by TJ Klune
I blinked. “I’m fine.”
She didn’t look like she believed me, but she let it go. She glanced over her shoulder at the others before lowering her voice. “We got as many as we could. They’re at the Lighthouse.”
“Something’s wrong,” I said, because I knew her.
She sighed. “Mark.”
My stomach flipped. “What about him?”
She shook her head. “It’s… there was a man. Jameson? I think his name is Jameson. Lives in the trailer park.” Her nose wrinkled. “Smells terrible.”
“Big guy? Mustache?” Jameson was an asshole on a good day, and these weren’t good days.
She nodded. “He didn’t want to come with us. Told us to leave him alone. Mark, he—he didn’t take that well. He was angry. I thought he was going to shift right then and there. Mark scared him. I could smell it, though he tried to hide it.”
“He stayed behind?” I asked, not liking where this was going.
“No,” she said. “He agreed to go when Mark put a fist through his trailer wall.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“It’s the moon, I think. It’s pulling on him. It’s getting stronger. Whatever it was, he snapped out of it almost immediately. It’s happening, Gordo. Carter. And now Mark.”
Even with all that had happened, I was surprised I was still capable of feeling gutted at the sound of fear in Elizabeth Bennett’s voice. “We’ll figure it out,” I said, though I felt like a liar.
“I’M FINE,” Mark said as we approached the Lighthouse, snow crunching under our feet. The power was still on, and the Lighthouse was lit up like it was a Friday night.
“You sure about that?”
He rolled his eyes. “He was pissing me off.”
“Jameson.”
“Yeah. Wouldn’t listen.”
“So you punched a hole through his house.”
“He listened after that.”
“Mark.”
“Gordo.”
I grabbed him by the arm. “Would you stop? For fuck’s sake. You can’t hide this. Not from me.”
“That’s almost funny coming from you. Talking about hiding things.”
That stung, though I deserved it. It wasn’t Mark, though. He didn’t dig at open wounds. “Don’t be a dick.”
He winced. “Sorry. I don’t—I don’t know where that came from.”
He was lying. We both knew exactly where it’d come from. “I need to know if you’re in control. You can’t go into a room full of humans if there’s a chance you’ll turn on them.”
For a moment I thought he was going to pull away. He breathed in through his nose as the others went inside. As the door opened voices poured out, some of them angry. I wasn’t looking forward to facing the people who had remained in town. Hopefully they’d bought the bullshit story being spun.
“I’m not going to hurt them,” Mark said, a scowl on his face.
“Show me your eyes.”
“Gordo—”
“Do it, Mark.”
He flashed his eyes.
Orange. Just orange.
I breathed a sigh of relief. “Just—stay by me, okay?”
His lips twitched. I saw the hint of teeth. “Gonna keep everyone safe from the big bad wolf?”
“Christ. That’s not going to be a thing. Ever. You hear me? In fact, you say that again and I’ll kill you myself. I think I liked it better when we hated each other.”
He took me by the hand. “I never hated you, Gordo.”
I looked away. I wanted to tell him the same, but I couldn’t. Because I had hated him. I had hated all of them. It’d taken me a long time to figure out how to stop. And I didn’t know if I was all the way there yet.
He sounded sad when he said, “I know. It’s okay, though. It only took my ex being an evil witch and me losing my mind to get you to come back to me. Worth it, if you ask me.”
“That’s not funny,” I said hoarsely.
“A little funny.”
“When this is over, we need to have a long talk about this thing you call your sense of—”
He moved then, almost faster than I could follow. One moment he was in front of me, his hand in mine. The next I was shoved behind him as he began to shift, growling low in his throat.
I looked over his shoulder.
The timber wolf stood in the middle of the road.
Its face still hadn’t healed, not completely. The silver in the crowbar was strong, and the wolf was an Omega. Its power to heal had slowed. The wound was knitting itself back together, but its muzzle was caked with blood, and its right eye was swollen shut.
And it was pissed off.
“Get inside,” Mark growled at me.
