The Alpha Under The Mistletoe

2

Maeve’s POV

He passed out on the table like a broken puppet, his arm still hanging at a painful angle. My chest thumped in a rhythm I didn’t like. I crouched closer, checking his pulse. Heartbeat was faint but steady. Breathing uneven. Too fast, too shallow. His blood felt hot under my fingers. Too hot. A wolf should’ve started healing already. Something was stopping it.

I hissed under my breath. “Great. Just great. First time in weeks I don’t have a pack drama, and this shows up.”

My hands moved instinctively, checking his torso, ribs. My fingers brushed over the bruises and cuts, and I froze for a second. Several ribs cracked. One looked like it could puncture a lung any second. I swallowed hard.

Then I noticed it... a small dart, almost hidden under dried blood at his lower back. Tiny, sharp, poisoned. Whoever did this knew exactly what they were doing. Blocking healing, making sure he wouldn’t get up.

I grabbed tweezers from my first-aid kit, trying not to shake. Every second mattered. The second I pulled it out, he twitched violently. His eyes fluttered open halfway, pupils dilated, and I felt it... raw strength, barely contained, trying to surge. The pulse under my fingers jumped. His body wanted to heal. Badly.

He groaned low in his throat, and I jerked back, heart racing. Whoever left him out here didn’t just want him gone. They wanted him dead.

I muttered to myself, voice rough. “You’ve got some nerve showing up like this. And you don’t even know me.”

He twitched again, head rolling slightly. Lips parted, groaning, his hand brushing against the table like he was trying to grab something steady. I clenched my jaw, pinning him down lightly with one hand while I examined the shoulder again. The stitching had held, but the limb was still dangerous. One wrong move, and we’d start over.

“Stop twitching,” I snapped. “You’re not dying tonight. Not on my table. Not like this.”

He tried to speak, voice hoarse and raw: “Hur… hurts…”

“Yeah, no kidding,” I said, rolling my eyes, even though it felt stupid to talk back to someone who could die if I moved wrong. “Stay still before you kill yourself.”

I tore another piece of gauze and pressed it over the smaller cuts, keeping one hand near the shoulder, one near his ribs. My fingers brushed over something hard in his coat pocket. Curious, I slid a hand inside and pulled out a small, leather wallet. Card inside, ID at the front.

Aaron Merrick.

My chest tightened. The name hit differently than I expected. Nothing about it screamed danger, but something in me tensed. The man lying in front of me wasn’t just any injured stranger. I dropped the wallet onto the table and shook my head.

“Great,” I muttered. “Of course. Of course you’re someone important.”

I felt it before I saw it. The pulse. The slight rise in his chest when I pressed, the way his muscles twitched without control. He wasn’t just strong. He was more than strong. Alpha strong.

I cursed under my breath, leaning closer. “You’re an Alpha. No wonder you didn’t heal right away. You’re drugged… poisoned… probably meant to die out there.”

He groaned in response, barely conscious, lips parting, eyes half-lidded. Even asleep he looked dangerous. Alive, he could probably crush me if I wasn’t careful.

I rolled my eyes at myself. “And I’m helping you. Of course I am. Maeve, why do you even care?”

I cleaned the area around his ribs, feeling the cracked bones under the bruised skin. I pressed gently, careful not to crush him. Then I positioned them, gently pushing the worst rib back into alignment. He hissed in pain, body jerking, eyes squeezing shut.

“Don’t move,” I snapped. “I said don’t move!”

He forced his eyes open for a second, groaning low: “Stop… stop…”

“Not happening,” I said, pinching my lips together. “You’re alive because I said so. Deal with it.”

By now, his body had started reacting to the poison being removed. Little sparks of movement under the skin, like his muscles remembered what they were supposed to do. His breathing eased slightly, still shallow, still rapid, but better than before.

I dragged him off the table, careful to keep his shoulder in place. His legs felt heavy like lead. I muttered a curse under my breath, shoving him onto the mattress I’d pulled into the center of the room earlier.

He groaned, body twitching, hand brushing against the mattress. His jaw clenched, teeth grinding. He tried to sit up.

“Stop!” I shouted, yanking him back. “Stay down before you kill the arm again!”

He hissed, pain lacing through it, but eventually settled. His chest rose and fell rapidly, each breath shallow but steadier than before.

I leaned down, pressing a cool hand against his forehead. “You think you’re tough? You’re going to learn the hard way that even Alphas can’t fight alone when they’re this close to dead.”

He muttered, voice barely audible, “Don’t… let them… take me…”

My stomach dropped. Whoever this was, whoever attacked him, it wasn’t just random. It was personal. Dangerous. Targeted. And now, somehow, that threat had reached my little cabin in the middle of nowhere.

I shook my head. “Don’t talk. Just breathe. That’s the job right now.”

I pulled clean gauze over the worst cuts, pressed gently, then wrapped his torso. His ribs groaned as I moved him slightly, but the slight shift helped. His body was reacting to my touch now, like he was trying to heal.

By the time I finished, the first rays of dawn were creeping into the room through the cracks in the wooden walls. He stirred again, claws digging into the mattress reflexively, teeth showing, body trying to move faster than it should.

I grabbed him, holding him down, forcing him to stay still. His eyes were half open, wild and dangerous.

“You are not moving until I say,” I growled. His body shook, clawing at the mattress, and I leaned down, pressing a palm to his chest. “Do you hear me, Aaron Merrick? You are not dying here, not today. Not on my watch.”

His eyes locked onto mine, and for a split second, I saw recognition. Not memory. Not awareness. Just raw survival instinct, panic, and something else… respect, maybe, for the only person keeping him alive right now.

I let out a slow breath and sat back on my heels. My hands were shaking from holding him down. My shirt had blood on it, smeared along my forearms. I didn’t care. The most important thing was breathing, alive, moving, surviving.

I talked to him like a fool. “You’re going to live, Merrick. You hear me? You don’t get to die on me. Not when you’re this close. Not when I said so. You think your packs will know you’re gone? You think anyone will find you out here? No. You’re mine, for tonight. Alive. Got it?”

His chest heaved, and he let out a low groan, almost like he was agreeing, almost like he was aware. Then his head fell sideways, exhausted from the effort of staying conscious.

I brushed his hair back from his forehead, grimacing at the dried blood. “I should’ve walked away. I should’ve let you die. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. You were too close to leaving this world without anyone caring.”

I adjusted the blankets around him, keeping the body heat trapped. I poured a little water onto a cloth and pressed it to his lips. He sipped weakly, eyes closed.

“Good,” I muttered. “Stay awake if you can. You’re stronger than this, Aaron Merrick. I can tell. And I’m not letting you go just yet.”

Hours passed like this. I stayed beside him, checking pulse, breathing, and wounds. The dart was gone, the poison wearing off, but his body wasn’t fully healed. I watched the rise and fall of his chest, noting every twitch and breath.

Somewhere between exhaustion and desperation, I realized I had a strange feeling. He was dangerous. He was an Alpha. And yet, in this moment, on my floor, with blood on both of us, he was helpless. Alive, yes. But helpless. And that realization… scared me.

I pressed my hand to his shoulder one last time, careful not to disturb the stitches. “Whatever trouble you’re running from, Aaron Merrick, it’s officially my problem now. And trust me, I’m not easy to deal with.”

His eyelids twitched, his lips parted slightly. His jaw relaxed. For now, he was alive. That was enough.

And that’s how the morning found us... blood-stained, bruised, dangerous, yet alive.

I leaned back, exhaustion hitting me like a wall. My cabin was quiet, except for his ragged breathing. I’d kept him alive, but I knew the real challenge was just beginning.