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What was wrong with me?
I had no idea but I was soon to find out.
TWELVE
I don’t know how long I lay there with the world spinning around me but I must have blacked out. Because some unknowable amount of time later, I heard someone calling my name and then a hand was shaking my shoulder.
“Zoe? Little Sis?” the concerned voice asked.
“Dios! What happened? What’s wrong?” another voice said sharply.
“I don’t know—I just found her like this when I came up to get her for dinner.”
I recognized the voices now—it was Christopher and Gabriel. When I opened my eyes and tried to focus on them, I saw both my stepbrothers were kneeling over me with concerned looks on their faces.
“Christopher…Gabriel,” I murmured.
“Zoe! Are you okay?” Christopher asked anxiously.
“What happened, little mouse?” Gabriel demanded.
I shook my head.
“I don’t know. I was feeling so hot and then I wanted some water so I came out here to get some but I got dizzy…so dizzy.” I put a hand to my head and groaned. My other symptoms were worse too—the soft cotton of my bra was chafing my tight nipples unmercifully and the wetness between my thighs seemed to be growing.
“Hot and dizzy? Did you go outside and stay too long in the sun?” Christopher asked. The Arizona sun was fierce, even during what would have been Autumn if I was still living back in Virginia.
I shook my head.
“No. I’ve been inside reading all day.”
The look on Gabriel’s face was grim.
“She’s hot and dizzy and having fainting spells,” he muttered to Christopher. “And smell her!”
At that point, both of them leaned down and inhaled deeply, which I found extremely offensive.
“Hey, stop it!” I cried weakly. “I took a shower this morning!”
“It’s not a bad smell—it’s a good smell. Too fucking good,” Gabriel said, scowling. He gestured at Christopher. “Pick her up. We’re going to take her back to my bedroom and check her.”
Check me for what? I didn’t know and I was still too weak to protest when Christopher scooped me up in his muscular arms and carried me down to the other end of the hall where he and Gabriel had their bedrooms.
My older stepbrother pushed open the door and let Christopher step inside before shutting and locking it behind us. The click of the deadbolt turning did funny things to my stomach. What were they going to do to me?
“Let me go,” I demanded, but my voice came out sounding weak and uncertain. “Let me down—I want to get out of here!”
“If I put you down, you’ll just fall over,” Christopher pointed out.
“And we can’t let you go until I check you,” Gabriel said firmly. “Go sit on the side of the bed and hold her in your lap,” he said to Christopher. “Don’t let her go.”
Christopher carried me to the big king-sized bed and settled on the side of the mattress still holding me in his arms. I noted that while Gabriel’s room wasn’t nearly the size of the master suite, it was still much bigger than mine. The bed had a black spread on it and there was a picture of a woman with long dark hair and light eyes on the dresser. Maybe his mother? Or possibly one of his sisters.
I was one of his sisters too, I reminded myself. What was I doing here and what did my stepbrothers plan to do to me?
“Let me go! What are you going to do?” I demanded, struggling weakly.
“I’m going to check you,” Gabriel said, frowning at me. “And you’re going to hold still and let me.”
“Check me? What does that mean? Check me for what?” I exclaimed.
“For signs that you might be going into your first Heat Cycle,” Gabriel said sternly.
“What? No!” I began to really struggle in earnest, panic giving me extra strength as I elbowed Christopher in his rock-hard stomach.
“Oof! Hold still, Little Sis!” he said in my ear, not letting go. “Gabe’s not going to hurt you—he’s an Alpha. He knows what to look for!”
“Hold her still,” Gabriel said, speaking over my head to Christopher. “No—not like that. I need her facing me.”
I wound up sitting in Christopher’s lap as though he was a chair—a chair that was capable of wrapping its arms around me to hold me still. I didn’t make it easy for him, though—I was panting after struggling so hard to get free and all the exertion made me feel hotter than ever.
“Keep her hands away from her body,” Gabriel ordered and Christopher took a firm grip on both my wrists and forced my arms down by my sides. Then Gabriel began unbuttoning my blouse.
“Please!” I moaned, writhing in Christopher’s lap. “Please, don’t do that to me!”
“Do what?” Gabriel paused for a moment. He had my blouse mostly unbuttoned and my white cotton bra was showing.
