The question was like the starting buzzer to a sprinter.
I turned and ran.
Cole followed.
She was fast, but she carried the backpack, and I was smaller and able to zig-zag between the trees faster.
Until I fell, struck down with a force like a chisel cracking open my spine.
The shift. I recognised after the first wave of white-hot pain had rippled down my spine.
Quickly, I tore my top from my body and managed to kick off my sneakers before the next strike of pain tore through me. My left shoulder dislocated with an audible pop. I screamed until the wave passed. I managed with my one good arm to push my joggers down my thighs.
My spine contorted, my hip cracked, my jaw ached, and I tasted blood.
Bone and muscle contorted, my jaw widened, elongated. I opened my closed fists, pulling claws from the palms of my hands, creating streams of red.
Each wave crashed upon me, no space between one ending and another starting, until they ran into each other, and I didn’t know where one ended and the other began, and I thought I might stay suspended in the pain forever, until, as unexpectedly as it had started, it ended.
I pushed myself up on shaking legs and stared at paws and fur.
It had been so long since I had last been in my wolf that I had forgotten what it felt like.
The crunching of forest litter distracted me from my own paws, and I turned.
Cole stepped out from behind a large fir.
My breath caught in my chest.
Oh.
I had never seen a more magnificent sight.
She was easily twice my size and radiated power. Her coat was grey and white, her eyes were unchanged, the deepest of browns, with flecks of gold that reflected every shade the forest offered.
Cole wasperfect,now that I could see, now that I was actually looking.
Strong, powerful, mine.
Mine.
The outrageous thought flooded my mind. It was all-consuming. It was undeniably true.
If there really was a Goddess, she had a cruel sense of humour.
Cole broke our silent stare first, lowering her head and producing an angered growl.
Of course. Cole would be enraged.
I saw everything clearly in a split second. Remembered the previous night with frightening clarity.
How Darren’s status had forced her into the position of Alpha Heir, that she ended a long-term relationship and engagement for.
And here I was, causing another problem. Only this was a problem that could be fixed… by getting rid of me.
I was running again.
This time faster. So much faster.
