Page 18 of Isabel and the Werewolf Beast

Now she appeared angry. What had I done?

“You’ll have to walk back to the front door, it’s the only one that opens… well, it’s the only one that opens for me.”

I glanced at the back of the castle. Nestled at the top of three brief steps was a wooden door. I made my way over to it and tried the doorknob. At first, I thought it might be locked, but the knob turned, and the door creaked open as though the hinges hadn’t been used for a long time and needed oil. Isabel’s soft gasp filled the night air and my ears. Would she gasp like that in bed?

When I was in this half-animal form, it produced my most basic desire. Food and sex. I’d always curbed them until now, but Isabel tempted me to throw my caution aside and climb on top of her like the beast I was. She was the reason I needed to get away from her.

The reason I shouldn’t stay outside with her.

For if I did, would my desire overcome me the way my rage had inside the castle?

I wouldn’t risk hurting her. Doing something I’d regret. If she needed me to find a way out of this curse, then the best place to look was inside her library. Yet leaving her alone felt like the wrong thing to do.

Chapter nine

Isabel

The werewolf was so annoying, yet his constant questions sparked my mind into action. I sat on the edge of the fountain and ran my hand through the water above his coin. What would he have wished for? Escape surely. It was what I’d wish for. I’d been excited to show him the castle grounds and then he’d changed his mind and returned to the castle.

I hoped he stayed well away from the ballroom. The fact his footprints dotted along the hallway downstairs said he’d come close to the room. What would I have done if he’d come inside? The other vampires would have attacked him. Ripped him to shreds and left hima bloody mess of blood and bones. I no longer wanted to see him dead.

And if his brother returned with Silas and an end to this curse and found his brother dead, then what?

No. I had to keep him alive.

Which meant I had to keep him happy too. I wandered back to the front of the castle, up the stairs, and inside to the library. A pile of books sat next to Dante while one was open on his lap. He didn’t glance up.

“You either read fast, or I sat outside for a long time.”

This time he looked at me. His brows furrowed in his furred face.

“You appear even more see-through than last time.”

I held my hand in front of my face, not surprised to find he was right. For a long time, I’d wondered if I was fading away and if one day I’d fade away to nothing.

“Are you certain?”

“Yes.” He rose and walked toward me, his long legs eating the distance in no time.

I stepped backward and held up my hand. He scowled but stopped. I might want to keep him happy here, but I couldn’t have him touch me.

“I get it. I’m an ugly monster.” He flung the book in his hand onto the chair.

It bounced off the seat and thudded to the floor with a jolting, reverberating sound that echoed in the quiet confines of the room.

“Is that temper yours or the werewolf’s?”

He tugged at the fur on his arms. The frustration, the anger, was clear in every tiny twitch he made. “What do you think?”

“The werewolf.”

His small outbursts reminded me of a newly made vampire. No one had ever taught him how to harness hisnew strength. To suppress the overwhelming urges that came with being supernatural. Powerful.

I swiped a hand over my face, but my fingers met icy air as though my body wasn’t there. Usually, I could at least touch myself in this state, but now I couldn’t. My stomach churned. Would his brother return? Or would I disappear before he made it back? Would Dante and everyone in the ballroom still be stuck here without me or would the curse end with my demise?

He inched forward. Stalking like the predator he was.

“Dante, stop.”

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