Chapter 24

Chapter 24

Will

The bandages on my body felt stiff, dried with the blood and puss that had dripped from my slowly healing wounds. Dr. Monroe had insisted I wear them for another day to let the wounds close. In the meantime, I could wait and watch. Surprisingly, there was no pain in those wounds. Alexis’s balm had worked wonders.

Her presence beside me was far more therapeutic and healing than any bandages that I was wearing. She stood wordlessly by me at the gate’s watchtower. Both of us were looking at the city.

It reminded me of the pre-war silence back in Germany. The calm before the storm, as it were. The city was unusually quiet, its roads starkly deserted, as if every person somehow knew in their heart that some calamity was on the horizon.

Knowing Blair’s vantage point, at the very least, granted us a rough idea of where he would attack from.

“If he’s going to come from the south, that big field beyond the graveyard is where he’s going to gather his soldiers,” Alexis pointed at the ground in the south.

“Would it be enough to hold all his soldiers?” I asked. After seeing what I had seen, it wasn’t a reckless guess to say that he had thousands of soldiers at his disposal.

“Somehow, we will have to contain the fight to the south. Otherwise, his soldiers will make their way to the town. I don’t even want to imagine what happens in that case,” Alexis whispered.

I could imagine what would happen to it if Blair’s forces were unleashed upon those unsuspecting citizens. The town square would crumble. Blair’s old tower would fall and cover downtown in its rubble. The suburbs would be filled with the sounds of screaming people trying to run away from those mutated soldiers. The fabric of reality would tear, and only madness would prevail.

The wounds that had recovered over the last few days had formed stubborn scars that made their presence known every time I moved. My previous litheness was compromised, but the doctor said it’d only remain compromised for a few more days.

The trouble was, I did not have a few more days.

But even as I stayed put atop the commune, watching everything from afar, the pack had been dispatched all over town, seeing to it that all the stray soldiers were wiped out.

“Will. The doctor, Vince, and I had an idea. Do you want to hear it? I want to share it with you this time around instead of, you know, going behind your back,” Alexis said. We had been standing here idly for a long time, neither of us talking. While I had been brooding, Alexis, it seemed, had been building up the courage to talk to me about whatever was on her mind.

“Tell me. I promise I’ll hear it out,” I said, trying to compensate for the rudeness that I’d exhibited a few days ago.

“We need one soldier,” Alexis said.

“But we already have a barn full of dead bodies,” I said, turning to face her. She was looking quite eager and excited. I, on the other hand, was plain confused.

“We need an alive one. Someone whose blood and body we can use to study the kind of serum Blair injected in him and all the other soldiers. Think of it as research. It will help us understand what Blair’s been doing. With that information in our arsenal, we can do several things. Off the top of my head, we can come up with an antidote that renders you immune to these soldiers. Secondly, we can use what we know about those soldiers and their altered chemical makeup to create something or do something that ends this madness without going to war,” Alexis said.

I had to give it to her; it was a very well-thought-out plan, and she had covered her bases, making it impossible for me to say no. It surprised me why this suggestion hadn’t occurred to me before. It was not like there was a lack of soldiers in the area. The more we seemed to kill, the more appeared out of the woodwork.

“Fine. I am with you on this,” I said, this time really meaning it instead of just being accommodating to compensate for my prior behavior. She had come up with a good, followable, and mature plan. This was the version of Alexis I liked best. Someone who used her mind rationally.

“That day, when you went off to find Blair, I couldn’t help but think what I’d do without you if I lost you. You don’t know how much I have grown to love you and cherish you in these past months,” I said, holding her hands and putting them on my chest so she’d hear my heartbeat and feel my earnestness.

“When you came home, all injured and apologetic, I thought the same thing. I cannot live a life without you, either. It’s the most difficult thing for me to imagine,” Alexis said, coming closer to me, so close that our bodies met and our lips were kissing the distance close.

Then, before reaching up to kiss me, her mouth lingered near my ear, and she whispered, “I love you more than life itself.”

It was a subtle kiss, a soft, tentative brushing of the lips as we held each other. My lips craved the softness of her cheeks, the wetness of her lips, and the warmth of her mouth. There was something powerful about reconciliatory kisses like this.

It was a sweet moment that ended all too soon when a group of werewolves suddenly returned from their hunt. Vince was leading them.

“What word from the town?” I asked, hurriedly stepping back from Alexis so that they wouldn’t see that we were having a romantic moment to ourselves.

“Will. Those goddamn soldiers have reclaimed Beckett Pharma’s tower. Apparently, they dug a whole tunnel from his new headquarters. They’re swarming out of that building like locusts. We managed to close that hole, but there are still soldiers within that building, doing crazy shit,” Morgan said.

“Is that true?” I asked Vince.

“Morgan’s right. Those bastards are trying to enter the town secretly. We can’t have that happen!” Vincent said.

“What do you say, my love?” I asked Alexis.

“Whatever we do, we do it together,” Alexis said.

