Page 62 of Way of the Wolf

I would have liked to learn whatever she had to saybeforethe hunt. Might she be a resource who knew what had prompted Augustus to turn into an asshole?

But, after tossing her clothes on the hood of my truck, Jasmine stepped away.

My phone vibrated in my pocket. I almost ignored it, but I’d been waiting for a text from Bolin, and it was his name that popped up on the screen, the message slipping in on the one bar of cell signal.

Uhm, I lost the case, Luna. A big burly guy with some magic about him jumped out at me when I got to the apartments. He beat me up and stole it. I’m at the ER getting stitches.

I stared in horror, distressed that Bolin had been hurt—from the description, the aggressor could have been another werewolf—and dismayed that he’d lost the case. Even though it had never been mine, I’d hoped… Well, I didn’t know. That it could help me with the pack, I guess.

When I dialed Bolin to apologize for the attack and make sure he would be all right, the signal wasn’t strong enough for the call to go through. I tried texting, but the phone informed me that the message couldn’t be sent. I bared my teeth at the screen.

Augustus, in his wolf form, padded past. I glared, more determined than ever to get answers from him.

A few feet away, Jasmine threw her head back, a lupine howl coming from her throat as the change took her. Other werewolves who’d already turned also threw their heads back and howled at the sky.

The clouds parted enough to allow a silver beam of light through. It gleamed on the hoods of vehicles and in the eyes of the wolves.

A surge of power swept through me, the moon magic demanding that I change, demanding I let the wolf come forth to hunt. The magic was so intense that I barely got my phone put away and my clothes off before the change took me.

Soon, I stood on all fours in the driveway. My mother and the big white wolf led the way into the woods, and the pack fanned out behind them.

More howls serenaded the night. The hunt had begun.

21

As a wolf,my instincts drove me, and my human memories and concerns grew hazy. I forgot about Duncan’s betrayal, the stolen case, and the treachery of my cousin, and loped through the forest with the pack, moonlight brightening the way. As a wolf inhaling the night’s scents and hearing every sound in the forest around us, all I could think about was the joy of the hunt and the overriding desire to find game.

And find it, we did. We swept into the foothills of the mountains, with dense evergreens rising around us and a river cutting through the forest, its roar drawing us. We came upon elk bedded down for the night and startled them into flight. With so many wolves, we were unmatchable. We were the supreme predators of the land, and we took down our prey and ate our fill.

I caught a dark-gray wolf—Augustus—watching me and remembered to be wary of him, but when he tilted his head back to howl his satisfaction at the successful kill, I did the same. We all did. The night sang to us, demanding we acknowledge the magic that nature had granted us.

After finishing the elk, the pack took a circuitous routethrough their territory, checking for intruders and enjoying the magic of the moon. We loped easily along the riverbanks, some pausing to lap up the cool refreshing water. Our powerful muscles carried us over boulders and down inclines as the waterway grew frothy. It headed downhill and gained width and depth as streams flowed into it.

A hint of a musky scent rose over the damp vegetation growing along the river. A moose had come this way. It was a rare find in this part of the state, and joy filled me at the contemplation of battling such strong prey.

Half the pack splashed through the river to run on the other side, seeking the moose’s trail there. Guided by instincts that believed it had remained on the closer side, I stayed there, following the waterway downstream. Soon, though, the terrain grew more difficult to navigate, the riverbanks turning into steep canyon walls.

The scent of game propelled us onward, led by?—

My step faltered as I realized Augustus was leading me now. My mother and the white wolf had crossed to the other side. I glimpsed them in the foliage over there, but the river had grown too wide and treacherous to follow them over. Jasmine and Emilio had ended up over there too. None of the wolves who’d been friendly to me were on this side, but some more of my cousins were.

My hackles rose with the certainty that trouble was coming. Oh, it was possible this was all accidental, that we would simply hunt together and nothing would happen, but I doubted it. My lupine instincts had been so preoccupied by the hunt that I’d allowed myself to be singled out, to be surrounded by werewolves who’d already tried to kill me.

Ahead, the moonlight shone on a railroad trestle bridge that crossed high over the river. There. That was my chance to get to the other side, to where the rest of the family hunted.

Hoping to gain the lead so my cousins couldn’t mess with me, I pumped my legs, bounding along the rocky rim of a canyon. The river roared through it far below, much wider and faster than it had been miles upstream.

The moonlight brightening the bridge showed wide railroad ties that offered sturdy purchase, but, as I ran out on it, I couldn’t help but glance down at the frothing water visible below.Farbelow.

A questioning howl came from the forest on the other side. It was my mother’s voice, and it sounded like she’d traveled away from the river. Or… beenledaway from the river? It might have been my imagination, but I thought I caught a hint of concern in her howl.

I parted my jaws, intending to send an answering call so she would know where I was, but two huge wolves trotted onto the trestle from the far side. Paws on the wooden ties, they sank low, setting themselves as their eyes bored into me.

My gut twisted, and I slowed down. They were there to block me—or worse.

When I glanced back, the dark-gray wolf that was Augustus padded onto the bridge from the other side. Another cousin came up beside him, the wolf with the black-tipped tail who’d helped attack Duncan.

Damn it. They’d led me to this. I’d walked into their trap.

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