Slip the Skin

by Shanley, Tera

  “Here,” he said at last. Pulling at his fitted thermal shirt, he undressed and stood, vulnerable, masculine, perfect in front of her. “Let me,” he said when she unzipped her jacket.

  His touch was fire as his hands brushed her chilled skin. Taking his time, he removed her clothes piece by piece until she stood as exposed as he. With his liquid mercury eyes he raked her body, raising wave after wave of gooseflesh. His gaze was so consuming she could almost feel it on the breeze.

  He brushed her cheek with his fingertips. “I can see her. Close your eyes and let her out. Let your wolf have your mind and she’ll do the rest.”

  The wolf who had saved her— She owed the animal her life and would start paying that debt by surrendering her control to the Lycan in her. Sighing and clamping shaking hands in front of herself, Linden leaned her head back, giving the moon her neck, and closed her eyes. Light filled her, growing brighter and brighter until it consumed her and she’d die of it. And in the last second of panic at the pain, she slipped into the skin of a gray furred animal. Graham, a dark and lanky wolf, paced the edge of the tree line, a slow whine coming from his lips. He needn’t be worried, though. She’d recognize him in any form.

  His approach was slow and measured, and when finally he reached her, she rubbed her head against his side until the warmth and confidence radiating from him filled her. A howl pierced the night air, as lonely as the song of a whippoorwill, and she turned. Graham watched her and when an answering howl ripped from her, he threw his head back and joined her. The woods were filled with the song of her new pack, a sound both chilling and comforting at the same time.

  Graham loped off toward the sounds then waited at the edge of the trees and watched her with that sterling gaze of his. Of course she’d go after him. Wherever his life went, hers would follow. Their fates were intertwined like the gnarled roots of a cypress tree. Her happiness depended directly on his existence, and so long as she lived, she wouldn’t hold back from him. He’d given her a second chance and deserved all of her.

  She trotted off behind him, and side by side they made their way through the forest to her new pack—through the woods that would lead her to a new life.

  SLIP THE SKIN

  FATE

  (A LYCAN NOVELLA, BOOK 2)

  By TERA SHANLEY

  Chapter One

  Reaching for her pillow, Linden Ashby’s fingertips found something dry. Cold. She was uncomfortably stiff but even if her eyes determined not to open in the still before dawn, her fingers couldn’t stop worrying over the texture beneath her hand.

  Crunching sounded, light and crisp against sensitive eardrums. The heady scent of earth and snow filled her nostrils. This place that prickled cold needles against her bare flesh was not her bed.

  With a gasp, she pushed up. She sat completely naked in the early light of morning, surrounded by woods that had gone eerily silent.

  “Graham?” she called, voice trembling as her teeth started to chatter.

  She dropped the dry leaves she’d clutched in her hand, and a red smear drew her attention. It ran a river from shoulder to wrist, but when she inspected it further, could find no reason she’d be covered in blood.

  “Graham?” she called louder. Panic quickened her breath.

  Two weeks ago, she’d been dying from the mass that pressed relentlessly against her brain. And now she was a newly turned werewolf, alone in the snowy woods. Neither one of these scenarios was okay.

  Think, Linden. Squinting, she made out one set of wolf tracks. Her own. She closed her eyes and listened. Snow fell lightly but it made a distinct sound as it brushed the bare tree limbs around her. A bird called in the distance and the breeze lifted creaking branches. Nothing more.

  With her arms drawn around herself to ward away the intolerable chill, she dredged footstep after numbing footstep across the trail she’d left in her other form. Maybe if she followed it, she’d find Graham.

  Something was wrong.

  He would have followed her to this place. He was faster. Stronger. And she’d seen the way he was with her the night before. His wolf couldn’t stay away from hers if he tried. They were bonded now.

  Unease fueled her and faster she ran until the trail burst into a flurry of wolf prints. Red painted the snow like a canvas. The intangible thread that pulled tight against her chest when Graham wasn’t around lay limp and broken inside of her and a sob tore at her throat. The smell of iron and death floated the breeze.

