by Mandy Rosko
He looked like a movie star. He had blond hair that was combed back and messy at the same time. Miranda even thought his blond beard looked pretty good, and she didn't like beards. His arms were around her. They were thick with hard muscle, and he was… holding her. He'd caught her right out of the air, which meant he was pretty strong if he didn't fall over. Miranda didn't think she was a heavy girl, but her weight coming down like that should've had more of an impact.
Which brought her back to his strength, and that was a total turn-on.
Down, girl. That was a bad thing, remember? If he was strong, it meant she'd have a harder time getting out of here.
And just because his smile, which quirked up at the corner of his mouth, happened to make that quivering feeling in her stomach start up again, it didn't mean anything.
Goddamn him for being so good-looking.
"Not that I didn't enjoy the view, but there are other ways of getting out of the house."
Miranda pulled what remained of her ripped nightgown around herself, a heat rising up her neck and into her face and ears. "I… uh…"
His voice. He sounded almost exactly like that horrible, enormous monster she'd seen in her dream. The one that held out its clawed hand to her and told her everything was going to be all right.
The blond from all her dreams and fantasies glanced down at the grass. A single, perfect brow lifted. "What were you going to do with that?"
The razor. Miranda shook the haze of lust and want from her head, recalling where she was and why she needed to get the hell out of here. "I need to use the phone, please."
"Do you? And who would you like to call?"
Miranda noted with a sense of giddiness, and dread, how this man, who looked like he could be on the cover of a men's magazine, was not putting her down. He was walking with her. She looked around quickly and noticed they were heading for a pair of double doors, about to go back inside.
"My friend Lois. I need to tell here where I am."
"I'm sure we can take care of that for you if you like," he said with that same easy smile on his face. He was used to getting what he wanted, and his voice continued to make Miranda shiver. It was so good and so bad at the same time. She couldn't handle how warm her body was starting to feel and how good his hands were on her, so she wiggled to get down, but he wouldn't release her.
"I can walk."
"I know."
"Are you Garret?"
He stopped for a brief second, then looked down at her and smiled. "I am. Who told you that?"
Holy shit. This was the guy who wanted to take her as a mate. Who the fuck said the word mate? That was so… animalistic and primal, and no one normal spoke like that.
"I want down. Let me down, right now."
Garret's brows pulled together. For a split second, she thought he would give her what she wanted.
He shook his head. "No, honey, I think you're going to run if I put you down."
Miranda's heart pounded, thudding in her ears and making her breath quicken. The urge to flee, to defend herself and lash out, was so strong there was no fighting it.
Miranda screamed and punched Garret in the face with the heel of her palm.
For whatever miraculous reason, he didn't drop her. His head barely turned to the side, but when he looked back at her, there was something that flashed in his eyes that made the need to flee less of a need, and more of a have to run now or she would lose her frickin' mind!
Miranda's fists flew. She punched and kicked blindly, and though her fingers and palms burst with pain with each strike, he didn't let her go. His grip seemed to tighten on her.
Her panicked punches forced Garret to look away from her, to gaze off in the other direction, leaving her only able to hit his cheek and scream in his ear, but he still walked with a calm patience toward the door to the house.
If Miranda was put back in there, she was never going to see the light of day again! They were going to lock her up and turn her into their baby maker!
She used her teeth next. The idea just came to her and she rolled with it, biting down hard on Garret's throat.
That seemed to do it. Even though she'd probably been hurting herself more than him with her punches, for some reason, that bite was enough to make him gasp. He didn't drop her right away, not until Miranda tasted blood in her mouth and… oh.
Garret dropped to his knees. The sudden jolt was enough to make her let go, and she fell out of his arms, rolling a little on the walkway.
She still tasted the blood, and now her body, every inch of space inside her veins, burned the way her tongue did that time she ate a ghost pepper.
Only, instead of sweating and feeling like she would die from the pain, she was sweating, her breasts heaving and nipples clenching, and the urge to… to…
She ran, but her legs shook and she fell on her face after three steps, getting a mouthful of grass. Miranda yanked herself back to her feet and struggled to stay on legs as weak as yarn as she hobbled into the woods, away from that taste that made her want to howl.
Chapter 4
She'd bitten him. His little she-wolf had bitten him.
And it was so damned good. The shock of the bite punched Garret in the gut in a way he'd never experienced before, and he fell. He fell to his knees and dropped his woman.
He pulled his hand away from his neck, and stared down at the bright red on his palm with satisfaction and pride, but then he turned in the direction she'd fled. A howl rose up above the trees. Several birds twittered, irritated, as they exploded into the sky, away from their nests.
Garret let the wolf out. He shed out of his clothes as the fur pricked through his pores and his bones snapped, lengthened, thickened, and changed.
If she wanted to be chased, he would chase her. His blood sang for the hunt, and his claws kicked up chunks of gravel and grass as he launched himself across the vast lawn and chased down his mate.
* * *
What was happening? What was happening to her?
