Lost Girl (Wolf Girl Series Book 2)
Page 15
He watched in interest, but not shock at what my wolf could do, which meant he’d seen it before. On that girl my mom spoke about? The one who survived the fire?
“Relax,” he said calmly. “If you think I’m murdering my people’s last chance to claim an alpha, you’re crazy.”
My wolf relaxed and Arrow dropped to one knee, putting out his hand to her. She tentatively crept forward, sniffing his palm, and he pet her between the ears like you would a dog. She started to wag her tail for full effect.
‘Traitor.’
‘He’s nice. Smells like us.’
I sighed. “You weren’t surprised by her. Have you seen a split shifter before? My mom says Run told her about one.’
He nodded. “We had one for a bit… we call them wolf angels.”
Wolf angel. That was… beautiful and so much better than demon.
He said they had one… for a bit.
All hope that I had that she was still alive, evaporated. “Did they… kill her?” I asked. Maybe the vampires got her too.
Sadness pulled at his features as he frowned. “She… killed herself. Being hunted your entire life can wear on you, ya know?”
I didn’t move. Didn’t breathe.
She killed herself. She would rather die than continue to be hunted. It was… a sobering reality I had never thought of. How many years could I live like this? Being kidnapped and then breaking free? Going to war over it…?
‘Don’t think about that,’ my wolf snapped.
“Is it true you saved Astra? You met her?” Arrow asked, breaking my depressing inner monologue.
“Yes, but she saved my friend first.”
“Then what the snakebite are you doing here?” he asked with a hiss, and I tried not to grin at his choice of cussword. “Come home. Each day we bleed magic. We need a leader to anchor our people to the land lest we become human. Don’t you care?”
What? Human?
“I… don’t know what you are talking about.”
Arrow sighed. “Paladin alpha raised with city wolves. Perfect.” He rubbed his temples.
“Paladin alpha raised with humans actually,” I corrected. “I grew up a banished wolf in Spokane, Washington.”
He groaned. “That’s worse. We will lose our wolves, our magic, our pride. Everything. Demi, we are over ten thousand strong. If we die, that’s on you!”
What? They would lose their wolves? Ten thousand… that was a ton… way more than Sawyer or anyone knew about, I was sure.
“I’m getting…” I held up my left hand and showed him the ring. “Married.”
He frowned. “You don’t understand. We are the last true werewolves. Magic runs through our veins. We can turn other people into werewolves by biting them. We claim our pack with pack bonds. We’re… real. Not like these fake and weak watered-down shifter wolves.” He gestured to the door where Sawyer slept.
“Be careful how you talk about those that I love,” I growled.
He sighed, shaking his head. “And what of us?” he growled. “Don’t you love us? We’re your real family. Astra is your pack. If what she says is true, you’ve already claimed her. That means you’ve already taken on your position as alpha. You must come home and prove yourself before our magic bleeds into the sky and we become worthless humans!”
Holy shit. Was he serious?
“That’s a lot to… digest,” I said, wondering what the hell I was going to do about it.
“Demi!” Sawyer’s voice called frantically from the bedroom, and Arrow started for the window of my office.
“Come home. Make Run proud. We need you.” Arrow, his eyes wide, looked at me for the first time with vulnerability.
“In my studio!” I called to Sawyer so he didn’t have a heart attack and go on a rampage.
“I’ll think about it…” I told Arrow. He leapt out onto the open window ledge and looked back at me.
“That man that saved you from your fall, that was your grandfather. Please tell me he didn’t die saving someone that was too selfish to help her people in a time of need.” Then he leapt out the window and took off running the second his feet hit the ground.
His words cut right into my chest, making my soul bleed. It was my grandfather, just as I expected.
“What are you doing?” Sawyer called from the doorway, and I froze. He would be able to smell the male in the room and I didn’t want to lie to him. Starting a marriage on a lie was sure to turn into a shitshow of a life.
