Hot Springs Werewolf Complete Series (BBW Werewolf Erotic Romance) (28 page)

I stood there on the grass, the sun shining down on me and the smell of the fire and smoke being gently pushed aside by the pure breeze from the forest. I was balanced on a tightrope and no matter if I went forward or back, I still risked plummeting to my death.

A minute and a minute and a minute and a minute and I may have stood there all day but-

A sudden pull.

And pain.

Fishhooks in every cell, the line to each one held by an unseen hand that had tugged.

I toppled over, my face hitting the cool grass and tried to breathe but all that came out was the keening of an injured animal. The pain receded and then pulled again, worse than before.

It was Red.

In pain.

In Hot Springs.

There was one more pull that made me cry out and I nearly changed right then so I could run away but I managed to stop myself. I couldn't go into that darkness and come out a week later hundreds of miles away.

The pull and pain vanished and I managed to get to my feet, tasting a metallic tang in my mouth. I'd bitten my lip without realizing it and now all I could taste was the iron of my own blood.

Red needed me.

He was in pain and no matter what future we had (or didn't have together) I couldn't leave him to suffer.

I turned and began walking to the road so I could hitchhike into Hot Springs. With every step, I studiously ignored the thought that was whispering to me.

Maybe it wasn't just Red who needed so desperately.

*

"T
hank you so much!"

I smiled as the Knopf's (Michael and Heather) waved at me and drove away. I could have shifted and run to town but then I would have had the whole naked problem to deal with. Lacking any other transport options I hitchhiked, having the good fortune to be picked up by another lovely couple on their way to visit their family. In the short trip I learned about their children, their grandchildren, how long they'd been retired and how long they were staying. I tried to keep up but twice in the trip I'd been struck silent as a feeling hit me, like all my cells were clenching at once for just an instant. The first time felt like a hiccup, the second was far stronger. A new variety of the connection to Red. We'd made it to town and I had them drop me off near Greasy Manna, me waving back at them as though everything really was fine.

They turned the corner and I felt the tug again. I knew, without knowing how I knew, that it was Red. He was shifting and each time he did, I felt it. A line from Big Blue's diary came to me:
her pain is my pain, my pain is her pain
. I thought he was being metaphorical but maybe not.

I looked across the road and saw Katy through the window. I'd left my phone (and everything else) behind me and my only hope was that they had actually gotten together by now and she had a way to contact Fen. Otherwise I'd be walking around town looking for werewolves. I walked across the road and entered Greasy Manna, the bell above the door jingling.

"Harper! Are you okay?"

Katy rushed over and hugged me without waiting for my answer. I hadn't seen her since I'd shifted. With my new senses she was practically glowing with health. I could smell her scent, like honey and mixed with that I could smell something else.
Someone
else.

Fen.

At first she was hugging me but then I hugged her back and I felt some pain inside me wisp away. I'd ignored how I felt about leaving Greasy Manna and my new friends, avoiding layering pain atop pain but now I was here I couldn't ignore it any longer. It had nearly killed me to go.

Finally we broke apart and I saw Katy was crying, tears glistening in the corners of her perfect eyes. I was about to hug her again, to comfort her when she punched me, right in the breast. She was a tiny girl but she swung that fist like a lumberjack.

"Ow! Not in the boob!"

"You don't leave and not tell people where you are!"

A few customers looked across at us. Me standing shocked, holding my sore breast and her, angry and looking like a furious pixie.

"I'm sorry! There were complications..."

She sniffed at my excuse, narrowed her eyes and then gently slapped me on the cheek and smiled at me.

"Only because you're cute."

I grabbed her by the arm and pulled her into the staff change room. There were customers waiting but this was important. As we walked back, I realized I'd let her punch me - I'd seen the movement coming and let it happen anyway.

"I need to talk to Fen. Red's in trouble. Can you call him?"

Katy didn't argue or pretend she hadn't been with Fen last night. She rushed to her locker, retrieved her phone and called him, telling him to come to Greasy Manna.

"Done. They're only a minute away. Anything else?"

