He dropped onto all fours, anguish radiating through his shoulder. He flinched and fell to the dirt. His belly flooded his mind with fire.
He roared again. Anger. Destroy. Kill.
And over all of it: Pain.
He had to return to his mate. He had to protect her. But most of all, he had to hide himself and her until he healed.
He lumbered around, searching behind him only to realize she wasn’t there. Her scent was there, but he saw no grizzly. Only a human, pink and unimportant, though something about it made him pause. Mate? He knew the citrus smell of her, acrid with fear, but this pink creature wasn’t his mate. And yet his nose twitched with interest. Important. He inhaled hard, trying to focus.
Pain.
Injured.
His thoughts scattered. Priorities realigned. His mate was gone. He had to hide and heal.
He roared one last time, the statement filled with all the mournful fury that coursed through him. He would leave, he decided. He would find a den to hide in and heal, and then he would search for her again.
He was still twitchy with pain and fury. He wanted that bitch cat. He wanted his mate. He wanted to kill something and end the pain. And then, in the midst of this disconnected anger, one of the humans annoyed him.
CHAPTER 22
“Mark, come back!”
Damn it! The stupid grizzly man wasn’t listening. It had been hell watching cougar and bear fight. She’d been helpless, doing her best just to scramble through the woods following the fight. But now the bitch was gone and Mark was hurt. He needed help, but he wasn’t listening to her. Thankfully, he wasn’t moving fast, so she took a deep breath and did what she’d do with a frightened dog. A really big dog.
She lurched forward and grabbed the scruff of his neck.
“Mark! Pay attention!”
Bad idea! The creature lurched, tossing his head at her. Pain exploded across her ribs as she went tumbling backward. Stupid, stupid. But at least she’d gotten its attention. That was good, right?
The grizzly lumbered toward her, his nose twitching as his belly dripped blood on the ground.
“You have to shift back,” she said, every word a painful push of breath. But she had to get through to the man. “You have to become human.” She knew enough about the size differential now to realize that if he turned back into a man, most of his wounds would shrink and heal.
A hard female voice sounded behind her. “Back away, Julie. Slowly.”
It was Tonya, and she turned to see the officer standing carefully behind a tree trunk with her gun drawn.
“Don’t shoot!” Julie called in panic. “That’s Mark!”
Tonya’s expression flattened into a dispassionate stare. “I know who it is. I’d recognize that roar from a mile away. Why do you think I’m here? Now move away.”
Julie did move. She pushed to her feet right into the firing line. “I’m not going to let you shoot him.”
The woman cursed and moved to the other side of the tree. “He’s feral, Julie. You have to accept that the Mark you knew is gone.”
“Bullshit. He just has to change back.”
“He’s not going to. Can’t you feel it?” Then she answered her own question. “Of course you can’t, but I can. He’s an animal now, nothing more, nothing less.”
Julie refused to believe that even though she knew it was possible. “He’ll come back to me. You’ll see.” Tonya opened her mouth to argue, but Julie stepped in front of her again. “And even if he doesn’t, there’s no reason to kill him.”
Tonya sighed, aiming her gun down. “Do you think I want to do this? I grew up with him! But ferals go crazy, and when they do, they hurt people.” She took a breath. “Mark doesn’t want that. And he asked me to do this, Julie. He made me promise.”
Julie was close enough to see Tonya’s face. The sheen of tears was unmistakable. Oh, hell. Tonya wasn’t being cold or heartless. It was the mask she wore when she was doing something impossibly hard. Like killing a childhood friend because he’d pleaded her to do it.
But even knowing that, Julie couldn’t let her do it. “I can bring him back. Look,” she said, pointing to where Mark had dropped to the ground. “He’s waiting for me. He’s safe.”
