Page 86 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

The key turned in the lock on the old iron manacle, and I pulled against it, testing its strength. I looked up into Clay’s blue eyes, and he set his warm hands atop my shoulders. “Just like last time,” he said, never breaking eye contact. “You’re safe here. No one is going to hurt you.”

Mental images of the chains in the cave with Devin tried to crowd my thoughts, drag me down into the cloying pit of panic, but as long as I looked into Clay’s eyes, I knew he was right. I was safe.

“It’ll be over before you know it,” Jared added from beside Clay, looking like he might be sick.

“I’m not worried about my shift,” I said, my voice thick.

I cast a glance to where Destiny was finishing locking up Vivian across from me. Vivian kept her chin up. Her eyes hard and sharp as cut glass.

And to Layla, who was looking at her manacles in terror as silent tears streamed down her face.

My fault.

All of it was my fault.

Please don’t shift.

Please don’t let them shift.

And Quinn, lying still against the stone to my right. He snored quietly, his face a blank sheet of blissful ignorance. If he shifted, would he think it was some kind of nightmare?

He wouldn’t be wrong. Except this nightmare wouldn’t end by waking. It would go on and on for as long as he would live.

Please don’t let them fucking shift.

I’d never been a religious person, but if there was ever a time for prayer, this was it. And I would pray to whatever god or gods would hear me.

Please.

“Hey,” Clay barked, and I pulled my focus back to his face. “This is not your fault, okay. No matter what happens.”

My throat burned. “You hear me?”

“I hear you.”

“We’ll be right over there with Ry and Destiny,” Jared added, pointing to the open archway of the entrance where Ryland waited with his hand poised on the old wooden crank handle that opened the panels in the ceiling.

The first gut twisting stab of the moon-triggered shift tore through my abdomen, and I struggled to stay on my feet, gaze darting between Layla, Viv, and Quinn to see if anything was happening to them.

They all seemed fine.

“Go,” I ground out, the word exiting my lips with a feral, garbled hiss as my vocal cords began to shift.

“Open it,” Clay barked at Ryland and began removing his shirt. Jared did the same. Ryland was already stripped bare. Layla and Viv had asked if they should remove their clothes, too, when Ryland had entered buck-ass naked fifteen minutes ago.

He’s shrugged and told them not if they didn’t care to ruin everything they were wearing. Vivian had removed her jeans and converse shoes. Layla pulled her bra out through the sleeve of her sweater.

Priorities.

I was barefoot in my panties, with just a tank top clinging to my clammy skin. I wore the one with the mustard stain near the hem just for the occasion since I knew I was going to ruin it.

Clay and Jared finished stripping down to their boxers. Except I knew Clay didn’t wear briefs normally. He must have dusted some off for the occasion. Pity. It might’ve been nice to have something to distract me as my insides began to boil and burn.

I clenched my teeth and let the weight of the moon shove me to my knees as the circular panels in the ceiling slid open.

“Allie?” Layla called tentatively, her bottom lip trembling. She was completely fine. Both she and Viv were still standing, watching me with mixed expressions of shock and dread.

“I’m okay,” I managed through gritted teeth as I pressed both my fists to the cool stone beside my knees, feeling my spine warp. I bit back a scream, not wanting to frighten them even more. I would endure this shift without so much as a fucking grunt.

I couldn’t help my body shaking. I couldn’t help the sound of snapping and grinding bones, but I could stopper my voice at the very least.

Jared was the first to shift fully, with barely a hiss of pain as the moonlight cast its eerie white glow over all of us. Clay was next, with a low growl in his throat.

Then came Ryland. His body bending and breaking and sprouting fur so quickly that it seemed as though he went from man to wolf in the span of a single blink.

Destiny had shifted outside and loped in to take up a place next to Ryland, her thick tail wrapping coolly around her to brush her paws.

The four of them waited in their wolf forms, a wildness in their eyes that wasn’t normally there. Even with their whole lives as practice, the moon- triggered shift still affected them with a spike of primal, animal instinct. They could just fight it better now. Control it.

One day, I would be able to, as well.

Clay and Jared waited for me to complete my shift.

Ryland’s fiery orange stare affixed to my friends, as if willing them to follow.

Baring my teeth, I let go, allowing my wolf to finish what she started. I sent one last glance to Clay and Jared, gaze flicking briefly to Ryland, hoping they understood.

Because there was one other thing I was worried about tonight.

