This was not the time to go around screwing perfect strangers—
perfect being the operative word.
I bit my lip and nodded. “Privacy is the right choice.”
“If you say so.” Declan turned around, and I stole one last glance at his muscular back.
Hot damn. I needed to get my shit together.
As soon as he was gone, I hunched down on hands and knees. My palm seared first, pain licking up the length of my cut, and I gasped, and the pain radiated out through my arm, rippling down the length of my body. My skin itched like a million mosquitos were biting me all at once. Coarse gray fur slid out of my skin as the bones of my jaw stretched and reformed. The pain was almost too excruciating, and I was sure it was too much for one last moment of effort, and then I collapsed onto four paws, panting.
All around me, a strange scent grew increasingly more pungent. There were the typical smells of the forest of pine and wet earth, but layered over that was a nose itching aroma of overripe fruit, but it wasn’t any kind of fruit I’d ever smelled before. The odor made my nose itch, and I sneezed and then sneezed again.
There was a rustling nearby, and then I inhaled the intoxicating musk of a dominant male wolf. Well, fuck. My nose worked as a wolf, which meant my inability to smell around Grayhaven was likely due to some sort of magic. Meaning, if Kane came here in wolf form, he could track me straight to where I slept.
My only comfort was that I’d left a web of trails all over the city, and it might take him some time to think of tracking me as a wolf if he couldn’t smell me with his human nose.
The biggest werewolf I had ever seen in my life circled the trunk of the pine tree. Declan was as massive in wolf form as he was as a man, and his dominance and power tingled over my fur. His fur was dark with gray scruff on his chest. Immediately, I rolled to my back, showing him my belly, and he moved in and ran his cold nose up the soft flesh of my stomach. He licked the side of my muzzle, and happiness flowed through me, so I licked the coarse, dark fur of his snout back.
Declan backed up a few feet and lowered his haunches with his butt up in the air. He wanted to play, and damn how I wanted to wrestle around with this wolf, but I needed to be good.
I let out a low whimper and rolled until my injured paw was in the air. My transformation into a wolf had likely sped up my healing a couple of days, but it had also made my paw ache and swell.
Declan sniffed my paw, and then he leaned over me and bit the bandage lying discarded on the ground. In a very human-like move, he slid the bandage back on my paw.
I chuffed and nuzzled his side, showing him my thanks.
Declan’s massive form plopped down just beside me, and he licked my snout once more. I rolled into him, laying my head on his side. If being around Declan in human form felt disconcertingly natural, it was nothing to how comfortable I felt around him as a wolf. His warmth enveloped me, and I felt safer at this moment than I’d felt in a decade. Maybe it wasn’t real. Maybe this would all come crashing down at any second, but as it was now, contentment warmed my heart and lulled me into a deep sleep.
Low voices pulled me out of my slumber, and I opened my eyes to slits as two familiar men crouched over me. Jasper and Lucas looked down from where they huddled a few feet away in the forest. I should have been feeling terror that I was surrounded by three dominant werewolves, but instead, I just felt like curling up closer to Declan and going back to sleep. The werewolf behind me was still snoring softly.
“She’s awake,” Jasper whispered, and then both men turned, and a pair of bright blue eyes and gray eyes found mine.
“Teagan,” Lucas crawled over to me and knelt in the dirt. “I just want to check your paw.”
Behind him, Jasper stood, turned his back to us, and grabbed the hem of his shirt.
“You’re distracting her,” Lucas called over his shoulder, though amusement laced his voice.
“I’d sense it if she was scared.” Jasper turned his head halfway, and then he reached down for his fly.
I turned my attention back to Lucas and rolled further into Declan to hold up my paw.
He lifted my paw, shining a penlight on it. “The stitches held, but a few dissolved, which is good. There’s some dirt here.” His thumb pressed on the side of my toe pad, and I yipped from the sudden sharp pain. I nuzzled Lucas’ leg, and he caressed my head. “Sorry, Teagan. You’ve still got some damage in there. It’s better if you stay…”
Lucas trailed off as in a whirl of motion, Declan dashed out from behind me. The massive dark wolf hunched over me, teeth bared in Lucas’ face. A low growl rattled from his throat. I was looking up from the underside of the situation, and even from here, Declan towered over the veterinarian.
Lucas set my paw down on his leg and tilted back his head, showing Declan his throat. Carefully, Lucas raised his hands. “I need to clean her wound and wrap her paw in fresh bandages, Deck.”
Declan retreated, climbing back over me, and landing in a huff at my side. For a second, I thought it was because Lucas backed down, but then I felt Jasper.
The alpha wolf wasn’t directing his dominance at me, but I felt it
