The Hellhound's Un-Christmas Miracle - Zoe Chant Page 0,1
“That was a rhetorical question, Flea.”
Fleance shrugged away a momentary unease at the nickname. “My hellhound says it wants to stop people being hurt.” The words came out as an embarrassed half-growl. “But ever since Christmas it sees threats everywhere.”
“…Yes.” Caine gave him a searching look, which Flea accepted warily. He wasn’t sure how much Caine could feel of his thoughts, but he trusted he’d never pick into his brain for them.
Not like his first alpha.
Fleance shivered, and tried to pass it off as another shrug. When Caine still didn’t say anything, more words forced themselves past Fleance’s lips. “Something doesn’t make sense.”
He didn’t have Rhys’s talent for figuring things out, but something about this latest horror wasn’t right. His hellhound snarled softly, and he hushed it. Caine is our alpha. A good alpha. We can trust him. He went on, piecing his thoughts together word by word: “Rhys’s theory is that my hellhound wants to protect people. Last Christmas, it went crazy when that couple went off-trail in the snow, because they were putting themselves in danger. But a kid pulling a dog’s tail? What’s the worst that can happen, that scaring the hell out of some poor five-year-old is the better option? It doesn’t feel like I’m protecting anyone.”
“No.” Caine’s voice was calm, but his eyes were watching Fleance too carefully for him to be entirely at ease. “It sounds more like it’s punishing them.”
Yes! Make them pay! Make it RIGHT!
Fleance flinched. Caine’s eyes widened and he leaned back, hands raised. “Easy.”
Anger flared inside Fleance. His anger, not his hellhound’s. Why are you wasting time talking? Why not fix this yourself? Fleance swallowed hard over the bile that rose in his throat. Caine wasn’t that sort of alpha. Fleance didn’t want him to be that sort of alpha. He’d spent too long under the boot of a man who used his alpha powers to cage and control him. But now, with this…
He clenched his fists on the torn fabric on the chair’s arms, then released them slowly.
“You were in Parker’s pack the longest out of the three of you, weren’t you?”
Fleance’s eye twitched. Had Caine read his mind?
No, he told himself. He’d just cut straight to the point, like usual.
He dropped his head. “I was the first one he turned. His test subject, Rhys calls me.” Fleance resisted the urge to touch the bite scars on his neck. Across from him, Caine’s knuckles went white as he gripped his upper thigh, where his own turning scar was. “You think he got something wrong when he turned me.” His voice was flat. “My hellhound’s broken. That’s why it’s so violent now that I’m not under Parker’s control.”
Caine made a face. “I don’t think that. And I’ve known Angus Parker since I was at college, remember. Given the way he treated the three of you when you were his pack, I doubt he’d consider violence to be something wrong with you.”
“Is that meant to make me feel better?”
“Yes and no?” Caine’s lips curved in a wry half-smile. “Yes, reassuring, because whatever you’ve been telling yourself, you’re not a monster. I spent long enough thinking I was one, so I should know. And no, not reassuring, because like I said. I know Parker. Not as well as I’d thought, but from what Rhys and Manu have told me…” He sat back and rubbed his face. “This is my fault.”
“What?” Fleance was still managing his reaction to the news Caine had been talking to Rhys and Manu. All those years with Parker had trained him to keep his problems secret. His surprise that Caine thought this was his fault slipped onto his face.
“I’m your alpha, aren’t I? I’m meant to take responsibility for all of you.”
Strange way of saying ‘control’, Fleance thought before he could stop himself, as Caine kept talking.
“I should have seen you weren’t coping. I should have done something to help. I’ve been so distracted with Meaghan’s pregnancy. We knew it would change things, the Heartwells warned us about that, but now…”
A shiver rippled across Fleance’s pack-sense. He leaned forward, trying to trace the source of the disturbance, and gasped.
Fleance had always been keenly aware of his pack. When it was just Parker, there had been no escaping it: his alpha had been like a black hole, dragging at his attention and ready to lash out if he felt he wasn’t being shown due respect. When Parker had added Rhys and Manu to the pack, the black hole had