Page 4 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

He was hulking in size, tan, and with short cropped dark hair. From this angle, I couldn’t see his face, but from the sound of his voice, I had to imagine it would be just as scary and intimidating as his growl.

“She’s been living in that fucking hunting blind in the woods for months, Clay. It’s destroyed. I went and checked for myself. That bag is everything that she has now.”

I saw where he gestured to a muddied brown sack on the edge of the front deck. My heart pounded hard against my ribcage, and hot tears stung my eyes. The picture of dad. I’d dropped it during the mudslide. I wanted to hope it was in there, but I knew it wouldn’t be.

“We aren’t a goddamned shelter,” the other guy seethed, rubbing a wide hand over the back of his thick neck. My toes curled and a hot flush stained my cheeks. What an asshole…

He was right, though. I wouldn’t be anyone else’s burden. It was why I’d moved out into the blind to begin with.

Jared stepped in closer to the other guy, his shoulders squared. The guy called Clay took two steps back and rolled his shoulders, limbering up as though for a fight.

Oh no. Hell, no.

I hobbled to the door, using the wall for support. Outside was a wide hallway with an open balcony at the end that allowed someone upstairs to see the living area downstairs from above. I didn’t bother to look around, rushing to get downstairs.

The stairs were hard to navigate, but I managed.

Once I got to the ground floor, I found the front door next to a kitchen I couldn’t see from up top and wrenched it open, stepping outside to a snap of cool air and the brush of a warm afternoon sun on my cheeks.

Their conversation stopped immediately as I made my way across the deck, shielding my eyes from the worst of the sun’s rays.

I snatched up my bag from the edge of the deck and tried to figure out what to say as my eyes adjusted. Jared was staring at me with a pained expression, his beautiful amber eyes going first to my hair, and then to the tear in my shirt that exposed most of my midriff.

The other guy stared, too, but not with anything that looked like pity.

Good, because I didn’t want any.

The guy’s fists were white-knuckle sandwiches as his sides, and he looked about ready to blow a gasket with the vein in his neck sticking out so much.

I was wrong about his face, though. His apprehensive stare was chilling, but he didn’t look like the monster I thought he would from that gravelly voice.

Scary, yes, but with incredible blue eyes like a frozen lake under bright sunlight.

They looked…familiar. In fact, he looked familiar.

“I—I heard you arguing and…” I stuttered.

“You don’t have to fight. I’m going.” I turned to Jared, averting my stare, completely unable to meet his gaze.

A hot blush rose to heat my face. “Thank you,” I said earnestly to him.

“For what you did. I think that wolf would’ve eaten me if you hadn’t been there. ”

I began to walk away, limping heavily. But as my feet connected with still-damp earth, I realized I was missing something, or a few something’s.

My boots for one.

And I’d left my damned cellphone upstairs in my rush to get outside and stop them fighting.

Jared moved to stand in front of me, unapologetically blocking my path as he shoved his hands deep into his pockets. “You aren’t going anywhere, Allie. Don’t worry about Clay,” he said, his amber eyes flicking to his friend. “He’s an ass in general. It isn’t you.”

Clay scoffed, but I didn’t dare turn around to see the look on his face.

Wait…Clay?

Isn’t that what Jared had called the wolf from last night? I glanced up into Jared’s eyes again, seeing the small fleck of green in the left one. Gulped.

Slowly, with my heart hammering in my chest, I turned back to Clay, flicking my gaze up only long enough to catch the unmistakable color of his eyes.

No. I almost laughed, giving my head a shake. That’s crazy, Allie.

“I—I left my phone upstairs. If you just let me run back inside and get it, I’ll be out of your way.”

“Allie,” Jared said, his tone hard with a warning. I chanced another glance up to see his jaw was set. “You’re covered in mud from head to toe, you have a sprained ankle, and…I don’t think you have anywhere to go.”

The truth of what he said hit me like a blow to the chest. I rocked back on my heels from the force of the impact. “You can stay here for now. We don’t use the guest room you were sleeping in. The only thing we ask is that you don’t tell anyone.”

My brows furrowed. Don’t tell anyone…what? I wanted to ask, but Clay growled behind me and I turned in time to see his icy blue eyes light from within. My breathing hitched.

What the hell is going on here? Panic made my fingers clasp tighter to my backpack as I backed away from Clay, closer to Jared.

“Clayton,” Jared hissed. “Control yourself.”

