Chapter 247: No right to refuse

I didn’t sleep all night. Dark thoughts spun in endless circles, making me toss and turn on the rumpled sheets. I thought feverishly about how to slip into that locked room without Damian noticing a thing.

Something capable of helping me was definitely hidden in there. I felt it with my entire being, trusting my own intuition. Damian’s hoarse, insidious words refused to leave my head, settling deep into the subconscious. The guy was hiding something that was the most valuable thing in the world to him.

Yet, the main obstacle was his total control. Damian spent his evenings in the apartment, robbing me of any chance to be alone with his dark secrets. Nor could I skip lectures and sneak back here in the middle of the day, since I simply didn’t possess a key to the front door.

If only a ghost of a chance arose to find myself alone within these walls for even a couple of hours, I would breach that lock by any means necessary.

After all, the room sat right through the wall from mine. On one side stood a demon, and on the other, his secret—trapped between two fires...

I could have torn the wall apart brick by brick, honest to God. But reality wasn’t a prison-break movie where inmates spent years digging tunnels with a rusty spoon. If I left so much as a single scratch on the light wallpaper, he would notice in the exact same second. And then I would be completely finished.

I knew with absolute certainty that I would regret ever being born if the Alpha’s serious wrath fell upon me. The razor edge of his potential anger terrified me to the point of numbness in my fingertips.

"—No, can you imagine, right in the mouth!" Rita said indignantly, slamming the white office door shut with a loud bang. My friend puffed out her lips with an amusing expression and fanned herself with a card. "Amelie, go already, they’re calling you!"

"Huh?" Finally surfacing from the viscous stream of my thoughts, I forced my unfocused gaze onto my classmate and rose smoothly from my chair.

Right. Medical examination... We stood at the very tail end of the long medical examination list, and the corridors had emptied out long ago as the other students wandered off home.

"Yes, right away," I murmured quietly, adjusting the strap of my bag.

Stepping into the office, I instantly bit my lip to suppress a surge of intense nervousness that pierced through me like a shot. A rising wave of fear suddenly locked my muscles.

Still, when you visited the exact same trusted doctor year after year, you grew accustomed to him—to that comforting safety net provided by parents standing close by. But now, they weren’t here with me, and there was no one left to shield me.

Clenching my fists, I surveyed the room. Everything around was so sterile-white that my eyes smarted from the unfamiliar glare. Bright overhead lamps blinded me, worsening the throbbing in my head.

"Ahem."

Scanning the walls, I was so lost to reality that I completely missed the man sitting at the desk literally half a meter away from me.

"Oh!" Gasping in surprise, I recoiled in fright, nearly clipping the medicine cabinet with my shoulder. "S-sorry, I didn’t see you."

The man merely arched a dark brow sarcastically. Throwing an appraising, cold glance at me, he silently pointed with his pen to a vacant desk next to his. Perching on the very edge, I stared at him warily. And the doctor simply... remained silent. He lazily flipped through my empty medical chart, and the oppressive silence weighed heavily on my mind.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" he dragged out a minute later, still without raising his eyes.

"Um? Me?" Completely losing my footing under his heavy, crushing presence, I felt incredibly awkward. Every second turned into torture. "What do I need to do?"

Rolling his eyes, the man muttered something dismissively under his breath, stripping away the last shreds of my confidence. His behavior was terrifying. He seemed angry at my sluggishness, and that irritation vibrated clearly in the air.

"Why aren’t you undressing? Here’s a chair for your things! What is this, your first time?" He raised his voice, sharply slamming the medical chart shut.

"Well, this is my first time. I don’t know how to read minds, excuse me." Exhaling nervously, I clutched the hem of my sweater with my fingers and tried to pull myself together. "Why do I need to undress?"

"What do you mean? You turned eighteen a long time ago. Ever since you were sixteen, you’ve been required to be checked for a mate mark, track all hormonal changes, and enter the data into the central database."

"Isn’t this a voluntary procedure? I don’t want you seeing me without clothes, examining things, and logging it into the database." Uttering these stubborn words, I stood up sharply from the chair.

I had no idea I would have to take off my clothes. Especially in front of a man. It turned out all my female classmates had calmly done this? How horrifying. At the mere thought of being inspected completely naked by a strange man, nausea rose to my throat. This doctor’s demeanor didn’t inspire a single drop of trust. Beside him, I felt only a looming threat.

"It’s not voluntary! It’s your direct duty as a breeder! Where on earth do you crawl out from?! One yells that she won’t let a tongue depressor near her mouth, and another refuses to undress?!" Suddenly, the man slammed his palms down on the wooden desk so hard that I squeaked in fright.

My heart skipped a beat, and jumping back on the spot, I backed toward the door.

"What are you yelling for, as if I’m slaughtering you?! Undress, I said!" he barked, rising from his seat.

"N-no. I won’t do it. I am categorically opposed to this examination," I stammered through numb lips. Quickly reaching behind my back, I blindly grabbed the metal door handle and turned my back to the doctor. "Goodbye."

"Sit down right now! You have no right to refuse the medical board—it is your duty to society!" At the harsh scrape of his chair sliding back and the furious, crushing booming of the man’s voice, a flash of primal terror surged through my body like searing lightning.

Yanking the handle toward myself, I leaped out into the corridor. Completely ignoring the stinging pain in my foot, I bolted away. Panic escalated with every passing second, crashing over me in a suffocating wave that knocked all the air right out of my lungs. I was trembling violently, near the brink of tears.

Suddenly, the metal band around my wrist pricked my skin with noticeable, sharp pain. Glancing down at it mid-stride, I watched in horror as a thin, crimson droplet slid down my hand. Had it just pricked me with a built-in needle? Again?!