Page 21 of The Healer and the Wolf, Part One

21

LEO

T he truck slowly came to a stop, and I slithered out the back, my entire body aching and sticky. Once I was on the ground, I slowly shifted back into my human form.

It took far more effort than it should have, and panic surged through my veins. No, no, no. I couldn’t be trapped again.

Breathing deeply, I focused on calming my heartbeat, and after a few more moments of straining, I was me again.

Thank fuck.

Wow.

What a fucking day.

It felt like I was waking up from some sort of fever dream. Was the man who had cursed my pack and stolen Ricky really dead? It was hard to remember everything that happened. All I knew was that I had been waiting patiently, biding my time and looking for the perfect opportunity to take Chadwicke out… but then he’d gotten handsy with Ven, and all thoughts of strategy had flown out the window. Everything was blood and hatred and the desire to kill anyone who might possibly hurt my family again. I was the alpha, and although I had failed to protect them before, that wouldn’t happen again.

Still... it felt so surreal.

At least until one of the truck doors flew open, and a thin, raggedy man stumbled out. I could have been blindfolded, and I would still recognize the scent that hit me square in the face.

“Ricky!” Hundreds of memories rushed through my mind all at once. The both of us betting on whether the tooth fairy was real when my first canine fell out. Us huddled in a gully under a rotten log in the woods, hiding from the man who had killed our parents and taken over our pack. When his first girlfriend had dumped him, and then when I had to break up with mine. Losses, victories, stupid little moments that meant nothing and yet everything all at the same time.

I couldn’t believe it was him.

“Leo,” he croaked.

We ran toward each other. Well, I ran, crossing the scant distance in a beat, while he staggered forward, but how we got there didn’t matter. What mattered was that I was able to embrace my beta, my righthand man, my ride-or-die, for the first time in who knew how long.

“Ricky, Ricky, Ricky.” I chanted his name over and over again, probably hugging him a bit too hard considering how frail he was. The blood covering me was getting on my beta, but I didn’t care. What was important was that he was safe, he was free . “It is so good to see you again.”

“You found me.” His voice was little more than a grating whisper, but I would listen to that forever because it meant he was safe. Excitement built in my chest. With Ven’s help, we would have him right as rain in no time. Really, I owed her everything. My life, and his. “I can’t believe you found me.”

“Did you think I would ever give up looking?”

I suppose that was a slightly disingenuous thing to say considering I absolutely had stopped looking when I was a wolf, but that was when I hadn’t been myself. Ever since Vanessa had broken my curse, I’d racked my brain to figure out what had happened to my pack. And while there were still massive holes in my memory, I couldn’t be more thrilled to see the man standing in front of me.

Ricky gripped me harder, and I felt wetness seeping into my shirt. He was crying, but I didn’t say a single word about it. If anyone deserved to cry today, it was definitely him. I remembered how lost, how confused I had been when I’d first regained my human form. Although he seemed to be handling the change better than I did, I had no doubt it was still pretty harrowing. Especially since he was in worse physical shape than I had been.

“How did you know where I was? And how did you break the curse? Before they took away my mind, they told you they were going to do the same to you once they made you watch all of us lose ourselves.”

“They did,” I answered.

It still hurt too much for me to really think about that fateful night. It was still so patchy and full of holes, and what I could remember was so horrifying my mind didn’t want to deal with it. I couldn’t remember how I had been defeated, only that I was.

“They did something to my memory, so when I came back, chunks of my life were lost to me. Are all your memories intact?”

“I-I think so. It doesn’t feel like there’s anything missing,” he answered.

“They must have made mine a bit worse, then. I’ve been wandering around as a mindless wolf. I was sort of aware that I was looking for something, but I could never place it, and I didn’t know I was.”

“I didn’t know either when I was in that body, but once the curse was broken, it all came rushing back. I remembered who and what I was.” He finally let go of me, wiping his face. “How did you break the curse?”

“It wasn’t me.” I grinned. “My friend did it. You’ve already met her. She’s pretty wonderful.”