It clicked in my mind who he was. Clayton Armstrong. Bad boy extraordinaire. He was a senior when I was just a junior at Forest Grove High, but that face and hulking form was hard to forget, even if he did skip more classes than he attended. The juniors still whispered about him in the halls.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Clay spat. “If Ryland finds out—”

“He won’t.”

Clay looked like he was using every last ounce of his will to keep from losing it, and I found myself still backing away, trying to get out of the line of fire before he exploded. Until Jared circled my wrist with his warm hand, stopping me.

“R-Really,” I stammered. “This isn’t necessary.” I swallowed past the ever-growing lump in my throat, trying unsuccessfully to tug my wrist away from Jared. “I’ll just go. Town can’t be far. I can crash at Viv’s place. I—I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to cause so much—”

“Stay,” Jared commanded, never breaking eye contact with Clay. When I chanced a look at his face, I saw that his eyes seemed to be glowing, too. The amber lit with a golden hue, only broken by the fleck of glowing green.

I rubbed my own eyes, taking another look before I decided I wasn’t imagining it.

“What are you?” I breathed and Jared broke his stare with Clay to look at me with furrowed brows. With his eyes on me, there was no doubting their other-worldly glow.

“You don’t remember?”

I tugged my wrist away and bolted, forgetting that my ankle was completely fucked.

I got maybe twenty yards before I fell on my face and the contents of the pack spilled all over the dirt drive.

I coughed and inhaled dirt, coughing some more.

A bloodcurdling animal snarl had me scrambling away on all fours as an enormous black wolf skated to a massive black wolf have Clay’s piercing eyes? Why did the white one have Jared’s?

I struggled for breath as they continued their animal conversation.

My head began to spin again. My breaths came slower…

and slower until I was sure I was on the cusp of passing out, but I fought against the pull of the dark.

This was not the time to be unconscious.

I wasn’t raised to be a sissy. I could change a transmission in a single afternoon.

I could shoot a bow into a target at two-hundred yards and hit it dead center.

I could deal with a couple overgrown wolves.

Couldn’t I?

Even if they were…what the hell were they?

Werewolves?

I tried not to laugh, but the sound started to burble up of its own accord. I pressed my lips tightly together to stop the sound from escaping, but my shaking shoulders and small noises gave me away.

The black wolf snapped at me one last time before it tossed a disgusted stare to Jared and stalked off into the trees.

I let the laughter out as soon as Clay was out of sight, tears springing to my eyes from the force of it. It was making my sides hurt. My abs were getting a work out. I snorted and wiped at the tears.

Was this what it felt like to go insane?

The wolf, Jared, sat gracefully with his paws at his front and cocked his big white head at me. It only made me laugh more.

“Allie?”

In the span of a single blink the wolf was gone and sitting buck ass naked in front of me was Jared. With one hand covering his junk and the other reaching toward me.

I shied away from his touch, the laughter dying on my lips as I took him in. As my mind tried to rectify what it was seeing from what it knew to be possible and impossible.

“Are you…” he trailed off, drawing his hand back with an apology in his still-glowing eyes. “Are you alright?”

“You were a wolf,” I blurted. “Like a second ago. I saw you. And now you’re…”

“It’s a lot to take in. I know. But I thought you saw me shift last night, and if you’re going to stay here—”

“I need a minute,” I interrupted by putting a hand up to stop him, feeling faint again. “And…a shower. Do you have coffee?”

“Don’t you want to talk about this?” Jared trailed off. The surprise unmistakable in his expression.

I eyed him. It was nearly impossible to stop my gaze from wandering low into his lap, where his torso tapered into an eight-pack and a sharp Adonis belt, and lower to…

“You need to put some clothes on,” I said plainly, not allowing my mind to wander back to the land of fairy tales made real. I would think about it, just…later. Not right now.

I needed that damn minute of peace to process before I lost my fucking mind.

I needed him to stop looking at me like I was the one who was crazy when he’d been a wolf five seconds ago.

Jared’s brows raised and he looked away, but not before I caught the start of a red flush in his cheeks. “Yeah. Right. Go take a shower. It’s the door next to the room you slept in. I’ll make some coffee.” He cleared his throat. “And uh…”

I stood and waited, unable to take my eyes off him now, wondering if at any second I would blink, and he’d be canine again.

This was madness.

“Then we’ll talk?” he asked, peering up at me beneath a set of thick caramel lashes.

I pursed my lips. “Yeah. You can start with telling me how long you’ve been watching me.”