He could bite her.
“No!” McGoven’s tone was firm, but that didn’t keep Loren from stumbling across the room toward him.
“Please! You can save her! Do it! Please.”
He looked away, his expression torn. “I can’t.”
“You know the rules,” Micha said softly from the doorway, seeming to agree with him. “You turn a human without permission, and it’s treason. Lukka won’t like it.”
“I know,” McGoven hissed, but his gaze flashed as if that fact annoyed him. Then he sighed.
“If I do this… It won’t be some simple good deed. Her life will be forever changed. There will be no going back.”
A part of Loren stirred in acknowledgment, sensing exactly what he meant—and more. But… Her voice was small, “We can’t just let her die.”
“Turn around,” McGoven snarled. “Close your eyes…don’t look.”
She scrambled to obey, eyeing the window and the storm raging outside. A second later, she heard a growl.
And then the snap of breaking bone and ripping flesh.
35
Loren woke up, frozen solid…except for the heat radiating from an arm slung across her waist. With a sigh, she relaxed into the embrace—until she realized her companion wasn’t the man she’d become accustomed to waking up beside. They smelled wrong. Like smoke and rain instead of pine, along with a vague odor that reminded her of a wet dog.
Alarmed, she opened her eyes and rolled over—coming face to face with a boyish figure, their features half-hidden beneath a mop of curly hair. Micha. He was asleep, his chest rising and falling with gentle snores.
That’s right,she remembered. They camped out in the living room to keep watch over Naomi. She and Micha had, anyway.
Bill left sometime before dawn. The dark glint in his eye warned against asking questions. Though, there were plenty that needed to be asked.
Enough secrecy. The need for answers loomed overhead like a storm cloud. She’d go insane without some kind of clarity. It had been hard enough keeping her mouth shut last night. All she’d done was watch.
And hear. Those horrific sounds still haunted her—the cracking of Naomi’s bones being wrenched back into place—her neck had been broken during the attack, Bill explained afterward. He had to fix the fatal injury first…
Then, he bit her.
There wasn’t any dramatic pause or fanfare. He merely hunched over that pale throat, teeth sinking deep. Then he cut himself, forcing his blood into Naomi’s mouth with almost clinical precision.
A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down,a part of her snickered, though the situation wasn’t funny in the least. After that, all they could do was wait. For what? Loren didn’t know.
In the end, she and Micha must have passed out on the floor—though she distinctively remembered being onoppositesides of the room.Not good,a part of her whispered, cringing at the feel of him so close.He shouldn’t touch me.
The fear itched at the back of her mind but, for now, she had bigger things to worry about. Sick with dread, she lifted her head and glanced over at Naomi. The blond still lay motionless on the couch.
In bits and pieces, the events of last night came flooding back. Naomi should have been dead—and the only reason she wasn’t was because… Well, because a police officer, who just so happened to sprout four legs in his spare time, turned her into a werewolf.
How would she react? Even begin to understand? After all, it wasn’t every day that you woke up in a stranger’s house as something…
Else.
Tell me about it,Loren thought with a sigh, as she gingerly disentangled herself from Micha’s grip and crawled to her feet. She just hoped that the blond’s bitchy demeanor hadn’t been just an act. After the events of last night, Naomi would need all the strength she could muster.
In the pale daylight streaming in from the bay window, she certainly didn’t look any better. Dried blood splattered her designer ensemble. That expensively highlighted hair was a tangled mess. Her throat…
The wounds hadn’t miraculously healed like in all the TV shows. They were still there. Still fresh. Still bleeding.
Loren’s nostrils flared with the grisly stench, and she couldn’t bear to look anymore. Eyeing the floor instead, she tried to rationalize her current reality. Relief and guilt went to war in the pit of her stomach. Within seconds, one emotion dominated.My fault.