Miranda's body felt funny. Everything tingled, and in the beginning, it hurt. Badly. Everything had ached, and when she'd tripped and fallen and heard the snap, she'd terrified herself with the idea she'd broken something.
That couldn't be the case because she was walking around now and she felt fine.
Except for how gangly her legs felt. How her feet… did not look like her feet at all, and she suddenly had more hair on her body than a pack of Venus razors would be able to handle in one sitting.
In the distance, she heard running water, and the smell of moss, wet rock, and algae told her where she needed to go.
It was close.
A stream. Miranda ran to it. She suddenly needed to see what she looked like more than she needed to get away from the blond-haired walking wet dream. Looking down at her mutated hands and legs and not seeing them in color was one thing, but she needed to see her face.
Miranda stumbled across the rocks, panting and struggling to breathe even though her body didn't feel tired. She splashed in the cold, shallow water, then had to wait, forcing herself to hold still so the ripples would stop.
It was like watching a monster appear in slow motion, a fog lifting to reveal what the shadowy figure she feared actually looked like.
A keening wail left her mouth at the sight. She touched her face. Her hand travelled the length of her long, furry nose. It stuck out with a wet, black end to it. A snout. That was what it was. She looked like a cross between the cartoon vixen in that old Disney Robin Hood movie, and an actual dog. It was just a blur when she tried crossing her eyes to look at it. Or, maybe her eyes were just blurry because she was crying.
She looked like a freak, like the wolf that had eaten grandma. It didn't help that she was still in the nightdress.
Miranda slammed her clawed fists onto the water, destroying the reflection. She waited for her face to change, to go back to being her face, but each time she left the water alone, the reflection went back to being that of the fu
rry-faced animal.
Her long ears flickered and twitched as someone entered the water behind her. She didn't look to see who it was. She didn't care.
"I think one of Dennis's foxes scratched you. He's a mutt, so he has many things inside him."
"What? What are you…? You did this to me," she accused.
Miranda's voice sounded different, and not because she was crying. There was that fact, but she couldn't get over what she looked like. She wanted to hide her face in her hands, but she didn't want to touch her face with those hands!
"I'm not a fox. I'm a wolf."
Nothing he was saying made sense, and she couldn't stop herself from crying. She couldn't stop the panic, or the need to go back to the way things had been before she closed the diner last night.
"What happened to me? What'd you do?"
The water sloshed gently again. Miranda gasped as Garret came to stand beside her in the water and knelt down.
He didn't need to kneel for her to see how big he was. He was still way taller, way bigger, and way more muscular than even the biggest, most buff guy she'd ever met, but he was back in that monster shape she'd dreamed about. He was furry, had a bushy tail and even the head of a wolf. He looked like an animal with the body of a human. At least, that was what she imagined he would look like under the fur. Her breath caught in her throat.
The corner of his mouth turned up in a crooked grin. It looked strange on his canine mouth. "Do I look ugly to you?"
Miranda's mind went blank for several long seconds. Her first instinct was to say yes, he did look ugly. She wanted to hurt him any way she could, and insulting his looks seemed like a good way to go.
But it wasn't true. She didn't think he was ugly. Miranda liked wolves, and as weird as it was seeing words come out of his mouth when he looked like this, he was still a sight to behold.
Miranda slowly shook her head, not daring to voice any of that, however.
"Am I fearsome, then?" His voice was back to being that harsh-sounding growl she'd heard the first time he'd said a single word to her, and it made her shiver. She couldn't tell if she liked it or if it scared her.
She nodded anyway.
He inched closer, and Miranda caught the swish of his tail in the water. "Do I frighten you?"
She swallowed, and tried not to look down between his legs. She didn't think he was wearing any clothes, and she was definitely not going to check to see if his fur covered his penis, no matter how curious she was.
She nodded.
"Does your new face frighten you?"
"Yes!" She didn't have to think about the answer to that one.
He didn't flinch. That smirk that shouldn't have been sexy when he looked like this, turned sexier. His voice rumbled lower, and something glinted in his eyes—eyes that were still that amazing shade of blue she'd never seen on anyone else.
"I think you're beautiful."
Miranda swallowed hard. She stared down at her hands, at the small but sharp claws that had replaced her fingernails, and she shook her head. "There's nothing pretty about these."
"Are you so sure?"
Garret's much larger, much more frightening hand reached out and took hers. She tensed at the touch.
"If you won't believe me, how about I show you?"
"Show me?" She swallowed hard, imagining what he had in mind, and this time, she couldn't stop herself from letting her eyes glance down between his hairy legs.
She couldn't see any hint of a penis through the fur. Thank God. That still didn't mean she was out of the woods yet.
Literally, in this case. Garret rose to his feet, pulling Miranda with him. Only when she stood was she reminded of how cold the water had been. Despite the fur, she shivered.
Then Garret started to pull off the ripped nightgown she wore.
"Hey!"
She slapped at his hands, and in retaliation, he ripped the material from her body. The sound of cotton shredding was sharp in the air. She lifted her arms to hide her nudity.
