Page 95 of Wolf's Chance

I didn’t know if I could speak, caught so fast between anger and sorrow. My voice was gone. My throat was so dry, the words lodged deep somewhere inside me. I didn’t know if I could keep my anger at bay—anger at what she had drawn, anger at her for seeing this part of my past, anger at it all. When I finally spoke, the brokenness that I carried within me seeped through as my eyes stung with unshed tears. “How could you know? How could you know that it would hurt?”

Willow moved closer, no doubt wanting to give me comfort, but I moved away, needing the space between us. I knew that I wasn’t angry at her, not really. She had no idea what these drawings were or what they meant to me. Or the pain that was unleashed when I looked at them. She didn’t know, but it didn’t make the pain any less.

“This is what I’ve been running from,” I admitted, the confession surprising even me. “These drawings,everythingthat they represent, I thought I’d left it behind.”

She reached for one of the discarded sketchbooks, her eyes taking in the scene, her finger tracing the image of a fallen wolf. “I don’t think you can leave something like this behind,” she murmured.

Resting my head against the bed, I tilted my head upwards to stare at the ceiling. I didn’t want to see what lay before me anymore. “It’s like you’ve been made to draw this as punishment,” I whispered, my voice hoarse.

“Punishment?”

“For leaving,” I confessed. “For walking away. But these…” I looked back at the drawings, gesturing weakly to the memories confronting me. “These are the past reaching for me, ready to pull me back in.”

Willow looked between the drawings and me, her forehead forming that one single frown line that told me so much. “Maybe…” She bit the bottom corner of her lip. “Maybe it’s about reminding you that you’re stronger now. Maybe you’re being shown that you’re ready to face this…” She cleared her throat. “Whatever this is.”

My snort was loud in the hushed quiet of the room, the words hanging between us, and I could see that she clearly believed them, but the fear I felt when I looked at those sketches, that fear didn’t make me strong.

It only reminded me of how weak I had been.

But the memories that had surfaced had done more than just remind me of the past, they had opened a door I’d shut behind me years ago. Now, it seemed that the only way to ever truly put the past behind me was to either step through that door or slam it shut and never look back.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” I said, more to myself than to Willow.

She leaned forward and placed a hand on the floor near mine, careful not to touch me but close enough that I could feel her presence. “You don’t have to do it alone,” she whispered. “I’m here. I think…I think we’re in this together no matter what.” She moved her hand closer to mine, almost touching. “You’re not alone.”

Looking at her, her green eyes filled with sympathy, her face one of concern, I could feel the emotion from her like it was my own. Willow’s hand lifted to push back her hair that had fallen forward, but my fingers reached it first. The soft, silky strands felt so delicate between my fingers as I gently tucked them behind her ear.

She watched me, eyes wide but cautious, trying to read my thoughts. I moved back, breaking the connection as I got to my feet.

Willow’s gaze followed me. I could see her uncertainty, and I could almost hear the unasked questions on her lips, but I couldn’t stay in this room a moment longer. Too many emotions battled within me, threatening to pull me apart or pull me under.

“I need air,” I muttered, the words more for me than for her. My voice was still unsteady, my heart still felt like it was ready to punch through my chest, and I turned away from her, uncomfortable with how much she’d already seen. The need to escape, to put as much distance as I could between the memories and her, was suddenly overwhelming even though I knew that wasn’t fair to Willow at all.

Reaching the door, with one hand braced against thedoorframe to stop me from bolting from the room, I could feel her eyes on my back. I didn’t look over my shoulder, but I steadied my breathing and tried to quell the emotion within me. “I’m not leaving,” I told her quietly. “I just need air.”

I didn’t wait for her response, walking quickly along the hall of the bunker, the cream walls silent as I passed. Jogging up the few steps that took me outside, I gasped with relief when the cold morning air greeted me. Walking a few steps away from the entrance, I relished the chance to catch my breath.

Without thinking about it, I shed my clothing, my form changing quickly from man to wolf. I needed to break free from it all, and the only way to escape was to run.

I wasn’t runningfromher or running away; I just needed a chance to regroup. A respite from the sorrow that surrounded me, and a chance to clear my head before I had to face it all again.

As my wolf raced across the bleak mountain, the cold wind whipped through my fur, and I let myself be free. The rhythmic pounding of my paws against the earth was liberating. Being in my wolf form helped me reconnect with myself, and the memories of pain and fear that I had buried deep down inside, while jumbled, were faced as I ran.

The peak stretched around me, the terrain hard and challenging, a reminder of the challenges I’d faced and no doubt the ones to come. With every stride, the weight lifted from my shoulders, the burden of the past a little lighter as my path seemed to be clearer.

For the first time in a long time, I felt something I thought I’d forgotten.

I felt hope.

TWENTY-SIX

Willow

I stayedon the floor long after Caleb had left the room. I wasn’t sure I had the strength needed to stand. The charge of emotion that had spilled out into this room didn’t disappear when Caleb did.

I’d seen him react to my paintings and sketches before—a flicker of recognition, a tightness in his jaw, the clench of his fists—but this time was different. The moment he had looked at the first drawing, something inside him had broken. When he saw the next one, he hadn’tjustbeen silent, he had been ruined as the air around him became thick with emotions I didn’t think he’d let surface in years.

All I had been able to do was sit there and watch him as his eyes traced lines of pencil that depicted scenes I could never have known, yet I’d drawn them with surprising accuracy. Scenes that I now knew belonged to him—someone who had lived through the things that I had conjured from…somewhere.

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