Page 262 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

"Whoa," the boy whispers.

Wraith swallows. The motion ripples down the scars on his throat.

The boy leans forward in his wheelchair, bandaged hands gripping the armrests. Then his eyes slide to me.

"And you still have a girlfriend?" he asks, voice pitching up hopefully.

Wraith stares at him in shock. A laugh huffs out of him.

He nods and reaches over to ruffle the boy's hair with his giant hand.

The boy grins beneath his bandages. I can tell because his eyes squish and his cheeks push up under the gauze.

"Sweet," he says.

I blink hard and look away before anyone notices, swiping the back of my hand across my eyes. The warm fuzzy feeling is flooding everything, and I have to bite the inside of my cheek to keep it together because I am not going to ugly-cry in a pediatric ward.

Wraith stays with the burned boy for another few minutes. Wraith shows him the scars on his hands, turning them over in the light, and the boy holds up his own bandaged mitts and they bump fists, gauze against iridescent burn tissue.

When Wraith finally stands, pulling up his mask, the boy calls after him.

"Hey, Wraith?"

Wraith turns.

"You're my favorite feral alpha."

Wraith gives the boy a thumbs-up.

Then he walks back to me, and I thread my fingers through his and squeeze so hard my knuckles ache, leaning up to kiss the side of his jaw.

"He needed that," I whisper. "And so did you."

He gives me a doubtful look.

For a few seconds I just stand there, hanging back. Watching Plague lose another chess game on purpose. Whiskey trying to sit up while covered in kids determined to keep him down, begging Valek for help. The silver-haired alpha ignores him even though he's within arm's reach, lounging with his back against a wall and long legs outstretched, thoughtfully reading a poem a kid wrote.

I let myself enjoy every moment of it.

The three fresh marks on my neck are warmer than ever.

The staff member rounds us up a few minutes later, herding the pack toward the elevator for the cafeteria portion of the visit.

Whiskey still has two kids attached to his legs and is walking with exaggerated Frankenstein steps so they can ride his shins.

"Silver Ghost does NOT negotiate with gravity!" he announces as he stomps past the nurses' station.

Plague walks beside me, adjusting his gloves with short tugs. "He's been workshopping that line all morning," he mutters.

"It shows."

Thane's in front, talking to the specialist about scheduling the next visit. He's got his captain voice on, but his hand keeps drifting to the back of his neck, rubbing. He's not as tired and stressed as he was before he marked me, but the dark circles under his eyes strongly suggest he could use a whole gallon of coffee.

Valek brings up the rear. The boy in the motorized wheelchair is rolling alongside him, asking him how many wolves there are in Russia, and Valek is chatting with the kind of patient attention I wouldn't have thought him capable of.

We pile into the elevator. Whiskey's tiny passengers have been peeled off his legs by a laughing nurse.

"I'm comin' back to finish this!" he calls through the gap.