  A barrage of memories flooded her, but they were impossible to understand clearly. They didn’t translate well from wolf mind to human. She only got flashes; pictures. Moments in time where she was immersed in happiness or fear.

  Running through the woods. Following Graham. He turned back with a wolf smile, waiting. Waiting for her. The others in the pack, howling, calling her to them, beckoning her to join them. Joy. Belonging. An unsuccessful hunt, and a drink at the river with her new family. A blasting sound. Terror.

  “No,” Linden whispered, sagging to her knees.

  Spurts of fire as pain ripped through the pack. Scattering. Running to live. Gathering here before it started all over again. The crack of metal on metal had been deafening and drove them to panic.

  The blood on her arm wasn’t hers. It was her pack’s. It was his.

  Gripping her stomach like it would hold her heart inside, she sobbed and searched the woods. She’d bonded with them, with Graham, just in time to lose everything.

  Bile rose in her throat and she clenched her teeth against the urge to retch. She had to find out what happened to them. She’d be useless to everyone if she lost control and froze to death in the shadows of these winter stripped trees.

  No wonder there was no sound. What animal would touch this place now? Even she, in her human skin, could sense the pain that enveloped it. No longer would it be a place of reverence, but this snow dusted meadow would be haunted from now until the end of time.

  Determined, she stood. Her skin itched as the cold bit into the layers of her skin. It seeped into her bones and made it hard to move. Clamping her chattering teeth tightly closed until her jaw hurt, she followed a pair of prints that smelled like Graham’s.

  Time left her, but she’d been trained for this. She’d endured years of treatment for just a little more time with family; with friends. She’d endured much in her fight against illness. Her struggle against fate had taught her that her limits were much wider than she could’ve ever imagined. She wouldn’t fall apart until she knew for sure.

  Her body was numb by the time she’d backtracked her way to the pile of clothes that littered the space between two matching Alder trees. They leaned toward each other as if they were sheltering her. Like they mourned with her. Trying her best to ignore the implications of Graham’s clothes lying scattered and forgotten near hers, she dressed as best she could with hands that had frozen into useless clubs. With Graham’s belongings gathered into her arms, she trudged the last distance to the back entrance of Ned’s bar.

  Ned was the pack alpha and leader of the biker gang, The Rebellion. He was also the owner of the bar she was currently wrestling the back door to. Locked.

  With a growl of frustration, she slipped and slid to the front door and banged on it. A handwritten sign was taped to the front window.

  Closed until further notice. So fuck off, it read.

  Classy.

  Banging on the door once more to no response, she searched for a spare key. Her purse and cell phone were inside. Also the keys to Graham’s bike, and if she couldn’t convince a taxi to come all the way out here, she was giving that thing a test drive. She’d ridden on the back enough over the past two weeks that she could probably figure it out.

  Her hand landed on a spare key under a rock in the landscaping.

  Besides, if she crashed the bike, she was still a werewolf. She swallowed hard at the memory of the blood soaked snow. It took a lot to kill a werewolf.

  And she was going to hold onto that belief
until something proved her wrong.

  Chapter Two

  Pain and fury, waves of it washed over Graham. Everything was dark, but over the edge of the black hole he swam in, murmured voices, human and grating, pulled him into another wash of madness. He’d kill every last one of them. They’d done this to him. He would tear and rip and bleed them until there was nothing left but bone.

  They’d done something unforgivable, unredeemable, and irreparable.

  The flash of silver glinted just before the cold blade cut into his flesh and he roared a promise of revenge.

  Something vital had been stolen from him. He couldn’t remember what, but the hole inside of him grew wider and deeper by the minute with its absence.

  He swore it. Humans would pay for their treachery in blood.

