Page 37 of Untamed

Wood scrapes inside the room. Orion emerges in bear form, shoulders nearly filling the doorway, and he keeps his head turned away from me. I can smell the answer before I get one. Cleaner, old fear, and something chemical cling beneath his usual scent.

“Did they hurt you?” My Alpha instincts start pushing hard enough that my hands curl at my sides, but I do not move toward him. “Was it the doctor? Graves?”

Orion stops and looks at me. A broken sound leaves him, low and rough, and then he backs into the den hard enough to shake the table wedged near the entrance. I sit back instead of following. If I charge the doorway now, he will defend it, and Orion has taught me that without ever needing to explain it.

I let a minute pass before I speak again. “You already know what they did to me before Wolfscorge. You were inside my head when the permanent bond opened, and I was inside yours.” The pacing inside the den stops. “I’m not asking you to confess any of that again.”

Nothing moves for several seconds. I can feel Orion listening even with the bond flattened between us, and I choose the next words carefully because he will hear any hint of demand. “I know what it’s like when every choice they give you is bad. That’s why I need to know if they’re putting you back in those rooms now.”

Fur whispers against the blankets. When Orion reaches the doorway again, he is human, one hand braced on the heavy table he dragged across the entrance. His face looks exhausted rather than guarded, which frightens me more than anger would. “You already know what I’m capable of.”

“I do.” I keep both hands on my own knees. “And you know what I’m capable of. I’m not asking what you did or what they made you do. I need to know whether somebody is hurting you now.”

Orion’s mouth tightens. He looks past me toward the kitchen, then back at the den as if the answer might be easier if he can find somewhere else to put it. “No.”

The lie reaches the bond before he finishes saying it. Beneath his usual scent is industrial cleaner, old fear, and something chemical I do not recognize, and I can feel exactly where he is holding the connection shut. I could push until something gives. I do not.

“All right.” I hate the words, but I make myself say them without turning them into punishment. “I don’t believe you, but I’m not going to drag it out of you.”

Orion’s head comes up at that. For a second the anger I recognize flashes across his face, followed by something more exhausted. “Then why keep asking?”

“Because I’m not fucking blind.” I turn one hand palm-up on my knee without reaching toward him. “If somebody is hurting you, you don’t have to protect me by pretending they aren’t. I’m already here.”

His jaw works once. “And if telling you gets you taken?”

My stomach turns, but I don’t move. “Then we deal with that together. You don’t get to disappear into one of their rooms because you think I’m safer if I don’t know.”

“You decide things for me all the time.” The words come out sharper now, more Orion than anything he has said since he came through the door. “You decide when I need space. You decide when a guard is worth fighting. You decide when not asking is better than asking.”

“Then tell me when I’m getting it wrong.” I keep my hands where they are. “I’m not going to pretend I always know what you need.”

Orion looks toward my open hand again. He does not take it. “Not tonight.”

“Okay.” I lower my hand back to my knee. “Not tonight.”

We stay like that for a while, him at the doorway and me on the couch with half the room between us. The bond never opens enough to give me the truth, but it stops flattening every time I breathe. Orion eventually disappears back into the den. I hear the scrape of furniture and expect the doorway to close completely.

Instead, several minutes later, his hand appears around the edge of the table. The fingers are cold when they hook around my wrist, but his grip is deliberate. “Come inside.”

I stay still long enough to make sure I heard him correctly. “You want me in there?”

Orion’s grip tightens once. “Yes.”

I get off the couch and cross the room slowly, stopping at the threshold until Orion pulls my wrist again. The den smells overwhelmingly like him and like me, my shirts mixed through his blankets, the air warmer than the rest of the house. I crawl past the table and stop where he puts me instead of choosing a place for myself. Orion sits beside me with his back against the dresser, close enough that our shoulders touch.

For several breaths he does nothing. Then he leans sideways until his forehead rests against my shoulder, and I keep both hands in my lap. His breathing is too fast, but at least it is no longer being hidden from me. When he finally catches one of my wrists and places my hand against his chest, I leave it there without moving my fingers.

“I’m not asking again tonight,” I tell him. “But if they call you somewhere tomorrow, I need to know you left the house.”

Orion’s eyes stay closed. “Why?”

“Because disappearing without telling me is different from keeping details private.” I can feel his pulse jumping against my palm. “You don’t owe me every piece of what happens in your head, but I need to know if you’re physically going somewhere they can hurt you.”

He does not answer immediately. The silence stretches long enough that I think I pushed too far, then he nods once against my shoulder. “Fine. I’ll tell you if I leave.”

Chapter Twenty-one

Orion