Page 1 of Depraved
1
ELENA
My life is… over,I tell myself as my heart clangs dully and painfully against my ribs—like there’s a heavy iron bell inside my chest that’s tolling a funeral knell.
I stare at the dilapidated ruins of the Lobo pack house. Smoke chokes me, searing my lungs, while I scan the wreckage of the massive cabin, eyes darting frantically, even though the charred black mess that used to be a building screams that there’s no hope.
My Jonah is gone.
I can’t believe I’m even thinking that because I just saw him a few minutes ago. He was just there, standing next to me. I have two simultaneous, polar opposite thoughts:I wish I hadn’t run out,andI wish I’d brought him with me.
A crater forms inside of me as an entire part of my soul caves in from the invisible impact of Jonah’s death. It strikes like a meteor full of cold, cruel, rock-hard reality.
The two-story log cabin has collapsed on one side, and the entire building is leaning, crooked, like an old man relying on a cane—the porch posts groaning under the extra weight. There’s an eerie creaking noise slithering from the pack house, and I don’t want to know what it is, though my pounding pulse instinctively whispers that the building is about to tumble down.
My mind flits to the shifters trapped inside, and my gut twists. I hope death was instantaneous for them. I hope they aren’t trapped in there, suffering. As the building groans again, I realize that I might lose my chance. If it crumbles, I won’t be able to retrieve Jonah’s body. That thought alone makes my knees quake.
Not before I find Jonah,I glance up at the moon goddess and snarl. Then I bolt forward, sliding on dead leaves from last season, the soles of my shoes growing hot whenever I crack open a burning ember with a molten core. I make an unwilling, completely unspiritual walk across fire, eyes searching through the flecks of ash for my mate—my best friend.
My wolf cries inside my head, a plaintive howl erupting as she paces back and forth in front of my vision, her avatar-like figure in midair in front of me. Her black fur is bristled, her white-speckled jaw tense as she tries to sniff out Jonah’s icy-mint scent, but the smoke is too much, and we both choke on the thickened air.
“Elena!” Black runs in front of me, his tone carrying the weight of an alpha’s command. He says my name but the way he says it yells,Stop!
My knees lock up, and I glare at him as he glances back at me. At nearly seven feet tall, I should find the pack alpha intimidating. My wolf certainly does. Her tail tucks down at his shout, and even though she’s only a figure in my head right now and he can’t see her, her shoulders hunch. But I square my own and glare up at the Jason Momoa-knockoff who marked me as his mate without my permission. He doesn’t cow me with his furrowed eyebrows. His long curly dark hair and beard may make him look like a biker who’d kill you as soon as look at you, but I know better. Black is an arrogant bastard, but he isn’t a beast … most of the time.
And if he tries to keep me from my mate right now, he’ll see just how feral a bitch I can become.
“Don’t get any closer.” Black’s voice is gruff, but there’s an underlying tremble as he crouches to examine a charred log.
I furrow my brow in confusion. Why is he wasting time—a sick feeling smacks at me like a flyswatter as my eyes blink to see through the billowing columns of smoke as I realize that Black’s not in front of a log. He’s in front of a body.
My hand flies up to my mouth, and I fight the urge to gag because that’s useless omega shit right there, and I will not succumb to it.You want to be a nurse, Elena, then prove it.I goad myself into taking that first step closer and I’m both surprised and disappointed by how much my body wants to rebel and fly backward, to dive into the bushes and clench my eyes shut, chanting, “This is just a dream.”
But I can’t. I take a second step and another, snarling at the part of myself that wants to hide and deny this awful reality. When I reach Black, I rest my hand on his shoulder, the massive shoulders that carry the weight of our entire pack.
I peer down at the man who’s lying face down, brown hair singed and covered in flecks of ash and rivulets of blood. I can’t tell who it is. I just silently observe as Black’s fingers extend toward the man, almost touching a jacket that looks melted. He pulls his fingers back at the last second and whispers, “Pluto.”
My heart immediately aches for him. I know Pluto was his best friend—is his best friend, I mentally correct when I see Pluto’s back rise and fall shallowly. He’s not dead. Somehow, he’s still breathing. And I’m not sure if I’m happy or horrified for him, but I hope like fuck he’s unconscious.
I try to think back to what I’ve learned in school, but we haven’t done a burn care rotation yet and I feel sorely inept. I feel like my hands are tied and I’m utterly, painfully useless.
I grab my phone, thinking I can search online for an answer about burn treatment … if I can get any signal out here in the Colorado wilderness. The pack house is at a remote location so that our pack can shift and hunt. Even if I do get a signal, I might not be able to find enough information. Or I might not be able to get supplies since most of them probably went up with the pack house. Or the emergency response team might not be able to get here in time to save him. That thought slides down my spine and leaves a chill as the moon rises above me.
I punch the Internet app on my phone anyway, cursing at it to load, just as the body spread in front of my feet stretches and morphs … shifting into a wolf.
Shifters are hard to kill, I know that much, even though I’m a relatively new addition to the Lobo pack and still learning the ropes. But as I stare down at the wolf twitching and slowly healing before my eyes, watching Pluto’s body recover from what I thought was something beyond repair, I’m overcome by shock.
“Thank fuck.” Black gets the words out before I can. My chest is still too busy decompressing from the metallic vice-grip of fear. I forget looking at the app, because now—now I have hope. My eyes start searching the soot-covered ground again.
If Pluto can shift … maybe he can survive this. If Pluto can survive … my eyes scan the bushes, thoughts immediately flying back to my mate. The sweet blond-haired beta that I bit and marked. Jonah. Where is he? Could he have survived too?
Black yanks his phone out roughly and dials, holding the slim device up to his ear as he stands and turns, eyes glaring as if his gaze alone can punch through the smoke for interfering with whatever he’s looking for.
His line connects and I listen, my throat going dry from swallowing ash and tension as my eyes search the ground for a sign that someone other than Pluto made it outside.
“Come on, just a footprint. I just need a footprint,” I whisper softly to the moon goddess as I take a step away from Black to search for Jonah. A footprint itself doesn’t guarantee it’s Jonah’s but then … then at least I have something to cling to.
And right now, I need that. I chew my lip before finding that it tastes like soot. I have to use the inside of my shirt to scrub my tongue and clean out my mouth. But a little bit of moonlight cuts through the dark billowing smoke right in front of me. That’s when I see the shoe. It’s blackened so much that I can’t differentiate between shoe and sock. The body it’s connected to is behind a bush but I immediately know it’s him. I just know. I rush forward, my heart clanging wildly, so loud that my ears pound painfully. My fingers tingle in anticipatory dread.
