I was still sitting on the bed, my back against the headboard, body tense. Braced because it was clear that whatever Cara had to say wasn’t going to be good. She wouldn’t even meet my eyes.
Shit.
Shit.
Shit.
I told myself I needed to find a way to be okay with that. If she was going to say I had to face my dad without completing the bond, I was sure I could—
“You’re special enough,” she said suddenly, quietly.
The babbling voice in mind went utterly still.
I gaped at her. “I… what?”
Chin still lo
~ CARA ~Life was… surreal.I’d eventually had to leave Rig’s bed, and his house and go to work. But it was hard. It was hard to think about anything except wolves, and packs, and vows, and… and the fact that Rig’s dad was apparently a monster.Then I’d catch myself thinking about all this stuff and look around at all the normal people just reading books and worrying about grades, and my entire world would flip again.I had to be crazy. It had to have been a dream. Or a mass hallucination, or—“Excuse me, but can I get some help?”I leaped up from the desk where I’d been staring at the computer screen without see
~ CARA ~When we reached the end of the row and the intersection of aisles, Rig stopped briefly, frowning, looking both ways up the aisle, then darting down the next row, hurrying even faster.My breathing picked up, but not because we were hurrying—I’d been hunting long enough I could run for long periods before I lost my breath. No, it was the sense of power and tension flowing off him in waves.That Avenging Angel was walking the city ready to do battle, and God help whoever got in his way.Then we reached the end of the next row of stacks and he swore, pulling me around the corner to the end of the floor-to-ceiling shelving unit and pressed me against it.“I—oh!” I gasped as he took my mou
~ CARA ~I stood in the staff area of the main floor, staring at Meg who was trying desperately to reassure me. But she didn’t need to. I didn’t feel scared… more just kind of shattered by it all. But I couldn’t explain that to her. What was I going to say?Oh, no worries, Meg. I can handle turning into a cat. I mean, the guy I’m in love with is already a dog, so you know, happy families.Oh, and did I mention that we’re gathering some outcasts? His friends are vowed to follow him and protect me and together we’re going to try and overthrow his homicidal father. So…it’s all good.I wanted to groan at myself. It sounded like the plot of one of those books I'd read in high school. The kind I used to hide from my parents...
~ CARA ~“Okay, this is fucked,” Meg muttered, folding her arms and looking back and forth between us. “You can stare at me with the pretty eyes all you want, Rig. I’m not falling for it. If you’re using her—”I tore myself out of Rig’s gaze and back to her. “I know that’s how it looks, but it’s really not—”“It looks like you’re going to get your heart broken—and probably your body too,” Meg snapped, but instead of anger behind her eyes, there was fear. Fear for me.I looked at Rig, pleading. How did I answer this without sounding completely unbelievable?
~ CARA ~…Anything they do to you, they do to me. You don’t have to handle this alone, okay?Those words were mind-boggling to me. I’d ached to hear them my whole life, but now that they were there, hanging in the air between us, it felt like they would be blown away by the slightest breeze.Rig stared at me, waiting for a response. I didn’t know what to say. Wasn’t sure I could say anything. I kept swallowing.I was at work, I reminded myself. This wasn’t the time. But the words were inside me and bubbling for the surface, forcing themselves out—“I’m afraid,” I whisp
~ RIG ~I crouched in my wolf-form in the bushes near the sidewalk that ran under the trees alongside the library listening as the last of the students descended the stairs down to the parking lot. Luckily none of them decided to brave the forest tonight, though they wouldn’t have seen me even if they had.I’d been hidden there since I left the library over an hour earlier. Cara had insisted. She’d desperately needed to get some things done so her boss wouldn’t be mad, and she’d insisted that if I was there she wouldn’t be able to concentrate.I didn’t know about her, but I couldn’t concentrate on anything else anyway.It had been so hard watching her fight tears… feeling the hollow ache of loneliness in her che
~ RIG ~I waited in more shadows, more bushes, hidden from the street under the window of her dorm room until the window finally creaked open and she leaned out, her face going from worried, to happy in a blink.“There you are. Sorry, one of the girls caught me in the hallway.”She pushed the window wide open, then stepped back so that I could leap inside.I peered through the bushes, examining the night-dark street and listening until I was certain the coast was clear. Cara had left the interior lights turned off so that I wouldn’t be seen.The minute I leaped inside the frame, then over her desk to the carpet of her room, she pushed past me to lean out and pull the window closed, checking out in the str
~ CARA ~I didn’t understand until Tessa dropped her head and rolled her shoulders forward, hunching slightly and keeping her eyes on his feet.“I’m not here to make trouble, I promise.”“Rig, what’s going on?” I breathed.He didn’t take his eyes off Tessa, but he spoke to me. “Tessa’s from an ally pack—but not mine, not a direct bloodline. She could be a spy.”“I’m not! I swear!”Rig moved so quickly my heart hammered, putting himself between me and Tessa, his arms slightly back to box me in as he stood over her.“I’m loyal, Rig! Ask Natalie! Natalie talked to me because she knows—"