“Fuck you,” I retorted. “I’m not going to leave you—”
“If it’s like the others, it’ll come for you first. I can’t hold it off if I’m worried about—”
“I don’t need you to worry about—holy fuck!”
I tackled Mark to the side as the feral wolf launched itself at us. We fell into the snow, Mark hitting the ground first. I landed on top of him as the wolf sailed over us, teeth snapping, missing my neck by inches. Its hot breath stank, and I could almost feel the weight of it in the air above us.
“You just wanted to lay on top of me,” Mark said from beneath me.
“Seriously,” I snapped, pushing myself off him and standing. “Now is not the time.”
The wolf had landed near the Lighthouse, skidding in the snow but managing to stay upright. Its ears pricked toward the bar, and I knew it could hear probably dozens of heartbeats inside. Its eyes flickered violet, and it took a step toward the bar door, and—
“Hey!” I shouted at it, trying to get its attention. “Over here, you goddamn mutt!”
It slowly turned its head toward me.
I swallowed thickly.
It really was a big werewolf.
Mark was at my side, half-shifted, and before I could chew him out for that, the timber wolf crouched low, ready to attack.
Screams came from inside the bar.
We all hesitated.
And then Carter burst out of the Lighthouse, the door slamming against the wall, the wood splintering. He, too, was half-shifted, and it hit me then that the people inside the bar had seen it, but before I could even begin to process this monumental fuckup, he’d tackled the timber wolf from behind.
It went down hard, slipping in the snow. Carter’s face elongated, hair sprouting along his cheeks, and he was snarling at the wolf beneath him. The timber wolf pushed itself up quickly, knocking Carter off its back and into the snow.
He landed, orange eyes wide, exhaling heavily.
The timber wolf rose slowly above him, lips pulled back, teeth bared.
I touched the rune on my arm, ready to light the motherfucker on fire, and Elizabeth stood in the doorway, eyes blazing, ready to attack whatever was going after her son, and Ox and Joe roared from inside the Lighthouse, their Alpha song bowling over us because one of their pack was in danger, one of their pack was about to—
The timber wolf stopped snarling.
Its eyes narrowed.
As the wolf lowered its head, Carter raised his claws, ready to swipe at it, to gouge its eyes out just as he’d been trained to do, but—
It didn’t happen.
The timber wolf just… sniffed him.
Its eyes were violet, and its hackles were raised, but it put its snout against Carter’s chest and inhaled.
“Um,” Carter said, lisping through a mouthful of fangs. “Guys? What the hell is going on?”
“Carter,” Elizabeth said. “I need you to—”
Joe and Ox appeared behind him, ignoring the cacophony of voices rising behind them. Their eyes were red, and when Joe saw his brother on the ground with a strange wolf above him, he tried to push past his mother. The timber wolf heard him coming and turned its back on Carter, snarling at Joe. It began to back away slowly, crowding Carter until he was forced
to scoot back in the snow.
“What the fuck is going on?” Carter squeaked, startled out of his shift as he got a face full of tail.
“Joe,” Elizabeth said sharply, causing her son to stop before he could reach the timber wolf. “Don’t.”
Joe looked surprised as he glanced back at his mother. “But it’s going to hurt him.”
“I don’t think it is,” Mark said thoughtfully at my side. “It’s… protecting him.”
“From what?” Joe asked.
“From you. From all of us. Step back, Joe.”
“But—”
“Joe.”
Joe did as his uncle asked.
The timber wolf eyed him warily, standing above Carter. Once it was sure that Joe wasn’t a threat, it turned back around and put its snout against Carter’s chest again, rumbling low in its throat.
Carter tried to shove its face away, but it snapped at his fingers, growling a warning. “What the hell is its problem?” Carter asked, sounding annoyed.
“I think it likes you,” Elizabeth said mildly.
“Oh, gee, Mother, thank you for your input! I don’t know where I’d be without you!”
“You wouldn’t be born without her,” Joe said, helpful as ever.
“Ox!” Carter cried, trying unsuccessfully to shove the wolf away from him. “Do your I’m-So-Special Alpha thing and get this fucker off me.”
