Anastasia came the next morning to the clinic only to find the doctor in his office, with his face long, with worry lines across his forehead.

"So, how did Cobra do on his first day?" Anastasia asked, trying to hide the tremble in her voice.

The doctor sighed heavily, seeming tired down to his bones. "Alpha, I apologize but it was terrible. I have never dealt with someone holding that much anger inside them."

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Anastasia sighed too. "What happened?"

The doctor explained slowly. "It was supposed to be just normal first-day troubles as he got used to the new place. He hated answering simple questions about himself. Hated being in my office for check-ups. Then nurses tried giving him medication, and he started shouting - demanding to see you, and demanding to see his ’mate’. He attacked everyone and tried escaping while yelling for you to come get him. The guards had to drug and drag him back to his room."

Anastasia felt her stomach drop.

This was definitely not going according to her hopeful plan at all.

She balled her fists, frustration and worry warring inside her.

"Fuck," she muttered under her breath. "This... this is bad."

_________

The corridor leading to Cobra’s chamber seemed to stretch into an endless tunnel as Anastasia approached.

Despite the clinker’s high ceilings and richly appointed decor, a claustrophobic sensation weighed upon her, the air itself growing heavier with each step.

The pair of hulking orderlies standing guard snapped to attention as she neared, their grips tightening almost gradually on the slender batons clutched at their sides.

With a mute dip of her chin, Anastasia issued them a silent command, one they obeyed by unlocking and opening the door for her.

She could sense Cobra’s presence even before laying eyes upon him.

Steeling her will, Anastasia stepped into the room, the door groaning shut behind her with ponderous finality.

Almost at once, Cobra seemed to register her arrival, his head whipping towards the sound of her steps.

"Anastasia..." His low rumble rumbled through the compact space, echoing in her very bones.

In the span of a heartbeat, he rushed upright and closed the distance between them in a few fast steps.

His muscular arms encircled her body, engulfing her utterly as he crushed her against his hard torso.

Burying his face into her neck, breathing in her pheromones.

Cobra rumbled his joy in a rasping purr that sent shivers down her spine. "You came, my love...you came for me..."

Ruthlessly she suppressed the pang of tenderness that was provoked by the naked relief and longing to drench his words, Anastasia drew upon her deepest resources of stoicism.

With one breath, she slipped free of his clinging embrace, extracting herself from the circle of his arms with a subtle flex of alpha dominance thrumming through her aura.

Cobra’s expression twisted into one of naked confusion and hurt as the connection severed, his eyes searching hers for answers that his instincts alone couldn’t solve.

He opened his mouth as if to protest - only for the words to get stuck in his throat

"You promised me, Cobra," she intoned in a voice made harsh by its own lack of inflection. "You swore that you would make an effort to heal. To at least try."

"I...I’m sorry," he mumbled in a rumbling murmur. "They pissed me off with all their questions and needles and...and saying I couldn’t see you. I lost control..."

"You lost control," she echoed tonelessly.

Swinging slightly, Anastasia allowed her eyes to rake over the chaotic disarray littering Cobra’s chamber - the smashed furniture, the dents and gouges scoring the walls, the debris field standing as mute testament to the violence so freshly unleashed.

When her gaze moved back to finding him, it had only grown more glacial.

"I told you very clearly, Cobra - the faster you find control, the sooner we can be together freely and openly."

She allowed a breath of weighted silence to hang between them before adding with quiet finality,

"Every outburst like this...every failed attempt to dominate your rage...it only extends our separation that much longer."

A grieving eagerness bubbled up from somewhere deep in Cobra’s broad chest, only to be strangled before it could fully appear.

"B-but they said I couldn’t see you at all!" he protested hoarsely. "No visits, no nothing - not for the entire day!"

"And did you try to understand why?" Anastasia arched a slender brow in a mute challenge. "Or did you simply fly into an apoplectic rage the moment their words displeased you?"

Cobra’s shoulders slumped in a clear admission of guilt, his eyes moving away from the intensity of her disapproving stare.

"I can’t be here every few hours," she pressed on in that same soft, implacable tone. "I’d hoped to visit once a day, but even that may be...unwise if you cannot even maintain that bit of restraint and control."

Sucking in a ragged breath, Cobra lifted his proud head and finally met her gaze squarely, his own burning with renewed resolve and determination.

"I can control it," he vowed, the words emerging in a low rasp tinged with desperation.

"I swear on my life, Ana...I’ll do whatever they ask without fail from here on out. Just please..."

He faltered, throat working convulsively for a perilous handful of seconds. "Please don’t abandon me to this place alone. I need you more than you can possibly imagine..."

The naked vulnerability, the truthful need bleeding into his tone proved to be Anastasia’s undoing.

As swiftly as her frigid mask had manifested, it fragmented and fell away to reveal the understanding warmth shining through underneath.

Crossing the short distance between them, she cupped his face in her cold palms, guiding his forehead to rest against hers in supremely intimate communion.

"I’m not abandoning you, Cobra," she assured him in a throaty murmur. "I could never bring myself to do such a thing. But you must understand - everyone here wants to help you...if only you’ll allow them to."

Cobra rumbled an affirmative, his arms once more encircling her frame to envelop her in his embrace.

