Page 1 of Call Don't Fall

Chapter One

Chasten

CALL DON’T FALL

CALL DON’T FALL

CALL DON’T FALL

Who did the yellow sign above my bed want me to call? It wasn’t like I could fall any further than I already had. I was flat on my back with thick IVs shoved into my veins. The bed was lumpy, and the sheets made an annoying ‘eek-eek’ every time I wiggled around.

CALL DON’T FALL

CALL DON’T FALL

CALL DON’T FALL

“Hello?” I decided to call out to my captors.

Maybe I was abducted by aliens.

Maybe it was organ harvesters.

Was there still a market for such things?

“Hello,” I called out again.

CALL DON’T FALL

CALL DON’T FALL

CALL DON’T FALL

I couldn't look away from the stupid yellow sign on the white ceiling. Somewhere close by, everything in the universe beeped. It made a little song: No newbie, no newbie, no newbie.

Maybe it was aliens after all. Aliens would make sense, right? Seriously, aliens. It had to be aliens. Had I been here before? Something was vaguely familiar. Where in the name ofFrost’s frozen balls was my wolf? Furry guy was never quiet for this long. I poked at him, trying to yank his tail inside his inner sanctum. But he didn't answer me. Maybe the aliens sucked him out through one of the IVs they had stuck in me. I didn't think he could fit out one of those tubes, but who knew what alien technology could do?

I've been at the Fall Festival on Hemlock Mountain. With a few friends, I stood outside that giant pumpkin waiting for them to light up the torch thing inside and make it a Jack O’ Lantern. They were never gonna let me live this down. Wait though. Wait a Frost damned minute! Where were my friends?

“Treg? Grina?” I called out their names, but no one came.

So much for CALL DON’T FALL.

I could call all I wanted but no one was going to show up before I fell.

“Oh! You’re awake,” called a gruff voice from beyond the curtain.

Curtain? Where had that come from? I hadn’t noticed the white starry pattern on the yellow background before. Aliens would definitely explain all the strange crap. Only the gruff-voiced man didn’t sound like an alien. Out of habit, I sniffed, trying to discern whether Mr. Gruff was a wolf like me or some other sort of shifter. Frozen Frost, maybe he was a vampire. That would explain all the damn needles and tube shoved into my veins.

I couldn’t smell him.

No.

Scratch that.

He had no smell.

Zero scent.

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