“You seem to be doing just fine on your own,” Ox said, stepping out of the bar and into the snow. The timber wolf glared back at him over its shoulder. Ox made sure to give them a wide berth as he approached us, much to Carter’s outrage.
“What happened?” Ox asked us in a low voice. “Rico said the hunters were in the garage?”
I scowled. “As if I didn’t want to kill them already, they’re touching my stuff.”
“He focuses on what’s important,” Mark told Ox, and I gave very real consideration to blasting him across the bar parking lot. But I didn’t think it would do well for whatever was going on between us, so I didn’t.
“I don’t like it when people touch my things.”
“I’m sure Dale would agree with that,” Ox said, because even though he was an Alpha, he was still a bitch.
Mark started choking.
I hated everyone. “Killed the red wolf. Crushed it under the truck.”
“You followed?”
I shook my head. “The guys and Jessie made sure our tracks were covered most of the way here.”
“And what’s that about?” he asked, nodding toward the wolf that now had the collar of Carter’s coat between its teeth and was trying to drag him away. It wasn’t going so well for the timber wolf, seeing as Kelly had burst out of the bar with an impressive battle cry, grabbed his brother’s leg, and was pulling him in the opposite direction.
“I couldn’t even begin to tell you.”
“Kelly!” Carter shouted. “Save me!”
“I am,” Kelly yelled back.
The timber wolf jerked its head back roughly, trying to pull Carter away from Kelly as it snarled a warning.
“Are we playing tug-of-war with Carter now?” another voice said. I looked up to see Team Human crowding around Elizabeth, even as the shouts in the bar grew louder. Rico had his hands on his hips, and his head was cocked, eyes squinted. “Because I don’t know if that’s going to endear the general population of Green Creek now that they’ve seen half of the Bennetts—who they assumed were just rich weirdos that lived in the woods—suddenly turn into monsters right in front of them.” Something shattered inside the bar, and he winced. “Bambi’s probably not going to like that. Or the fact that I’ve been keeping this from her.”
“I can talk to her for you,” Jessie said, patting his arm. “Give it a woman’s touch.”
“You stay away from her,” Chris said, glaring at his sister. “You already think she has a nice rack. It’s not cool to try and steal Rico’s girlfriend.”
“Or is it?” Rico asked, eying Jessie up and down. “I mean, as long as I can watch, I wouldn’t mind—ow, vete a la verga, culero, my arm isn’t supposed to twist that way. Stop it!”
Jessie waited a beat to prove her point, but then let Rico’s arm go.
Chris and Tanner laughed.
Jessie glared at them.
They backed away from her slowly.
“Um, guys?” Robbie said, coming up behind them, looking frantic. “As fun as this is, I think we’ve got a problem.”
He pointed over his shoulder back in the bar.
Pressed against the windows were many, many faces, eyes wide, mouths open as they watched a wolf the size of a horse trying to steal Carter from his brother, both of whose eyes were glowing brightly.
Will, the drunken owner of the motel, spoke first. “I knew it!” he shouted, eyes rheumy and bloodshot. “Fucking animals. No one believed me, but they came and stayed in my motel! Mountain lion my ass. Look at the size of that fucker! Shape-shifters! We’re surrounded by shape-shifters!”
“Fuck,” Ox said succinctly.
imperfect
THEY WERE… loud. The people inside the bar. Some of them cringed away from the Bennetts, trying to get as far from them as possible while still remaining in the Lighthouse.
Will, the bastard that he was, tried to tell anyone who would listen that he knew something had been going on in this town, had been going on for years, and everyone had called him crazy. “Who’s crazy now?” he said, laughing wildly. “Who’s crazy now?”
“I could do it again,” I told Ox under my breath. “Alter their memories. Like I did with the people after Richard.”
Ox shook his head slowly. “You were off your feet for a few days after that. And there were only a handful. There’s almost fifty people in here. I need you strong.”
He had a point. Expending that much energy would make me next to useless for at least a week. And we didn’t have time for that now. “There’s always after.”
