The Gamma He Thought Could Survive Anything Chapter 04
“Fine.” I didn’t even give him the chance to threaten me. Money was money.
“Transfer the money first.”
Surprise flickered across his face, then irritation.
But paying me was obviously the option with the least cost. A moment later, a hundred thousand deposit hit
my account.
2 a.m. My phone screamed me awake.
It was Theron.
“When’d you buy this herbal bite balm? Is it expired?”
Ophelia’s whining bled through the line.
“What is this awful place? I can’t stay here another night.”
I asked calmly, “What time is it?”
“2 a.m.”
“You know I have insomnia. And you woke me for bite balm?”
“Sorry. Ophelia’s skin is sensitive. She gets allergic reactions easily.”
“Medical care out here isn’t great. I just wanted to make sure she’d be safe.”
I knew he wasn’t going to let it go. So I told him.
After I hung up, I stared at the cracked wall.
I’d gotten insomnia caring for Mom at the pack hospital.
Theron took me to healer after healer till it eased.
Now he’d woken me for one bug bite on Ophelia–with a mountain climb the next day.
I stayed awake until dawn.
We packed our gear and headed up the mountain.
Ophelia clung to Theron’s arm, complaining the entire way.
“So many bugs. I’m dying. Suffering for my art here.”
Theron wiped her brow, handed her water, sometimes carried her.
Even so, Ophelia insisted on walking herself. She wanted to prove she could do it.
Running on almost no sleep, I led them to the summit in a daze.
The morning sun slowly rose above the endless mountain ridges.
Clouds drifted upward through the valleys, weaving together with crimson light until the entire landscape
looked like something out of a dream.
Ophelia gasped in delight. She grabbed her camera, hunting for the shot.
“I’m so lucky.”
Several hours passed. The sky gradually darkened. Rain was coming.
“We need to go. Rain up here will crash your core temp.”
Ophelia remained completely absorbed in her camera.
It was as if she hadn’t heard a word.
I raised my voice.
She startled. Her footing slipped, and she fell to the ground.
Both of their backpacks were kicked over the edge.
Several loose rocks followed them, tumbling into the ravine below.
Theron rushed over. His eyes were colder than the storm.
“What did you do?”
His expression stopped me in my tracks.
Rain hit. Seconds later, a downpour.
Ophelia grabbed his sleeve.
“Theron, my legs won’t work. I’m freezing.”
Theron tore open my pack, pulled the raincoat and thermal blanket, wrapped her up.
I was soaked through, trembling.
I held onto the thermal blanket. “I need that too.”
He shoved me aside.
“She’s an Omega. Fragile. You’re a Gamma, raised in these hills. You can take it.”
“Minimum loss, Don’t fight her for it.”
“Just hang in there. We’ll all make it down together.”
Then he scooped Ophelia into his arms and strode down the trail.
It felt like a hole had been torn through my chest. Cold wind rushed straight through it.
Minimum loss? I was the only one who was ever expected to lose.
I gritted my teeth and followed them.
By the time I reached the middle of the mountain, I was swaying.
The storm had tanked my wolf’s core temp. Days of exhaustion caught up. I collapsed.
Theron and Ophelia were already gone.
The mountain rain and fog swallowed me whole. My body felt strangely weightless.
Just before everything went dark, I heard someone shouting. “Lyra! Lyra!”
At the base, the healer team Theron’d arranged in advance rushed Ophelia off.
He stepped beneath a shelter, drying himself with a blanket while repeatedly looking back toward the summit.
Why was Lyra taking so long?
She was a Gamma. She could run this mountain twice.
Suppressing the unease creeping into his chest,
Theron contacted the werewolf rescue team.
Just then, several werewolves came down another trail, taking shelter from the rain.
One of them shook the water from his clothes and called over.
“There’s a she–wolf gone on the mountain. yours?”