He threw his muzzle back and laughed. "You are hardly naked like that. You might as well drop your hands."
"You ripped my clothes off!"
Every instinct inside her was freaking out. This wasn't normal. This wasn't even close to being normal, but Garret wasn't advancing on her, and though he still looked at her with that half-lidded gaze, Miranda didn't think she was about to get sexually assaulted anytime soon.
It was especially strange because the idea of having sex with Garret, a man she didn't know, who wasn't even really a man, didn't sound so scary at all.
Her body tightened and a warmth pooled in her belly, dipping between her legs. If she didn't keep it together, she was going to have a major problem here. Thoughts of Garret, naked and on top of her, shouldn't be making her this warm, this excited.
But they were. If his stupid face and body weren't so good-looking, this wouldn't be happening to her. She was just having a normal reaction to him being so close to her; that was all this was, and she really needed to get over it. Right now.
Yeah, it was not so easy to do as she would have liked.
His blue eyes clouded, and she swore she saw his eyes dilate to the size of olives. "You should get your head out of the gutter, unless you want me to fuck you in the water."
"I never said you were going to fuck me. I don't like being fucked, anyway."
Though that word did make her skin feel tight, especially around her nipples.
Stop it! Stop thinking about that!
Garret shrugged. "Make love, mating, it's all the same."
She let out a shocked laugh. "No, it's not."
"It will be when you're with me. They'll all be good and pleasurable for you, and you'll want more."
The sound of his voice made her want more. Even his voice was sexy. Sexy and soothing and calling to her to submit.
Miranda shook her head, still trying to resist that desperate need buzzing inside her. "No, I won't."
She couldn't even make it sound sincere to her own ears.
Garret walked by her, heading out of the water. "Now you're being stubborn."
She was. "Am not!"
He turned his head, glancing at her over his broad, wide shoulder, that same cocky, sexy smirk on his face. "I can smell your lust. It's strong."
If Miranda hadn't been covered in fur, she might have blushed. Well, everything sure as hell felt hotter, despite how she was standing in the cold water of one of the streams leading into the Niagara River. Maybe under all this glossy amber-colored fur, she was blushing.
Then she realized where Garret was going. He was walking away. A sense of panic and urgency took flight in her chest as she rushed after him. "Hey! Wait, where are you going?"
He continued to walk, and it was only when Miranda had caught up to him and was right behind him that she realized he’d had to know she would follow after him like a lost puppy.
He was probably smirking about it.
"I want to show you the beautiful things you would have missed had you not been changed."
"Things I would have missed?" She was having a surprisingly easy time keeping up with him. She hadn't expected that. It wasn't like she was in the best of shape, but Garret was moving at a light jog. With how long his legs were, that should have been a fast run for Miranda, but she felt like she could handle it. This was almost easy.
"I will still have to kill Dennis for what he tried to pull. That stupid bastard's been looking for you ever since he knew I was."
"What? Why were you looking for me? I never met you before in my life!"
His voice was quiet, no longer holding that trace of that cocky smirkiness. "You did once."
She stared at the back of Garret's head, at those long, pointed, gray-and-black ears. If she'd ever seen him before that horrible night in the woods, she was pretty sure she would have had some memory of it. No. Just, no.
"Anyway, I wouldn't have changed you. It's too dangerous. Mates of wolves are supposed to have an
easier time of it, but they can still succumb to the illness and fever that follows. You would have remained a human, but now that it's done, you'll need to learn some control. You'll also need to see the things your pack and I see."
"My pack?" she asked, her voice small.
Garret came to a stop, his movements graceful even then. His chest rose and fell a little faster than when he'd started, but he was hardly winded. "Of course. This is your pack and your territory now."
Garret fell onto all fours and shook himself out. His front legs were longer, but like this, he looked a little more like an actual wolf.
Maybe if someone saw him like this from really far away, they might mistake him for the real thing.
"Now, get down on your paws like me."
Miranda looked at the ground with the dirt, dead leaves, and pine needles. "I don't think I want to put my hands in that."
Her hands weren't what they used to be, but that didn't mean she was going to just stick them in the mud.
Garret's eyes changed. They turned from those bright blue orbs to a golden, glowing amber color. "That was a command, sweetheart."
Her first thought was to tell him to fuck off with his commands, and then walk out of there, to go anywhere but where he was.
It was like her brain and body were disconnected, however, and the second his command was out, even though Miranda's thoughts and anger were faster, her body still obeyed.
When she was on all four paws, she blinked and looked down at herself, at her hands that were now muddy and dirty, and she glared at Garret. "What the hell? How did you do that?"
He sat, seeming to not care that he was putting his butt in the dirt, and smiled at her. "I am your alpha. Of course you will do as I say."
"What?"
She wanted to shriek at him. She wanted to leap at him and claw his eyes out. Miranda remained perfectly still, however. It was as if... as if she really couldn't attack him.
He was describing this like the wolves in Twilight. Or like a man from every paranormal romance she'd ever read in her life. It wasn't supposed to be real.
