Page 1 of Rogue Wolf

CHAPTER 1

Tamaska

The Blood Opal was everything.

If Tamaska kept telling herself that, then the rest of it wouldn’t matter. Not the blood that had been split the night the vampires attacked…an attack that burned raw in her mind, and not Kodiak and Shota’s fight to the death for the alpha position.

Kodiak had won, but at what cost?

She shivered as questions and thoughts tangled in her mind.

Because no matter how progressive Kodiak might be, so much was lost. Shota. Olcan. That horrible, bloody fight. Was that all this world had to offer now? Death and bloodshed?

And what about her? What were her options? She could turn into the thing she hated or the thing she still feared. She’d chosen to become a shifter, for Kodiak, the man she loved, but even that…that might kill her.

Yet what could she do? Not become a bloodsucker. She hated the vampires who had killed her best friend, who’d marked her; stolen the opal.

And deep down, while she could accept what Kodiak was, a wolf shifter, she still feared canines. His offer of turning her, something she’d accepted, could she do it? Really? Was it worth the risk?

She’d said yes and she did mean it. But underneath turmoil ruled.

So she clung to the mystery of the Blood Opal, their mission in finding it and unraveling whatever importance it might hold.

“Just keep it together,” she muttered as she scrubbed the brush back and forth on the carpet, its bristles stained red with blood.

She dipped the brush into the hydrogen peroxide laced water, the stench one of death and crime, half hidden by the searing bite of the cleaner.

If only she could erase the memory of that bloody night from her mind as quickly as she could erase blood stains from the floor. She’d give her brain a good scrub and then get on with life.

Instead, her life had been shattered and its pieces scattered, some of them never to be found again. She’d entered an entirely new world, one full of beasts she’d always thought were only myths made up to scare children. More than that, she was about to become a monster herself.

Either way, that’s what she would become. A shifter, she told herself for the millionth time, was preferable to a vampire any day.

“You don’t have to do this,” Ash said. The pretty female shifter cleaned nearby, moving a red-stained cloth up and down the meeting room wall at the back of the wolves’ clubhouse.

“I do,” Tamaska replied, her elbow aching from scrubbing.

“You look exhausted,” Ash said.

Eyes dry from a lack of sleep, she dipped the brush into the bucket of cold, chemical-filled liquid. The water turned red so quickly, it needed to be replaced again.

“So do you. And I have to help.” Tamaska doubled her efforts on a stubborn spot.

“No, you don’t. This is pack business.” Ash’s jeans and shirt were stained from hours of washing every inch of the clubhouse. And she looked like Tamaska felt; tired, drawn, like she’d visited hell along with everyone else.

No, she needed to help with clean-up. If she was going to be part of the pack, then she’d pull her weight.

Even if she wasn’t about to join the pack, about to be turned, she still needed to pitch in. Wolf shifters had already been killed protecting her against the vampires. She owed these people her life. Not just Kodiak, but all of them.

Her heart squeezed at the thought of his name.

“It’s the least I can do.” Tamaska slammed the brush into the carpet and, pressing down hard, she scrubbed.

She rinsed the brush and continued, determined to show the others she could do it. Each time she scrubbed, she removed more blood. After so long, though, it felt like with each cleaned patch, another would appear. She felt like Lady McBeth.

There was so much blood to clean up in the main building. How long would that take? The pack needed to regroup before the vampires came for her again. And so long as she was marked, they would.

There has to be an easier way.

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