Laurel flinched. “Excuse me?”
“A werewolf.” I paused, watching the shock roll off her like heat waves above hot asphalt. “She and Dad left because she was pregnant with me, but you already knew that.”
“How—who told you this?” Anger flashed through her eyes, and I sensed her alarm. Defensiveness. Fear. Shock.
“I had my suspicions, but then I found a letter that my dad had written to you. Did you know about me?”
“I don’t understand.” Laurel had stopped breathing, and her eyes turned glassy. “Did something happen to you?”
Her confusion mixed with anxiety, making a heady aroma that burned my nostrils. But it was the underlying hint of affirmation that made me sick to my stomach. She’d known all along.
“Happen to me? No, I was born this way. But my family was too disgusted by what I was, so my parents fled and lied to me my whole life. You’re just as guilty as they were for keeping this from me.”
Laurel’s face had turned pale. “Born this way?”
Her voice rang with the horror of a truth she knew but couldn’t accept.
I slowly extended my claws as I held back tears. “Born. A. Werewolf. Except I didn’t turn into one until I came here to Magic Side.”
For an infinite moment, Laurel stared at my hands in shock. Then she bolted to her feet and pushed back the chair as she staggered away. “How? This isn’t possible.”
“I’m not sure I understand your question. My mom was a werewolf, and I’m a werewolf. I grow fangs and fur and run on four legs.”
And eat rabbits and bacon, my wolf added, snickering.
With her eyes wide and unfocused, my aunt began to quake and clutched the wall for support. “It’s not possible…we bound your wolf. It shouldn’t be possible…”
My head spun as I took in her words. “Bound my wolf?”
Laurel looked at my claws in terror and then wrung her hands. “It’s okay. It will be okay. We can do it again. Your mother and father aren’t here, but I can teach Pete and Casey.”
Oh, my God.
The world around me twisted and warped like it had been demented by a carnival mirror.
She did this to me? And my parents helped?
Laurel approached tentatively. “Don’t worry, Savannah. I can fix this—”
I bolted out of my seat and maneuvered to the far side of the room. “What do you mean, fix this?”
She pressed her hands to her mouth. “You must be so scared. But don’t worry, I can make it go away.”
My wolf surged in my chest, and my fangs sprang out. Traitorous bitch! She’d bind me again?
Confusion and desperation spun in my mind as I tried to maintain control of my wolf.
She could make it go away.
At first, all I had wanted was to make it go away. When I’d thought I was a werewolf because Billy or Kahanov had infected me. But this was different.
I was born a wolf. Wolfborn. And Wolfie was a part of me now.
A part that I hadn’t wanted. But in that moment, staring down my aunt, I knew I couldn’t give her up. That I’d never give her up.
You’d better not! Wolfie growled, still raging and fighting for release.
I backed away from my aunt, who’d betrayed me, who’d lied to me, who’d help tear out a part of my soul.
“Savannah,” she said, reaching out. “Don’t be afraid. I can help.”
My wolf tore at me from within, and hair burst along my arms.
“I don’t want your help!” I snarled in a feral voice that made my aunt’s eyes go wide. “I want to know why you lied to me! Why you did this—why my parents did this!”
Laurel paused and looked at me with terror and confusion. “To protect you. Your parents and I bound your wolf with a spell to keep that half of you a secret. We wanted you to lead a normal life.”
“A normal life?” I scoffed. “Never knowing who I was or what I was capable of? A life without magic? A life with only half a soul? Did you hate what I was that much?”
Betrayal sank its bloody fangs into me, and a sob lodged in my throat.
“None of us ever hated you.” Laurel’s eyes brimmed with sorrow and determination.
“Not my grandfather?”
She froze, and I could sense her panic. “He wasn’t the reason.”
“Then what was?” I growled. “What was so important that you took that half from me without ever telling me the truth?”
My skin itched and tingled, and I could sense a shift coming on.
“You were born just after Dragan died—”
Horror took me as the room spun. I cried in pain as the shift began—as who I was began to melt away into something else.
Dragan. Had they worried I was going to be like him? A monster? Was that the truth?
Were they right?
I howled and charged for the door of the drawing room, but Laurel flicked her hand, and it slammed closed.
“You can’t leave, Savannah. It’s not safe. I can help turn you back.”
“I don’t want to turn back!” I screamed. “I want to be who I am!”
I hadn’t fully shifted yet, and I struggled for control. I needed hands to get out of this damned house.
Someone pounded on the door and started shouting. Casey? Panic seized my mind. If he came in and found me as a wolf, would he shoot me on sight?
I summoned every ounce of willpower to keep the shift from taking over, but I could barely think with my wolf raging in my chest. I jiggled the doorknob, but the door was stuck. “Let me out!”
“I can’t let you leave,” Laurel said calmly. “It’s not safe. Not with Dragan out there. This may be the reason he’s after you. Please calm down. You need to stay here with your family.”
White-hot rage flashed through me like a thunderclap, and my body trembled. “You’re going to lock me up? Like you did my wolf?”
Laurel began to cast a spell, and terror clutched my mind.