I release him but he doesn’t flee. He leans against me, head down, panting heavily. His entire body is trembling. I don’t think it’s just the car that has him so scared. I lick his ear. He flicks his ear at my touch and he turns his head and starts licking my face.
Slowly my heart rate returns to something more like its normal rhythm. That was too damn close. I’m going to have nightmares about the flash of headlights and the roar of air as the car passed. I don’t think the human saw us, or if they did, they’d likely just think they saw two true wolves. It’s all good. Fitz is unhurt and there aren’t going to be any repercussions. I can breathe.
As gently as I can, I get Fitz to stop licking me and start guiding him back towards the pack house. He pads by my side, keeping his body pressed close to mine. I’ve never been more relieved in all my life.
We walk slowly. He is no longer panicking, but he doesn’t seem to be enjoying being in his wolf form. He is a shifter, a child of the moon goddess. He should be loving this. Did the collar stunt him for far too long? Did the hunters fully brainwash him into thinking his shifter nature is monstrous? Or is it just who he is? A shifter who would rather be human?
I’m distracted from my morose thoughts by a twig. So I stop to investigate it. Fitz immediately stops walking too. By the scents lacing it, the twig has recently been part of a bird’s nest. And a deer has stepped on it. I shuffle it over to Fitz with my snout. He stares at me but then cautiously sniffs it. He is soon engrossed. My human side is smiling indulgently.
Fitz starts to investigate the forest floor. Snuffling around with his nose pressed to the ground. That’s more like it. I watch him fondly for a while. He turns back on himself and then startles. I look around in alarm before realizing he jumped at the sight of his own tail. My tail wags, if I was in human form right now I’d be laughing my ass off.
Luckily I’m not and he is not attuned enough to his wolf side to be able to read my amusement. He is having a difficult enough time as it is, I really don’t want to offend him and make it worse.
He continues to sniff around and I shepherd him back towards the clearing and our clothes. Once there, I return to my human form. The woods suddenly grow darker, quieter and nearly all the scents vanish. It feels like the world has changed, not me.
Thinking of Fitz’s weird hangups, I shuffle back into my jeans before turning to him.
“That’s enough for tonight, you can shift back now,” I say.
He stares at me with panic in his eyes. A long high-pitched whine trembles out of his throat. Shit. Quickly I crouch down in front of him and stroke his soft fur.
“Hey, it’s okay,” I say as gently as I can.
Reaching out with my magic, I search for his human side. It’s right there, very forefront in his consciousness. It hasn’t taken a back seat to his wolf at all. There is no slumbering part of him to call forward at all. Wolf and man are completely entwined.
“Don’t worry about it, it’s easier to shift to human in daylight,” I tell him and my lie does sound very convincing.
I grab my shirt and his clothes. “Let’s sleep on it and try again in the morning.”
He gives me a sad look but starts trotting towards the house.
What if he gets stuck in his wolf form and turns feral? My chest tightens. I’m sure that won’t happen. Between myself, Harry and Callum, I’m sure we can help him get back to his human form. He is not going to be trapped like this forever. Imprisoned in a form he never wanted to be in.
I swallow. Maybe I should never have forced him to shift in the first place. But what was the alternative, let him fall into a fit every full moon. Or distract him in my bed every month? My cock twitches at that though and I hate how enticing it is.
There is something seriously wrong with me. Perhaps it’s time to find an omega and settle down. Seems like my body wouldn’t object to regular sex. My gaze flicks to Fitz who is trotting beside me. No, find an omega who doesn’t want to kill me, I tell myself. I’m pretty sure that’s a fundamental first step in forming a healthy relationship, neither party wishing the other was dead.
We reach the house and it takes Fitz a moment to figure out how to climb the stairs on four legs instead of two but he manages it pretty well. I watch him slope off towards his room, head down, tail down. The very picture of dejected misery.
“Fitz, come sleep in my room,” I offer.
His ears perk up at that and he follows me eagerly. Once inside my room he curls up on the floor, tail covering his nose.
“The floor still isn’t comfortable, even in wolf form,” I tell him as I point to the bed.
He gives me a surprised look before jumping up onto the bed, turning around in a circle and curling up again. It reminds me of the way he curled up on the floor the first night I brought him here, as well as the time he had curled up in the basement on the blankets I had given him.
The realization strikes me like a beam of hope. Fitz has always been in touch with his wolf side. That has to be a promising sign. He is going to get the hang of shifting. Just not tonight. Tonight he needs the comfort of an alpha’s presence.
Stripping my jeans off, because I’m not sleeping in clothes for anybody, I try not to think about the logic of letting a murderer sleep in my bed.
I do think about having a shower but my bed is just going to get covered in wolf hair anyway, so I might as well wait till the morning. With that thought, I slide into bed.
“Goodnight Fitz.”
He gives a little rumble in response and it makes me smile. Maybe there is hope for him yet.
Chapter seventeen
