A river of foxes and wolves flowed over Dawnie, who swatted and snapped and roared with rage. Foxes and wolves went flying, and more took their place until she disappeared under a boiling hill of fur. The lions didn’t intervene. They left her to the residents of Flowering Dogwood who had lived and suffered under her paw for so long. Her screams curled up into the night until they grew weak, and finally stopped.
Blake left them to it. He stumbled off, prowling through the woods, searching for Krista and Ethan.
Blake’s blurred gaze landed on Hattie, now in human form, naked and bleeding. She knelt over a limp fox body.
Blake limped over to her, frantic.
It wasn’t Krista. It was a male, an older fox with a grizzled muzzle.Where the hell was his mate? Where was the cub?
Hattie was keening in sorrow. “Floyd! You finally grow a pair, and now you have to go and die on me? You sorry son of a bitch, I’d kick your patootie if you were alive!”
Her tears dripped into his fur.
“If you were alive now, I’d go to dinner with you. You dumb old coot. Why couldn’t you stick around, Floyd? Oh, only the good die young…”
Through swollen eyes, Blake saw that Floyd’s flank was rising and falling.
Blake shoved him with one torn, bleeding paw, and Floyd gave out a pained yelp. He was injured for sure, but not dead.
Hattie let out a shriek of anger and smacked him on the head. “Why, you gold-bricking, faking, cheating…”
Floyd’s fur rippled and he shifted into human form.
He sat up, looking pained. “I was merely winded and tryin’ to catch my breath.”
Hattie looked at him narrow-eyed. “I will accept your offer of dinner,” she said. “But I’m going to give you a wallopin’ for making me think you were dead, you fleabag.”
Floyd grinned back. “Worth it,” he said, in a shaky voice.
“And I get to drive.” Floyd, who was already pale, blanched a sickly shade of ivory. But he managed a weak smile. “Still worth it.”
Blake turned and limped off, every step wrenching groans of pain from him as his flesh slowly knit back together.
His mate. Must find his mate. Where was his mate?
All of Dawnie’s bears were dead now. So were several foxes and wolves. Blake ran over to them, scenting madly, but Krista wasn’t one of them.
He should be able to sense Krista. Why couldn’t he? Did that mean she was dead or was it because he was so weak he was going to pass out any second?
Krista nudged him. He gasped in relief.
They both shifted back into human form. Blake sank to his knees. Why was everything spinning?
“I didn’t… bug you…” he gasped. Or at least he tried to make the words come out.
“What? Shift back to wolf so you can heal, you idiot!” Krista’s face went in and out of focus. He’d heal much faster in animal form.
Blake’s head lolled to the side. He saw a lion cub running over to a huge lion. The lion was nuzzling the cub and he thought he heard purring.
Ethan was all right. His father would probably never let him out of his sight again.
“I… bug… the bug…” he mumbled. He wasn’t shifting until he got a chance to make her see the truth.
“What? Yes, of course, you bug me, you big jerk! And it doesn’t matter, I still love you! Shift now or I swear to God I’ll… I’ll withhold sex.”
“No, you won’t. You don’t have the willpower,” he mumbled with a bloody smile, and he shifted back to his wolf form.
The last thing he remembered was Krista cradling his furry face in her lap.
