Chapter Three

June

My head buzzed. I felt sick, and I couldn't remember where I was. Around me there was some shuffling. A whimper, a snarl. My head had throbbed even as I'd been fading in and out, but the volume was too much to ignore now.

"She bit me!" A man's voice startled me. "Deal with it."

That voice. I had heard it right before . . .

I gasped, opening my eyes.

Now I remembered.

It was dark, and there were never-ending trees in the open air around me. Wild plants and unruly bushes told me this wasn't the trimmed and landscaped arboretum. I felt around for my phone and pepper spray, but everything was gone.

They were going to kill me. This was where I would die. Me and that naked girl and that guy on the ground.

Pain shot up my arm from a tender part of my forearm as I adjusted my position. The sleeve of my hoodie had been rolled up to give the wound some air. My eyes widened as I realized: that was no woman, it was some kind of wild thing with teeth.

"She's up," someone said.

The blanket I was lying on smelled like my grandad's attic, and it was itchy, but at least it was keeping the sticks from poking me. The men who had taken me had managed to find shirts to wear and the woman-thing was now in a long, knit dress that was a couple of sizes too big for her, but at least she was covered. My head throbbed again. These assholes had let me fall asleep after head trauma.

Everyone, save the two who were on the ground grunting and moaning, was staring at me. From left to right was the big guy I'd locked eyes with right before getting kicked in the skull. Huge, tan, with a short haircut and sharp jawline. Then there was a short one who looked like he had been through boot camp or something, as the way he held himself was militant. Then there was the gangly young one with messy cornsilk hair, and one on the end who was prodding the campfire with a branch and frowning at it before looking up at me.

I had nothing at my disposal. No phone, not even my lanyard and keys. My heart sank. The first guy stood slowly, then took a couple of steps toward me.

As I sat up straight, the pain in my arm stung, bringing surprised tears to my eyes. I scrambled backwards and gripped the bite on my arm.

"Stay back," I hissed, pushing my legs in front of me and managing to do nothing but stir up last year's fallen leaves and twigs, entangling them in the blanket.

The man stopped, raising his hands palms out. "I'm not going to hurt you, but you'd benefit from listening to me for a minute."

"I'm not listening to my kidnapper," I snapped, and kicked back some more until my back was to a tree.

"She's got you there, Dom," the young blond one said. The one poking the fire laughed, then tried to cover it up as a cough.

Dom. He made me nervous; he was a big guy to begin with, and if that muscle definition meant anything, he was an athlete or at least a gym rat.

"Okay, then, does anyone look less scary to you? They can explain it instead."

It wasn't much of a choice. I wasn't going with buzz cut, the young blond one reminded me of a gangly puppy with too much energy, and he'd probably botch the job. The one poking the fire seemed moody.

"I don't want to hear what any of you have to say," I said, my voice shaking. "I want to go back home." And I want to call the cops .

"You're in a position you don't know you're in yet, but you're going to need our help," Dom said. "You barged in on us, and while I know what it probably looked like, that wasn't it. We're taking these two somewhere safe to heal."

I glanced quickly at the grunting, pained figures on the ground and then back up at Dom. I couldn't possibly have read the situation wrong, could I?

"How do I know you're telling the truth?"

"You don't." He shrugged. "But you will when the shift starts. Or you can try to ask one of these two, if you can get them to talk at all."

The man on the ground made a choking sound then spit out a wad of clotted blood. I gasped and snapped my eyes back to Dom in concern. "Yeah, that's about how they've been all day. The warlock said it was only supposed to last nine hours," he muttered.

I was breathing hard, trying to stop myself from hyperventilating. I clutched at my chest and pulled my arms and legs in tight to my body.

"Hey, now, relax," Dom said, putting his hands up in front of him, keeping soothing tones. "In through the nose, out through the mouth."

I took in a deep, shaky breath and managed to let it out slowly. Then another. Then I was ready to talk. "Okay, okay." I breathed.

"You've been bitten."

"Obviously."

"No, you've been bitten by a werewolf," he said.

If I had been in any mood for humor, I would have laughed. "A werewolf?"

"And on the next full moon—which is what, three weeks away?—your body will try to shift. If it can't shift completely, it will try the next full moon and you'll get a little closer. If it doesn't happen then, you'll go through the shift the next moon, and the next, until you either shift or . . ."

This sounded crazy, but he looked dead serious. If he had a psychosis, or a mental illness or something, it might be dangerous to argue with him. But then I realized the other three watching this whole exchange didn't seem phased.

Seriously? A werewolf? This was all a bad dream and I wasn't just abducted by a bunch of guys who legitimately thought werewolves were real. They had to be on drugs, maybe something recreational gone terribly wrong. Or a cult, what if they were from a bizarre cult? This was it, I was going to end up on a true crime podcast.

And yet, that woman's face wasn't human . "What happens if I don't turn into a wolf?" I asked. "You said I either shift, or . . ."

"You shift or you die trying."

My breath caught in my throat. I was telling myself in my head that what I was hearing wasn't possible. It wasn't, but the serious faces around me and the things I'd seen so far were seriously creeping me out.

