Where The Ice Gives Way (Charlotte and Blake) novel Chapter 198

Emily

I am sitting with Lacey when Gregory is brought over. She has been quiet beside me for the last few minutes, listening while I tell her about the house I

grew up in. Gregory lowers himself onto the cot across from us with a grunt. He is older, maybe late forties, with a thick grey beard tangled along his jaw

and shoulders broad enough that the blanket around him looks too small. Dirt is caked along his arms and beneath his nails, just like everyone else had.

“Hey, Lacey,” I say, standing to grab the fresh bucket of warm water one of the Munroe medics just brought in. “You want to give me a hand here?”

She sets the mug aside and reaches for a stack of clean clothes Bennett left on the table. I carry the water over and set it carefully at Gregory’s feet before

sitting beside him. Lacey comes to my other side, the clothes folded against her chest.

Gregory looks between us and shifts awkwardly. “That’s really not necessary, ma’am.”

I smile at the use of that name. “No need to waste your water and time on me,” he adds, voice rough from disuse.

“Hey now.” I dip a clean cloth into the water and wring it out. “Everyone deserves a little kindness.” I hold out my hand. “May I?”

He looks at it for a long second, then slowly places his hand in mine. I start with his knuckles, washing away the dirt gathered around cracked skin and old

scratches. The water turns brown almost immediately. Lacey kneels on his other side and wets another cloth, then begins wiping carefully along his brow.

“We’re not just washing away the physical stuff, Gregory,” I say quietly. “Think of it more like washing away the past. Preparing for the future.”

He lets out a short, broken chuckle and closes his eyes. Lacey’s mouth curves faintly as she cleans the dirt from his temple.

“Is that what you did, Emily?” Alpha Thomas’s voice cuts across the room, and my hand stills over Gregory’s. Thomas stands near the wall with his arms

crossed, face tight, eyes fixed on me, clearly looking for a place to put all the anger he has carried around all morning. “You just wash away your past?” he asks. “Do you think that makes you better than everyone else?”

I lift my eyes to Thomas. “No,” I say. “I did what I had to do for me, I had to find myself again and remember my own worth after being forced to believe I

was nothing. That I was below someone because of my rank.”

He moves too fast. The cloth falls from my hand as Thomas lunges and his hands close around my throat before I can even draw breath. The whole world

snaps into one sharp line of pain as his claws break the skin on my neck. Gregory roars and reaches for him, but Thomas throws him backward from the cot

with one arm. Gregory hits the floor hard, taking Lacey down with him in a tangle of blankets and limbs. Then Thomas is behind me.

His chest slams against my back, one arm locked around my throat, claws pressing in deep, as heat runs down my skin. I freeze, because one wrong move and I know he will tear me open. His breath hits my ear, hot and shaking with rage. “Your rank is all you are,” he hisses. “All you

ever will be. It seems

you’ve forgotten that and become a greedy little bitch.” My pulse pounds against his claws.

“Now here’s what’s going to happen,” Thomas says, dragging me backward. “You’re going to come with me nice and quiet.”

My lungs burn, and Sasha slams against my ribs as I suck in what little air I can. “THEO!” My scream rips through the prison, and Thomas’s claws dig deeper, causing pain to flash hot down my neck.

“You stupid fucking bitch,” he snarls.

Theo comes barreling across the room. Blake is right behind him. Gareth moves too, but all of them stop when Thomas jerks me harder against him and presses one claw directly beneath my jaw.

“One more step,” Thomas spits, “and I will tear out her throat where she stands.”

172. 172.

1:04 pm P PN

Chapter 198 Make An Example of You

Theo’s face gees deathly white. His eyes drop to my throat, and something feral twists through his expression so violently that Yelen is almost visible

beneath his skin

Gareth’s voice comes low. “Thomas

“Don’t,” Thomas snaps. “No commands. No howls. No tricks from your little white wolf. Move, or make one of your stupid little sounds, and she dies.”

Charlotte stands beside Blake, one hand pressed to her chest. Her face is frozen with terror, but her eyes are already searching, already calculating. Blake’s

jaw is clenched so hard I can see the muscle jumping. Bennett has one hand around Dr Hale’s arm, holding him back. I hear Gregory groans from the floor,

but I can’t turn my head to see him or Lacey or the others we’ve just rescued. All I can do is look ahead, right at Marcus’s smug face as he grips the bars of

his cage, eyes wide and bright. Thomas shifts his hold, dragging another small sound from me, and Theo flinches like the claws are in his throat, too. “Now

here’s what’s going to happen,” Thomas says. “You are all going to get in that cage. Right there. Get in and pull it strut.”

No one moves. They all look at me, and I can see it in every face. Gareth is weighing distance and speed. Blake is listening for the split second he might

command. Charlotte is trembling with Shanti. Theo is staring at me like the world is ending and he is being asked to stand still for it. There is nothing they

can do…Not like this. All Thomas needs is one tiny movement. One twitch of his hand. One slip. And I am dead.

Theo takes the first step back with a whimper. He backs into the cell Thomas pointed to, eyes locked on mine the whole time. Blake follows, then Charlotte,

Gareth, Bennett, and Dr Hale. Even the ones we just brought out of the cells are forced back into the cells. Then the door swings shut and the lock snaps.

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