  ****

  Graham wasn’t home. Realistically, Linden hadn’t expected him to be, but if she had a plan, and followed the steps of said plan, she could avoid dipping cheerily into insanity. Standing back with a glare for his small one story, she ran her fingers over the perfectly trimmed top of the hedges that adorned his landscaping. Okay, she’d try his cell phone again.

  No answer just like the thirty-four previous times she’d dialed him.

  A waiting taxi idled in the driveway, and through the window, the driver read a folded newspaper like he had all the time in the world. The meter was running, after all.

  “Where are you,” she whispered, frowning at the porch. She hadn’t any of the other pack members’ numbers. She’d only been initiated the night before and hadn’t spent enough time with them to friend request a pack of burly biking werewolves on any social media sites yet.

  What if Graham lay in the woods somewhere and she’d missed him? No, she couldn’t think like that. Someone had taken the time to write the closed sign on Ned’s. Someone knew something, she just had to figure out how to track them down. Wait. She didn’t have the pack members’ numbers, but Ned had given her the card to a healer the day he whipped Graham for turning her. He’d said to call him if he was too injured and had trouble healing.

  Oh please, God, let her still have that number. Dropping her purse, she dug frantically around the plethora of her bejeweled belongings. With her heart in her throat, she upended it and dumped the contents onto the snowy walkway.

  “Ahh!” she cried, lifting the crumpled card in triumph.

  With shaking fingers, she dialed the number and hit the call button.

  “What?” a man growled on the other end of the line.

  Opening her mouth to explain who she was, she hesitated. “Ned?”

  A beat of silence. “Who is this?”

  “Linden. Ashby? You drank my blood last night and we hunted squirrels together. With our teeth? I feel like this should be ringing some major bells for you.”

  “Linden? You’re alive?”

  “Why is everyone always surprised that I’m still alive? It’s not like I—”

  “Stop,” he drawled out. The order in his command was impossible to ignore. If she tried for an hour to bite out a snarky retort, she wouldn’t be able to override her instinct to obey the alpha. Not after initiation the night before.

  “We couldn’t find you in the chaos last night. And something happened to Graham. Well, we had no reason to believe you were still with us.”

  “He’s alive?” So the rest of what he said made no sense but she didn’t give one flying fruit weevil right now. Graham still existed on this earth and the weight she’d been carrying on her shoulders lifted like magic.

  “No.”

  Wait, what? “But you just said something happened to him like he was okay.” Tears stung her eyes and she blinked hard against them.

  A hundred phantoms tainted Ned’s sigh. “It’s too hard to explain over the phone, Linden. Can you get a ride to my house? You need to see for yourself to understand.”

  She nodded, realized he couldn’t see the gesture, and hoarsely whispered, “Yes.”

  “Is this your cell phone you’re calling from?”

  Again she answered, “Yes.”

  “I’ll text you the address. No need to knock when you get here. Just come in and we’ll hear you.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Ned.”

  “Linden,” he rushed just as she was about to end the call. “I’m really glad you’re okay.”

  She smiled sadly. If Graham wasn’t okay, than neither was she. She might as well have died with him in the woods last night if the painful shredding of her soul was anything to go by. Ned didn’t have to share that burden though. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “Are you okay, Miss?” the cabby, an older gentleman with a mustache as thick as his accent, asked.

  With the door closed, she rolled down the window to feel the breeze against her face, then recited Ned’s address. She wasn’t up for discussing any event that had happened over the past twenty-four hours. They were her joyful moments, just for herself. The way Graham’s arms felt around her as they watched the moon together outside of Ned’s. The way his lips felt against her neck when he spoke of his relief that she’d survived her disease; that she’d survived his bite. The joy she felt at releasing the wolf inside of her. The belonging she felt when surrounded by her pack. The love that filled her when she was adored by her mate — fanged, gray furred, wild, perfect. Another ripple of debilitating loss swept her in a tidal wave of unescapable despair.

  The other moments had been hers too, not meant to be shared with anyone except the ones who were there. Anger, pain, loss. Emotions the cabby, no matter his life experiences, could begin to understand.

