Page 161 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

Icouldn’t be sure how long I stood there as my pack, family, retreated from the barrens. It might’ve been hours, but more likely it was only minutes.

I didn’t move so much as an inch until their howls of anguish echoed over the valley and I knew that they were outside of his reach. At least for now. At least for as long as I kept up my end of our deal.

That was my hope, but Devin could just as easily decide he’d rather I kept on trying to fight him. Hell, maybe it turned the psycho on.

Once even the echoes of my pack’s call faded, I crossed the barrens. Each step felt like another nail in my coffin, but I reminded myself that this wouldn’t be forever. He wouldn’t always have the upper hand, and as soon as that power shifted, I would be ready.

My wolf went dormant as I approached Devin, his hand still outstretched, waiting for me to take it. I silently thanked my inner beast for allowing me to do this, whether she would bear witness to it or not.

Even that primal, reactive part of myself knew this was the right thing, for now.

To save the ones we loved. Devin had always been taller than me, but the bulk he’d added to his once slender frame made him absolutely dwarf me in all ways now.

Though we both knew who was the stronger wolf here, I sensed that in human form, I may have more difficulty fighting him off than I originally thought.

I grimaced, slipping my fingers over his callused palm. He gripped me tightly, hauling me in until his face was level with mine. “There,” he said. “Was that so hard?”

My gut instinct was to strike, my fist clenched and ready at my side, but I held myself back.

Devin lifted two fingers to caress the tender flesh beneath my chin. “So much fire,” he said, gazing into my eyes in a way that made my stomach turn. “We’ll have to do something about that.”

He snapped his fingers, and Forrest tugged a small sack from a leather cord around his neck and dumped its contents into Devin’s waiting palm.

Four white pills.

“Open,” Devin said with a grin, his gaze slipping to my lips.

“What are they?”

He pursed his lips for a moment, considering me before he replied. “A paralytic. Can’t have you running off or trying anything before I can even get you home.”

Fear spiked my blood with a fresh wave of adrenaline, and my heart began to pound anew.

As though he knew exactly where my thoughts had wandered, he let his predatory gaze slip down the length of my body and licked his lips. “Don’t worry, my pet. I won’t touch you. Not until you want me to.”

My brow furrowed, confused at the easy way he spoke. Like he really expected me to crave the touch of a narcissistic psychopath like him.

I glanced at Forrest and the coward let down his gaze and stepped away.

It was one thing to stand by an asshole like Ryland, a man Forrest had known and befriended for upward of twenty years, even after his truth came out.

It was why I’d let him and a few others go free instead of forcing them to bow.

I understood misplaced loyalty.

Once, I’d placed that same faith in the man standing before me now.

But this. Standing with Devin. Helping him crush a pack that he once defended. I shook my head, and even though he wasn’t looking at me, I knew he could feel my disgust radiating from me in waves. He would die for this, too.

I would make sure of it.

I flinched away as Devin leaned in, his warm breath fanning over my ear. “I might let you kill him if you want,” he whispered conspiratorially. “Call it a wedding gift.”

“You’re insane.”

My head jerked back as the sharp rap of the back of his hand found my cheek. The tang of blood bloomed over my tongue, and I blinked the dark spots from my eyes.

“You will not speak to me that way,” he hissed, looking every bit the crazed lunatic I knew he was, but only for a beat before he slicked his dark hair back from his face and sighed.

“Now. Open wide.”

I groaned as I resurfaced from the drug, my head heavy and ears filled with cotton. My fingers twitched over something smooth, like velvet or suede, and I worked hard to peel back my eyelids, but they wouldn’t cooperate.

It was dark wherever we were. A suffused orange glow was the only light that flickered behind my shuttered eyelids.

Taking stock, I realized there was something brushing against my chest and shoulders. I could feel it against my flesh, and yet I couldn’t move to touch it.

It took more effort than I ever would have thought possible to get my eyelids even a fraction open, but I did. Grunting like a rabid animal.

Where was I?

A smooth carpet coated the earthen floor beneath me. Propped behind my back was a small mountain of suede pillows. An old kerosene lantern hung in one corner of what looked like a really big tent. The dark tactical style canvas of it at odds with the plush interior.

I rocked my head to one side, gaining back another modicum of movement and found a bed. What looked like a real mattress on top of some kind of cot-like structure to keep it up off the floor. A rumpled green blanket hung half on and half off, and my nose wrinkled as the smell hit me.

