Page 35 of Wolf's Fate

The bus was going to the same destination, sort of. It was just taking a more scenic route, and my stop wasn’t the last stop on its journey, which was fine. As my pulse slowed, the panic that had gripped me mere moments before began to feel distant. I began to think that my behavior hadn’t been rational, and now safe and warm on the bus, I felt a little foolish. The guy probably hadn’t even noticed me—I mean, why would he? I’d probably misread the whole incident.

Almost as if in a daze, I reached into my backpack and pulled out my notepad, dropping it open on my lap. A quick search and I found a blunt pencil, and without thinking too much about it, I started to draw. The lines were rough at first, but with each sure stroke, the tension I’d been holding onto started to fade. Shapes began to form, and slowly those lines began to take a life of their own.

Broad shoulders sat atop a bulky torso, heavy with muscle, slowly taking shape on the page. The posture was rigid, and the set of his shoulders was stiff, but there was something familiar in the way he held himself. A wide chest and long armshanging at his side, it wasn’t until I started adding the facial details that I knew who I was drawing.

The man from the platform.

His eyes stared at me from the paper, as they had at the station. My pencil hovered uncertainly over the drawing as I noticed details about him that I had missed before. His eyes were hard, unblinking, and completely emotionless. His square face was hard angles and planes, not softened by his crew cut. His button-down shirt was pulled tight under his lightweight jacket, which I wasn’t sure he needed if I was correct in guessing what type of man he was.

His arms, which I had thought were simply at ease at his side, I now saw were taut with tension, his hands curled, almost as if he was fighting the urge to clench them. His stance was wide, feet apart as if he were braced for something, grounding himself in anticipation, as though he was ready to spring into action at any moment. As I looked at him, I knew I wouldn’t have outrun him.

But had I outsmarted him in my desperate bid to flee?

A shiver slithered down my spine as I held his stare, fear once more knotting in my belly. Not wanting to look at him any longer, I closed the notepad and my eyes, willing myself to forget.

It would be better when I got to the others. I repeated the thought over and over, trying to convince myself it was true. Once I was with them, I would be safe. I needed to sever this tie to Caleb and his world—his secrets and the dangers that surrounded it. Maybe then, just maybe, I would be of no interest to any shifter.

My life could return to normal once more.

Normal. The word felt as foreign to me asshifterhad only a few weeks ago. But normal was all I had left to cling to. This sense of danger and unease all the time wasn’t for me.

I liked safe. I liked routine. My life had always been built around simple, almost predictable patterns. I needed stability. I liked things that made sense. Which I felt was probably the very opposite of a shifter’s existence. For the hundredth time, I wondered why the hell it wasmewho was tied to someone as unpredictable as Caleb.

He was everything that I wasn’t. A drifter, whereas I liked a place to call home. I wasn’t built for this kind of life. This excitement and worry weren’t for me, and I knew my ME would let me know about it sooner than I was ready.

Yet, here I was, on a bus with the wrong ticket, unable to let go.

With a sigh, I rested my head back on the seat, willing myself to rest so I was ready for the next step. I still had a mountain to climb. Literally. With a groan, I pressed the heel of my hands into my eyes, trying to chase the remainder away. Caleb wouldn’t be there this time to carry me.

Caleb.

Always Caleb.

No matter how much I ignored it, no matter how many sketchbook pages I covered, the pull between us felt so real that I wasn’t sure if I wanted to cut it, even if I could.

I did know one thing. If therewasa Luna…I hoped she heard me as I thought about what a sick and twisted sense of humor she had.

One other thing I would tell her…she could take her amusement and shove it up her ass.

TWELVE

Willow

The bus journeywasn’t as long as I thought it was. When Caleb and I traveled in Lily’s truck, it felt like we werealwaysin the car. But then, at the time, I wasn’t taking into consideration the fact that Caleb had taken detours from his destination and then double-backed on himself.

We’d had the whole wolf-in-the-road incident, and as I journeyed on the bus, I thought about that. How naive had I been? He’d told me that he saw a program where alpha wolves were dominant and you needed to stare them down. It had sounded plausible.

Had it?

No. It had sounded like he was batshit, but had I challenged him? No. Why? Because the alternative for an explanation of what to do when in a face-off with a wolf is notI’m a shifter and can communicate with them.

No one wasevergoing to come to that conclusion naturally. So maybe I needn’t be so harsh on myself for believing it.

Maybe.

I flipped idly through my notebook, reviewing the sketches and drawings that I had done since getting on the bus. The man from the platform was featured in detail on two pages, but there were other images and snippets of scenes that made no sense to me.

There was nothing of Caleb, and I found myself flipping back further until I found a simple sketch I’d done of him where he was shirtless, jeans hanging low, and feet bare. He was looking to the south, and I wondered what held his attention so often, as it was a familiar pose for him to be looking in that direction.