Chapter Text
The smell of blood lingered in the air long after the last infected fell.
Elena hated that smell.
It clung to everything—skin, leaves, damp earth. It settled in the back of the throat and stayed there, metallic and sour, as if the forest itself had tasted violence and couldn’t spit it out.
She stood still for a while after the fight, trying to steady her breathing.
Samson, meanwhile, had already moved on from it.
He crouched a few meters away near a fallen trunk, one hand braced against the wood while the other dragged through the grass, wiping blood from his fingers. His movements were methodical, almost distracted, like the slaughter behind them had been no more significant than clearing brush from a path.
Yet Elena could see the strain in the set of his shoulders.
He’d taken more damage.
One infected had managed to rake claws across his back. Another had bitten into the side of his forearm before he tore its jaw free. Fresh blood ran in thin lines down skin already marked by scars and bullet wounds.
“Of course,” she muttered under her breath. “Of course you got hurt again.”
Samson’s head turned slightly at the sound of her voice.
Even from a distance, he noticed.
Always.
She walked toward him slowly, one hand pressed to her own side where the bullet wound still throbbed with every few steps. Adrenaline had masked it during the attack, but now the pain returned in steady pulses.
When she reached him, she planted her hands on her hips.
“Sit.”
Samson blinked once. Then looked away, back toward the trees.
Elena narrowed her eyes. “No. Don’t do that.”
She stepped into his line of sight again and pointed firmly at the ground beside the log. “Sit.”
For a second she thought he might ignore her entirely.
He was an alpha infected. Bigger than her, stronger than her, capable of tearing through six attackers in less than a minute. The fact that she was scolding him like an unruly child would have been laughable if it weren’t so absurdly real.
But after a pause, Samson lowered himself down. Slowly. Without protest.
Elena tried not to smile at the tiny flare of satisfaction warming her chest.
“Good,” she said, kneeling beside him. “See? We’re learning.”
He watched her face closely, expression unreadable.
She unpacked what remained of her supplies with a sigh. The cloth she’d used earlier was already stained and half-useless, but she tore cleaner strips from the inside hem of her shirt. The water was low. The antiseptic almost gone.
“You’re expensive to keep alive, you know that?” she murmured.
No response.
She dipped cloth in water and reached for his forearm first. The bite mark was ugly, flesh punctured and torn where teeth had sunk in. Samson didn’t move when she touched him. Didn’t tense. Didn’t pull away.
He simply sat there, broad shoulders relaxed, eyes fixed on her face instead of the wound.
“You really are used to this,” she said softly.
That bothered her more than she wanted to admit. No one should be that used to pain.
She cleaned the wound carefully, wiping blood away in slow circles. Samson’s breathing remained steady. If it stung, if it burned, he gave no sign.
“Most people would hiss, at least,” she added.
Nothing.
“Complain?”
Nothing.
“Swear?”
His head tilted slightly.
Elena huffed a laugh despite herself. “Right. Forgot.”
She wrapped the forearm tightly and tied it off. Then she shifted behind him to inspect the claw marks on his back. Up close, she could see how many scars were already there. Old slashes. Burn marks. Round puckered bullet scars. Lines that looked like restraints had rubbed skin raw over and over.
Her fingers paused. What had happened to you?
The question stayed locked behind her teeth. Instead, she poured a little water over the newest scratches and began cleaning them. Samson’s back was broad and warm under her hands, muscles moving subtly with each breath. He still didn’t react, even when she pressed near the deeper tears.
Elena found herself staring at the scars more than the fresh wounds. Every mark was a story she’d never hear properly. Every scar proof that he’d survived things that should have broken anyone. And yet here he was, sitting quietly while she fussed over him in the middle of a forest.
Her chest tightened unexpectedly. Could this be something?
The thought came uninvited. Not romance—her mind wasn’t foolish enough to leap there, not with the world the way it was. But something else. A bond. A strange companionship carved out of disaster.