I spun around, a tear slipping free from my cheek. Sawyer looked at my tear, the open window, and then my wolf, and gripped his heart. “Who was here? Tell me you aren’t cheating on me, Demi.” The broken vulnerability in his voice killed me.
“Ohmygod no!” I rushed forward and then plopped down at his feet and patted the ground next to me. Sawyer took a seat, watching me with a pale complexion and untrusting gaze. I didn’t blame him.
“Sawyer… my real dad… wasn’t just a Paladin,” I breathed.
His entire body clenched and he sniffed the air, no doubt smelling a male Paladin wolf.
“He was also the alpha.” I dropped the bomb and waited.
The poor guy had no idea it was coming. His entire face fell, mouth going slack. I swallowed hard. “I met a Paladin wolf named Arrow on my journey through Troll Village. He just came by to ask me to—”
“He was here in our house!” Sawyer stood, bolting from the room.
“Sawyer, wait!” I took off after him, yanking his arm.
“Demi, there could be more. They could be about to attack!” His hand was on the front doorknob to alert whatever guard stood outside this door.
“Sawyer, listen to me. I’m trying to tell you something important. The Paladins are my people, they aren’t going to attack us!”
He froze, body going limp at my words and he spun from the closed front door to face me with the most hurt expression I’d ever seen. “Your people? What does that make us?”
Fuck. This was not a position I wanted to be in. “You’re my person and Sage and your people are my people too.” I threaded my fingers through his hair and he closed his eyes. “I just have… a lot of people … and I don’t want to be forced to belong to one group. It doesn’t feel right.”
“What did he want?” he growled.
I sighed. “For me to go to the Paladin lands and… I dunno, be their alpha I guess. He said they needed me or their magic would die out.”
He barked out a laugh, but my glare stopped him.
“I’m sorry, Demi, go live in trees and tents and be alpha of the wild savages? No thank you.” He chuckled.
I frowned. “Have you ever even been to their land? Did Astra seem like a wild savage to you?”
He quieted. “Well, she didn’t seem normal, and no I’ve obviously never been to the traitors land who cursed my entire family.”
Shit, I’d forgotten about that. I winced.
“Well, maybe they’ve changed. Maybe they don’t curse anymore…” I offered, knowing I was fighting a losing battle. It was totally horrible that a Paladin witch wolf, or whatever, had cursed his line and he’d had to live with the consequences.
Sawyer threaded his fingers through mine. “My darling, if you want to be an alpha, then you can lead here by my side. You say the word and you can be however involved in leadership as you want. You want to be on my war team? Granted. You want to start making the budget for next year? Done. But I need you here. With me. With your parents. Sage. Our people.”
He was right. This was a stupid weird midnight intrusion. What was I going to do, run off into the woods and leave my fiancé, my parents, my best friend? No way.
Arrow was trippin’ if he thought that, and why come in the middle of the night with a knife on his belt after he admitted to being sent by the vampires? Maybe he was dangerous to me…
But even though I wanted to think he might be an enemy and put his plight out of my mind, I knew that couldn’t be true. No… he would never hurt me. He’d
gotten in my apartment where I slept with round-the-clock security. If he wanted to kill me, he would have.
“How did he get in here?” Sawyer went to the front door and pulled it open.
Our eyes fell to Walsh, passed out on the floor with some type of tranquilizer dart in his neck. Red and black feathers protruded from the end of the dart. It looked homemade.
“Savages,” Sawyer growled.
I ignored the insult. I knew he was just pissed Arrow got one up on his friend. We pulled the dart from his neck and then dragged Walsh into the living room, heaving him up onto the couch. Then Sawyer called in a replacement guard and we went back to bed.
What a night. Not how I wanted to tell Sawyer my deep dark secret. Not on the day after he proposed to me! We both lay there for an hour staring at the ceiling wide awake, that unsaid elephant hanging in the room.
I was a Paladin alpha.
Fuck.
