then. He hated that he’d let it go on for so long.
Sinclair was very pointedly not meeting his eyes; he hadn’t wanted Dom to find out.
“And... another question,” the doctor began, her gaze flickering toward Dom. “You can choose to answer this in private. Have you had sexual contact with an alpha this past year, with you being on the receiving end?”
Sinclair swallowed, his ears turning pink. He wasn’t looking at anyone when he said quietly, “Yeah. I have.”
“Do you remember approximately when that was?”
Sinclair shook his head.
“Seven weeks ago,” Dom said.
Sinclair still couldn’t look at him, but his flush deepened. The doctor glanced at him for confirmation; Sinclair nodded.
“Right. I’ll make a note of it.” The doctor smiled again—a little more cautious this time. “Jesse, I’ll need you to collect a urine sample. When you’re done, hand it over to the lab. We’ll call you back shortly.”
Sinclair flinched, but he took the small plastic container.
Dom waited for him outside the restrooms. Then they sat against the wall again, waiting in silence until the nurse called for Sinclair. Sinclair wiped his hands on his pants, breathing faster.
Dom squeezed his hand. “It’ll be okay.”
“You don’t know that,” Sinclair said between gritted teeth. “Things weren’t okay for a long time, Dom.”
Dom hated that Sinclair had felt so hopeless. Worse, he’d only been a child back then. “What do you want me to say?”
Sinclair shrugged, heading back into the doctor’s office. Dom followed him.
When they were seated, the doctor looked hesitantly at Sinclair. “Would you like me to run through your medical records first, before we discuss the test results?”
Sinclair sucked in a slow breath. “Yeah. Probably.”
“We’ll start with the beads that were in your arms,” the doctor said. “Those were slow-release drug implants. Specifically, they were releasing hormone inhibitors.”
Vaguely, Dom had the faintest sense of foreboding.
Sinclair’s jaw tightened. “So what happened when I removed them?”
“There has been a hormonal imbalance in your body.” The doctor met Sinclair’s eyes. “Because there are other implants, those beads served to neutralize the hormones they produced.”
Sinclair stiffened. “What other implants?”
The doctor turned her screen around to show them some MRI scans—cross-sections of Sinclair’s torso. “When we did a scan based on the Facility’s reports, we found these in your midsection.” She highlighted two areas on the MRI image. They looked familiar, but wrong. There was an organ that opened up into Sinclair’s intestines, and something else. “This is an ovary,” the doctor said. “And this is a uterus.”
Sinclair had gone deathly silent. Dom stared at the screen, his mind making connections too quickly—things he w
as now afraid of the doctor saying.
“So—So what you’re saying,” Sinclair muttered. “I have omega parts?”
“Yes. When you removed the hormone inhibitors, the active hormones in your body went into effect, thus triggering what we know as a heat.”
“It can’t possibly...” Sinclair seemed stunned.
The doctor looked very apologetic. “I’m afraid that this might be bad news. You’re pregnant.”
18
Jesse Freaks Out
The words didn’t sink in, not at first. Jesse stared at the screen, trying to straighten out his thoughts. There was an ovary in his body. A uterus. Omega parts. Inside him.
It couldn’t be. He’d never felt anything different inside.
He pulled up his shirt and saw the scar. The big silver line just above his navel. The one that had hurt inside for weeks. Back then, he hadn’t known why—all he’d known were stretches where he’d dipped in and out of consciousness, someone changing his IV fluids whenever he could think. Then, he’d dropped back into darkness.
Jesse remembered the pride on Larson’s face whenever he paraded Jesse naked in front of his audience. He’d always been inside a clear fiberglass box, and he would never hear what Larson told the potential buyers. But Larson had always pointed a red laser dot at Jesse’s abdomen, where the scar was.
He understood now that Larson’s aim had been this. To put something inside him. So a buyer could impregnate him for whatever reason.
It was still inside him. This thing. And now Dom had fucked him, and... there was something growing inside Jesse. Something that shouldn’t be there.
He reeled, trying to breathe, his stomach turning.
“Shouldn’t his body have rejected it?” Dom’s words sounded faraway.
“We did some tests,” the doctor said, just as faintly. “These match Jesse’s DNA, but with the Y chromosomes turned off. We believe they were grown from stem cells.”
Jesse tried to absorb it all, he really did. But part of his mind just refused to take in the information. It violently rejected everything, and it made his head spin. He felt like puking.
He tried to breathe. But when he looked up, all he saw were white walls. Alarm hissed through his veins.
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