The man turned to Marco and moved over to put a finger on his eyelid, lifting it up and then saying in a low but firm voice, “You’re awake. Good. Do you know where you are?”

Marco shook his head slowly back and forth as the door opened again and Ian walked in. Marco stretched out his hand wordlessly and Ian rushed over to him, taking his hand in a warm grip. “Marco! You’re awake, thank God. Nicky has been inconsolable—hell, all of us have been!” He turned to the boy in the chair, who still hadn’t awakened, though he was by now stirring restlessly. “Nicky, Nicky, wake up! Marco’s awake!”

The beautiful boy’s eyes sprang open and he threw himself onto Marco’s chest, tears streaming down his face. “Marco!” he cried. “Oh God, Marco, I was so scared!” He kissed Marco on the lips, and then began to kiss him all over his face, raining the kisses down, some soft, some passionate, until Marco pushed him gently away, uncomfortable at being kissed by this strange boy. He stared over at Ian and then back at the blond boy.

“Ian, what the hell’s going on? I’m sorry,” he said, turning toward the young man. “I can see that you obviously think you know me very well, but…who the hell are you? I don’t remember ever seeing you before in my life.”

Chapter Two

The shocked silence that greeted Marco’s words erupted into chaos after a shocked little cry from Nicky. Ian gasped in disbelief, and the doctor put an arm around Nicky’s waist and spoke soothing words to him that Nicky couldn’t even focus on. He couldn’t have held back the tears that burst from his throat if he’d tried. He looked wonderingly from Marco back to Ian and then the doctor was pulling him from the room. He stared back at Marco as he left—was this some kind of cruel joke? It wasn’t possible that Marco could have forgotten all they were to each other —all they’d gone through to get to where they were?

The doctor pulled him down the hallway to a set of chairs in the waiting area near the nurse’s station. The doctor’s name was Jeremy Tate, and he was the brother of one of the bloodmates in their pack. His sister, Elizabeth, had been mated to one of the gammas for several years, and the pack had come to trust Dr. Tate implicitly. When Marco’s organs started to fail, the wolves grew frantic and called Jeremy, who was Chief of Staff of the hospital in Brevard, the closest town to the lodge. He’d arranged for an immediate transfer to the hospital, where they could give Marco the life support he needed.

Dr. Cornsilk was also now on staff at the hospital, so between the two of them, they were able to manage all of Marco’s care with the help of a nurse and a lab assistant who were mated to a pack members as well, making sure his blood work didn’t fall into anyone else’s hands. Dr. Cornsilk was a non-shifting wolf himself—what the wolves called a natural pet—from the Dark Hollow wolf pack and had recently been on staff at the Hunter’s complex, acting as a double agent for the wolves before the wolves attacked and closed the operation down. He was at the nurse’s station looking over some early lab results when he saw Jeremy bring a tearful Nicky into the hall, and he quickly came over to them in alarm.

“Oh my God, has Marco…” “No,” Jeremy said, “but something’s badly wrong. He’s awake, and doesn’t seem to remember his own bloodmate. Can you go in and check on him? I need to take care of Nicky.”

“Of course,” he said, already sprinting down the hall to the Alpha’s room. “Don’t worry, Nicky,” he called over his shoulder. “I’m sure he’s just disoriented.”

“He’s right, you know,” Jeremy said softly, his arm still wrapped around Nicky’s shoulders. “Marco couldn’t forget you. Please don’t be so upset.”

“I-I’m sorry. I know I’m being an idiot. It’s just…Marco’s been so sick, and I thought he was dying. Then to have him wake up and look at me like that. Like I was some stranger…”

Jeremy patted his arm. “Give him a few minutes and we’ll go back in there. I’m sure it’s just a temporary thing. He seemed to know Ian.”

Nicky stood up, wiping away his tears. “Can I go back in now? I have to see him—I won’t make a scene and get him upset again.”

“All right,” Jeremy said, getting up to stand beside him. “But if I see him getting upset, I’ll have to take you out of there. The lab work is still out and we don’t know what caused this collapse. Until we do, we have to be careful with him. He came close to not making it. We used up all the alpha blood we had on hand to transfuse him and get him this far. There can’t be any more relapses. Casey and Zack have given too much blood as it is,” he said, referring to two of the other alphas in the pack. Zack had rushed all the way from the North Georgia branch of the pack to give his blood, after Casey, the battle commander, had given all he could.

“I know. I’ll be careful, I promise.”

Jeremy smiled at him and took his arm to lead him down the hall. Jeremy was fairly young to be the Chief of Staff, but even young as he was, he was well-known as a brilliant cardiac surgeon and the hospital had jumped at the chance to have him when he indicated an interest in the job. Jeremy had grown up in Brevard and loved the mountains, so had decided he was needed there more than in one of the major medical centers.

