Chapter 70: Undressed And Underprepared

BOOM.

The fourth explosion lit the storm clouds orange for a half second and faded.

Alpha Thunderfang turned and left without a word. Down the stairs. Gone.

Nova’s mouth had been open. The thank you was right there, loaded, ready, aimed at his back. She swallowed it because he didn’t want to hear from her. He had held her cuffs while his hands burned and she couldn’t even say two words to him because two words might make him angry and angry was worse than silent.

She stayed silent, then looked at Derek, who was looking at her like she might detonate next.

She wanted to tell him what this meant. She wanted to tell him that she had worn silver since she was very little but couldn’t find a single word big enough.

Then she noticed his palms and her hand flew to her mouth.

The burns were worse than she had realized. His skin was raw in places, blistered in others and he hadn’t said a goddamn word about it.

"I’m fine, Nova. See?" He held his palms up and she watched the skin knit itself back together in real time. Alpha healing. Something she knew in theory but had never seen up close. But it didn’t matter. This wasn’t nothing. He had hurt himself to help her.

He flashed a grin. "Stop being so cute or I will be forced to take action."

She lowered her hand from her mouth. The gratitude was still stuck somewhere between her chest and her throat and it was too big for the exit and she was going to have to find another way to get it out or it was going to live there permanently.

Astra appeared in front of her with a scanner out.

"Stay still."

Nova stayed still. Her body was making a strong case for horizontal. She had been feeling achy since the rain started at the ceremony and every hour since had added another layer of terrible. The cuffs coming off should have made her feel better. Instead, she felt worse, which didn’t make sense.

"You’re running a fever. A bad one," Astra said, reading the scanner with a face that suggested the numbers were personally offending her.

"Slaves get those," Nova explained, though the fact Astra clocked a fever was surprising because wolves ran hotter than slaves.

"I am aware, Nova. You are running hot for a slave and for a wolf. Hotter than you were earlier."

Astra had used her name. Nova noticed and didn’t say anything about it because drawing attention to kindness from Astra felt like pointing at a rainbow and asking it to stay.

Astra turned to Derek. "Bedrest. I will come check on her in the morning."

The injector gun came out of the kit and struck Nova’s neck without a word. Nova winced the second it touched her. She knew it didn’t hurt. The flinch was involuntary. A cooling sensation traveled down Nova’s spine, and the aches and pains started to fade.

Then Astra turned to Derek like Nova wasn’t sitting between them. "She’s very lucky. Those scars are treatable." She pulled a small jar from her kit and handed it to him. "Twice a day."

Nova looked down at her wrists. Then at the jar. Then at Derek, who was holding it with an expression she couldn’t read because he had too many expressions tonight and she had run out of translations.

"Now," Astra continued. "Can we all acknowledge that she is not going to be a slave because Thunderfang doesn’t have slaves? Or are we all going to continue with that charade." She held up a hand before Derek could answer. "She’s not cleared to work. She’s sick. But even if she weren’t, you are going to have to find a different healer to clear her, because I will not clear her or any patient to be a slave."

Nova blinked a few times, visibly confused. She glanced over at Maria, who was equally confused, which was at least validating that Nova wasn’t the only one missing the playbook.

A mindlink conversation started. Nova could tell because Derek, Beta Voltcrest, and Astra were making eye contact in the specific way that people do when they are having a conversation.

Maria caught Nova’s eye again from the bar. She held up her blue drink, pointed at it, and made a one-minute signal, glancing at Astra, whose back was turned and whose attention was buried in a mindlink.

Nova felt sick. Her body was making a compelling argument for bedrest that she was planning to ignore because she wanted one of those.

Derek yawned. "I’m working on it, Astra."

Maria started laughing, which made Nova laugh, because the man had answered Astra’s statement a minute after Astra had said it like he hadn’t just been in a long silent conversation. He was fooling neither of them and the yawn was the cherry on top.

Derek scooped Nova off the couch before the laugh finished leaving her mouth, moving towards the stairs without room for negotiation. The decision was made.

Nova opened her mouth to argue. She wanted to try the blue drink. But he was already halfway down the stairs and the determination in his eyes stopped her.

He didn’t speak until they were back in his quarters and he gently set her down on the bed. The kind of gently that contradicted every other thing he had done in the last twenty minutes, which had included tackling her, carrying her against her will, and outrunning a blue drink.

"I’m going to take care of you, Nova. Will you let me?"

That question caught Nova off-guard. She turned it over in her head trying to understand what he meant by that.

"Of course," she whispered. "I promise I’m fine. I don’t want to-"

He cut her off mid-word with a kiss, then turned towards his bathing chamber, where Nova heard running water. When he returned a moment later, the water was still going, which meant he was drawing a bath for her. That was unexpected.

His fingers found the zipper at the base of her neck and pulled it down slowly.

Her blood ran cold.

This was what mates did. She knew that. He was probably going to see her naked at some point. Mates did that when they mated. It still didn’t change the fact that she barely knew him and this was new for her.

Her heart was hammering so loud she could hear it in her ears.

Derek pulled the uniform off her shoulders. Down her body until the fabric pooled on the ground. Cool air met her bare skin. Her undergarments came next.

She had never been fully bare in front of a man before and her face caught fire under his gaze. Her hands moved before her brain did, covering herself on instinct. He caught them. Moved them back to her sides and held them there.

"You don’t hide from me," he said before his lips found her collarbone.