I knew that I was in no shape to fight right now. Taking Alexis with me would only compromise both of us, as one would spend time covering the other. At that critical moment, a thought occurred to me.

It was inevitable that I was going to retire from this life soon. Vincent would be the alpha after me. He would have to delegate, oversee, and take care of the commune.

“Vincent,” I said, calling him from above.

“Yeah, boss?”

“I leave this one up to you. You’re going to lead the pack and do what needs to be done about this,” I said.

Several members of the hunting party gasped in surprise. Alexis looked at me with disbelief.

“Are you sure, Will?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said. Then, looking back at the hunting party, I said something that had been lying heavy in my mind for some time. “We stand on the brink of war. It might not be as impressive in scale as the Second World War, but make no mistake, it is a war by every definition of the word. The last time the Grimms faced a war, we fled. However, I have understood after a long time that running is not in the cards for us anymore. We make our stand in this town. We will drive away those who seek to disparage us!”

It wasn’t quite a big crowd, but still, the hunting party resounded with applause, cheers, and hoots instilled with passion and courage. I meant every word of what I had said.

“Go, then. Regroup. Recuperate. Reinforce. When you are ready, go back and conquer that tower!” I said. Then I stayed there, watching them head back into the commune to do as I had said.

“Why aren’t we going with them?” Alexis asked.

“The last time I went into that tower, I was alone. It was just you and me. That’s why we failed. What good am I as the alpha if I cannot harness the raw force of the pack? Trust me. When those forty, fifty pack members go in that tower, they will kill every soldier in their path.”

“Is this one of the steps?” Alexis asked.

“Steps?”

“You know, steps to retirement? You’re trying to see if Vince is ready or not?”

I smiled and nodded.

“But we do have a plan of our own, don’t we? Capture a soldier alive and bring him back here?” I asked. “I’m just prioritizing what’s important to me. Right now, I’d rather spend time with you and do what you think is right.”

Alexis gleamed with glee, her face breaking into a broad smile.

“You know, when you agree with me, it turns me on so much,” she said, tugging at my wrist and pulling me toward my home.

“I have all these bandages,” I said, pointing to my body.

“What I’ve got planned for you does not require you to take off your bandages,” she said, winking at me.

It intrigued me enough to follow her to our home.

Once we were inside, Alexis pulled the curtains, shrouding us in secrecy. Then, she walked over to me slowly, her eyes alive with desire, her body becoming a vessel of pleasure.

“All you’ve got to do is sit back and enjoy the show,” she said, pushing me down on the sofa.

“The show?” I asked, amused.

“No words from the audience!” Alexis said, putting her foot on my thigh. Then, while slowly arching her back, she took off her top, revealing her naked midriff, her slender waist, and her swaying breasts. In another moment, the bra was gone. Now, her boobs hung there on her chest, her peach-colored nipples looking enticing. I wanted to move forward, wrap my hand around them, and take those nipples in my mouth, but Alexis had her foot on my thigh, preventing me from moving.

She danced a little as she came forward and descended on her knees. I closed my eyes in anticipation of what was to come. I could feel her pulling away my pants as she positioned herself between my thighs.

Then I felt her mouth close around my cock. As she sucked it, licked it from down under, and swallowed its length in her mouth, my penis became harder, struggling to remain fit within the tiny cavity of her mouth.

I did not dare move.

Alexis slowly bobbed her head up and down, her wet lips enveloping the length of my dick. I could feel the tip ramming against her throat, but it felt so good, that moistness, that tightness deep within her mouth, and the way her tongue rolled on my frenulum.

I opened my eyes as the sensation intensified, only to find her sitting there between my thighs, her breasts heaving, my entire cock deep in her throat, and her hands cradling my balls.

I watched as she retracted her head, a trail of precum and spit connecting her now-distant mouth with my dick. She wiped her face with the back of her hand, and her skin flushed red.

I remained quiet and in awe of what was happening as she took off her pants, then her panties, and climbed on top of me, her hands gripping the sofa for support, her sexy, slender, naked body against me. She gently took my penis inside, sliding on top of it till it was deep inside her.

Alexis moaned as she rode me, her beautiful form thrusting up and down in the air as she straddled my cock, latched onto my body, and brushed her breasts against my face.

I buried my face in her bosom, kneading her perky tits in my hands, licking the areola, and sucking on her nipples as she rode me roughly, her moans escalating in tone and pitch as both of us neared orgasm.

And then, unable to hold myself back any longer, I came into her pussy, shooting my load deep into her as my dick throbbed and pulsated in the wake of this powerful climax.

“Ah, my God!” Alexis moaned, her thighs quivering as she collapsed on top of me, catching her breath. “I love you, Will.”

“I love you too, Alexis,” I panted.

Exhausted by this spontaneous lovemaking session, I fell asleep right there on the couch, and it wasn’t until late in the night that I woke up to the noise of people talking in raised voices outside my house.

Alexis was nowhere around. I put my clothes back on and headed out the door to see that the hunting party had returned. Many of them were covered in blood, though, from the looks of it, it did not seem like their blood.