I went to open my mouth to thank her when my cells clenched and I nearly doubled over.

"What's happening?"

I stood up, gulping air.

"Not feeling good. Stomach upset."

She narrowed her eyes at me.

"Fen has been
upset
. Is it the same thing you're upset about?"

I nodded, not knowing how much she knew. Red had told me he was a werewolf almost immediately because I was from a family of them. Had Fen told Katy? Before I could say more, her phone buzzed a message.

"They're across the road. Come with me."

Katy took me by the arm and led me back out into the diner. She grabbed a burger that was intended for a customer, put it in a bag with a bottle of lemonade and made me take it as I left.

Clutching the bag in my hands, I crossed the road to where Fen and Jake were waiting. Fen didn't greet me but leapt straight in.

"Have you seen Red?"

"I was going to ask you the same question."

They knew about the fire, having just come from there. They told me the fire brigade was there now, putting it out but nothing was left. As Fen was finishing up telling me about it, there came another clench, sharp and sudden and I groaned. It was gone in a flash and I stood up and saw Fen and Jake exchange a look.

"Where's Red, Harper? Which direction?"

"I don't know. Something's wrong. I can feel this pull. It hurts."

"It's Red. You're connected. If you close your eyes, you might be able to feel where he is. We have to hurry though."

He took the food and I closed my eyes, taking in a breath. I could smell Jake and Fen (Fen overlaid with honey scent from Katy). I could also smell the burger, the paper bag, the lemonade bottle, the road, a few car fumes. I breathed them in and then let them go, ignoring them.

As I did, I felt like a light appeared in my mind. A direction and a distance. It was like being a wolf again and I knew precisely where home was. This time I felt Red was across town, maybe only a few miles from the Finch mansion.

"He's near the mansion."

"We'll take you."

We got into the truck, the two of them squeezing together and me sitting on the side. As we drove off and I gulped down the food, Fen kept talking.

"Freyr has issued a Call. It's tomorrow night, in the grounds of the Mayor's mansion. You know it? Do you know what a Call is?"

I did know both the location and what a Call was. Thanks to Big Blue's diary. A formal summons from one pack to another so a challenge could be held. Issues sorted. Families slaughtered. The Toulouse pack had issued a call to the Finchs. Only Millie and my grandfathered hadn't attended and so they were the only ones who survived.

"I know where that is and the Call."

"We need Red. He's Alpha. But he has gone Wild."

I could feel the capital letter thudding into place on it. Not wild like an animal undomesticated. Wild. Something else entirely. Like Big Blue.

"What does that mean?"

Jake cleared his throat and I blinked in surprise. I'd never heard him speak before.

"He has turned into a mindless wild beast. This morning he destroyed a Toulouse business and then two of their properties. If we can't capture him then they might kill him. Or we might have to, if he doesn't come back."

"If he doesn't come back?"

Jake looked at me and I saw sorrow in his eyes.

"Sometimes when a wolf goes wild, the person they were is gone forever. We need you to help us find him Harper. He needs you."

I looked away, tears prickling the corners of my eyes and ate my burger and drank the lemonade as we drove across town, sitting in silence.

Red had gone wild and although neither of them had said it, I could feel the rest of the sentence hovering in the air. He went wild
because of you
. He went wild
because you left.
He went wild
because he thought you were killed
.

A Call from Freyr. He was looking to repeat history. Red had told me there were many Toulouses. On the night of the challenge when he had broken Marcus' arm I counted about fifty werewolves in the Guile pack. They would be outnumbered. I had to tell them but I didn't want to dig into the past right now.

"What if it's a trap? The Toulouse pack planning to kill you all."

"But it's forbidden." Fen. Jake had lapsed back into silence.

"Just humor me. Pretend that tomorrow night they plan to murder the Guile pack."

"Not possible," Fen said, his sentences getting shorter. I saw him clenching his hands on the wheel, this thick fingers digging in. Then I noticed Jake was breathing heavily, frowning, his eyes speckling with gold.

