Maizie collapsed into the bedside chair, resisting the urge to cup her hands over her ears. What was happening? Pain twisted her stomach, made her cross her arms over her belly instead, holding tight. It was the first cramp since her shower, but it seemed to hurt twice as bad. She grimaced, rode the pain, waiting for it to subside.
“It’s starting already,” Granny said with a nod to Maizie’s belly.
“What?” Maizie squirmed in her seat. The pain dulled but still hadn’t completely gone.
“The change. The change is starting. Good gravy, he really didn’t explain anything?”
“Gran-”
“Well, dear, I’m sorry. But you shouldn’t have let him turn you without asking a few questions. You wouldn’t hop into bed without discovering the important things about a man first, would you?”
Important things like he blamed her for his wife’s death and that he was the very thing she’d spent her life despising?
“How did you know I’d been bitten?” A sly subject change. Maizie hoped Granny wouldn’t push her to admit
“I can see it in your eyes.” Granny leaned toward Maizie, staring at her eyes but not into them. “They have that wild look. Quick, larger pupils, like you see everything.”
Maizie wasn’t sure about that. At the moment she was too busy noticing how the dull pain in her stomach had spread to her legs and arms. Her muscles ached as though they’d been sorely overworked. And the racket of the nursing home was becoming damn near deafening.
“You smell like him too.”
“What?”
“You must have noticed it. It’s such a wonderful smell, like earth and trees and wind. I can smell that on you now. But that’s normal for werewolves.”
“Werewolves…” Maizie still couldn’t fully wrap her brain around it. “Gran, how do you know about all this?”
Granny opened the drawer of her nightstand and pulled out an old leather-backed book. She handed it to Maizie. “Gray gave it to me years ago when your grand-dad passed. He offered to take me into his pack. Tells you everything. I can’t believe he didn’t at least warn you about the first change.”
“It wasn’t Gray.”
“What? Then who? What happened?” Granny’s face paled.
“Don’t worry. I’m sure Gray took care of it. He took care of me. But then we got distracted.” He was too busy fucking her blind to tell her she’d been turned into a werewolf. “And then I just…I didn’t stick around.”
“Well, I can’t imagine what could possibly distract him from something so important. What…” Her cheeks flushed. “Oh. Yes, well… A highly amorous nature is normal too.”
“It tells you that in here?” Maizie read the cover. “
“Some of it’s bullshit, of course.”
“Gran.” The woman hardly ever swore which made the rare occasions all the more surprising.
“They were afraid of their own shadows back then. And it’s not a curse. It’s a virus. You come down with the full-blown disease first, like chickenpox, before your body creates antibodies to control it. After that you can change back and forth at will. The rest of the book is fairly accurate, I’m told. Pack law, instinct, tradition. You should read it before things progress too far.”
“Great.” She felt like crap, achy, sick to her stomach, overwhelmed by all manner of noises, and now she had homework. Maizie shivered, her skin tingling. She checked her arm to make sure it only
“Yes, dear. I heartily agree. Read the book or find Gray. Your choice, Little Red.”
Something told her the time for choices had just run out.
Chapter Eleven
Her body was trying to turn itself inside out…through her bellybutton.
Maizie snuggled tighter into a ball on the couch, tugging the blanket under her chin. The cottage was full of shadows, the sun nearly set. The temperature on the hummingbird thermometer suctioned to the window read eighty-two degrees, but Maizie was shivering so hard her teeth chattered.
This was worse than the time she’d caught the flu and had to be hospitalized for a day and a half while the worst of it passed. They’d been afraid she might die. What did that say about her chances now?
Another shard of pain tore through her abdomen, like a chainsaw slicing her from navel to neck. She screamed, but the sound was hoarse, the last half hour had ruined her voice. She should’ve called Gray. But what could he have done except watch? She’d already thrown up until there was nothing left inside her. No one needed to see that.
Her body convulsed, every muscle pulled tight then stretched apart. The blanket flew across the living room, falling behind the chair in the corner. Dear God, she was freezing, even as sweat dripped from her chin and nose. She couldn’t stop shivering and when another wave of pain raked through her body she found herself writhing on the floor.
Her hair was sopping wet, long strands clinging to her face, stuck to her neck and dripping little puddles on the floor. She pushed up, locked her elbows then rested there for a second trying to find a moment’s peace. Her body wouldn’t have it.
“Ohmygod, ohmygod. Something’s happening.” She collapsed.
If it was possible to survive every bone in her body being broken simultaneously and rearranged, muscles ripping from tendons, organs shifting, cartilage growing, stretching her skin-if it was possible to survive her own autopsy-Maizie now knew what it would feel like.
Her mouth opened on a voiceless wail as she watched her fingers shrink, the bones in her arm pulling back, reshaping. She could feel each thick hair poke through her skin like fat needles forcing their way through the smaller follicles.
She screamed again when the cartilage of her nose crumbled and reshaped, stretching her flesh, her jaw thrusting out, teeth sharpening, ripping her gums as they grew. But the sound wasn’t her own, or at least none she’d ever heard herself make before. It was a crazed, high-pitched screech that hollowed toward the end.
Her spine arched one way then the other, bones breaking along her back, reshaping, pushing beneath the sensitive flesh above her ass.
“No. Please…a tail.” Tears stained her face, but she couldn’t feel the moisture through the fur. Her legs transformed just as her arms had, the pain just as excruciating.
And then…finally it stopped.
Maizie lay motionless on the floor next to the living room couch. Her eyes closed, she panted, trying hard to catch her breath. The pain had lasted a lifetime. It took several minutes to trust it wasn’t coming back.
She licked her lips, except she didn’t have any. Teeth, long and sharp, scraped along her tongue. She licked again and nearly touched the top of her nose. The fur was rough against her tongue, salty from sweat and tears.
She opened her eyes, almost crossed them trying to see the long muzzle where her nose had been. Something scurried along the foundation of the house. She listened and felt her ears turn. She shook her head at the strange sensation and got to her feet, shaky at first, the center of balance so different from two feet to four. Her shorts were crumpled around her back feet, and what was left of her T-shirt still hung around her neck.
She tried her best to paw the torn fabric and managed to catch her claw in the collar and rip it the rest of the way. She made a mental note to be naked next time this happened. The thought stopped her for a second. She knew there’d be a next time.
Free, she shook herself.
