Wolfsong (Green Creek 1)

Maybe I just wanted a normal life, away from everything that shouldn’t exist.

Maybe I wanted to leave all of this behind and find a place where wolves didn’t know my name.

Thomas had told me once that the longer a human was in a pack, the stronger the scent of pack would be until it was a part of them, ingrained into everything that they were.

Any wolf would know I belonged to others, no matter how much I scrubbed my skin.

And it grated at me.

&nb

sp; I stayed away from the others as much as I could. I worked later, not leaving the shop until well past midnight. The guys at the shop tried to push me, but I snapped at them to leave me alone.

Mark and Elizabeth didn’t push.

I didn’t want them to, but I was confused as to why I thought they should.

I should have known Elizabeth would wait until she thought I was ready. Sometimes, I thought she knew me better than I knew myself.

I rubbed my hand over my face as I walked down the dirt road toward the house at the end of the lane. It was probably foolish of me to be out in the dead of night alone, but I had faith in Gordo’s wards, even if I was losing faith in the man himself.

I was tired. Of a lot of things.

I sensed Elizabeth before I actually saw or heard her. I didn’t think this happened to most humans in wolf packs, but I didn’t know any others to ask. And the thought of asking questions these days was exhausting. Especially on top of everything else.

I said, “I know you’re there,” and expected her to walk out from the trees as a wolf.

Instead, she said, “Of course you do. I wouldn’t have thought anything less.”

She melted out of the shadows, moving with an inhuman grace. She wore a loose pair of sweats and an old sweatshirt of Thomas’s, the sleeves falling over her hands. Her eyes flared briefly in the dark, that Halloween orange that reminded me so of her son. There was an ache in my chest at the very thought of him.

And she knew. Because that’s just something she could do.

She said, “Ah. I wondered if that was it.”

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” I grumbled.

She laughed quietly. “I can’t not. It’s who I am.”

“Lurking in the forest in the middle of the night is who you are?”

“I don’t lurk.” She sounded moderately offended.

“You kind of do,” I said. “It’s part of your whole… thing.”

“I like you,” she said seriously. “Very much.”

I couldn’t stop the smile on my face even if I tried. “I know. I like you too.”

I started walking toward the house at the end of the lane.

She fell into step beside me.

“You’ve been avoiding us,” she said.

“I’ve been busy,” I said.

“Ah,” she said. “At the shop.”