“Oopsie.” Virgil gave him a squeeze. “Don’t be a hater. We had fun. It’s not my fault you ate those Tater Tots.” He let go and smacked the back of Archer’s head.
When Archer abruptly scooted back and the chair’s legs scraped against the floor, Virgil jumped like a spooked horse and sprinted around the table.
Laughing, Archer stood and pushed in his chair. “Don’t get into too much trouble. My wolf is going out for a run. Do me a favor and don’t lock the back door like you did last time.”
Virgil gave an innocent shrug while leaning against a chair, his damp hair dripping down his back.
Archer enjoyed the brotherhood of the pack. The banter, the stunts they pulled, the jokes—none were malicious, yet it filled a void in his life.
Walking onto the back deck, Archer stripped off his shirt and jeans. The crickets were trilling in the grass, and fireflies blinked in the darkness like twinkling stars. He rarely ever saw any upin Oregon. Down here, everything felt different. The sky seemed bluer, the air drier, and the woods less dense. The wildlife was even different. Instead of otters, bears, beavers, or elk, they had coyotes, skunks, snakes, and mice. Lots of prey for his wolf to hunt.
Archer descended the steps and shifted.
Sniffing the air, his wolf took in the fragrance of lavender, cut grass, and Catcher’s territorial markings around the house. He excitedly followed a jackrabbit but lost the scent.
Most Shifters couldn’t remember but a few seconds or minutes of their shift. Archer could hang on for about an hour. Most of the time, he’d let his animal take over completely and force himself to black out. Other times, he watched. It was like being the passenger inside a car. He could feel things but not with the same intensity.
His wolf’s thoughts raced and tangled with his own, but wolves didn’t use language. He saw flashes of images and felt impulses.
When in wolf form, his animal was in charge. And when in human form, Archer was in control. His wolf sometimes woke up, aware of what was happening, occasionally wanting Archer to react a certain way, but his wolf had no control—not unless he forced his way out. As long as Archer remained awake during his shift, he could force his wolf to relinquish power and shift back.
But he rarely did. That just pissed off his animal. A symbiotic relationship between the two was imperative.
After a few laps around the yard, his wolf took off. It was harder to run than it used to be. More pressure came down on the front right leg to compensate for the missing limb. Archer still remembered the fear and panic his animal felt the first time he shifted after he had lost the limb. The guilt would haunt him forever because his wolf was the innocent victim in all this.
He ran for an incredible distance, mindful of territorialmarkings by neighboring packs or other animal groups. If you didn’t mark the perimeter of your land, a Shifter could wander onto it by accident. Nobody wanted to kill or maim a wanderer, so the pack regularly marked the property lines. Since his wolf could smell it from a distance, he didn’t have to worry about accidentally drifting onto claimed territory.
Where the hell are you going?
Because his wolf had enhanced night vision, he had no trouble navigating through the brush. So why was his wolf sticking close to the road? He ran as if he knew where he was going, and Archer couldn’t recall him ever exploring in this direction. Maybe after he blacked out, his animal went on all kinds of adventures.
Turn around, Archer urged while visualizing their property.
“Woof,” he replied.
He ran for miles. A band of coyotes yipped and howled not too far away. Archer didn’t like venturing off their territory without a packmate alongside him. Over a thousand acres of property, and his wolf decided to take him on a run in the middle of nowhere.
Archer pushed against his wolf’s skin, urging him to go back.
His wolf ran even faster, turning onto yet another road. Out of breath, his pace finally slowed. Saliva dripped from his thirsty mouth as he sniffed the air. A heady scent filled his nose, like leather and oil. They passed a car, and when Archer recognized the house, he panicked.
It was Noah and Cecilia’s place.
His wolf sniffed around the edge of the house before taking a leak.
Fuck.
After watering the weeds, he trotted around back and found a hollowed-out rock filled with water. A dim light on the back of the house revealed a small flower garden and not much else.While gulping down the water, his attention snapped up to the bedroom window.
A light switched on.
“What’s up with those pants? You look like a clown,” Noah said.
“I can’t do yoga in a skirt,” Cecilia argued. “Hope lent them to me.”
“I’m the only one who wears the pants in this house.”
Archer wanted to roll his eyes. Guys who talked like that were just asking for it.
