Page 50 of Ravaged Wolf
I’m looking for something to get into to keep my hands busy when Nia arrives with Rosie in tow, wielding a soda, the red kind, but without a cherry on the can. Rosie’s wearing her pup, and the pup is peeking out of his sling at me with sober interest.
“He’s working on the old peeps home,” Nia announces, slapping the soda can into my hand.
“The elder cottage,” Rosie corrects. “We’re building a dorm for the elders so they have a place to go if the den floods again.”
“If? More like when,” Nia mutters. Rosie and her pup both frown at her. Nia is unapologetic. “I’ll take you there,” she says. “This is so exciting! I knew today would be the day.”
“I didn’t,” it’s my turn to mutter.
“Oh, come here,” Rosie says and draws me into a hug. I have to stick my butt out and bend so I don’t squish the little alpha heir who’s still watching me with the sober consideration of a grown dominant male. It’s his father’s expression, and it’s really funny on a baby’s face.
Rosie pushes me back and smiles, her eyes misting. “Go get ’em,” she says.
I try to smile back, but I don’t think I quite manage it. The baby’s brow furrows.
“Well, no time like the present!” Nia chirps and grabs my hand. “Let’s go rip the Band-Aid all the way off.”
Nia is a force of nature. She plows through the busy cavern, and as if they’re not even conscious of it, her packmates shift out of her way or pause to let her through. Everyone except Pritchard. He catches sight of her from where he’s lazing as his wolf by the big fire, rises, shakes himself off, and pads after us at a distance.
I am so curious to know what the deal is between them, but I don’t feel comfortable enough with her yet to ask. I think we’re getting there, though. Like we could become friends, real friends, not just females who form an alliance to protect our rank, like my friendship was with Brynn and Teagan.
I guess I could have made real friends back then, too, if I’d been braver and surer of myself. But then, I wouldn’t have been Izzy Owens. Some people are born brave, or they’re raised to be. I was born cautious and raised to be well-behaved, and that’s a different thing.
I follow Nia out of the den and down one of the paths leading into the woods, and my stomach knots and my heart thumps like I’m breaking the rules. I’ve got that dread. My skin has that tight, prickly feeling. I’m stepping out of line.
I hold the soda tight. My sweaty palms and the condensation on the can are a slippery combination. Every few yards, Nia shoots me an encouraging smile, and I grimace back. It’s the best I can do.
Oh, shit. What am I going to say?
I’ve tried so many times to script out the conversation in my head, but I can’t get past, “I brought you this.”
It’ll come to me, though. It has to. Right?
My heart pumps faster, my steps slow, and Nia has towait for me to catch up at a fork in the trail. “Not much farther,” she says.
All the blood drains from my head to my feet. My ears whoosh. Every nerve in my body is on high alert. Pritchard’s wolf steps on a branch a few yards behind us, and my pulse shoots straight up like the puck in the strongman game at the carnival. Ding.
Nia grabs my hand and squeezes. “You’re not alone.”
I nod. Clearly not. Pritchard is back there freaking me out.
Nia leads me the last few yards, down a side path, and into a clearing with the skeleton of a cottage. Only half the frame is standing. Trevor is kneeling on one knee in the center of the wood floor, nailing down the subfloor.
He’s not wearing a shirt.
If I had breath in my lungs, he’d steal it. He’s perfect. The swell of his biceps, a shade paler than his tanned forearms. The light catching on the blonder strands of his hair like sun dappling the bark of a tree. He glances up, his blue-gray eyes instantly storming.
My stomach clenches. My wolf trots forward, ears perking.
He slowly rises to his feet, his hammer hanging at his side.
I swallow, and nothing works. My mouth is bone dry, and my throat sticks. Nia digs her elbow into my side. I look over, blinking. She bugs her eyes emphatically at the soda in my hand.
Yes. Okay. Right. I know my first line.
She slowly backs away as I hold up the can and make myself say, “I brought you this.”
His gaze focuses on the soda. His brow wrinkles. I see the exact moment he remembers that night, and then the dawning horror as he remembers theothernight. Everymuscle in his body stiffens. The corners of his eyes crinkle in pain. He looks like I punched him in the face. No, like I plunged a knife into his gut. That’s not what I wanted.
