Brave and Bound

Lyanna

Replacement? The word echoes in the cramped space of the trauma room, ringing like a death knell in my ears. I stare down at the gruesome mess of Callum’s mangled leg, my blood-slicked fingers gripping the jagged edges of his fractured tibia. I hold the broken pieces steady so Bram can work his healing magic, but my mind is spinning out of control. I cannot possibly be a permanent replacement for this pack's doctor.

"I am not staying," I mutter, the words slipping past my lips before I can stop them. I risk a quick glance up at the massive, brooding Alpha lying on the table. As soon as this leg is stabilized, as soon as the worst of the danger is over, I am walking out those doors. I have to. But looking at the sharp, stubborn line of his jaw, a nagging question creeps into my mind. Is he actually going to let me go?

The terrifying reality of Vance’s promotion hits me like a physical blow. Panic tightens my chest. If there is a paper trail detailing how Vance's father funneled money to help me through medical school, Vance will find it. He will use his new Alpha status to hunt me down. If I remain stationary here, I am a sitting duck.

"Bram?" I say distractedly, forcing my attention back to the surgical field. I maintain the pressure on the bone fragments while the healer does his work.

My thoughts race faster, spilling out in a frantic stream of consciousness. "I need my car. My clothes are scattered. I have a medical residency waiting for me. I can't just abandon my post at the hospital and disappear." I keep muttering aloud, listing my desperate needs, terrified of the consequences of staying in one place.

"Tell me where your car is parked," Callum’s deep, gravelly voice slices right through my rising panic. "I will send a team of my warriors to fetch it. Same goes for your clothes. We can grab whatever you need."

I freeze, my hands still locked on his broken leg.

"As far as your schooling goes," Callum continues, his tone smooth and unwavering. "We will set up an arrangement for you to take your classes online. You can finish your residency right here in this clinic, under my protection."

I snap my head up and frown hard at him. "How did you...?"

"You were talking to yourself," he states simply, offering a faint shrug. "It wasn't hard to catch every frantic syllable. You forget how sharp my hearing is."

"I cannot just leave my school, Callum," I argue, staring at him like he has lost his mind.

"I didn’t say you would be leaving school," he counters, acting as if the matter is already closed. "I said you would be doing your residency here. You can take the academic classes online."

"Excuse me?" My voice pitches up in sharp indignation. "You cannot keep me here!"

Callum merely raises that dark, arrogant eyebrow at me. The smug expression makes me want to scream.

"You are not my Alpha," I snap, leveling a fierce glare at him. "You don't get to issue orders about my life."

He ignores my defiance. Instead, he leans forward on the metal table, ignoring the grisly state of his own leg. His piercing jade eyes lock onto mine, trapping me in his intense gaze. A low, possessive growl rumbles deep in his chest.

"What I am is your mate."

The raw power in those words sends a jolt straight down my spine.

"Tell me truthfully," Callum presses, his voice dropping to a dangerous, silky register. "If I let you walk out of here, if I let you go back to your human school, and I come to visit you in a week’s time... will you still be there?"

I look away, breaking the intense eye contact. I focus my gaze back on his shattered muscle and torn flesh, refusing to give him the satisfaction of an answer. He is right. He perfectly deduced my plan. Even if this giant, infuriating man wasn't my fated mate, the sheer terror of Vance figuring out my location would force me to transfer schools immediately. I would run at the first opportunity.

"That is exactly what I thought," Callum murmurs, a note of dark triumph bleeding into his tone. "And that, my dear mate, is why I am not letting you leave."

He leans back against the table. A heavy silence falls over the small operating room. We both retreat into our own heads for a few long moments. The only sounds are the steady beep of a nearby heart monitor and my quiet instructions to Bram as I signal him to fuse the next section of bone.

The tension in the room is suffocating. I desperately need to change the subject before the weight of the mate bond crushes my remaining common sense.

"Why did you say I was brave earlier?" I ask, keeping my eyes on the surgical field.

"What?" Callum asks. I catch a slight tremor in his voice. The excruciating agony of the unmedicated surgery is finally catching up to him, clawing through his Alpha endurance.

"Back in the woods," I clarify, daring to meet his gaze again. "You said you knew I was intelligent, compassionate, brave, and lonely. I understand the intelligent and compassionate parts. You explained the lonely part. But why brave?"