The next few days, Sawyer and I tried to pretend Arrow never showed up and that I hadn’t dropped the alpha bomb on him. Instead we planned for our very public, very giant, engagement party. Wolves were invited from around the entire city. My parents were guests of honor, which was going to be awkward as fuck. The last time my mom and dad had to see Curt Hudson was after he banished them. Sawyer wanted everyone who attended to know that they were forgiven, and the guest of honor position did that politically… I guess. I was still learning to be a political sleuth. It didn’t suit me, but I knew it was my future.
“It has to be classy but sexy. Think of yourself like the first lady,” Sage said as we roamed the mall looking for an engagement dress for myself for tonight. Yes, I was waiting until the last minute. Walsh and Eugene trailed behind us at a ten-foot pace because Sage was off duty and on bestie detail.
“I will not! Gross,” I told her. “I’m the future alpha’s wife. No big deal.” I gulped.
She laughed and laughed some more until I elbowed her in the ribs.
As we stepped into another dress shop, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I suddenly had the strangest feeling I was being watched.
Glancing over my shoulder, I looked at Walsh and Eugene, and scanned the area around them. Nothing out of the ordinary. Hmm.
“I’m thinking black. It’s classic,” I told Sage.
She shrugged. “It’s also boring. What about deep blue? Oh, or red!” She ran to a floor-length red gown with see-through side panels and stroked her fingers over the fabric.
I shook my head. “Red says I’m a siren who has entrapped your future alpha and I intend to be a conniving bitch through his entire reign.”
Sage’s eyes bugged out. “Wow, tell me how you really feel.”
I grinned and stepped over to trail my fingers across a pale blue number. It was a muted color, but something about it reminded me of Audrey Hepburn or Marilyn Monroe; it was a classic color. I pulled it out and inspected the design. The upper bodice was a tight corset style, only belling out into a flare at the knees like a mermaid. From the knees down were tiny sewn in crystals.
“Oh, Dem, it’s gorgeous.” Sage ran her finger over the small satin bow under the bust.
I grinned. “I love it.” Pulling the tag out, I glanced at the price and my eyes fell out of my head.
“I hate it. Let’s go to another store.” I went to hang it back up.
Five grand, for an engagement dress. Were they insane?
Sage pulled the tag from my hands and looked at it, rolling her eyes. “My sweet sixteen dress was more than this. It’s totally fine.”
My mouth dropped open. “Sage, that’s obscene. That’s someone’s monthly salary.”
She pulled out her phone and hit a few buttons.
I panicked. “No. What are you doing?” Sage was a loose cannon; I never knew what she was going to do.
“Hey, Cuz,” Sage purred into the phone and my whole body went rigid. “Demi is scared to buy her dream dress for tonight because it’s five grand.”
I punched her in the arm, hard, and she winced before handing me the phone.
“You asshole,” I mouthed to her, but she simply held the dress over her body and began to spin around the room with it as she ignored me.
“Hello…” I gulped, pressing the phone to my ear.
“I love that you’re economical,” Sawyer said, “but I plan on only getting married once, so let’s go big or go home with this, okay, love?”
“I mean, I guess if there is any time to go big or go home, it’s with your wedding to a millionaire.” I laughed nervously into the phone. I hated talking about money. It felt weird when I stopped to think of all the stuff Sawyer bought me and how much it might cost.
“Billionaire. But yes, get the dress, okay? Can’t wait to see you in it.”
Billionaire. My eyes bugged and I mentally stumbled over his words. I mean I had seen Hudson on everything since I got here. Hudson hospital, Hudson laboratories, Hudson pharmaceuticals but… billionaire? I shook my head.
“Kay,” I squeaked into the phone and ended the call. “Low blow,” I called at Sage and chucked the phone at her. She caught it in mid-air and then laughed.
“Try it on.” She shoved the pretty dress at me and I conceded.
After slipping the dress on, it was like the fashion angels sang as I walked out to model for Sage. It fit like a glove and I felt so beautiful.
Sage’s mouth dropped open at the sight of me. “Holy shit. You have to wear heels with it.”
I shook my head. “Sawyer said yesterday not to get shoes, that he got some for me.”