"What is it? I thought you knew they were underhanded murdering cowards?"

"There is an accord," Fen said between gritted teeth. "We abide by it - all packs do and it gives us peace. We can fight, and do, but it is formal. Packs sneak around it but to do so is dishonorable. If the Toulouse pack violated the Call, it would be over for them."

"What do you mean over?"

He turned to me, his eyes glowing gold.

"They'll be killed. Every single one of them. Packs will come from across the country to do it. They'll be wiped out, down to the last child."

We continued driving in silence and now I had a new weight on me. If I revealed Millie's diary, together with what remained of the papers to the pack, the Toulouses might be destroyed entirely. Freyr Toulouse I'd barely met but I understood he was behind it all. Edward Toulouse was no great loss to the world but when Eadie had bitten his hand off, my anger at him had sort of gone with it.

But what could I do? Red was wild, crazed and attacking the Toulouses. Soon the packs would meet and the Guile pack had to attend. And they would be killed. I was sure of it.

I could delay it perhaps, get the proof out and then packs would descend from all over the country to exterminate the Toulouses. Down to the last child Fen had said...

Even as I thought it and took pleasure in imagining Edward Toulouse ended, I knew I could never do it. I was a werewolf and I would defend myself and those I loved with deadly force if necessary but I couldn't reveal the truth and have all those people die. No matter how many of them were outright evil.

Then another clench came, stronger than before, pulling and hurting and I was gone.

*

G
rass again, cool against my body. I opened my eyes and found myself naked in a backyard. I stood up, singing the alphabet to myself to push back the wrongness and saw a piece of glass fall out of my hair. I picked it up. Safety glass, like the kind they install on truck side windows. Like the kind you might smash through if you shifted into a wolf inside a truck and then leapt out.

Oh, what was happening to me? Had I really done that? Shifted and smashed out the window to run away?

I sniffed the air but I couldn't smell Fen or Jake. Just grass, trees and freshly washed clothes hanging on a line. I could feel the house was empty.

I crept over to the clothes and helped myself to a dress. Slipping it over my head, I then moved down the side of the house and walked out the front gate, barefoot and looking around for any sign of Red.

As I made my way down the street I noticed it was later in the afternoon. Maybe I'd been a wolf for a few hours. But why hadn't I found Red in that time?

I could still feel I was close to the edge of town and the Finch mansion. Had I just been sleeping in a backyard the whole afternoon?

A twinge, weaker than before but in a definite direction. I turned a corner and headed towards Red. Or the beast he'd become.

As I walked through the edge of suburbia I kept looking around me, searching for any sign of Red. A footprint, a tuft of hair - anything. But there was no sign. I breathed in deeply, sniffing the air, trying to catch his scent but all I could smell was grass, flowers, sidewalk and houses.

Then I heard a howl. A wolf, calling to the sky. But it was no ordinary wolf. It was Red.

I picked up my pace, leaving the houses behind me and entering a run-down area near an electrical substation. On the far side of it the houses built up again but here in the middle it was isolated. If I got in trouble, I wouldn't be able to find help easily.

"Red?"

I called out his name, unsure whether I should be doing so. What if he was some crazed thing? Better I know and then sneak away to find Fen and Jake.

I walked around the substation, feeling the soft grass and weeds under my feet. There was a mesh fence running around it that had seen better days. Parts of it were rusted and sagging. As I continued on, I came across a gaping hole in it.

Red had come through here.

I crept through the hole, feeling the world closing in on me. Now if I had to run, there was possibly only one exit. All around me were warning signs and I was scared I'd brush up against something and get electrocuted.

I crept past a large box that was plastered in warning signs and then gasped at the beast in front of me.

It was Red - but not. It was like he'd stopped halfway between wolf and man. He stood taller, nearly seven feet, wild bestial face with glowing golden eyes. His hands ended in sharpened claws and his body was covered in dark fur. Muscles stood out in stark relief. He was all sinew and muscle and wild fury.

I remembered Fen's warning but I couldn't leave Red to be attacked or killed. I had to save him.