Page 9 of The Alpha Dire Wolf (Bloodlines & Bloodbonds #1)

Sylvie

T he closer to home we got, the stronger the pull of the forest became.

My instinct had always pushed me onto the right path, steering me clear of danger and bad decisions, but this was something new.

This time it was in control, and I was merely a passenger.

I had to step foot among the trees once more.

“Are you okay?”

“Huh?”

So caught up in my need was I that I’d forgotten about Charlene’s presence in the passenger seat entirely. She looked at me now, her eyes examining my face, full of concern.

“You haven’t said a word since we left Agnes’s.” She looked out the windshield and then back at me. “Did I do something to make you mad at me?”

“What? No, absolutely not!” I said. “I’ve just been distracted, that’s all. I promise. It’s been really, really good to see you, Char. All my other friends are back home, so it’s nice to have someone here, in person.”

“Okay.”

She wasn’t convinced, I could tell, but I didn’t have it in me to argue more at that moment. My focus was elsewhere, on tall thick-trunked trees and dead leaves crunching underfoot. Lichen-covered rocks and the call of wildlife all around me.

The gravel under the tires as I pulled into my grandmother’s driveway was a jarring shock to that peaceful tranquility. In hindsight, it was impressive I’d guided us home safely.

“Look, I’ll call you later. Is that okay? I just need to be alone for a bit right now. That’s all. But I really would like to continue catching up with you.”

Charlene nodded. “Yeah, that sounds really nice. I’d like that too.”

We smiled and embraced, and then I watched her head down the driveway to where she’d parked her little red Mazda against the curb. Putting on a smile, I waved goodbye as she pulled out, hoping my impatience didn’t show.

The second she was gone, I turned around, my back to the street, looking out past the big oak with its tire swing as well as the old wooden playset nearby with its slide and bars and another swing.

Beyond the shed with the garden tools and lawn mower.

Past the edge of the grass and into the depths beyond.

I looked left and right, peering as deeply as I could into the cover of undergrowth, searching incessantly for—

What the hell was I searching for?

Blue and gold circles. That’s what.

I’m losing it. This is nuts. There was a rabid bear the last time you went in there. Only the random kindness of a wolf saved you.

A wolf that had tackled me out of the way. It hadn’t attacked me. I’d suffered no wounds, no cuts from its claws, no bite marks. The wolf had intervened on my behalf.

A guardian? The guardian?

“Lead paint in the walls,” I said, trying to justify my imagination. “Asbestos maybe, in the kitchen tiles? Has to be. Maybe toxic mold somewhere. A carbon monoxide leak?”

I frowned. My grandmother had died unexpectedly to everyone around her.

Was it possible it was something that simple?

Other than the encounter with the wolf, nothing else around me was proving problematic, but I made a mental note to replace the fire and CO2 monitoring system in my grandmother’s house anyway. I’d rather be safe than sorry.

And it would explain a lot.

But if it wasn’t that, what explained the wolf? The blue-and-gold-eyed wolf. Nothing explained it.

My feet started toward the forest on their own. I could never recall making the decision to head there. The pull was too great, a maelstrom I was being sucked into.

“Crazy,” I muttered, my feet still moving. “I’m crazy.”

The trees grew nearer.

“Muttering about muttering about being crazy actually makes me sound crazy,” I pointed out to nobody but myself, which probably meant I was crazy.

I laughed, high-pitched and tight.

Nervous.

Arms around myself, hugging tightly, I followed the siren-like call of the deep woods, lured in like sailors of old. I couldn’t resist. I’d come to accept that.

“But that doesn’t mean you need to be stupid about it either,” I countered loudly, interjecting some logic.

That same logic detoured me from my beeline and to the shed.

Pulling it open, I rooted through the various tools there, eventually landing on a medium-sized hatchet.

The wooden handle and rust-free but dusty blade showed little use, but the weight in my hands provided a reassurance to what little remained of my sanity.

Five steps from the forest line, the breeze picked up, whisking me into the embrace of the forest on a trail of warmth.

Shrubs swayed peacefully, while boughs sighed, reaching up for the warmth of the sun, eager to drink it all in.

The forest welcomed me, tiny swirls of wind and leaves spinning up around me, like some sort of fairytale.

This happened last time.

Two squirrels darted round and round a tree trunk as they raced up to its heady heights, locked in a dance as old as the trees and then some.

Remember that this feeling didn’t last. If the breeze turns cool, leave. Don’t wait around. You’re just here to …

What was I there for? To see a giant wolf, hoping it was friendly a second time?

“Stupid. You’re stupid. Your little hatchet won’t do a damn thing against a wolf that size.”

Yet I had to see it again. I had to. There could be no negotiating with the call.

I hadn’t gone more than a few hundred feet into the forest before the hairs on my arms stood on end. A second later, those on the back of my neck joined in.

Pausing mid-step, I slowly lowered my foot, inch by inch, trying not to make a sound as I balanced myself out before looking around. Just like at the cemetery, my body was screaming at me. I was being watched.

Someone, or something, was out there, and it had its eyes on me.

“Hello?”

The instant the word left my mouth, I blushed red, despite the lack of audience. “What an idiot I must look like, talking to the trees. Good thing nothing out here can understand me.”

“I can understand you just fine,” a calm, deep voice said from directly behind me.

I spun so fast my back cracked from top to bottom, the sound vying with my shriek to see which was louder.

Standing in the middle of the forest was the man from the cemetery.

Feet comfortably spread apart, fingers tucked casually into the pockets of jeans that fit his hips and hugged his impressive quads to a degree that drew the eye, he stared back at me with the casual manner of nonchalance that boasted of a confidence level bordering on arrogance.