I glanced down at the woman on the ground, snarling and curling her legs up to her abdomen. She was in pain, and she was furious. And in the back of my mind, I replayed the bite. Her face certainly wasn't human, but would I call it wolfish? Whatever it was, she was back to normal now. And the men around us, they had the eeriest look in their eyes. The light kept playing tricks on me, giving them yellow, animalistic stares.

"So." I took a cautious breath, wrapping my arms around myself and trying to ignore the throbbing in my head and my arm. "I was bitten by a werewolf. Let's say that's true, can't I go home and deal with it on my own?"

"There is no going back." Dom's eyes held something like sympathy. "And there are beings out there who want you dead because of what you will become."

That was a terrifying thought. I pushed it away. I needed to deal with one problem at a time. "My roommate will be freaking out right now because I didn't come home. I always come home, and I was supposed to bring back food."

Dom turned, studying the expressions of the others. He ran his hand over his short hair again, something he must do when he's frustrated.

"I'm not out here trying to be the bad guy. I've done a lot of shit in my time, but right now I'm taking you to a safe community where you can live through this painful process. You can decide what to do after you're okay. Leave, go back home, I don't care. But I'll be damned if I let a human go and expose us like this. We have a bad enough rap with the other creatures out there, I'm not about to add to it with you."

"You'll let me go home if I go to your community first?" I asked.

"Yes, after that I won't stop you."

Good. This was good, provided his "community" wasn't a bunch of cultists who were going to eat me or something.

"She's still not convinced, Dom," Buzzcut said.

"Who wants to shift?" Dom asked.

"I'll do it."

Young, blond, and full of energy stood from the ground and began to strip.

"Whoa, whoa." I covered my eyes with my arms, ignoring the stinging arm with the bite in it.

Fingertips brushed the skin on my wrist. It was Dom. He had rough calluses on his hands, but he was soft when he touched my arm and directed it away from my face.

"No, you need to see this."

Even with my arms no longer covering my face, I still had my eyes closed. He couldn't make me look at Magic Mike over there. Or at least, I didn't think he could until I started hearing the strange sounds.

Pop and snap . I shivered and cringed hard. It sounded just like my leg had at my very last track meet when I'd messed it up. I subconsciously gripped my thigh with my good hand. I watched in horror as a human body shifted into something else.

Bones moved under the skin, reshaping and fusing where they didn't belong. I instantly regretted my medical classes as the names of muscles and bones ran through my brain as I saw them move around. His skin grew fur. The face elongated. A giant gray wolf stood before me, his yellow eyes peering into mine.

I didn't register that I was screaming until Dom's hand flew over my mouth. "Calm down, it's only Carson."

I took a sharp, quick breath. I took many sharp, quick, panicked breaths. The nails in my hand dug into the skin on my thigh. I tried to calm myself down using the breathing exercises from my therapist. I tried to keep my eyes closed as I did it, but the moment my breathing was even a little bit under control, I opened them again.

The wolf sat there, watching me. He cocked his head to one side. At one point he tried to inch forward on his belly, but Dom held out a hand and the wolf stopped.

I was grateful, even though I was in no state to show it yet. It bought me time to calm down. Finally, Dom called Carson off.

"That's enough," he said calmly. The wolf stood to shake out his fur, then reversed the process. I went numb at the sounds of the body shifting unnaturally, and I kept my eyes shut tight this time.

"It's okay, he's dressed," Dom told me.

Carson was back in human skin with a pair of shorts on. I sighed and my shoulders dropped some of the stress I had been holding. I shook out my head and tried to relax the rest of my body. Then I looked down at my arm.

The wound had been cleaned of blood at some point, but I could see the larger indents where fangs had torn at my skin. Carson was a wolf. She was a wolf. Were they all wolves? And if so, why were two of them sick?

"Where are we?"

"The woods. Western Montana," Dom answered.

My heart nearly shot into my throat. "Montana? How long was I out? Where is this community of yours?"

"You can call it the village for now. That's what we sometimes call it. And it's in Newfoundland."

"Canada." I felt weak, like I was going to pass out. A feeling that was quickly accompanied by my growling stomach.

"Aaron, rations," Dom ordered.

Buzzcut, I mean Aaron, reached behind him, rustled in some bags, and tossed over an entire bag of potato chips and a stick of beef jerky. Dom caught them with ease, and handed them to me.

"Here, eat," he said. I kind of shifted where I sat.

"I need to pee first," I muttered.

He jerked his head in another direction, deeper into the woods. "Feel free."

I was surprised at that one. "You don't think I'm going to run away?"

"We would hear you leaving and have no problem catching you," he answered. "Besides, where would you go? We're in the middle of nowhere."

He had a point.

I stood and went as far as I felt comfortable without worrying about getting lost on my way back. The images of Carson turning into a wolf roiled around my head as I allowed myself an internal freak-out. No one would believe me if I told them what had happened.

I returned and ate my bag of chips and jerky, and didn't speak for the rest of the night. The four men were quiet as well. In the end, the only sounds were the crackling of the fire and the sounds of pain from the man and woman on the ground.

"Get some sleep," Dom announced. No one questioned him. He must have been some kind of leader to them. I was tired and stressed, so I was happy to lay back down on my blanket. I didn't know how much sleep I would get, but at least my body could relax.

Wolves.

It was impossible to absorb.

And if what Dom said was right, I was going to be one of them.