Another horrible possibility to add to the list of others: that my wolf would challenge him.

It was the first time we’d both been in close proximity in our wolf forms at the same time since the Four Corners.

And the moon-triggered shift would give my wolf near full control.

Ryland’s orange gaze moved to me as my shift completed, a small sound escaping my half-canine lips at the final stab of anguish.

My canine body shuddered, immediately moving to pull against the chains, to thrash in the manacles. My wolf snapped at Ryland, growling.

Enough.

The alpha’s command punched into my chest and I whimpered, still thrashing, but unable to look him in the eye anymore as the weight of his will crushed down on my spine. Pressed hard on my windpipe.

Allie, it’s all right, Jared’s voice echoed in my skull, sounding foreign and distant.

I could understand him, but I wasn’t the one in control.

Though the sound of his voice seemed to soothe my wolf enough to stop pulling too ferociously on the manacles.

If she pulled and twisted much more, she was going to break our ankles.

Look, Clay’s brusque voice brushed over my skull and my wolf followed his wolf’s gaze to where Layla and Viv and Quinn were all still completely, perfectly human.

Even feral as she was with the urge to be free, my wolf settled, seeming to recognize them. To recognize that this was good. She whined happily, pulling on her chains with the urge to go to them.

They’re okay. They’re not shifting.

The part that was still me wanted to shout in triumph. Though there was a small part, a part I promptly told to shut the fuck up, that ached with sadness. Because that part knew that this meant goodbye.

I would never put them in harm’s way again. I would never risk this or something worse happening to them.

I just lost my best friends.

But at least they would get to live long, normal lives and—

Layla’s shriek snapped like a bolt of lightning through the tepid air, piercing me straight through.

“La La!” Vivian screamed, trying to reach Layla as she crumpled to the stone floor, curling in on herself. Vivian’s chains snapped tight, and she pulled on them. “Layla!”

But Layla was beyond hearing her. My wolf and I watched, mute, stupefied, and powerless as Layla’s wrists snapped backward and she screamed. As her body contorted and she flipped onto her back, her eyes wide and glowing as she stared up at the spiteful moon.

Each of her screams sliced us so deeply, injured us so irrevocably, that I wondered if we’d ever recover.

That was when Vivian began panting and her back hunched, arms wrapped like bars around her stomach. She vomited onto the floor and staggered into the wall. Moonlight glinted on her elongated canines as she turned her bright eyes to the moon.

They’re shifting, Ryland spoke in my mind, and I knew he was right. I knew it as my friends broke and reformed, their screams echoing all around me. I wanted to close my eyes. Plug my ears.

I didn’t want to watch, but I did. I watched every pain-filled second. I took in every crunch of bone. Every tear. Every bloodcurdling pop of their joints. I didn’t look away.

Wouldn’t.

I did this.

Layla completed the shift first, scrambling to figure out how to stand on four legs instead of two.

Her wolf lifted its black head to reveal a white starburst of fur over her forehead, spreading up behind her right ear.

The white socks to match. When she felt my eyes on her, she snapped in my direction, then yelped when her manacles bit in, keeping her from lunging.

Vivian’s agonized moan turned abruptly to a growl, and I turned my watery gaze to her, finding her wolf where she’d stood a moment before. She, too, snapped at me, her jowls frothing.

Her wolf was the color of wet sand, with rungs in the shape of a fish’s gills around her shoulder blades that shone a pale gold in the moonlight.

She snarled and yanked at her chains. Unlike Layla, she found her footing straight away and kicked out her legs and clamped her foamy mouth around the iron manacles, trying to get herself free.

Layla whined low in her throat, and I found her staring at Quinn where he lay, still virtually motionless against the wall. He’d have woken by now if he were going to shift, wouldn’t he?

My chest ached as I watched Layla try to get nearer to him. Even in her wolf form, she seemed to know what it meant that she shifted and he didn’t.

She’d just lost him forever.

With a quick jerk, Layla’s wolf turned its burning eyes on me, her teeth bared and muscles shaking beneath her coat. She snapped in my direction, giving a forceful yank on her chains. The hatred in her gaze cut me deeply, scouring out my insides and burning down my throat.

Vivian, picking up on Layla’s distress, abandoned chewing on her iron manacle. When her gaze fell upon me, she lifted her head and howled long and loud into the night before she began to pull on her own binds. Trying to lunge at me.