Callum draws in a ragged breath, fighting the pain. "When you heard my pack approaching through the trees, you didn't run. You easily could have. You had no idea they were my pack members coming to save me. For all you knew, it was a rival patrol coming to finish the job. Yet you stood your ground. You looked like you were ready to fight my own Beta to protect an injured man. For someone who clearly isn't a fighter, that takes immense guts."

I frown, feeling a sudden flash of defensiveness. "How do you know I'm not a fighter?"

"You aren't built like one," he replies simply, stating it as an absolute fact.

"Are you saying I'm fat?" I demand, feeling insulted. I take care of myself. I hit the human gym regularly. Sure, I know I need to let my wolf Anita out for more runs in the woods, but I am certainly not overweight, not even by the strict, athletic standards of werewolf society.

"You know you aren't," Callum says, his jade eyes tracking my every movement. "But I saw you naked in the woods. Those of us who have spent years fighting in daily pack wars, we don't have the softness to our bodies that you do. The battle hardens everything."

A devastatingly sexy smile touches his lips, transforming his rugged face. "And before you jump to any wild conclusions, let me be clear. I find your soft curves incredibly alluring. I find your body very sexy."

My hands freeze over his open wound. I have no idea how to process that compliment. The sheer heat in his gaze makes my skin burn.

"Sexy," I repeat under my breath. "That is definitely not a word anyone has used to describe me in the past."

I realize a second too late that I spoke aloud again. I look up and catch him grinning at me, a genuine, boyish expression that momentarily erases the pain lines around his mouth.

"Some people, like myself, find pure intelligence sexy," Callum says, his voice dropping into a intimate whisper. "But if I am being honest, I have been itching to touch you. I have wanted to run my hands over those soft curves since the very second we locked eyes."

I roll my eyes at him, trying to mask the sudden flutter in my stomach. "Some people, like myself, find it incredibly hard to believe that a man caught in the jagged teeth of a rusted bear trap was 'itching' to touch me."

"Then that should tell you just how strong the magnetic pull of the mate bond truly is," he counters smoothly. "As much as this surgery hurts, just having your hands on me dulls the agony. Your scent is filling this room. It gets stronger the longer you stand near me. Your scent and your physical contact are literally the only things keeping me from blacking out right now."

He shifts slightly, his muscles bunching as a wave of pain hits him, but he keeps his focus pinned on me. "As an Alpha, finding my Luna, my fated mate, comes with certain benefits. You are the other half of my soul. At the risk of sounding cliché, you complete me. Now, I have a question for you."

"Okay," I say cautiously, turning my attention back to the small bone slivers scattered in the torn tissue.

"Why didn't you run?"

I stop and look at him like he is an absolute idiot. "You were trapped and bleeding out. If those approaching wolves weren't your pack, they would have ripped your throat out."

That damn dark eyebrow arches up again. "And they would have killed you right alongside me."

"I didn't pry a steel bear trap off your leg just to leave you to die at the hands of the assholes who set it in the first place!" I argue stubbornly.

Callum chuckles, a low, rich sound. "So, you are telling me you are more stubborn than brave?"

"Call it whatever you want. I wasn't going to leave you there to die."

"Thank you."

I wait for him to elaborate. When the silence stretches on, I glance up. "For what?"

"For getting me out of that trap. For not abandoning me when you could have been slaughtered. And for not letting that butcher Benson hack off my leg."

"The man is a menace. He really needs to retire," I say, shaking my head.

"Which is exactly why you are taking over the infirmary," he declares arrogantly.

"I am not replacing him, Callum. I have a life. I have school. I have medical labs, practical exams, and a dozen other academic requirements."

Callum dismisses every single excuse effortlessly. "We will contact the school administration and figure out the lab credits. Like I said before, you will get far more opportunity to practice real surgical skills here in my pack than you ever would in some sterile human laboratory. The exams can be proctored online. Humans do it every day. Do you have any other arguments you need me to shoot down?"

"You are so arrogant," I mutter angrily, grabbing a pair of surgical tweezers.

"Confident," he corrects smoothly.

"What?" I ask, my brow furrowing.

"I am not arrogant. I am confident. There is a massive difference."