Friendship. She almost laughed at herself. Friendship with an alpha infected. If Marta or Tomas could see her now, they’d call her insane. Maybe they’d be right.
She tied off the bandage across his shoulder and sat back on her heels, looking at him. He turned his head slightly, meeting her eyes immediately. There it was again—that direct, unwavering stare.
No shame. No hesitation. No social awkwardness. Just focus.
Elena’s pulse skipped. He was not a man, not fully. Not anymore. He was something changed. Something dangerous. Something whose strength she had seen firsthand, whose violence had been horrifying in its efficiency.
He could kill her in seconds. He could snap her neck before she drew a breath. The warmth in her chest chilled. What was she doing Believing in friendship? In safety? He was an alpha infected. No matter how many words he remembered, no matter how gently he’d carried her, no matter how obediently he sat while she patched him up—
He was still that.
Her hands stilled. Samson noticed instantly. The shift in her expression, the pause in her touch, the way her breathing changed.
“Elena.”
Her name came rough and low, dragged through a throat unused to speech. She stared at him. He’d said it more clearly this time. Not perfect. But clearer.
“Elena,” he repeated, watching her with quiet intensity.
Every fearful thought scattered like birds startled from a field.
“Oh,” she whispered.
Something softened in his face at the sound of her voice. Elena swallowed hard and looked down quickly, pretending to fuss with the bandage knot so he wouldn’t see the sudden heat in her cheeks.
“You can’t just do that,” she muttered.
He said nothing. Of course.
She cleared her throat and resumed treating the smaller cuts across his ribs, fingers steadier now. The truth was embarrassingly simple: when he said her name, the rest of the world blurred. The conflict. The fear. The logic. All of it slipped aside for a moment.
“You’re trouble,” she murmured.
He tilted his head.
“I know you don’t know what that means.”
Once the wounds were cleaned and wrapped as best she could, Elena sat back again and studied him critically. Blood still streaked his neck and chest. His long hair hung in tangled strands around his face and shoulders, damp with sweat and grime. Some of it stuck to the drying blood near his temple.
“You look feral,” she said.
Samson blinked.
“Worse than usual, I mean.”
She glanced around until she spotted a thin strip of cloth torn from her ruined bag lining. An idea came suddenly, absurd and light.
“Hold still.”
He did. That still startled her every time.
She moved behind him, gathering the heavy curtain of long hair in both hands. It was thicker than she expected, rough in places, surprisingly clean in others where river water had washed through it.
Samson stiffened slightly at the unfamiliar sensation.
“It’s fine,” she said softly. “Just me.”
His shoulders eased. She combed through tangles gently with her fingers, separating knots, smoothing it back from his face. It took longer than she expected. His hair reached past his shoulders, wild and uneven but undeniably striking.
“There,” she murmured.
She gathered it all together and tied it back into a low ponytail with the strip of cloth. When she stepped around to face him again, she burst out laughing. Not mocking laughter. Warm laughter.
He looked… different. Still massive. Still scarred. Still intimidating enough to freeze blood. But with his face unobscured and hair tied back, there was something unexpectedly handsome, almost noble, in the sharp lines of his features.
Samson stared at her, puzzled by the laughter.
“Sorry,” she said, smiling despite herself. “You just—”
She stopped. He was staring at her again. Not confused now. Watching her smile. The realization made her own fade into something softer.
“You look better,” she finished quietly.
He reached up slowly, touching the ponytail at the back of his head as if unsure what had changed. His fingers brushed the tied cloth, then lowered again.
“Elena,” he said once more.
Her chest gave that strange painful flutter again.
“Yes,” she whispered. “That’s me.”
For a while neither of them moved. The forest was quiet around them, evening light filtering gold through the trees. Blood dried. Pain dulled. Breath slowed. And Elena, against every instinct she’d ever trusted, found herself hoping this impossible thing between them might last one more day.