Ember was saying, “It’s okay, Quinn. Aaron will take care of him.”
“I gave him a broken rib though.”
“And at the next full moon, it’ll heal right up.”
Rhett cut in. “Well, why didn’t he catch the thing?”
Jeremy said, less judgment than bafflement, “He folded like a vanilla.”
Ezra growled at that, but even he had words to throw though they all knew Trevor could hear them. Or maybe, under the circumstances, they thought otherwise. “Something’s wrong. Something has to be wrong.”
Speculation continued, voices like ping-pong balls.
“Wrong like what? He’s losing his strength?”
“Oh come on, we would know. It would be in his scent, and anyway he’d have told us.”
“Trevor?”
He blinked, brought himself back to Rhett’s industrial-style kitchen with its black walls and iron fixtures and exposed pipes. That last voice had been here in the room with him. Kelsey.
“Can you talk to me?” she said.
Aaron had left. Trevor shifted on the chair, then went still as pain knifed his side. He ducked his head.
“I…I don’t want to assume anything. But all the wolves were throwing and catching that kettlebell, all of them. They wouldn’t even let Quinn play because he’s not old enough yet. Not strong enough.”
He nodded.
“Trevor, is there something…physical? Something wrong?”
“Yeah.” He sounded hoarse. One word out, now for a few more. But he couldn’t grasp them.
“Wolves don’t get diseases though. Not like humans do. Not like…” A faint catch of her breath, and then she crouched in front of him, grabbed hold of his hands. “This isn’t about us. Right? It’s not about that.”
He forced himself to nod.
“It is? You couldn’t catch the kettlebell because of us?”
Another nod.
“But…but…”
He gripped her hands and tried to talk to her. Tried. Couldn’t.
“Trevor, you told me everything. The gap didn’t hurt you, you’re okay. You told me.”
“I—I thought if—if we—then I would be.”
“You’re weakening. Your wolf strength is weakening.” She repeated as if she needed multiple tries to believe her own words.
“All of me,” he whispered.
“What?”
“My…reflexes, strength, senses. My voice.”
“No,” she said.
