CHAPTER 30: CHAPTER 30

When I woke up in the morning, the first thing I felt wasn’t the chill of dawn seeping through the window, or the faint smell of damp wood that always lingered in Alpha Zach’s quarters.

It was heat. A suffocating, unnatural heat. At first, I thought I had woken in the middle of a fire. My skin was slick with sweat, my throat dry. Then I realized it wasn’t the room it was him. Alpha Zach’s arms were around me again. My heart nearly stopped. My first instinct was to scream, but my voice tangled in my throat as my eyes focused. He was there. In my bed. Holding me like I belonged to him. His face was pale but flushed with fever at the same time, strands of his dark hair sticking damply to his forehead. His body was burning hot, pressed tight against mine. I couldn’t breathe. Panic clawed at me, raw and immediate. I wanted to shove him away, to run, to lock myself behind the strongest door in the packhouse. My legs twitched, ready to spring. But then I froze. Because his grip on me wasn’t violent. It wasn’t the crushing, punishing hold he usually had when he wanted to remind me I was his possession, his personal omega. It was desperate. Trembling. He clung to me like a drowning man clings to the last piece of driftwood.

I swallowed hard. Every instinct screamed that this was my chance I could escape. Slip out of his grasp while he was weak, burning up with fever. I even swung one leg off the bed, silently praying the floorboards wouldn’t creak. And then I stopped. Because I caught sight of his face. For the first time since I’d been dragged into this nightmare world, Alpha Zach looked human.

His jaw wasn’t set in its usual cold fury. His eyes were shut tight, lashes trembling against his flushed skin, his lips parting as though each breath cost him a battle. Sweat rolled down his temples, soaking into the sheets. He looked less like the predator who haunted me, and more like a man trapped inside his own burning body. My chest twisted painfully. Damn it.

I wanted to leave him. I wanted to run far, far away and never look back. But another part of me, the part I couldn’t silence, whispered something else. I was a doctor and saving life comes first Before I woke up in this cursed werewolf world before fate chained me to this Alpha psycho’s madness I had been a surgeon. A healer. Someone who couldn’t just stand by while another life was slipping into danger. Even if that life belonged to the man who terrified me most. My fingers curled tight in the sheets. I should have kept walking. But instead I came back. I sat on the edge of the bed, heart hammering in my chest as I studied him. His skin was too hot, fever radiating from him in waves. I pressed my palm lightly against his forehead and flinched. He was burning up. A fever this high could kill a normal human. But he wasn’t human he was Alpha. His strength was monstrous, his body resilient. And yet, something was clearly wrong.

My mind raced through possibilities. Infection? A festering wound I hadn’t noticed? Poison? I bit my lip hard. I had no medical tools here, no sterile gloves, no IV drips or antibiotics. Just myself, my hands, and scraps of knowledge I had no business trying to use in a world like this. Still, I couldn’t just sit there and watch.

He groaned suddenly, low and guttural, his grip tightening on me. My pulse spiked as his fingers dug into my wrist. His nails scraped against my skin, leaving faint red marks.

"Don’t leave..."

The words were barely a whisper, slurred and feverish, but they cut me deeper than a shout. He was talking in his sleep. Dreaming. And in that dream, I was leaving him.

I shivered violently. Why me? Of all people, why me? I forced myself to breathe. I couldn’t lose focus. His fever was climbing higher. If I didn’t do something now, even an Alpha’s body might not withstand the strain. I pulled gently, trying to free my hand. His grip was like iron, but I managed to slide free, inch by inch. My wrist throbbed, but at least I was mobile. The first step was cooling him down.

I slipped from the bed, legs trembling, and hurried to fetch a basin. The water in this world wasn’t clean, not like the filtered kind I used to take for granted. But it would have to do. I soaked a cloth and returned, my hands shaking as I wrung it out. When I pressed the damp cloth to his forehead, he flinched. His lips curled in a faint snarl, and for one terrifying second, his eyes snapped open. I froze. His gaze was glazed, unfocused, pupils dilated. His breathing was harsh, labored. He wasn’t fully conscious more trapped between fever dreams and reality. But his hand shot out anyway, seizing my wrist again with frightening strength.

"Mine" he growled

The single word was hoarse, raw, broken. His fevered voice slashed through the air, and my stomach twisted into knots. I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to rip my hand free and shout that I wasn’t his, that I never would be.

But I bit it back. Because right now, fighting him would only make things worse.

So instead, I whispered softly, "I’m not leaving. But you need to let me treat you." Did he hear me? Understand me? I had no idea. His grip didn’t loosen. His eyes fluttered shut again, his breathing uneven. I swallowed hard and continued my work, moving the cloth across his skin, wiping away the sweat. His chest rose and fell in erratic patterns, his muscles twitching like he was fighting invisible enemies.

"Nightmares," I realized aloud, my voice trembling.

Even the crazy Alpha had nightmares. And in some cruel twist of fate, he clung to me in the middle of them. Hours slipped by in agonizing silence, broken only by his fevered groans and my quiet attempts to keep him stable. I changed the cloth when it grew warm, fetched more water, dabbed his neck and chest, whispered soft reassurances even though I doubted he heard them. But I couldn’t ignore the fear crawling up my spine every time his hand twitched, every time his body jolted like he might wake fully and snap my neck for daring to touch him.

Still, I stayed. Because as much as I hated him, as much as I wished he would disappear from my life forever, I couldn’t stand by and let him burn alive from within. When dawn stretched into mid-morning, his fever finally broke. The violent tremors eased. His breathing steadied, his skin cooling beneath my trembling hands. His grip slackened until I could finally pull free without force. I collapsed onto the edge of the bed, exhausted. My hair clung to my damp face, my hands numb from holding the cloth for so long. Every muscle ached, but I didn’t care. Relief washed over me like a tide.

He would live, ThankGod for that. I should have been furious at myself. Should have regretted saving the man who made my every waking moment a cage of fear. But as I sat there, watching him sleep more peacefully than I’d ever seen, my heart was heavy with something else. Something I didn’t want to name. I had seen a side of him I wasn’t supposed to see.

Not the Alpha. Not the monster. Not the one who hunted me in my own nightmares. Who’s inner voice is constantly hunting. But I saw a man who had clung to me, desperate and vulnerable, whispering words that made my chest ache.

"Mine." The word still echoed in my head, long after he drifted into silence. What does he mean by that? I buried my face in my hands and wished, not for the first time, that I had never been dragged into this world. Because the longer I stayed, the harder it became to keep my walls from cracking. And once they cracked there would be no escape. And I will be stuck here forever. Oh god please save me. The psycho Alpha had gone back to sleep again. I peeped at his face, his chest was raising and falling peacefully and suddenly a crazy thought creeped into my head. "What if I press his face with one of the pillows?" No-no-no he will died and I will have his blood on my hand. I’m not a monster like him.