When We Were Mates (Demetra and Emris) novel Chapter 105

Chapter 105

Alpha Emris.

“Emris?”

“Emris?”

I’m in that place between sleep and waking where sound reaches you but your body refuses to acknowledge it, where you’re still half–submerged in everything that dragged you under last night. Every revelation about my father, about the pack, about the kind of legacy I’ve been handed without my consent.

“EMRIS!”

I open them.

Silver is standing at the foot of my bed, and Silver never raises his voice.

“What?” My voice comes out rough, dragged up from somewhere deep.

“Something happened to Elena.”

I squint at him. Elena is in the north wing… a completely separate section of the pack house. There hasn’t been a breach in our pack and there cannot be one now, not with every security measure we have running. So whatever he’s saying doesn’t compute, and I don’t move because it doesn’t make sense.

“Get up.” Silver says it again. “Did you hear me?”

And that’s the thing about Silver… he doesn’t come to me over trivial matters. So I force my eyes fully open and actually look at him.

“What do you mean something happened to Elena?”

“Demetra removed her from the wing. She had her relocated to a shack on the outskirts of the woods. This morning Regan noticed Elena was no longer in her room and started questioning the Deltas. He just found her out there in the woods, bitten. Multiple wounds across her body.”

“WHAT!” I throw the covers off. “How many…how many HOURS has it been since she was found?”

“Regan just found her-”

“Demetra did WHAT?”

I’m already up and moving, pushing past Slade without a word as I drive both hands up through my hair and walk out of the Alpha’s Groove at a pace that doesn’t invite conversation. My mind is running calculations at full speed and I don’t like any of the numbers it’s producing.

Is this revenge? Is this Demetra’s answer to how I treated her yesterday…going straight for Elena, for the mother of my son? She knows those woods. I think I once told her years ago.

Hyenas. Foxes. Snakes thick as a man’s forearm are in those woods. So what the hell was she thinking-

We’re stepping off the elevator when I hear Milo’s wail. It come through the walls and every paternal instinct I possess rises up immediately.

I come around the corner into the living area at the same moment the pack doctors arrive. Regan has Elena on the couch,

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Chapter 105

and what I see stops me for exactly one second before fury kicks back in.

She’s gasping. Shallow, ragged breaths like the air isn’t coming fast enough. And the wound… I see them immediately because they’re impossible to miss.

Her right hand has puncture marks and that tells me whatever bit her didn’t let go clean. Her inner thigh has a full bite pattern and it’s still seeping. Werewolf wounds close. Shifter wounds close. The fact that these haven’t means only one thing…the animal that inflicted them carried something in its saliva. Venom, possibly. Or she sustained enough simultaneous bites to overwhelm her body’s ability to heal fast enough. Four wounds total, and every single one of them is still open and angry against her skin.

Milo is standing in the middle of the room screaming hysterically as he stares at his mother.

“Get Milo out of here.” I growl.

“Mommy-”

“I’m fine, baby.” Elena reaches a shaking hand out toward him and he lunges forward before the nanny can pull him back. I let it happen for one second.

“Your stepmother tried to kill me.” Elena’s voice breaks on the last word in tears as the doctors move in around her

Regan notices me so he puts himself directly in front of my face.

“Your FUCKING Luna is insane.” He says it like he wants me to feel every single syllable. Like he’s daring me to defend her. His eyes are bloodshot from rage and for a moment I just let him stand there because I’m still looking at Elena’s leg, still staring at the wound on her thigh that should have closed by now and hasn’t, still turning over the one question I cannot

answer.

Is this who Demetra is when I push her too far?

I’ve never had reason to ask that before. I thought I knew her as the kindest person to ever exist.

“Say something, you bastard!” Regan shoves forward. “Where is she? Where is that bitch?”

He spins toward the Deltas and grabs the nearest one to hit!

“What in the hills is going on?” Mom comes in.

“Alpha.” The pack doctor gets my attention at the same time too.

“She has four bites distributed across the hand, right thigh, left calf, and lower back. All four are significant in depth…we’re looking at tissue damage past the dermal layer on at least two of them, which is consistent with a larger predator. We’ll have to disinfect her at once. Once we’re sure the infection is stable, we’ll stitch her closed and she’ll heal”

“Can it be done here or does she need the pack hospital?”

“We can set up here, Alpha. We have everything we need.”

“Then set up immediately-”

“What in the world is going on in here?”

Teddy’s voice.

I look toward the entrance and she walks in with Demetra.

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Chapter 105

Who has a pink water bottle in one hand, hair pulled back in a ponytail, wearing black leggings and a sports bra with a gh flush in her cheeks like she’s been outside in the cool morning air. Like she’s been jogging. Like she started her morning with a run and is only now strolling back in to find out what all the noise is about.

The smile on her face dies the instant she takes in the room.

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