Nuzzling deeper into the nape of her neck, he allowed his mate’s familiar, comforting scent to suffuse his senses and anchor his agitating thoughts.

"I understand," he breathed against the throbbing pulse in her throat. "And I promise, my love - I’ll do better from here on out. No more...outbursts or uncontrolled rampages. I’ll cooperate fully with them and focus solely on finding that control, that...clarity and balance again."

His oath murmured in such hushed deference and naked subservience, coaxed a tremulous smile to her lips.

"That’s all I want for you, Cobra," she affirmed softly. "I believe in you."

Nestling herself deeper into his neck, Anastasia pressed a kiss to his throat.

"Just think of me," she breathed against his fevered skin. "Remember my presence, my faith in you...let it be the goad and anchor you need to stay the course."

Cobra’s answering rumble resonated through her slight frame with telling finality.

"For you?" His gruff whisper caressed her nape with graveled tenderness. "Anything, Anastasia...everything. Just please don’t ever leave my side..."

_______

The exhaustion weighed upon Anastasia’s frame as she headed to the packhouse.

Each step seemed to require a huge effort, her limbs heavier than normal.

Sinking into the plush cushions of her bed, she grabbed her phone in her palm.

With a deep inhalation, she tapped the screen and lifted it to her ear, listening to the trill of the ringtone echo and resonate in the smothering silence.

"Liam?" The name emerged as little more than a relieved exhalation as Anastasia closed her eyes against the swell of reassurance hearing his voice prompted.

His voice is not enough, she needs to see him.

They switch the call from a voice call to a video one.

She hitched when her gaze fell on his naked chest, his skin seemed dumped as well as his hair and his chest was bouncing up and down fastly.

"Are...are you working out?" she asked hesitantly, unable to move her gaze away from his sweaty face, his open mouth releasing fast pants.

An amused chuff sounded over the line, shunting aside her idle musings. "No, just running through some training routines - you know how it goes..."

Anastasia found herself mesmerized by the minute sounds, imagining with vivid clarity the flex and ripple of corded musculature beneath sweat-slicked skin as his throat contracted with each ponderous swallow.

Her gaze went hazy and unfocused, missing the curious look he undoubtedly angled her way.

"You’re not sleeping enough, are you?" The gentle censure carried through the ether to penetrate her meandering reverie.

Blinking rapidly, Anastasia found herself refocusing guiltily upon his concerned features peering back at her from the pixelated screen.

"I...sleep just fine," she does not

Liam simply arched a doubtful brow, a look she’d seen countless times before whenever he wordlessly called her a liar.

"Cobra’s...first day at the clinic hasn’t started off very promisingly," she confessed, fingers toying fitfully with a loose thread in her blouse.

Narrating the day’s events with stark, unembellished detail, Anastasia watched myriad emotions flit across Liam’s austere features as the tale unfolded.

Surprise - then shock and disturb - only to resolve into a skeptical, shuttered mask by the time her voice trailed off into the expectant silence.

When at last he found his words, a thread of consternation wove through the familiar timbre.

"Jeez, Anastasis...if he’s that much of a danger, maybe they should just put the blondie down before he really hurts somebody."

The casual callousness included in the glib remark caused Anastasia’s breath to catch with a wounded hitch.

But before she could marshal any comeback, Liam’s expression softened into sorry lines.

"Look, I’m kidding - mostly. Let’s just hope they can find a way to restrain that raging beast before it’s too late, huh?" His wolfish grin flashed with rakish charm, tempering the implied barbarity somewhat. "I’d hate for my blood to get drained like a fine wine."

Despite herself, Anastasia felt her own lips quirking in a smile.

As they carried on the call, Anastasia gradually started to get better.

At length, however, a more straight tone lent its weight to their conversational accord. "I miss you, Liam..."

The admission hung fraught between them, seeming to amplify every passing beat of silence thrumming over the open line.

For his part, Liam offered no verbal reply - merely a somber dip of his angular jaw and a considering look shadowing his eyes.

It was answer enough, and one that lanced through Anastasia’s chest with a familiar, keening ache.

He didn’t miss her.

And she can not blame.

Anastasia was well-versed in masking such sorrow, suffusing her tone with studied lightness as she posed her next question. "My birthday’s coming up in a couple of weeks, you know - will you be attending it maybe?"

She held her breath, somehow making herself meet his searching stare despite the scream of emotions battling within her chest.

A spark of...something...flickered across his handsome features before the shuttered mask resettled into place once more.

"You know how things are with me and your packhouse, Anastasia," he hesitated, pulling absently at the snug fabric of his tank top to unstick it from his perspiration-dampened skin. "What happened there still scares me. I don’t think I can do it. I am sorry."

He didn’t give voice to the painful memory, but then, he didn’t need to - not with her.

"What I mean," Liam pressed on with studied nonchalance, "I can’t make it this year - maybe next time around though, yeah?"

He rejected the offer with an easy grin, one that never reached the shuttered depths of his gaze.

Anastasia felt her hopes deflate like a pricked bladder.

But years of practice allowed her to mask the swell of hurt behind a peaceful facade.

"Of course," she murmured with every appearance of equanimity, offering a smile that mirrored his own. "Whenever you’re ready, Liam - I’ll be here waiting as long as you need..."