“Maybe.” He looked at the people standing before us. They were starting to get loud again. Jameson, the owner of a brand-new hole in his trailer wall, was staring at Mark as if he expected Mark to shift and eat him right then and there. It would have been funny if the situation weren’t so fucked. Especially since Mark seemed on the verge of doing exactly that. I stayed close, trying to get him to calm.
Others were still at the window, staring out at where Kelly and Robbie were keeping an eye on Carter. The timber wolf hadn’t been too pleased when Carter had tried to follow us inside, growling at him until Carter stopped trying to get away. I had a good idea what was going on there, and I thought Elizabeth did too, if the knowing look on her face meant anything. The others were… too young. Too inexperienced. Even Joe and Ox seemed perplexed. I didn’t know if it would matter in the long run. The wolf was an Omega. If it was like Pappas, I didn’t know if there was any turning back. It was best if Carter didn’t know. At least not until we could be sure.
He was in for a rude awakening, at any rate.
“What are we going to do?” Mark murmured. He was breathing in and out through his nose, and I knew he was doing it to keep his heart rate slow. I didn’t know if it was working. “We can’t—Ox. There’s a reason packs are kept hidden.”
Ox tilted his head. “Why, though? Because the Alpha of all says that’s the way it’s supposed to be? She betrayed us. Or is it because it could bring hunters down upon us? They’re already here. And we’re trapped inside with them because witches have surrounded Green Creek and taken our wards away from us. These people are in danger. Don’t they have a right to know why?”
Mark paled. His voice was rough when he spoke. “Do you even know what you’re saying? What you’re risking? It’s not just about us, Ox. If this gets out, if this spreads beyond our borders, then it puts other packs at risk. People are scared of what they don’t understand. And they won’t understand us.”
“I get that,” Ox said lightly. “I do. But we can’t live in fear. If we’re going to h
ave hope for a tomorrow, then we have to deal with it today.”
Mark shook his head. “You don’t—you weren’t there. You didn’t see what they did to us. What the humans did to our family. They came in and—there were children, Ox. They were just kids, and they—”
Ox wrapped a hand around his neck, bringing his forehead to Mark’s. “Breathe,” he whispered, eyes flashing red, and Mark’s nostrils flared. “I need you to breathe. I know it hurts. I know it does. We will stop it, okay? We’re going to find a way to stop it.”
Mark reared back, breaking out of Ox’s grasp. For a moment I thought he was going to lash out. “You don’t get it,” he growled, deeper than any human ever could. The people closest to him backed away slowly. “You’re fine. You don’t have this—this thing inside of you. You still have your tether, and it’s intact. I can feel it, Ox. Every fucking second, I can feel it. Just because you still get to keep everything you love doesn’t mean you get to spout your Alpha bullshit on me. That’s not fair. None of this is fair.”
Blood began to drip from his hands where his claws had popped into the fleshy part of his palms.
“Mark,” Ox warned, eyes blazing. “I need you to calm down. Listen to me, okay?” He reached for Mark again. “We’re right here. Your pack is here. Gordo is—”
“Don’t,” Mark said, chest heaving as he took a step back. He bumped into a woman, who gasped and almost fell back. She was caught by Jameson, who glared at Mark. “Don’t tell me to calm down. Don’t talk to me about Gordo.”
“Mark,” Joe said, coming to stand next to Ox. “You’re scaring people. This isn’t you. This isn’t who you are.”
Mark laughed bitterly. “You don’t know the first fucking thing about me. You left, Joe. My brother died. He was cut to ribbons, and you left. You didn’t even have a second thought about it, and even if you did, was it about me? Or your mother? Or was it just about Ox? Was it just about your fucking mate?”
Joe’s throat clicked as he swallowed, jaw tight.
“That’s right,” Mark said, voice hard. “All I wanted was to keep everyone safe. That’s all I ever wanted. And then those fucking hunters came, and they took everything away from me. And then Thomas took what was left of my shredded heart and put it beneath his heel, telling me I didn’t have a choice. I had to leave. And just when I thought I could finally forgive him, when I thought it would all be okay again, he died.” Ice blue gave way to orange. “And then you made the same mistakes he did.”
