Page 51 of A Wolf’s Wound

Ryder

“I knew you before you knew me,” Brian says.

Just the sound of his voice makes my stomach twist. Cloying and wheedling, like a little boy’s, underlaid with some dark, sick satisfaction.

“Growing up here, it’s easy to see that some folk are different.

Better at sports, even though they never try out for the local teams. Better at hunting, but same thing, right?

Always deer in the freezer, but no deer blinds to be seen.

It was the camping that got me, though. That’s what gave it away. ”

Gave it away?

He knows about the shifting. Of course, he does. He’s already a shifter, isn’t he? But he was human when I knew him, and he knew all the way back then.

“I hid out in the woods one night,” he continues.

“I wanted to know what Buck was getting up to. You know him. He’s how you met me.

We used to work at the same tackle shop.

Anyway, I wanted to go camping with him and Johnny, but they said I couldn’t.

Family stuff, even though they weren’t family.

Of course, I took it some kind of way. I was jealous.

But I see now. I get it now. And that’s when I saw you. ”

He looks at me, full of admiration. It makes my fucking skin crawl.

“I saw you shift. I saw all of you, free and… and more . And I knew then and there you had something I wanted. Something I needed, that I’d been longing for my entire life.

And I get why you didn’t want to hang out with me so much, why you couldn’t invite me along.

I’m lucky you looked at me, man. Fucking humans,” he spits, his voice full of vitriol that makes me take a step back.

“The way we have to live—in the shadows, only letting slivers of our true selves show—it’s all because they run things.

Isn’t it? And who the hell says they have to?

What good are they, man? Eating old, dead meat they didn’t even hunt.

Making bullshit laws and killing anyone too different.

It’s sick. The way we live is sick, but I’m going to change that. Remember? Like we talked about?”

He continues rambling. Only half of his words make sense, but all of them are dripping with hate toward humans. A gnawing horror eats at my stomach. He thinks he’s helping. He thinks he’s helping me , that we’re still friends.

Hannah looks as disgusted as I feel, but when I shoot her a look, urging her to leave, she just raises her chin. If she understands I’m trying to get her to leave me alone with this human-hating freak, she’s not on board with the plan. She even crosses her arms around her chest for good measure.

Of all the fucking times to be stubborn.

“Faster, stronger, tougher—hell, you could even drink me under the table and then some. You had everything. A family to support you and a pack you belonged with. Every woman’s head turned when you walked into the bar, like they could just tell you were better.

It bothered me a bit because I was human.

Right? Because I just didn’t understand why you were so much better than me. ”

Shadow’s tail drapes over my shoulder. His claws are beginning to irritate my skin, but I don’t shove him off.

I’m not sure I want him walking next to Brian in order to get to Hannah.

I see a hunger in Brian’s eyes, one that tells me he needs to hunt soon.

New shifters are often insatiable. It’s part of the reason we never schedule more than three new shifts under one moon.

They’d eat the entire forest up if we let them.

And Brian’s had no one to lead him, no one to help him through this. Fuck, his transformation alone must have been excruciating. No wonder he’s sounding a little cracked.

“I never thought I was better than you,” I say, and it’s true. I didn’t. Maybe he wasn’t my cup of tea, but I never gave much thought to him at all. He was just… there. I never really gave him much thought at all.

In retrospect, that’s probably worse.

He snorts. “Sure. Look, you don’t have to spare my feelings. As soon as I figured it out, it’s like…” He waves his hands in front of his face and throws them toward the stars. “Boom! You know? I knew what you were.” He smiles privately to himself. “And then I knew what I had to become.”

Hannah doesn’t seem inclined toward self-preservation, so I indulge Brian. It’s the only plan I can think of at the moment. Let him think we’re still friends and then take him down when he’s distracted.

I can’t risk him turning on her.

I give Hannah one more look, pleading with her to run and find help, and then direct my attention back to Brian before he starts to unravel. I try to force an easygoing smile, but it feels more like a grimace.

Acting’s never really been my thing.

“I liked our nights together.” Not a complete lie, even if the enjoyment had more to do with our mutual friends and copious amounts of vodka. “I didn’t know you were feeling down. You should have told me, man.”

He snorts. “Feeling down? I wasn’t just feeling down. I was a lesser being altogether. I could feel it, you know? This, this hole.” He taps his chest. “I could feel that I was meant to be so much more.”

“I mean it. I shouldn’t have just let you disappear off the face of the earth and not reach out. That was fucked.”

It was probably one of the worst things I’ve done in my life, even though this nagging memory keeps wanting to emerge. That dream, with the blood in my mouth and the liquor in my belly.

I shake myself and meet Brian’s eyes. He’s right to want an apology for that, even if his methods are going to get his ass kicked as soon as I can manage it safely.

At the end of the day, this is my fault.

I abandoned him, and from the sounds of it, he managed to get himself turned into a shifter.

Maybe if I hadn’t treated him like shit, he might have chosen differently.

Or at least, he would have felt like he could come to me after he turned.

If he’s the shifter who’s been turning all these humans, it’s my fault. Well, my fault and the fault of whatever asshole bit him.

“You think I blame you for that?” His brows rise up, nearly touching his hairline. Every expression he makes is exaggerated, like he’s acting on a faraway stage. “Nah, man. How could I? Why the hell would you go out of your way for some human?”

“Because we were friends.”

“Friends!” Brian laughs. “You can’t be friends with a human. It’s like being friends with… with a cow. A chicken, more like. They’re prey. You’re a hunter. It’s not natural to want anything more than that.”

“How can you hate humans so much?” Hannah cries, exasperated. “You are a human!”

Shit. Of course she wouldn’t know. She doesn’t have my sense of smell. All this time, she’s been standing around because she thinks Brian is some sort of human stalker. She has no idea the kind of danger she’s in, and now it’s too late.

Brian’s head swivels toward Hannah, and all the hair on my arms prickles as he slowly shakes his head. There’s no chance of her running, now. Not when she’s the focus of all his renewed attention.

A deranged smile twists his lips. “Not anymore.”