Just then, the driver’s door opened, and Ven stepped out of the truck. I expected her to be jubilant over our victory, smiling from ear to ear at the success of our mission, but I could smell even before I saw her face that she was steamed.

“What the hell was all of that out there?” She wasn’t yelling. In fact her voice didn’t rise above her normal volume, but it didn’t need to. Every syllable was coated with white-hot rage. What could I have possibly done?

“What are you talking about?”

She glared at me. “Look, I know things went sideways out there, and I understand that him putting his hands on me kind of threw us both for a loop, but that is no excuse for how crazy you went out there. There were innocent people, innocent children ! And you put them all in the line of danger.”

Had I done that? It was difficult for me to remember. I did recall seeing that bastard grabbing Ven’s wrist, and smelling the rage and fear emanating from her. I’d had no choice but to act. I had to protect her. The only reason she had been in danger was because she was trying to help me.

But after that? After that it got a little blurry. Snippets of the night replayed through my mind, but everything was cloudy. I still wasn’t used to shifting back into my wolf form, and my inner animal had completely taken over, pushing human Leo back into the deepest recesses of my mind. That wasn’t how it was supposed to be. A shifter was two equal parts, animal and human, working in harmony. The curse was still affecting me and had clearly thrown that balance out of whack.

Still, part of me knew I was an alpha protecting my pack. What did Ven possibly expect?

“I had to run all over that estate protecting people from you! And that’s not to mention how hurt you got. What if you lost? Did you ever think of that, Leo? Ricky and I were both depending on you being okay, and it’s like you forgot the both of us existed!”

My beta was looking uncertainly from me to Ven. I felt a bit embarrassed and guilty that he was put into the middle of something he didn’t understand, and maybe he didn’t even have the emotional capacity to deal with it, but if Ven was upset with me, she had every right to express it.

Although I couldn’t remember everything, I knew the plan wouldn’t have worked without her. She’d gotten a job at the compound, found a way to get us inside, rescued Ricky while I was consumed by bloodlust, and she had literally slammed into a powerful warlock with the very vehicle she was driving in order to stop him from casting a spell on me while I was recovering from a particularly hard hit.

Did it rankle my wolf’s nerves? Absolutely. He was seething, wondering how one of his pack could challenge him after such a clear victory. But I knew better than he did, even if he wanted to fight me on that.

“Sorry if this is awkward timing…” Another head popped out from the extended cab. I didn’t recognize the woman, and my growing concern and confusion with Ven doubled at the unknown presence. “But we really shouldn’t stay around this place much longer. I’m sure that bastard’s brothers will come swooping in at any moment, and I don’t want to be anywhere in the proximity of his compound when that happens.”

“Who the hell are you?”

“Sorry, the name’s America. America Aguirre. Long story short, that warlock tricked my parents into signing over ownership of their first-born child. I’ve been in his custody since I hit puberty. Not exactly a fan of the guy, and I really want to go back to my family. So, if we could all just pile back into this truck, I know a chop shop where you can drop me off. I can probably get you a different set of wheels for your ride back home… wherever that might be.”

I blinked a couple of times. It didn’t surprise me that Chadwicke was involved in trafficking. How many other shifters and magical folk had been put into a similar position? Good riddance to him.

“I would like to not be with the compost,” was all I said.

While I wasn’t ignoring Ven’s anger or her words, I had no idea how to respond. I wasn’t even sure I had done anything wrong. I trusted her, but also, I’d done what I was supposed to do. We were all safe, and even people like America were already benefiting.

Surely that was a good thing, right?

Because if it wasn’t, and if the only thing I was good at was inherently bad, what did that make me? What was my purpose outside of protecting and defending my pack?

Too many questions, one right after the other, and they were really bringing down the joy. I finally had a solid victory but…

Ugh.

Complications.

“Why don’t I drive for now?” America said, looking to a still-fuming Ven. “You be my shotgun? That way, the two of you can sit in the back and continue your reunion.”

“Yeah, sure,” Ven said flatly. “As long as you don’t mind if I pass out for a bit.”

“By all means, snooze away. But let’s go now, okay?”

