I couldn’t.
They didn’t understand that I couldn’t.
Ryder and Thorn give me updates on the full moon. I ran without so much as a goodbye, but Aunt Germaine told them how to reach me. She knew I’d come for messages when the moon was brightest. She knew I couldn’t stay away forever.
Losing Elise never should have happened. She had been so young, full of life. She had been so happy. I still remember when she told me she wanted to be with the Alpha. She told me he was going to mate her and they were going to have pups and be happy together.
They were going to be happy.
So what the hell had happened?
I still can’t wrap my head around everything. I know she was happy with him, excited. I thought the Alpha was a huge ass, but Elise didn’t. She had so many hopes for the future that would never come true.
She wouldn’t have given up on her dreams.
I’m so busy daydreaming, caught up in memories of my cousin, that I don’t hear Red come out of the cabin. By the time I see her watching me, it’s too late. She’s seen me. Luckily, I’m in wolf form, and most people wouldn’t even consider I might be a shifter.
She’s standing in front of the cabin, curiously eyeing me.
I eye her right back.
“Hello,” she says to me. This is it, I think. This is where she either chases me off or shoots me. Most campers don’t want wolves around – if that’s what I could call her, a camper. I have a feeling her situation in the woods is one she plans to deal with for a long time.
She’s made herself quite comfortable at the cabin.
My fight-or-flight response is threatening to kick in, but I gulp it down. She’s not going to hurt me. I’ve been protecting her, guarding her. I won’t leave her now. I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t guarding a female. As Elise’s cousin, I was her right-hand man.
But I’ve never guarded a human before.
And I doubt this one has ever seen a shifter.
“Here, boy,” Red says, squatting down. She holds her hand out. For me to sniff? So she thinks I’m a dog. That’s fine with me. I hesitate for only a second, then I swagger on over to her. She likes my swagger. She grins as I strut over to her, confident, head held high.
“There, boy,” she motions for me to smell her hand and I do. I’ve smelled her before, but never this close, never this strong. She smells perfect. Sweet citrus and vanilla mixed with her own scent. I close my eyes automatically, wanting to savor the smell.
“Ah, yes, you’re a sweet little guy, aren’t you.” She reaches out and scratches my neck and then behind my ears, and I melt.
I fucking love this girl.
Maybe it’s because I’ve only ever mated with shifters, but I’ve never had anyone pay this much attention to me in wolf form.
I’ve never had anyone pay any attention to me in wolf form.
And now I can’t believe what I’ve been missing out on. I fight back the urge to shift and claim her right now, to push her back on the wood planks of the cabin porch and fuck her hard. Instead, I focus on staying in my wolf form, in being here for her.
“Where did you come from, I wonder?” She says, more to herself than to me. I realize, suddenly, that I might find out a lot about her this way. I might find out more than I ever hoped, actually. If she talks to me even half as much as she talks to herself, it won’t be long before I learn all about little Red.
She stands up and brushes her hands on her jeans. Red is curvy and cute, and freckles dot her nose. Her hair is long and she usually wears it back in a ponytail, but today it’s down and curls around her face and chin.
She looks like she’s in her mid-20s, maybe, and for the millionth time, I find myself curious about why she’s in the woods.
I take a few steps forward and nuzzle against her leg. She giggles: a joyous sound that fills the clearing. Then she pets me.
“I’m going to go out today,” she says. “I’m starving and I’m tired of eating berries,” she admits this like it’s a secret that berries are a horrible way to live, and I wonder why I haven’t been bringin
g her meat. I’m an excellent hunter. If she can start a fire, she can cook meat, and I could hunt it for her, bring it to her.
I could care for her.