Tall, dark and handsome, he was the doctor every unattached nurse on staff was crazy about, but Jeremy didn’t seem to be interested in any of them. Instead, he spent a great deal of his off time at Mountainwood, the wolf’s lodge. Once Nicky had been surprised to see a strange look of longing on his face as he stared at Nicky and Marco from across the dining room. At the time, Nicky thought he might be attracted to Marco, but he’d never noticed the look again, so thought he must have imagined it.

Jeremy led him into Marco’s room and when the door opened, Marco looked up at them with a narrowed gaze. Ian held out a hand to Nicky, and he came closer, standing by Ian’s side. “Marco,” Ian said. “Here’s Nicky, your mate—your bloodmate. Surely you recognize him.”

Nicky looked down at Marco hopefully, holding his breath, but Marco shook his head. “No, I’m sorry, but I don’t.”

Nicky sagged against Ian, who broke with the pack tradition never to touch another wolf’s mate and put a comforting arm around him. He gave Marco a warning look and Marco sighed deeply.

“Look, I don’t mean to hurt your feelings. I can see that I am, but I don’t mean to, I swear. You’re a very nice-looking young guy, but I-I just don’t remember. I’m sorry.”

He looked so genuinely upset that Nicky felt pity for him, even though his heart was breaking. He shook his head slightly. “No, it’s all right. I understand.” He turned to the doctor. “But how is it Marco knows Ian and not me?”

Dr. Cornsilk shook his head. “I have no idea, Nicky, I’m sorry. There is a type of amnesia called systematized amnesia in which the victim loses all the memories related to a certain location or a certain person. It’s a kind of dissociative disorder and is known to be associated with too much stress. It’s rare, but that could be it.” The doctor shrugged slightly and shook his head. “We’re just not sure. We’re still running tests, so maybe we’ll have some answers soon.”

Nicky nodded sadly, and turned back to Marco. “I-I need to stay here, though, with you, if that’s all right. Please don’t make me leave you. I promise I won’t be a bother.”

Marco shifted in bed, looking confused and uncomfortable. “Well, I…” he looked over at Ian helplessly and something unspoken passed between them.

The wolves, especially close friends and associates like Ian and Marco, had an almost psychic connection at times, it seemed to Nicky. At least they seemed to be able to sense each other’s feelings very well. Or maybe they had discussed it before he arrived, but Nicky knew with a sinking feeling the decision had already been made and not in his favor.

Sure enough, Ian spoke up next to him. “I’ve already called Logan, Nicky, and he’s on his way to pick you up. You’ve been sitting here for two days straight, and you’re exhausted. Marco’s out of danger now, so you need to go home and get some rest. I’ll stay here with him and I promise you I’ll call if anything goes wrong.”

“No,” Nicky said, frantic at the idea he had to leave his mate alone and, in his mind at least, unprotected. “I can’t just leave him. Please!”

Ian gave Marco another significant look and Marco spoke up. “Look, uh, Nicky, maybe it’s best if you go home for a while. I’m pretty tired, so I’ll probably just sleep.” He looked at Nicky with kindness, but absolutely no recognition whatsoever. “You look pretty exhausted too.”

Jeremy came over to Nicky quickly and drew him unresistingly into his arms. “Nicky, come on with me, and we’ll wait for Logan outside.” He rubbed Nicky’s back, soothing him. “Give Marco a chance to rest,” he said in his ear.

Marco spoke again, and this time with a steely edge to his voice and a grim expression on his face. “I may not remember him, but I do know one thing for sure, doctor. You need to take your fucking hands off my mate.”

Marco had been questioning Ian when the blond boy and Dr. Tate walked back in the room. Something moved in his chest—what was it? But it was gone before he could put a name to it. The boy—Nicky, they’d said—looked terribly upset, and Marco didn’t like to see him that way. He wasn’t sure why, but it seemed wrong somehow. A strong surge of protectiveness swept over him. Ian had been explaining to Marco that the beautiful boy was his mate—his damn bloodmate and he still couldn’t remember. He didn’t feel the primal pull that he knew he was supposed to feel.

He had no memory of even liking men that way particularly, though wolves didn’t feel any prejudice against the idea like humans did. When your blood picked your mate, it seemed foolish, not to mention futile, to struggle against it, so the wolves of his pack were mated to both male and female pets. So while he thought the boy absolutely gorgeous, and felt an attraction to him—hell, who wouldn’t—he felt no blood pull, no compelling urges.