My second one? “You want me to fight it back?” I bit out, glaring in her direction. How the hell was I supposed to do that? “That’s like asking someone not to throw up.”
“If you do this, if you give in, you won’t survive. Your body and mind haven’t had enough time to heal. Fight her back.” The Alpha’s words came out in a growl, her eyes flashing gold as she clearly fought back a shift of her own.
“Her?” I choked out, arching my back as every muscle in my body screamed in pain.
“You and your wolf may share the same body but not the same mind. Push her back until you only feel the slight tingle in the back of your head. Put her in her place. Control the shift.”
She made it sound so simple, but every time I tried to push the pressure on my mind back to the edge of my subconscious, fear ripped through my body, causing my muscles to tense and shake.
“She’s going to fight you inch for inch. Keep going.”
I was really starting to hate this woman. Not only did she know more about me than I did, but she hadn’t even bothered to tell me her name. If I was going to be stuck here for god-knows-how-long, the least she could do was tell me her name.
“Who are you?” I growled, clenching my jaw as a new surge of pain bubbled up my chest.
“Most of the pack calls me Alpha because that’s what I am,” she said, her voice sounding terribly far away.
“Not your standing,” I growled, clawing at the ground.
“Your name.”
“Ash,” she said, gently rubbing my arched back. “You can call me Ash.”
Ash. I released a shaky breath, holding on to that single word as the world tipped sideways. I’m not sure if it was because of something she’d said or because of the heightened senses she claimed I had, but there was no mistaking the tremors coursing through the ground beneath me. Faint at first, they grew in strength until someone joined us on the very edge of the property.
“I’m sorry, Joanna, but I need to sedate you.”
Her words were the last thing I heard before darkness found me again.
When I finally woke, I was right back where I started. The only difference now was that the woman from before sat on the other side of the barred door. Her brows pinched above her eyes, giving her forehead the same worrylines I’d seen on Val so many times before.
Oh no! “Val!” I sat straight up, immediately wishing I hadn’t. Blood rushed to my head as the room spun in wide circles around us.
Ash was beside me in a second, throwing open the door before kneeling beside me. Supporting me with her weight, she held one hand on my back while the other pressed a cool cloth to my forehead.
“Easy,” she soothed, rubbing circles into my back. “I know your lungs burn but you need to take deep breaths. That’s it.
Do it again.” Then, with a nervous laugh, she said, “You gave us quite the scare.”
“I could tell,” I said, pointing at the deep creases above her eyes. “My sister gets the same look all the time.”
Ash offered me a partial smile, then handed me the cool cloth once I was able to sit upright on my own. “Val?” she asked, canting her head to one side.
Nodding, I set the cloth in my lap and looked right at her.
“She’s probably worried sick. She’s always taken care of me, and if I don’t get back to her soon—”
“That isn’t possible,” she said apologetically. “Not yet. If you leave the territory now, you won’t be able to control your shift. It’ll take some time before you can fight your wolf back on your own.”
“Will I always have to fight?” I asked, dreading the thought of having to go through that pain again. If I had to fight inside my own mind all the time just to see my sister…
“You never should’ve brought me here.”
“You’re only saying that because of the road ahead. You need to be patient. Your body’s been through a great deal these last forty-eight hours.”
“Forty-ei
ght… no. You don’t understand. I need to get back to her.” I’d never gone more than a day without talking to my sister and considering how I left things with Jerry, I could’ve been just about anywhere.