I let out an exasperated sigh. "How do you keep hearing every single thing I mutter?"

"How long have you been hiding out among humans?" he teases lightly. "I think you forgot just how sensitive a werewolf's hearing is. And I am an Alpha. My senses are dialed higher than the rest of the pack."

I groan internally. Living in the human world for so long ruined my filter. I grew accustomed to mumbling my private thoughts without anyone catching them. Now, I am going to have to watch every word I breathe so I don't accidentally start a pack war or offend this insufferable Alpha.

A sharp knock on the door interrupts our intense banter.

"Come in," Callum calls out.

"Does no one in this pack understand that this is a sterile operating room?" I complain under my breath, already forgetting my vow to stop talking to myself.

The heavy door swings open. Cedric steps inside, leading a young, wide-eyed woman by the arm.

"Excuse me, doctor," Cedric says respectfully. "I brought one of the packhouse omegas. She handles the clothing repairs, but she is terrified. She says she has absolutely no clue how to suture a warrior's flesh."

I turn and see the poor girl staring in absolute horror at the gruesome, bloody mess of Callum’s open leg. Her face turns a sickly shade of green. She looks like she is about to pass out on the tiles.

"Give me one second. I will be right out," I tell Cedric.

I quickly grab a thick, sterile surgical towel and drape it over Callum’s exposed muscle and bone. I need to spare the young omega's stomach. The last thing I want to deal with right now is the smell of fresh vomit contaminating my workspace.

Cedric nods and guides the trembling girl back out into the hallway, pulling the door shut.

I turn my attention back to the surgical table. "Alright. I have all the major bone fragments locked back into their proper places underneath. There are a few tiny slivers of bone missing, but hopefully, Bram can work his magic around the gaps."

"I am a strong Alpha wolf, mate," Callum says. "I will make it work." He tries to sound boastful, strutting his pride for me, but his voice lacks its usual booming resonance.

"Right. I am going to align the main bone fragment against the existing structure and let you start the internal healing process while I go check on the omegas in the hall. When I come back, I will finish laying the smaller pieces over the top, and then we will finally get you sewn up. You will be nearly back to normal soon, Alpha."

"Callum. Lyanna, just call me Callum," he murmurs.

The profound, heavy fatigue dragging down his words is impossible to ignore. I look up into his brownish-green eyes. Usually, they are so expressive and sharp, but right now, they are clouded with sheer exhaustion. The adrenaline crash is hitting him hard. His massive body has been through hell today.

I step closer to the edge of the table. Reaching out, I place my hands flat against his broad, muscular chest. His skin is radiating intense heat. I push gently against the hard muscle, coaxing him to lie flat against the metal surface.

"Why don't you just rest while I am gone?" I say, my voice dropping to a soft, soothing murmur. "You survived a brutal attack. It has been a long, bloody day, and your body desperately needs the downtime to heal."

I watch the tension slowly bleed out of his shoulders. His heavy eyelids start to flutter shut.

I know this is crossing a professional line. I know I should maintain my distance. But the undeniable magnetic pull of our mate bond overrides my logic. My fingers have been itching to touch him in a way that doesn't involve medical triage since I first laid eyes on him in that forest clearing.

Yielding to the instinct, I reach up and gently thread my fingers through the dark strands of his hair, finding the soft, clean patches that aren't matted with dried blood.

"Sleep, Callum," I whisper softly. "I will be right here when you wake up."

I am not entirely sure what possesses me, but I lean down over the table. I tilt my head and softly press my lips directly to his. The contact is brief, a gentle brush of warmth against his mouth, but it sends a spark of electricity shooting straight to my core.

Callum lets out a deep, rumbling sigh against my lips. The remaining fight drains out of his massive frame. He instantly succumbs to the comfort of the bond, his breathing evening out as he falls into a deep, healing sleep.

"Sleep well," I whisper quietly into the quiet room.

I take one last look at his relaxed face. Making sure his leg is securely covered, I turn and step out of the trauma room. I pull the heavy door shut behind me, immediately spotting Cedric waiting in the corridor. I instruct the Beta to stand guard over the room and protect his Alpha.

Taking a deep breath to steady my racing heart, I pivot on my heel and head toward the main infirmary floor. It is time to take charge of this crisis and teach these terrified omegas how to save their warriors.