Her face screwed up. “That’s dangerous. If they are hideous you will have to pretend you love them.”
I grinned, about to retort when I felt something… that weird feeling I was being watched again. It was a pull on my energy that I couldn’t explain, yet it felt familiar, so I was just left feeling confused.
“What’s wrong?” Sage must have noticed my face.
I swallowed hard. “Nothing.” I stepped into the dressing room and quickly changed, then paid for the dress with Sawyer’s credit card. I wanted to be happy. Tonight was my big night, but I felt this pit in my stomach, a sickening feeling that was mixed with loneliness. I felt fine before we got to the mall, but now my emotions were all weird and depressing.
What the hell?
I was about to question my sanity, when we stepped out of the store and Astra leaped into view. “Alpha.” Her voice shook as she sprang in front of me.
My heart jackknifed in my chest at the sight of the tiny Paladin wolf on Werewolf City land.
Eugene stepped forward, springing into action from across the mall, but Walsh stopped him, looking at me.
I shook my head, and then waved them off. “Sage, can you give us a moment?” I handed her my dress and she looked confusedly at Astra, nodding.
Why was she here?
The small wolf girl looked dirty, sick, confused. She had dark circles under her eyes and a network of red scars across her face; her skin was pale and covered with dirt. There were even a few twigs in her hair. A protective need surged up inside of me.
“What happened to you?” I grasped her shoulders and pulled her aside.
Had she tried to heal someone again and only taken on the illness herself?
That sick lonely feeling I’d felt in the dressing room fled me then and a resolute calm washed over me as she sighed in relief. It took me a moment to realize I hadn’t been feeling my own feelings, I’d been feeling hers!
“Alpha. I need you,” she whispered.
I frowned at her. She looked like she was in rough shape, and although she insisted on calling me that name that I hated, I didn’t want her to suffer.
“What happened? How can I help you? Do you need some food? Medical care?” I gestured to the food court. She looked skinnier since I’d last seen her if that were possible. It had only been a few weeks. Had someone been starving her? Anger surged within me at the thought.
Her bottom lip quivered. “A
lpha. Come home. Please.”
Fuck. Not this again. My heart tightened in my chest until it felt like I couldn’t breathe. “Did Arrow send you?”
She swallowed hard. “Arrow is off trying to make money so we can trade for food and blankets and all the things we need.”
What the what did she just say? “You all need food?” Did all of the Paladins look like this? Had Arrow looked skinnier last time I’d seen him? I had been half asleep and hadn’t noticed, and he’d been clothed this time.
Astra placed one hand on each side of my face, and I saw Walsh, Eugene, and Sage press in closer to me, hands on their weapons.
“When will you understand? We. Need. You.” Her voice cracked and the spots where her fingers touched my face started to tingle. “The magic that makes our people special is tied to you. Come. Home. Now.” She growled the last word and I knew it was asking a lot of her. She was the most submissive wolf I’d ever met, and yet she stared into my eyes, holding eye contact, and it burned right through to my soul.
I swallowed hard, staring back as tears threatened to spill over, a thousand thoughts flashing through my mind. I had to help them. How could I not? I mean, they were people and they were suffering… but Sawyer… my love, my fiancé that I was marrying… I couldn’t just leave this whole world to go live in the fucking jungle with his sworn enemy.
She broke eye contact, looking away from me and at the surrounding mall. “You’re not coming.” There was disappointment in her voice, finality.
“I’m going to help you,” I assured her. “You remember that place we came through the Wild Lands wall into Werewolf City a few weeks ago?”
She nodded, but her shoulders drooped like she’d lost all hope.
“Go there with some of your people. Bring wheelbarrows or horses or whatever, because I’m going to have a bunch of food sent there.”
She frowned, looking utterly destroyed. “Okay, Alpha.”
Fuck. Why did the disappointment in her voice tear into my heart?
“Food is good. You need food, right? Oh, and blankets.” I snapped my fingers. “I’ll send both… okay?”