Page 8 of Bound to the Griffin (Hillcrest Hollow Shifters #3)

Jackson

The cold was supposed to clear my head. That was the lie I told myself as my wings cut through the late-afternoon air over Hillcrest Hollow’s forests, each beat rattling the winter wind in my ears.

Grandma Liz’s words kept echoing, no matter how far I flew: She’s not your soulmate.

It would be better if I forgot she existed and let the others do their job of driving her off.

I’d really tried. I’d buried myself in work, in patrols, even in paperwork that didn’t need doing.

All it had earned me was the title of “grumpiest sheriff in Hollow history” from Drew, and a deep ache inside my chest. Yet here I was, breaking my own rule about keeping a safe distance, angling toward the glow of Halver’s Haven just to see her.

One glance, I told myself. Just to confirm the pull I felt toward Gwendolyn Avery was fading, or, better yet, that I’d imagined it.

But then it hit me—sharp, sudden, primal.

A knot of urgency coiled low in my gut, the same sense of warning that had saved my unit more than once overseas. Something was wrong, very wrong.

I banked hard, snowflakes blurring the world beneath me, and followed the thrum in my chest straight toward the B it had featured in all of my dreams, though her shouts had never sounded like this.

This was fear. Pain. Not the ragged noises of arousal that had paraded through my brain.

I dove, pressing my paws along my body and sticking out my neck for speed.

The forest opened into a narrow ridge, a drop-off hidden beneath a heavy quilt of snow.

And there—my heart damn near stopped—was Gwen, half over the edge, limp as a rag doll.

She hung headfirst over the edge of the short drop, and though short, I knew jagged rocks were hidden beneath the fine powder snow.

A massive gray wolf had his teeth clamped around her ankle.

The first thing my brain registered: he was attacking her.

The second: it was Kai. I knew the shape of that wolf, had seen it roam the forests night after night, day after day for years on end.

Ever since I’d settled in the Hollow. He was menacing her unconscious body with his maw of razor-sharp teeth, and my mind flashed with images of raw wounds, of tears and gashes in soft, silky skin.

“Drop her!” I roared, the eagle in me shrieking over the wind.

It didn’t come out in words anyone could understand; I was no telepathic being like Chardum, the resident dragon.

Kai would understand the meaning anyway, especially once he met my sharp claws.

I arrowed down, my paws reaching, claws gleaming, ready to tear into him.

Kai’s ears flattened and he almost released her—would have, if I hadn’t pulled up at the last instant.

If he dropped her, she’d fall. I shifted mid-landing, boots crunching into the snow, and lunged for her.

“Got you,” I muttered, hauling her back from the ledge.

She crashed into my chest, clutching fistfuls of my jacket like she wasn’t letting go anytime soon.

Her breath came in ragged clouds, smelling faintly of the same blend of tea she’d made for me.

Her eyes blinked hazily at me as she rose from the depths of darkness.

I had never been more relieved to see someone wake.

I glared over her head at Kai. “What the hell was that?!” Blood scented the air from her torn leg, and it dripped into the pristine snow in bright, scarlet drops.

I hissed in fury at the sight, my gut roiling with horror and with shame over having failed to protect her.

She was so limp in my arms, barely conscious at all, but her warm brown eyes had locked onto my face like it was the only thing holding her to the surface.

The wolf whined and dropped down on his paws, belly in the snow, eyes apologetic.

Under my glare, he wilted even more, and then he shimmered, his fur melting away in a flash of warm light.

Kai crouched in the snow, naked as the day he was born—human again—only his stupid cowboy hat somehow still on his head.

A red blotch bloomed across his jaw, already fading, healing fast.

“She tripped,” he growled, his voice rough from the shift.

“I was trying to scare her a little, not send her over. I caught her before she could crack her skull.” That’s not what it had looked like to me, but it was true that if the wolf had let go, she could very well be dead now.

The image of her with a broken neck, blood pooling around her in the snow, was jagged and sharp.

Horrifying. It made me growl, the sound that of the lion side of me, and it intimidated even irrepressible Kai.

Normally grumpy and half-feral, he winced, unbothered by the icy wind. “What can I do?” he asked miserably.

Gwen jerked against me, her body trembling against mine as the cold began to sink into her skin.

Her clothes were wet and soggy from the snow she’d rolled through, and she had to be in shock from the pain and the scare.

Her face was as white as the snow around us, her lips turning an alarming shade of purple.

I lifted my head only long enough to glare at the one responsible. “Get Arden. Now.”

For a heartbeat, he just stared at me, something wild still burning in his eyes.

Then he shifted without another word, snow kicking up under his paws as he bolted into the trees.

He didn’t want to obey, but at the same time, he was not a bad man.

Once my anger calmed and my mate had been healed and tucked into her warm bed, I would remember that.

And remember that Kai had held on because he hadn’t wanted to kill her.

The wind sighed in the sudden quiet. I looked down at the woman in my arms, her cheeks red from the cold.

There was clarity returning to her gaze, and with it, anger I was happy to see.

Good, let her be mad. I was mad too. Kai had a lot to make up for.

Then I winced internally, because I knew I did too.

If I’d been around, none of this would have happened.

Her lips parted, like she was about to argue with me too.

She had no idea she’d just given me another reason I wasn’t letting her go.

“No,” I said to her, and her mouth snapped shut.

“Whatever you’re about to say, forget it.

I’m carrying you home, and I’m not leaving until the doctor has taken care of you.

” Her dark eyes softened, and, with a tired, shaky sigh, she settled her head against my chest beneath my chin.

That sign of trust almost undid me. Damn it. It shot through my pulse like wildfire and stirred feelings that had nothing to do with this situation. Lust, desire, passion. It had no place here, but passion was so close to fury, and with Kai gone, my fury had no place to go.

I rose, cradling her tightly against my chest, careful of her injured leg and the bloody gash at the back of her head.

The snow had been disturbed from her run, and I could trace back her steps with my sharp eyes, see the large bounding leaps Kai had made as he chased her.

I saw, too, the way the wolf had sped up and leaped, the timing impossible to read from these tracks.

A thermos had rolled to a stop at the base of a tree, its lid missing, and lavender and chamomile wafted up from the interior.

An explanation for the redness on the wolf’s face.

I nudged it with the toe of my boot so it came to lie at the center of the path, but I did not bend down to pick it up.

I’d come back for it later and locate the lid for her, too.

My mate was obviously crazy about her teas, those had been the only things unpacked when she’d invited me into the B this was a task that suited him and wouldn’t force him indoors.

With a nod of his head—his cowboy hat briefly shading his face—he darted back into the forest. Clothing scattered as he shifted, and a big, silver wolf leaped over the back fence and disappeared.

I’d have to pick up those clothes and hope Gwen hadn’t seen that flash of light as the man shifted.

The dark outside would have hidden the sight of the wolf to her human eyes, though, and she appeared to have focused on her other guest, on Arden.

I could only barely hold back the possessive growl that wanted to rumble from my chest when I discovered that.