The Lost Alpha Prince (Book 15 of the Regal Eclipse Pack Series)

Chapter 3

Tate sat back in the seat in the doctor's office waiting for Santos to get back. He'd just gotten back from the lab they'd raided. The entire thing had been burned to the ground. And good riddance.

They'd been casing the place for the last several days after a few different members of their pack had recently disappeared. They'd tracked him back to his lab and began to do some spying, trying to figure out what was going on and how they could free their pack members.

It hadn't taken too long before they figured out that he was experimenting on them, and they'd quickly put together a game plan to not only get their people back but to also destroy anything and everything to do with that lab.

Tate had spent the last twenty-four hours making sure everything was burnt to the ground and nothing was viable. There were things there that no one needed to get their hands on. He felt like it was his responsibility to make sure it didn't happen. How in the world the man at the lab had found out about them was still a mystery to him.

Finding the strange man in the basement had been a bit of a surprise as everyone else he'd held captive had been from Tate's own pack. They'd been preparing to set the place on fire when one of his men had alerted him to the man in the basement. Tate had them check the place over to make sure they hadn't missed anything, though by that point, he already knew all of his own pack members were accounted for. He'd made sure of it.

Tate hadn't even been aware that the place had a basement. He'd headed down and walked into a room that smelled so much like blood, it had made his stomach turn. He'd almost turned around and walked back out. But seeing the man laying on the table had reached a place deep inside him, letting him know he could not leave him there. He seemed relatively unharmed though he was very weak.

What Tate didn't understand was why he was being held captive. The man was human, though he'd been chained up like a werewolf with silver cuffs holding him down to the table. He was in excellent shape too, which Tate found rather interesting, though not a bad thing. It was probably part of what kept him alive, though they weren't sure what had been done to him, if anything at all.

All he'd asked for was water, which Tate had been more than happy to give him. Beyond that, he hadn't said much except to tell Tate he didn't know his name. Which meant either one, he really didn't have any idea or two, he didn't want Tate to know. And at this point, Tate wasn't sure which.

Tate glanced around the small office. It was full of medical texts and files. He really didn't understand why Santos didn't keep digital medical records. His office would be much more organized. Not that Tate was in there often, thankfully. He'd lose his mind if he had to come into all of this chaos daily.

Dr. Santos finally walked back into his office and nodded to Tate before sitting down in his chair behind his overly cluttered desk. "Alpha."

"Doc. Give me an update." Tate crossed his arms and sat back in his seat. He hadn't even been home yet to see his mate. At least he didn't still smell like smoke. He'd found a river to bathe in not too far from the lab's former location.

He'd felt the need to come here first, to check on those he was responsible for before he indulged in his own well-being. He needed a shower, he needed his mate and he needed a few hours of sleep.

"All of our people are doing well and healing up. Fortunately no one had any seriously major issues. But they were given minimal food and water while they were there, and so we've been rehydrating them all among other things," Dr. Santos told him with a small sigh.

Tate nodded slowly at that. He was glad all of his people were going to make a full recovery. They were his first priority, and the fact that they'd been taken in the first place had made him feel like he'd failed as an Alpha. It annoyed him to no end that someone had dared show up on his lands and kidnapped members of his pack from their homes. Who did that? He sighed. "And the human?"

Santos frowned and rubbed his jaw, leaning back in his chair thoughtfully. For a moment, Tate wondered if he had died given the strange look that had passed over Santos' face.

"He's ... honestly Alpha, I'm not sure what to make of him. He's in way better shape than he was when we brought him in here, but he's still suffering from memory loss," Santos finally said.

"So he's awake?" Tate asked him.

"Yeah, he woke up today. I spoke to him just a bit ago. He doesn't have any memory of anything before he was taken captive. He thinks he was there for a few weeks, but he's not sure. He said there was no clock or windows where he was being held at."

"Yeah he was being kept in the basement of that place," Tate confirmed. "We almost missed him." He shuddered. To have suffered at the hands of that monster and then be burned alive? He couldn't even imagine such a horrible fate.

"But here's the thing, Alpha. There's something in his brain. I'm not one hundred percent sure of what it is. I'm no neurosurgeon, but I think that's what's blocking his memories." Santos stood and moved over to a wall mounted light and flipped it on. X-rays were already hanging from it and Tate stood and walked over to look at them. He could easily see whatever that thing was inside the human 's brain. Something small that contrasted quite a bit with the rest of his brain.

Tate stared at the scan for several moments, then turned and lifted an eyebrow at him. "And you think that crazy psycho put it in there?"

Santos shrugged. "He has no scars from it. I looked all over his head. It was almost like he was born with it in there, which is impossible, but makes me think it's been there for an extremely long time. But even then, I don't think a scar like that would fade so much that it's impossible to find. Not on a human. Brain surgery is no small thing. He should have a scar somewhere."

Tate nodded slowly, taking all of that in. This made absolutely no sense. Not that he was a doctor, but even he could see that Santos was baffled by it. "Can you remove it?"

Santos balked at that. "I wouldn't even want to try, Alpha. It would be too easy to do brain damage to him. He'd be better off seeing a human neurosurgeon. Not to mention, we don't know why it's there. He may have a medical reason for it to be in place. I could be wrong about it blocking his memories. He may just have post traumatic amnesia which will go away on its own."

That would be much easier than him having brain surgery. Especially since they weren't sure what that was in his brain. "Does he have anything else wrong with him?" Tate asked.

"He was just extremely dehydrated like the others, and his blood count was really low when he first came in, almost like he'd had a lot of it removed from him. I thought he might require a blood transfusion, but he's recovered quite well. If I didn't know any better, I'd think he was a werewolf himself." Santos motioned for them to walk back over and sit down.

Tate moved back into the chair he had previously occupied and frowned. "The room he was in reeked of blood, almost enough to make me gag, but he wasn't hooked up to anything when we came in except the table he was on. The cuffs were all silver too."

"Like for a werewolf," Santos mused.

"Yeah, like for a werewolf. But he has no burn marks from the cuffs." Tate sat back and ran a hand over his face. "Doc, is it possible for someone to have recessive werewolf genes?" It was about the only think he could think of at this point.

"No...well I suppose anything is possible, but I've never known anyone to have recessive werewolf genes. The gene itself is dominant. That's why when there's a human/werewolf mating, the offspring is always a wolf," Santos said, a thoughtful look on his face.

There would be one way to find out the answer to that question. "Can you run a blood test on him?"

"Of course, Alpha. I want to do more blood work anyway and make sure that his blood count has returned to normal. What are you planning to do with him?" Dr. Santos asked.