Page 55 of Alpha Games
Aspen was wearing the same fuzzy sweater I’d first seen her in when she’d blinked those big,innocent eyes in my direction and stolen my breath along with my heart.
Not innocent though.
I was a blind fool.
Aspen heaved up nothing but spit and rested her cheek against the porcelain toilet seat.
“Cold feels good,” she whispered. “Everything is so hot. Like you.”
“How much did she take?” Fallon spoke behind me, holding the bucket of ice against her chest. I shook my head. I didn’t have the answers. I always had the answers. This was…
Out of my control.
Aspen let out a soft snore, falling asleep once again as her head rolled back against my chest.
Fallon rested her hand on my shoulder. “Let’s get her into bed.”
*
I didn’t know a woman could be this delicate.
I was no stranger to the feminine form. It was one of my favorite pastimes. But for every hard edge I was made of, Aspen had a soft curve to counter it. To keep my beast from raging and tearing through my skin, I laid behind her and held her close.
My fingers trailed along her jaw, tucking hair back behind her ear, and dipped down to trace her shoulder again. This felt right. Touching her was what my fingers were made to do.
But everything else was wrong.
I wasn’t normally this blind. Not since I was a child and learned the hard way what demons could do when you weren’t looking. My eyes were open when it came to Aspen. Or so I thought.
“What else are you hiding from me?” I whispered, dragging my thumb over her small knuckles and feeling the velvet smoothness of her hand as it rested on the silk sheet of my bed.
“She’s not her.” Fallon stood hugging herself in the open doorway of the bedroom with the light from the sitting area beyond filtering in to my dark space. “I don’t know how this happened, but I swear she isn’t like mom.”
“I know that.” My beast rumbled inside me, issuing a warning for Fallon to stay back.
Aspen was too warm and full of spark to be a wasted junkie living for their next fix. It was a miracle any of our kind could slip to the level our mother had gone. Shifters had a fast metabolism. Even now, I could smell the drugs burning through Aspen’s system. But my mother, like many others, turned to animal tranquilizers and street modifications in potent cocktails when the pressures of the world became too much.
The epidemic of loneliness. That’s what the newspapers were calling it. The growing population of wolf shifters no longer finding their fated mates. Humans and shifters weren’t so different after all. Not at their core. Without love, even the strongest of the species would slowly fade away.
I stopped touching Aspen long enough the drag my hand through my hair.
Maybe finding your fated mate wasn’t enough to keep the demons at bay. It was possible thatIwasn’t enough… again.
We’ll try harder. We’ll fight them all.
“Knock it off,” my sister growled.
“Knock what off?” I sighed, putting my hand on Aspen’s hip as she groaned and drooled on my pillow.
“I can see you going there.” There was a rough edge to Fallon’s voice covering her sadness. “Stop it.”
I kept my hand possessively on Aspen’s hip, turning to look over my shoulder as Ivan came into the suite. He stopped at the bedroom door next to Fallon and my beast let out a warning growl.
“There’s nothing, Alpha.” Ivan bared his neck. “Her room is clean. Not a trace of anything in there.”
I pushed the relief I felt at his statement down deep, not wanting to be fooled again. If Ivan said he couldn’t find any drugs or paraphernalia, I trusted him. He knew where to look. Once a junkie, always a junkie. That’s what Fredrick said. But just because he hadn’t found anything didn’t mean she hadn’t gone looking for it.
Ivan scratched his bald head. Sadness drifted from him in waves. “Someone must have given it to her.”