Page 16 of Fighting Furry

“Wow,” I said, absentmindedly running my pointer finger over his thigh. He didn't seem to notice, so I didn't stop. “So werewolves and harpies exist, any other supernatural creatures?”

“Uh-huh,” he said, his voice a bit gruff. He looked down pointedly at his lap and I realized I was caressing his crotch. Were his cheeks actually red?

“Is that bothering you?”

He growled, gripped my wrist, and dropped my hand back in my lap. “You are never allowed to have sugar again.”

“You don't like my hands on you?” I asked in a mock-hurt voice. I knew he liked my hands on him, I'd felt indisputable proof of that.

“When your hands are on me next time, I don't want you to be able to blame it on the sugar.”

“Like that'll ever happen,” I said, my happy high vanishing like a rabbit from a hat. Mm mm, rabbit. Somehow, my stomach rumbled with hunger again. And for rabbit? There must have been some good stuff in that sugar, like LSD. I glanced out the window as Axel veered off an exit ramp. We were leaving the city? Why were we leaving the city? Sick dread curled in my gut. What did I even really know about Axel? Nothing good. “Where are you taking me?”

“Somewhere you can be free,” Axel said, all calm-like.

Somewhere I could be free? Wasn't that serial killer talk for dead? “You're going to kill me, aren't you?”

He glanced over at me, but he was frowning. Had I figured it out? Oh, my god, I didn't want to die. I was too young and buff to die. I had my whole fucking life in front of me. My skin itched and that nervous energy from earlier returned one hundred times stronger.

“Julie? Calm down.”

“I'll do whatever you want, just don't kill me.”

His eyebrows quirked up. “Whatever I want?”

A lone tear slipped from my left eye. This was it. This was the way I was going to die.

“Shit, Julie, I'm just kidding.” His gaze bobbed from the road to me and back again. He looked sort of like a bobble head. I giggled.

“You look like a bobble head,” I said.

“Oh, good. Happy Julie is back.”

He didn't sound happy about that and he should sound happy about that. I was delightful. He must really hate me if he couldn't see how delightful I was. He'd probably do just about anything to get rid to me, including driving to an abandoned field behind an abandoned supermarket. My dread returned a hundred-fold as we passed the deserted store. He was really going to kill me. “I need to get out of here,” I said, my breath caught in my throat.

“Just calm down, okay. I'm not going to hurt you. If you were sober you'd realize that.”

“No,” I said. “I just need to…Just let me out of here.”

My body shivered and I felt my jaw start to change. Axel looked over. “Damn it. Do not shift in this car. Do you understand me? Do. Not. Shift. In. This. car.”

He was using that alpha voice again, but it only made me more determined to escape. I didn't fight the change. Being a wolf would make me stronger and…Oh, crap. I'd forgotten to unbuckle my seat belt before I shifted. I was bigger as a wolf, so big my clothes had just torn off, but the seatbelt was tight and pressed right against my throat. I couldn't breathe. I was going to die. Killed by a seatbelt. How fucking embarrassing.

Human Julie probably could have reasoned that she was unlikely to die by seatbelt, but wolf Julie was a tad more highly strung.

The car door opened and Axel was there, hands in the air. “I'm not going to hurt you, I'm just going to unbuckle your seatbelt.” He reached in and pushed the button and I was free. I leapt from the car and squared off against him, except I couldn't remember why I needed to fight him. My mind felt clear and rational. This was Axel. If he'd wanted to kill me, he could have done it twenty times over already.

He just stood there, hands in the air. “Are you sober now, Julie?”

I nodded.

“Do you think you could change back to human?”

“Naked,” I yipped.

He grunted and pulled his shirt over his head in that way hot guys do, by gripping it behind his neck and pulling up. Even as a wolf, I found him unreasonably sexy.

He threw the shirt at my wolfy feet and spun to face the car. “Shift and put that on.”

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