Devin’s scent. That strange combination of smooth musk and sharp pine that I’d once loved, but now thought smelled like a bog in the forest. The kind that housed algae and toads and smelled absolutely rank when it got too hot out.

Yeah. I didn’t know how I’d ever actually enjoyed that smell.

As though on cue, Devin swept into the tent, pushing through a flap opposite me. He was still full naked, his body glistening with sweat in the lamplight.

Judging by how dark it was outside, I had to guess it’d been at least a few hours since the barrens, which meant I could be literally anywhere within a two- hundred mile radius. Not a comforting thought.

“You’re awake.”

No shit, I wanted to reply, but my tongue wasn’t ready to work yet and sat uselessly on the floor of my mouth.

He turned back and lifted the flap, calling out into the night, to where I could hear the distant sounds of people and animals milling about, setting up camp.

“Bring him,” he demanded, and the shadow of a tall man moved from beside the entrance, his footsteps fading as he moved away.

Devin moved to the corner of the tent where a basin was placed high on a collapsible camp table. He splashed the water on his face, scrubbing away the last splatters of what I had to assume was Sam’s blood from his cheeks.

He took a cloth from the top of a stack next to the basin and soaked it in the water, wringing out the excess before coming to me.

I cringed inwardly as he knelt at my side, cocking his head, considering my face, my neck, and then lower, to where someone had mercifully dressed me in what looked like a white nightgown.

“You’re even more beautiful than I remembered,” he told me, lifting a finger to twirl it in my long silvery hair, making my blood pump faster.

The spark of fear doing enough to burn off some more of the paralytic from my blood, enabling me to twitch my hand into a loose fist and close my gaping mouth.

Devin lifted the cloth to my cheek, scrubbing away what felt like a mat of blood even though I couldn’t remember being hurt. When the cloth came away brown instead of red, I sighed inwardly, glad to see it was only dirt.

“I didn’t touch you,” he said, and I wanted desperately to believe him.

“W-what…” I tried, the word coming out as if I had a ball in my mouth.

“Hush,” Devin chided me, dragging the cool cloth down to my collarbone. “It’ll be a while yet before your strength returns. Be patient.”

I narrowed my eyes on him, wondering what the fuck he was playing at with this bullshit nice guy act.

“The alchemist,” someone announced from outside as the feeling returned to my toes.

“Let him in.”

A man entered a moment later. Tall, with broad shoulders and silver strands in his dark hair that caught the light as he moved through the tent.

“This is the bitch?”

“Don’t call her that,” Devin snapped at the man, whirling on him with a warning in his stare and muscle coiled to strike.

The man, to his credit, didn’t so much as flinch at Devin’s threat, instead surveying him as one might survey a specimen beneath a microscope. Finding it particularly lacking.

When he looked at me, though, the same disinterest was not present in his cutting stare.

“Shall I proceed then?” the alchemist asked Devin, not bothering to pay him any mind as he brushed past to stand before me.

“This...this spell you’re casting, how long will it last?”

“It is permanent.” A spell?

Devin was having this fucking alchemist prick cast a spell on me?

I had to clench my jaw as tightly as I could to stop myself from smiling.

Being the twin soul wolf allowed me to mate to two shifters, but it had also allowed me to be somehow impervious to the magic of other immortal races.

And that ability hadn’t only extended to me, but to my entire pack when I became alpha.

It was a secret I knew wasn’t safe if shared. People like this alchemist, with his clear status in the witching community, apparent in his dress and confidence, wouldn’t allow shifters like me to live if they knew the truth.

And this one, clearly, didn’t.

The alchemist inhaled sharply through his nose and tipped his head to one side, cracking his neck and flexing his fingers until each one popped.

“I’ll need a moment in private,” he said, closing his eyes and spreading his hands at his sides, palms down to draw magic up from the earth.

“No.”

The alchemist’s eyes flew back open to glare at Devin.

“Either you leave, or you will not get what you’ve asked for. This magic is ancient. Forbidden. Known only to a handful of my kind. Its knowledge cannot be—”

“I don’t give a fuck about your magic. Besides, I’m not in the business of leaking information that could harm my kind.”

The alchemist seemed to consider this and then nodded. “Very well, but if you tell a soul, I’ll have to kill you.”