And why shouldn’t he be that confident? His tanned skin had that natural, effortless look to it that spoke of a man who worked outside, and his soft black facial hair was streaked through with just that right wisp or three of gray to appear seasoned without being too old yet.

Brown-blond hair fell from his head in waves that was somehow both shaggy and unkempt and perfectly styled all at the same time.

An impossible paradox, yet this man pulled it off.

Perhaps it was the way it framed his face, a strong, squarish look centered with a pair of eyes that stifled my breath.

They were mismatched. One bright blue … the other a bright amber-brown.

Just like the wolf.

“Hello,” he said.

Something about his tone told me I’d been staring overly long, making an already awkward encounter even worse.

He was prompting me to speak, to say something, and not just admire his face or the way his rolled-up sleeves revealed the thick, brawny forearms of someone who wasn’t afraid of manual labor.

Or the way his jeans, when he shifted, pulled just the right way that I could see a bit more than I should notice.

He knows you’re staring at his junk. Stop it. Speak up. Say something!

I couldn’t. I should, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t look away, the man—and that was it, he was a man— had my full attention.

There was no fighting it. No struggling against the pounding of my heart in my temples or the rush of blood to parts of me that would continue to tingle long after he was gone.

“Are you okay?”

That was three lines in a row for him. All while I stared—no, gawked—at him, wishing my body wasn’t reacting the way it was to his presence. Like a magnet, I was drawn to him.

“I’m okay,” I finally managed to eke out, hoping I didn’t sound quite as much like a mouse being strangled as my ears said I did. “Who are you? Why are you following me?”

It was perhaps a bit rude of a first question, but this was the second time I’d seen him. Both times he’d been watching me.

“Following you?” he asked, tilting his head sideways. Somehow that made him even more attractive. “You’re the one following me. You were looking for me.”

“What?” I shook my head forcefully. “No, I wasn’t.”

“Then who are you looking for?” he stressed, those damnably different eyes not wavering from me one bit. “I heard you call out for someone. Did you lose them? Did a pet run away?”

“No.” It was all I could manage.

Fresh warmth coasted in on a new gust of wind. The forest sighed happily in response, if such a thing was possible. Birds chirped, and squirrels chittered. A comforting blanket of safety wrapped itself around me as I considered the stranger in front of me.

“Well, I’m the only one out here, and I don’t think I’ve ever met you. Have I?”

“Not unless you count watching me at the cemetery,” I said brazenly. “But, no, we’ve never actually met. I would remember that.”

His full lips ticced upward slightly—not much but enough—and I flushed red all over again, my entire face burning.

He didn’t have to say it outright, but it was very clear he’d understood the inflection in my words that I had never intended to put there.

Where had it come from? Why the hell couldn’t I control myself around him?

“I was there on business. I apologize for staring. But I must agree,” he said, both eyes burning holes inside me. “I would never forget meeting you.”

Oh, god . His words curled my insides in the hottest, most pleasantly spicy way imaginable. The man could talk .

“I didn’t come out here looking for you,” I reiterated, not bothering to hide my attempt at a topic change. If he took one step toward me, I wasn’t sure what would happen. Not with him looking like … like … that!

“Did you find what you were looking for?” He shifted his weight, pulling his shoulders back and emphasizing the fit and muscle his gray flannel was hiding.

“No, I didn’t,” I said, thinking about the wolf with matching eyes. “I’m not sure I ever will. It’s confusing.”

I tried to wave it off, like it was nothing.

The man didn’t let it go. He leaned a little closer.

We were separated by something like ten feet still, but I swore he could have kissed me had he come another inch.

The pull of his everything was sucking me in, a black hole threatening to take hold of me and never let go.

“I understand,” he said with far greater gravity than two words spoken between strangers should ever be able to contain. “But you shouldn’t be out here.”

The spell broke over the hardness as he spoke.

“I shouldn’t? Why the hell not?”

“Because some secrets are best left buried,” he said, his face losing its warmth and becoming cold steel as hard as his muscles. “You should leave them that way. Don’t come back looking again.”

Without waiting for a response, he was gone. A cold wind escorted him out. The forest pulled back, bushes shrinking, limbs lifting away. It was empty.

“Wait!” I shouted, rushing off after the man without taking a moment to think it through. “You can’t just go!”

The forest seemed to swallow him up. I followed his footprints for a few dozen steps before skidding to a halt as a fallen tree loomed out of the bushes. At the base of it was a thick, unmistakable print of a boot.

Haphazardly I climbed over the trunk that was almost as tall as I was, looking wildly on the ground beyond, desperate to find another print. I had so many questions for the mysterious forest-man with two different eyes.

What I saw on the other side pinned me in place. I didn’t dare jump off the log. Not now.

In the soft forest floor on the other side of the log, clear as day, was a print. But it wasn’t that of a boot. It was larger. With fewer, but far broader toes.

A wolf .

I looked deep into the bushes and the forest nearby, trying to figure out what had happened. Where had the man gone? Was the wolf here watching us the entire time? Why? What did it mean?

For a moment, I wondered if perhaps it had attacked the mystery man, hunting him as it did its other prey. No. I would have heard screams if that were the case. Besides, that man, whoever he was, he was no prey.

That man was a hunter, just like the wolf.

Backing slowly off the log, I retreated to where I had seen the man, picking up the hatchet I’d dropped upon his entrance. Everything seemed darker now, robbed of a light that had shone brightly during his presence.

First his warning and then the wolf print. It all had ominous foreboding written all over it, and my instinct agreed. It was time for me to leave. Like the man had said, I should have stayed out.

I was no longer welcome in the forest.