Page 173 of The Werewolf’s Wrong Mate

Cassie gave a faint, pained laugh. “The air was already hostile. We’re just personalizing it now.”

My gaze snapped to her. That tiny piece of humor, frayed and exhausted as it was, pulled me another inch out of the dark.

Sava’s expression softened for one brief second. Then she went back to work. “You have three claw tears on your arm. They look worse than they are. Hip is ugly, but it missed anything vital. Shoulder is strained. Ribs are bruised. You will feel like death for two days and argue with me about staying in bed by morning.”

“That sounds medically optimistic.”

“It is a warning.”

Cassie’s lashes fluttered. She was trying to stay awake. She was trying to keep me calm by force of will while her body shook with the aftermath of terror.

I wanted to tear the world open.

Sava glanced at me. “Sit.”

I didn’t move.

Cassie squeezed my wrist. “Ian.”

I sat in the chair beside the bed.

Sava exhaled through her nose. “Wonderful. Civilization has entered the suite.”

The wolf didn’t care for her tone. The man knew she had earned it.

Sava cut the ruined fabric away from Cassie’s hip with small silver scissors. I tracked the blades. Sava noticed. Of course she did.

“If you lunge at my scissors, I will sedate you.”

“You can try.”

Cassie’s eyes opened. “Ian.”

The warning in her voice did what silver would not have done. It got under my skin and stayed there.

I looked at her instead of the scissors. Her hair was tangled with leaves and sweat. The mark at her shoulder was dark, swollen around the edges, threaded with faint black veins that pulsed when her pain spiked. Mine answered beneath my skin, a deep tug behind the ribs, as if something inside me had hooked itself to the exact rhythm of her suffering.

“Breathe with me,” she whispered.

“I should be saying that to you.”

“Then pretend you are better at this and do it first.”

I breathed. Once. Again.

Her grip loosened a little.

Sava cleaned the punctures. Cassie went rigid, teeth sinking into her lower lip so hard I smelled the fresh bead of blood before I saw it.

A growl rolled out of me.

Sava froze.

Cassie didn’t. “No.”

The growl stopped with the word still vibrating in my chest.

Sava looked between us, eyes sharp. “That is going to be a problem.”