Page 5 of Wolf's Providence

“Doc!” Fear gripped me as I clutched his arm. “What the hell is happening? I’m still… Oh my God, am I still human?” Because there was no way on God’s green earth that I should be looking at my life-threatening wounds of one week ago and now seeing they were almost healed completely. “Cannon?” I looked up at the alpha, who was also studying my wounds with a frown. “Did I become something else?”

“You’re still human,” he assured me with a quick smile.

Doc covered me gently. “Definitely still human,” he confirmed. “Caleb’s blood didn’t change that. It’s just… Well, it’s just his blood didsomething,and I’m not quite sure what.”

“He forced his blood into me, not knowing if it would heal me?” I asked as my mind reeled, struggling to process the enormity of what they were saying.

“An act of desperation,” Cannon murmured, and I couldn’t tell if he meant to say it out loud.

“He only wanted to save you,” Doc confirmed with a sharp look at his alpha.

“Has this been done before?” I asked them both.

“Yes,” Cannon spoke clearly. “And failed every time. We don’t know why it would work on you when it’s never worked before.” He saw my look, and the corner of his mouth hooked up slyly. “You think our ancestors haven’t experimented?” he asked me. “How do you think we know so much about ourselves? Only the Goddess gives us the magic to heal quicker and heal completely through the shift.”

“Only two full-blooded shifters can make full shifters,” Doc reminded me, and I heard the resigned bitterness in his voice.

“Is Caleb in danger?” They both looked confused by the question. “Is there some, I dunno, pack law that prohibits him from doing this?”

“There will be consequences,” Cannon told me sagely. “But his actions and behavior were heading that way anyway.”

“Where is he?” I’d really tried not to ask after the first time when I’d been met with such suffocating silence I hadn’t asked again. “Do you have him? Is he here?”

“He’s gone, Willow.” Doc looked at me with sympathy. “He left after…after he thought you were dead.”

I felt my eyes widen as I looked at him incredulously. “He thinks I’mdead?”

“He didn’t stick around to find out,” Cannon growled, his eyes flashing with anger.

“We need to find him!” I tried to sit up but flinched with pain. “Why am I so sore if I’m practically healed?” I demanded of Doc.

“Because your body is in conflict with itself,” he told me, but I saw his hesitancy.

“You have no idea, do you?”

Doc shook his head. “I don’t,” he admitted. “Not fully. The fact you’re alive at all, I can’t even explain that. But Isawit. I witnessed it with my own eyes. Your body started to heal, the skin knitted together and then it just stopped as suddenly as it started.”

“And now?” I heard the tremor in my voice, and I knew I was going to freak out.

“Now, I think your mind is trying to catch up.” He shared a look with Cannon. “The damage that was done is almost healed, but it’s like your brain never got the memo, so it’s still processing the pain you would have felt, not realizing that you’re healing has bypassed it.”

My chest felt tight. The weight of it all, and Caleb thinking I was dead, was too much. “I don’t think I can handle this,” I told them both. “It’s too much.”

“It is a lot,” Cannon agreed. “I’ve reached out to the shaman. Hopefully, he’ll know more.”

My attention was on Doc, whose head was down. “I’m a medical marvel?” I tried to joke—God knows why, none of it was funny.

He looked up and offered a weak smile. “You understand why Lily can’t stay?”

Because my near-death experience had been fast-forwarded several months to almost being right as rain? Yeah, I got it.

“Tell her I got an infection,” I repeated what I said earlier. “Tell her I must be quarantined. Open wounds and things, theyfreak her out. It’s why she’s so good at leaving when you check the bandages.” Leaning my head back on the pillow, I closed my eyes. “Use lots of medical terms. She’s not stupid, but it’ll remind her you’re the professional.”

“The fact you protect our secret is appreciated by us all,” Cannon told me as he stood, and I saw he meant it. “Don’t underestimate the gratitude we have to you for that.”

“There’s no need,” I murmured, embarrassed. “It’s never been my secret to tell.” My body itched. “The itching?” I asked Doc, eager to change the subject. “It’s his blood, isn’t it?”

He nodded slowly. “I think so. But…I don’t really know.”

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