There were no more arguments after that, and we piled back into the truck. It smelled a lot better in the front than it did in the back among the compost. Technically, we were stealing valuable planting matter, but considering everything else I’d done, that was fairly low on our list of offenses.

It was too bad we couldn’t take the truck all the way to Ven’s. The compost would be a terrific boon to her garden. Perhaps we could arrange to transport it somehow with our next vehicle.

For miles, none of us said anything. While I had to admit a chunk of it was definitely from the awkwardness between Ven and me, it wasn’t the sole reason. We were all exhausted. When I glanced at Ricky, I could see he was deep in thought.

It perplexed me that his memories hadn’t been stripped away—not because I wanted him to go through what I’d gone through, but because it made the understanding of his transition to humanity a little shakier. He would have different struggles than I did, which meant I would be a little less apt at helping him.

I’d have to do my best no matter what happened. The most important thing was that he was safe and sound.

“Are you okay?” I asked after a while. I was asking Ricky, of course, who took several moments to come back to me.

“Huh? Oh, sorry. I… I’m good, I think. There’s, uh, a lot I’ve got to sort through in my head right now.”

I chuckled. “Tell me about it.”

He snorted. “Yeah, I’ll bet.”

“Pardon me for interrupting yet again,” America said from the front seat. “But I’ve got to ask you guys a question.”

“By all means, ask away,” I said. We owed her for helping us out. I wasn’t sure exactly how instrumental she’d been in the escape plan, but if Ven trusted her, then I did.

“So, I was cut off from pretty much my entire coyote clan, but some of us shifters who worked for the brothers—if you could call it working—heard whispers of a wolf pack that managed to take down two of those psychopaths. I gotta admit, when I saw you fighting, I really hoped it was you.” She glanced at us through the rear-view mirror, and I saw a myriad of expressions flash through her dark eyes. She and Ven looked so similar. Not quite sisterly, but cousins, and they both definitely emoted so much through their gaze. “Was it? Or did I just get caught up in a myth and y’all were just here to save your friend?”

“It’s not a myth. Before all of this happened, we killed two of the brothers who were kidnapping magic folk from all over the state. We didn’t know who they were related to or that there were seven of them until it was too late.”

And what a mistake that had been.

She scoffed. “Yeah, not a lot around here were aware that Katarina Vensyclov’s brood had moved in until they started making trouble, and by then it was too late. They’d already gotten their hooks into everything.”

I hadn’t heard that name in ages, and it sent shockwaves rippling through my mind. I couldn’t believe I had forgotten the name of the matriarch. Sure, while she had never bothered us, and some people weren’t even certain she was in America, she was still the root of all the troubles of my pack. It was hard not to resent that. Surely if she was a good person, her seven sons wouldn’t have turned into such monsters.

“Just so you know,” America continued, “you’re not the only one who has a bone to pick with the brothers. I know of a lot of people outside of my family and clan who are tired of those bastards chipping away at our communities.”

Oh? While I knew we had two allies who had helped us take down the brothers in our original fight, I didn’t know anyone beyond that. I also didn’t know if any of those who helped us were still alive, or if they had been cursed.

If they were, then I would need to start looking for them once I found the rest of my pack. It would be much harder considering I wasn’t as close with them, but I owed them that much for helping us in our time of need. Besides, in my relatively short time of being alpha, I had wanted to change things. Wanted shifter groups to look at each other less as rivals and more as equally important parts of the magical ecosystem.

“How tired?”

“Tired enough to throw down if the opportunity presented itself.”

I admired the bite in America’s voice and understood that bitterness right down to my core. “Thank you.” I didn’t know what the road ahead of us held, but I was glad it didn’t necessarily mean we were going it alone. “That is good to know.”

“Of course. Granted, I’d like to settle in with my folks a bit before I go answering any war calls, but if you drop a line, I’ll make sure to answer.”

I nodded, and the conversation faded after that. It was a positive note for sure, as was having Ricky sleeping against my side, but neither of those things made me forget that I was in the doghouse with Ven.

It was an uncomfortable feeling, but I hoped we could talk things out once we had safely returned to her home.

All in good time.