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She doesn’t answer and I watch her struggle to pull her shirt on and then to determine which way are the front and back of her pants. “Here. Let me.” I help her dress because there’s somethin’ horribly fuckin’ sexy about maneuvering her legs into garments that makes me want to do it all the fuckin’ time.
Maybe it’s because the act of puttin’ ‘em on and watchin’ her struggle to get her hands through the arm holes makes me want to shred the clothes in half and just have her freckled body naked and pressed against me for all time. “Still need to count,” I whisper.
She jerks up. “What did you say about my cunt?”
I laugh a lungful a’ laughter, bend down and kiss her mouth just because I can. “I love you.”
Her lips twist. She doesn’t say anything. Just stares at me with jaded yet dazzling eyes. She’s tired. She needs rest. She hates me. It’s the middle of the night. “You sure this can’t wait?”
She shakes her head. “I owe Freya answers. It’s why she helped me fight off those zombies at all. I’d be dead without her, a couple times now.”
“You held your own.”
“She killed twice as many of those creepy things as I did. More than you.” I frown, not liking that I got bested by an Omega. I like the reverence and respect in Echo’s tone even less. I’ve never heard her use it before.
“This important shit you gotta tell ‘er?” I’m grumblin’ and she gives me a funny look. She opens her mouth, like she might ask me about it, but then takes her questions another way. She doesn’t wanna get close, but that don’t matter. Gonna tear down that fortress she built between us even if it means I gotta pull it apart brick by brick.
“Life and death,” she says.
I nod, havin’ suspected as much. “And it affects everybody?”
“Yeah.”
“Then we wake everybody.”
She pauses in the doorway of her hollowed out tree castle long enough to look at me and gawk. “Everybody? You mean the Six, right?”
“I mean the Six, the rest a’ my Alphas and all Yaron’s people. Alphas, Betas, your Omega — everybody.” I step up next to her and look down at her face, her perfect face, illuminated by this thing Paradise Hole begs to call moonlight. “You think nobody’s hearin’ you, but that ain’t true. I hear you. And you been talkin’ a different tune ever since you saw the man in the cave.”That fucker.“Been usin’ the wordtogetheran awful lot. So, don’t stop now. You got shit to say, say it to all of us.”
Her jaw snaps shut and she gives me a funny look, wrinklin’ her nose before combin’ the thicket of her curls behind her ear. Her fingers get tangled. She gives up. “Should we wake everybody up?”
“Just not the dead.”
Her stoicism cracks and a smile breaks out over her face. She snorts, tryna stifle it, but in the end just gives in. She exhales and stares out at the world rollin’ out beyond this tree, this strange little sanctuary. “Fuck you, Berserker,” she says, parodyin’ my own words back to me.
I grin like a goddamn loon, wantin’ nothin’ more than to go to her and shower her with affection, but I hold my ground. For now. I point left with my chin. “Go wake our Six. I’ll handle Yaron’s crew.”
She doesn’t say more as she brushes past me without a backward glance and I smirk, chest feelin’ tight though my lungs feel airy. I can breathe in her presence. Without her, I been drownin’ for days. The breeze that filters in through so many trees even smells like her. Huh. Feels like there’s more vegetation surrounding us than there was when the battle began. Shiftin’ my beast’s gaze out at the world, I see that I’m not mistaken. I grin. The outside is just as stunnin’ as the inside. Covered in flowers. Paradise Hole covered in bright patches of green.
I find Yaron awake, sittin’ in one of those patches. He watches me approach, clearly able to see me as well as I can see him. “Your Omega has exceptional gifts.”
I preen at the compliment, though it bites in equal measure. “She does.” But she’s not mine. Not anymore. “Dark City Omega’s got somethin’ to say to us. Let’s get a fire goin’. Make space for your people. You seen the witch?”
He lifts a finger and points up at the tallest boughs of a nearby tree. I shout up at the white owl perched among its sparse foliage. “Echo’s ready to talk to you. Whatever the cave guy told her, she’s gonna tell you and me and everybody else. Meet there on high ground.” I point and she takes off into the sky.
We get a space cleared out slightly east, where the ground rises higher and drier. Alphas and Betas work together to get a ring of logs from the fallen trees Echo tore down arranged into a circle, a fire flaming brightly at their center. I sit next to Echo. Whiskey sits on her other side. There’s space enough in this inner circle for about forty Alphas and Betas to cram in together, all in various states of healing.
Some’ve got bandages wrapped around their heads and arms and legs and chests, some lookin’ unscathed, but not many. Maybe two. When space along the logs fills up, those that aren’t too injured, or aren’t still dealin’ with the bodies — i.e. anybody that can still fuckin’ stand — crowd in behind us.Survivin’we might be one-twenty, butstandin’we’re only eighty and a few.
I can tell the attention makes Echo nervous and take her hand. She jerks, as if outta instinct, but I hold firm, not allowin’ a retreat. Because there’s nowhere she’d go that I wouldn’t chase after her…but I’m done chasing.
I meet her wary gaze and lean in, brushin’ my lips over her earlobe as I whisper, “I’m here no matter what.” Louder, I cock my head to Barbero, standin’ just behind Whiskey. “We got booze? Grab it. I’ve got a feelin’ we’re gonna need it. Organize anythin’ you can find to eat, too.”
He leaves and I nudge Echo in the side. “You cold?”
“No, no. I just want to make sure Freya is here.”
“She’s here.” I point at the log two over. This log has only three occupants despite the fact that there’s enough space enough for six — Yaron, an Alpha with a bandage over his right ear and the left side of his chest, and a white owl.
