But behind all of that is my wolf howling inside me. I don’t need to talk to my family to know what this means. I’ve found my mate, and my wolf wants to claim her. To mate with her once and for all.
It’s all-consuming. Every cell in my body is telling me that it’s time to seal this bond now that my mate is within arm’s reach of me.
But looking at her now, she’s too injured. I don’t know what she’s been through, and I don’t even want to try to imagine it.
I have to take care of her first.
She has to know that I’m safe. That I’m not going to hurt her like whoever it is that did all of this to her. Only then will I be able to seal our bond.
I kneel beside her to pick her up and carry her home. The moment my skin touches hers, a zap of electricity forms between us. This is what I’ve been waiting for.She’swho I’ve been waiting for.
As soon as I pick her up, her hair tangles around my arm, and I see just how long it is. It’s a mousy brown, straight, and nearly trailing the underbrush below us as I carry her. Twigs and leaves are tangled in the strands.
Looking down at her face now, I can tell she’s beautiful. The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. I don’t even need to see her eyes to know that.
“We’re going to take care of you,” I whisper, hoping she can hear my voice through her unconsciousness.
I walk back to the house with purpose. It sprawls on our land before me, and as soon as I see it, I quicken my pace.
Excitement grows in my chest at the idea of her waking up and taking her on a tour of the house or spending time with her in the backyard stargazing late at night. I can’t wait to get to know her and to share my life with her.
Declan and the others are standing on the porch as I approach.
“Call Doc,” I say to them as I walk through the open front door and carry her down the hall toward my room.
Nobody comes inside to see her other than me. But after a while, Declan knocks on the door and opens it. Doc Peterson stands behind him, an oversized medical bag in hand.
I’ve known him my entire life. Doc’s seen some gruesome things. But the worry in his eyes as he looks at my mate makes my heart sink.
“And you found her in the woods like this?” Doc asks, clearly already having been briefed by Declan.
We explain everything. I point out the lacerations on her arms and the bruises. As soon as he sees the syringe marks, coupled with my account of the smell of drugs in her system, Doc shuffles around in his bag.
He pulls out a bag of fluids and a few other vials of liquids. “We can’t know what happened to her until she wakes up. But what I’m going to give her will flush out any sedatives in her system as well as help move the drugs through her faster.”
Doc is careful as he pulls her arm toward him, pressing his fingers against the blue-green vein clearly visible under her pale skin. He tries to avoid the other marks from syringes along her arm, but it’s difficult.
As the needle from the syringe presses against her skin, I hear a gasp. I look at her face, seeing her beautiful hazel eyes filled with fear.
“She’s awake!”
Chapter 3
Addison
The all-too-familiar needlewoke me up. I remember the burning, the aching, the screaming.
I won’t let it happen again. Never again.
I yank my arm away from the man with the needle. He’s different, not like the doctors who have held me against tables and forced drugs into my system before. But that doesn’t mean he’s safe.
I sit upright, my muscles aching even more than they were last night from sprinting as far as I did. My spine crashes against wood, and I scream. My mouth is open, and all I hear is the shrill, broken shrieks I manage to let out.
The man with the needle backs up. He sets it down, holding his hands in the air in front of him. Then another man sits down on the edge of the bed.
My focus is on him in an instant. He’s saying something that I can’t quite make out over my own yells.
I expect him to launch at me, to wrap his hands around my arms and clasp a collar around my neck again. But it doesn’t happen. This man, a true stranger to me, is just trying to calm me down.
