Page 27 of Isabel and the Werewolf Beast

I glanced at where she was staring at the broken vase on the floor in tiny pieces of blue and white porcelain.

“Sorry about that. When the plants in the maze hurt you, I carried you back here, but you turned into a damn ghost.”

“Which doesn’t explain the broken Ming vase.” She folded her arms over her chest and glared at me.

“I was a little angry I couldn’t help you.”

“Oh,” she whispered, the heat and anger disappearing from her voice.

“The rage took over for a moment.” I pointed at the vase. “I didn’t mean to break things, it just kind of happened without conscious thought, but then I figured out how to get you back outside, so I could tend to your wounds.”

“Yes, you dragged a rare Turkish rug outside into the dirt after letting me bleed all over it. Thank you.”

I rolled my shoulders. The rage was building in me again. Why did Isabel infuriate me so much? Make my emotions so volatile that I couldn’t control them.

“I could have left you there to die.” I pointed at the floor. To the spot I’d watched her bleed endlessly and been helpless to help her inside the castle.

“Maybe my death will end this damn curse.”

“Don’t think like that. There are many books I haven’t read yet. One of them might have the answer.”

“I doubt my books will have the answers we seek,” she said still scowling.

I growled, the sound rumbling from my chest and from my throat.

Why were we back to fighting? I’d thought we were on our way to becoming friends.

She marched up the staircase. I followed on her heels. If there was a killer raven in her bedroom, then I’d stop it. She stomped, and even though she glided in her incorporeal form, I saw the way her limbs moved in anger, along the hallway until she paused at a closed door.

“Nemisis used to be my pet, so don’t hurt her.”

I blew out a long breath. There went my plan to pluck the feathered fiend. Is that why she was so upset now she was back in the castle? She was worried about her pet. I wanted to hug her and tell her everything would be all right, but she’d pass right through me in the castle. I’d have to save the hugs for in the castle grounds.

“A pet. So you do love something.”

What would it take to make her love me? Where had that thought come from? Love wasn’t an emotion I was familiar with. I’d never had love once in my life. I yearned to appreciate what the emotion was like. Was it like the way I read in books? All-encompassing? Consuming and exciting?

“I love a lot of things,” she said. “You ruined a couple of them.”

I chuckled. I’d known she’d be mad at me for breaking her precious items.

“Don’t ruin my pet.”

She pointed her dainty finger at my furred chest and I hungered to press her hand against me. To have her run those fingers over my body.

I cleared my throat and asked, “How do you suppose I should stop a killer raven without killing it?”

“If I knew that, I would have done it already.”

“Is it like the plants in the maze? Will it poison me?”

“No. Raven’s aren’t poisonous. Yews are.”

“You planted a poisonous hedge on purpose?”

She never ceased to amaze me with her knowledge. Her beauty was one thing, but her mind was another.The complete package of everything I’d ever desired in my life.

“Of course.”

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