Minutes of torture dragged on, but still Gentry refused to cry out. He wouldn’t give Wolf the satisfaction, and the last thing he needed was for Blaire to come out and investigate a strange noise. He hadn’t made it far enough away from the house and was breaking apart in the snow just on the edge of the back porch light.
Those minutes felt like an eternity, but at long last, the pain subsided, and Wolf lay panting and whole on a layer of ice. His fur kept him warm from the stiff wind, and he could smell everything, see everything, hear everything. Blaire was singing a bluesy song about a man falling from everything to nothing. She didn’t sound unhappy, though, despite the song choice. Pretty voice. She would make a good she-wolf. Pretty howl. Too bad his bite wouldn’t turn her. Only ten percent survived the bite, and most of them were men. His bite would poison her for three days until she passed away in a slow death that would turn any witness’s hair gray.
He wasn’t supposed to kiss her for a reason. Werewolves liked to bite when they fucked. The instinct had been there tonight, overwhelming almost. All it would take was one hard kiss, a bleeding lip just deep enough, and he would be the death of her. Fragile humans. Easily poisoned. Easily killed.
He couldn’t be the death of her.
Wolf stood and shook snow from his coarse, gray coat.
He wouldn’t hurt her. The woods blurred by as he loped through the thick trees and brush. He couldn’t hurt her. She was his to protect from the Bone-Ripper Pack. At least for a week. He wouldn’t bite her too hard. He would be gentle with her always if it meant he could keep her.
We can’t keep her, Wolf. The human side of him was Logic.
But Wolf was Instinct. Wolf was Want and Desire. Fuck you, Logic.
He huffed a wolf laugh as the human side tried to Change back. It was a wave of nausea and then nothing. Logic thought he was in control, but he wasn’t. Wolf only let him think that so he could function normally around the humans and blend in. Dumb fuck thought he was going to put Blaire in the friend-zone tomorrow. Hell no.
Wolf was going to hunt her down a present, and tomorrow he would fuck her proper. Get her attached to him. Make her crave him. Get her to love him and stick around. He’d wanted a mate for two years, and Logic had denied him. Logic had run from every woman, thinking they would settle him. He’d run from everyone and everything he’d ever known. He’d made them be rogues, but maybe Wolf didn’t want to be a rogue anymore. Maybe he didn’t want to be on the outside. Maybe he wanted everything. War, blood, pack, Blaire, pups from Blaire.
She won’t make you pups, Wolf. She can’t.
Wolf yipped to drown out the voice of his human side.
Wolf wouldn’t let Logic run from Blaire. Perhaps he would hunt her ex and bleed him slowly so she wouldn’t look sad anymore when she talked about him. She wasn’t invisible. She was vibrant and beautiful and funny and everything good that Wolf wasn’t. She would wash his soul clean. She would make him forget all the wolves he killed, all the bad things he’d done.
She would make him forget how much his heart hurt when he thought about Dad, Roman, and Asher.
Wolf was dark inside, always had been, but Blaire was bright and chased away the shadows. She made him want to breed and settle. She made him want to defend her and protect her and make her happy. She made him want to take care of someone other than himself, fight more efficiently, and claim territory.
Blaire Hayward—fragile human beauty—made him want to be a better werewolf.
Chapter Six
Blaire held the comforter clutched to her chest as she listened to another long wolf howl rising. Rising like the sun on the eastern horizon, rising like the fine hairs all over her body.
She’d had no idea wolves lived in this area, but the terrifying predator had lifted his voice for the first time five minutes ago, and Blaire was still frozen in fear, even safe and warm inside the cabin.
It sounded so close.
It was probably just the mountains making the voice carry and sound much closer than it was. And see? There, it stopped now. The monster was probably on its way back to its den miles and miles and miles away to sleep for the day. She hoped. Blaire knew embarrassingly little about wolves.
As the minutes dragged on and the animal didn’t sing again, a wave of potent relief washed through her. Sure, the sound had been beautiful, and a part of her felt lucky. How many people could say they’d heard a wild wolf howl? But animals with sharp teeth and hunting instincts scared her.
Blowing out a sigh to expel the rest of her tension, Blaire rolled out of bed and padded to the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee. But when she reached the main living area, a horrifying scratching sound shook the front door.
Blaire yelped and bolted the rest of the way to the kitchen, grabbed the biggest knife out of the block, and held it toward the door with shaking hands as another scratch rattled the door. It sounded like a dog clawing to get in, but in her heart, she just knew it was the wolf that had been making all that noise.
She was being hunted.
Her cell phone was in the bedroom on the charger. Maybe she should call the police, or animal control. Gentry would’ve been her first choice, but she didn’t have his number, and she sure as heck wasn’t opening a window to yell at his cabin. She didn’t want to get her face eaten off by a freaking wolf!
She stood there petrified except for her shaking hands clutching the butcher knife. Her legs wouldn’t move because in her illogical fear-filled mind, if she moved, the wolf would sense her in here like some heat-seeking dinosaur, break through the front window, and devour her.