  He was kind for asking, but her admission to how broken she was would only drag her further into endless sorrow.

  Leaning her head against the side of the window, she didn’t even care about the frigid cold wind stinging her cheeks.

  She’d rather feel pain than nothing at all.

  Chapter Three

  Ned had definitely said not to knock, but Mom had instilled manners in Linden. Lifting a pink gloved hand, she drew back to wrap her knuckles on the thick wooden door to the two story home.

  The door flew open, and Barret, the beefy, bearded, and very bald biker who’d helped to kidnap her two weeks before stood there with a somber frown. Surprisingly, he pulled her into a rough hug and pounded her on the back until she was pretty sure she choked part of her lung onto Ned’s plush carpet.

  His murmured encouragement rumbled against the side of her face. “Everything is going to be okay.” The words added another layer of numbness. “They’re downstairs. The boys are waiting for you.”

  The leather of his Biker vest pealed from her face as she sidled around him. Whatever was about to happen would change her life forever. She’d had these moments before. The first had happened with Dr. Latham told her the dizziness she’d been feeling was more than just exhaustion. That the numbness in her left arm was something more serious than a stressful course load at school. That moment had changed everything. Her life had been peppered with them after that. Every appointment, test, lab, and treatment was life-changing.

  She stumbled down the basement stairs in a haze, preparing herself for what would be. Whatever they would say to her, it was going to hurt. Maybe it would hurt more than anything ever had before.

  Stopping at the bottom of the stairs, her gaze fell on a cage — huge with bars that were clawed and damaged. Deep rust red dotted the bottom half and the smell of iron clung to the walls. Ned stood with an arm crossed over his chest, and the other hand cradling his chin like he was in deep thought. Tristan, Graham’s friend and coworker, sat a chair with his head in his hands. His long hair covered any emotion on his face. Dan, Wayne, and Cesar stood talking quietly against the wall.

  In the cage, a gray wolf paced, snarling, bleeding and beautiful. Such elation filled her, she’d die of it and happily. Bolting, she yelled, “Graham!”

  And just as she reached the cage, he lunged and clamped onto her hand in the exact same moment Ne
d curled an arm around her waist and yanked her backward. Flesh tore and a stream of red left her body as her mangled hand pulled from of his snapping teeth. Such a feeling of hurt took her as she clutched the injury to herself. The pain in her hand was nothing against the smart of his betrayal.

  Tristan pulled her further back as Ned leveled the wolf with a look of burning fury. “Stop it!” he yelled over the snarling noise that ripped from the animal’s throat.

  The sound halted, but Graham lowered his feral gaze to her. Such a look of hatred, she’d never seen in her life.

  “Why?” she asked in a shaking voice.

  Tristan pulled her hand free of the folds of her jacket and whistled at the open wound. He was leanly built and tall like Graham, so she had to look up to see his face. Green eyes and a grim set to his mouth pitied her.

  “Why did Graham bite me?” she tried again.

  It was Ned who answered. “Because that isn’t Graham. Not anymore.”

  “I don’t understand. I know that’s Graham. I’d recognize him anywhere.” Even to herself her voice sounded small and frightened. “He’s mine. I know it’s him.”

  “Do you feel your bond?” Ned asked, a note of hope in his voice.

  Her heart sank to her toes. The answer to that question was important. Closing her eyes against his imminent disappointment, she said, “No.”

  Tristan cursed and Ned waved the other three werewolves out of the room. When they’d gone, Ned motioned for her to sit in the chair and Tristan leaned against the wall beside her.

  “I’ve only seen this happen once in my lifetime, but it’s happened many times in our history. Graham was hurt badly last night. He should’ve died but his wolf survived. A testament to his strength but it might have been better if they’d both passed.” He inhaled loudly and great sadness, deep and burdensome, pooled in his dark eyes. “Graham won’t change back, Linden. He’s gone wolf, and he’s not coming back.”