Page 30 of The Way We Were(wolf)

“Anything but stay,” she responded with a curt nod.

“You shouldn’t have trusted me, Lucy. And I’m sorry for that. So, so sorry.” He took a

stepbackward. And then another. The lines crossing his face and the droop of his eyes said he didn’t want to let go of her hand, but his feet didn’t get the message.

“I didn’t, Eric. I didn’t trust the wrong person.”

With his last step, he let go of her hand. “I wish with everything I am that you were right.”

With that, he opened the door and sprinted into the darkness.

“I am right,” she whispered to the empty salon. Grabbing her purse, she ran to the back door. “You’rethe one who’s wrong.”

The cold air stung Eric’s lungs, so he breathed faster to inflict more pain. He deserved it. He’d broken Lucy’s heart back there, and there was nothing he could have done to stop that from happening.

Well, he’d tried, at least. He did the only thing he could think of at the time when he realized she was about to confess her feelings to him. Feelings he’d more than reciprocated. Words he would have given everything to hear come out of her mouth. But he couldn’t let her say them. Because he didn’t deserve it. He wasn’t worthy of her heart, not with the way he’d gotten her to open up, trust him, fall in love with him.

So, he kissed her. Stopping the words on her tongue was the only thing his lizard brain could think to do. But once his lips met hers, words didn’t matter. Because everything she hadn’t said…he felt through their joined lips.

“Idiot!” he screamed into the night sky as he ran into the woods. He looked up, thankful for the thick blanket of clouds that covered the night sky.

Would he ever forget Lucy’s empty, distant stare as he left her? Her trembling chin? The way her arms hung limp at her sides, her shoulders drooped and her back rounded? Probably not. And he was glad for that because he deserved to feel all the pain she felt—tenfold.

A loud sound rumbled from behind him just as a flash of light shot in front.

What the…

He continued running, hoping he was faster than the vehicle—a four-wheeler, if his quick glance was accurate—that roared in the distance. This wasn’t happening again, was it? He’d been so careful, but maybe someone had figured it out—that he was a werewolf—and he was being chased out of town just like before.

The roar of the engine got louder and louder with each passing second. He couldn’t afford to stop and see what was going on, his knuckles already sporting thick tufts of hair. But for the first time in his life, he wished the transformation would come sooner rather than later so his human legs could get a break, and his werewolf legs could quickly carry him to the safety of the dense woods.

“Eric!” a voice pierced the air, loud enough for him to hear over the engine. But it wasn’t just any voice. No, he would know that voice anywhere.

“Stop!” Lucy shouted. But he couldn’t obey her command. He had to keep running. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw her silhouette through the headlights, her body bouncing high off the seat with each bump she hit. And she was quickly gaining ground.

“Stay away, Lucy!” he bellowed back, his voice deep and menacing, which was good because the transformation was happening, and he’d get to the woods in no time. But if it happened before he lost Lucy…

“Aaaaaaaah!”

The engine stopped, and when he turned around, he noticed the empty seat on the vehicle.

Time moved in slow motion. Only the sound of his heartbeat and rapid breathing filled his ears. And then he took off, back in the direction he’d come, because leaving Lucy wasn’t an option. What he was going to do from there, he didn’t have a freaking clue. He just knew he needed to act fast, for her sake and for his. And, in turn, for her sake again.

“Lucy!” he shouted with a roar so loud it echoed through the dense forest.

“Over here.”

His heart cracked down the middle from the pained groan with which she’d responded. But she sounded close. And lying in the thick grass about two feet from the vehicle, he found her.

“Oh, Lucy.” He crouched beside her, moving his hands over her body as he checked for obvious signs of trauma. Fighting against the clock, he tried to find what was hurting her. If he identified it fast enough, he could fix her before he put her in harm’s way. And judging from the speed at which his heart knocked around in his ribcage and the scorching heat raging in his body, he was running out of time. The speed of the clouds moving across the sky only added to the urgency. “Tell me what hurts.”

“Here,” she said, bringing a hand to her chest. Oh, geez—this was way worse than he thought. He covered her hand with one of his own as he thought how best to handle the situation. Broken bones were one thing, but an internal injury was something he’d never attempted to heal before. Not to say that he couldn’t, but his mind was buzzing too much with the urgency to both help Lucy and get a move-on to think about what this kind of injury would require of him.

He’d just gotten an idea when he felt her other hand come around and grab his wrist. With a jerk of her shoulders and some leverage with a leg strategically placed between his, she had him on his back faster than he could blink. But also…where had the rope come from?

“Did…did you just hogtie me?”he asked between gasps for air as he fought to regain the air she’d knocked from his lungs.

“I never mentioned I grew up on a pig farm?”

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