“What happened to you?” I gasped, too horrified to remember to keep a safe amount of space between myself and the bars. I closed the distance to the cell to gently trace the wounds on his hands. They looked defensive.

The alpha didn’t respond, but when I reached up to inspect the damage to his face, he closed his eyes and pressed his head against the bars, giving me easier access.

Someone had beaten him. I didn’t know if they’d let another test subject at him or if the guards had hurt him, but the truth was too obvious to ignore. They’d done this to punish him for his unwillingness to cooperate in the breeding room.

“They’re monsters.”

It was only when he opened those piercing blue-green eyes to look at me I realized I’d spoken out loud.

“I’m so sorry.”

351 unwrapped his hand from the bars and reached out toward me. I flinched on instinct, but he only stroked his abused fingers clumsily over my arm. Trying to comfort me.

I set my jaw as I looked at him, grim determination settling in deep in my gut. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

The good thing about working in a lab as well-stocked as this was that finding rubbing alcohol and ointments was a breeze. I was back at 351’s cell within five minutes, arms full of medical supplies, and saw him waiting for me by the bars.

“Sit with me,” I said as I sank down to the floor in front of his cell, scooting close enough to reach him with ease.

He obeyed slowly, eying the bottles I’d brought with caution.

“It’s to clean your wounds,” I explained, trying to ignore the twinge in my chest when I realized why he was so wary of a woman in a lab coat bringing medical supplies to his cage. “Rubbing alcohol and some ointment for your bruises, nothing else.” I held up the two containers for him to see.

He still didn’t look entirely trusting of the bottles, but when I poured some of the alcohol on a piece of cotton, he let me dab it on his skin. It had to have hurt, but he didn’t so much as flinch as I cleaned every laceration I could see. When I was done with his face and the scrapes on his knuckles, I placed the used piece of cotton in the discarded pile next to the ointment. “Do you have any more cuts or scrapes? Or can we continue with the bruises?”

He was still for a moment, staring at me with obvious hesitance. But after a few moments, he twisted around, turning his back to me. His heavy muscles flexed and bulged, tensed and ready for violence, but he still turned. For a short moment I didn’t know if I was more shocked or awed that he trusted me enough to have his back turned to me… but then I saw them.

Several long, red gashes of broken skin marred the middle of his back. Tell-tale wounds from a lash. He’d been whipped. Brutally.

“Who did this?” The anger in my voice manifested in my hands as well. I had to take several deep breaths before I could steady them enough to apply the rubbing alcohol to the deep lacerations.

He still didn’t move under my careful touches, but I could feel the tension in his hard muscles as I gently brushed my free hand against his unbroken skin. I didn’t think about it—it was an instinctual urge to soothe the pain laid bare in front of me, despite his silent endurance. His skin was warm and surprisingly soft underneath my fingers. I kept them there while I dabbed cleaning solution in his deep lash marks, mumbling soothingly when his muscles twinged with the pain. It took far too long to clean them all, shaking as my hands were, but he sat patiently through it until I finally put the bottle of rubbing alcohol down.

“If you turn back around, I’ll take care of the bruises,” I said, my voice hoarse with barely restrained emotion. The tears that had been threatening to escape ever since I saw his damaged back stung in my eyes. I wasn’t sure why seeing the alpha like this hurt so much. The shock of realizing exactly how ruthless Dr. Axell truly was was a shock, but this… it felt so… personal, somehow. Like I was the one he’d had beaten, not a criminal alpha on death row.

351 turned around to face me once more, and the look in his eyes made me lower mine as something warm and confusing pressed against the inside of my chest. There was so much tenderness in his blue-green gaze. It felt… so intimate, like he… knew me somehow.

Fumbling, I reached for the lotion meant for bruises. It was ridiculous, of course. I may have empathy for what had happened to him, perhaps even on a personal level and not just professional, but there was no reason to start reading anything more into it. And this man… He was deep in his instincts. Of course he would see a young woman caring for his wounds as an intimate gesture and react appropriately. It didn’t mean I had any excuse to lose my damn mind. I had a job to do.

Biting the inside of my cheek to steel myself, I looked back up at him, focusing on his bruises instead of the look in his eyes as I poured lotion on a fresh piece of cotton and reached in through the bars to dab it on his discolored skin.

It was a quicker job than caring for his scrapes and cuts, and I breathed a quiet sigh of relief when I could finally put the used bit of cotton in the discarded pile with the others and screw the lid back on the bottle of lotion. But before I could stand up, the feral alpha reached a hand through the bars—slowly, as to not startle me—and brushed his warm, scraped fingers against my cheek.

“Thank you.” His voice was rough, and the hesitant way his soft lips formed around the words spoke of how infrequently he used it.

I couldn’t help the rush of warmth and pity and anger that coursed through my veins as I felt his gentle caress and looked back up at him. I could see him—the man behind the feral beast, struggling to break through the haze from the chemicals they’d given him. His lips parted, to say more I realized, but he couldn’t find the words. Frustrated, he growled and pulled his hand from my face, clenching it around one of the bars.

That’s when I knew, with unequivocal certainty, that I had to save him, no matter the cost.

OceanofPDF.com

7

It was four days before the handheld RFID copier I’d ordered off eBay was delivered to my home address, but it gave me enough time to prepare my plan.

It was simple, in the end. I’d bought clothes and a lab coat in a size I thought would fit a man of 351’s stature and kept them in my locker at work. The security team was used to me leaving late and didn’t give me any second glances. As long as the feral alpha could pass for just another researcher who happened to leave at the same time as me, he could be swiped out on my card and hopefully shouldn’t draw any attention.

The only pinch point was in getting him out of his cell. That’s where the RFID copier came in play.

I spent the day after my eBay delivery trailing after Dr. Urwin and Dr. Axell—the only two people on our team I was sure had access to the cells. Just before lunch I saw Dr. Urwin put down his card by the coffeemaker while he had his lunch at the break room table along with Dr. Axell, Dr. Miller, and Kenneth, the main lab assistant.

My heart rate spiked at the sight of the unguarded card, and I covertly glanced over my shoulder to make sure no one was looking this way. Thankfully, they were all deeply engrossed in conversation about what sounded like the potential to control the alpha who’d mounted the woman in front of me earlier in the week if she conceived his child.

I suppressed a shudder at the thought of using an innocent baby like that and turned my attention back to the card.

Careful to keep my body between the men at the table and the coffee counter, I slipped my card copier out of my handbag and snatched the card up under the guise of grabbing a mug.