Page 45 of Bullied Wolf Mate

Empty.

My wolf panicked, growling as we both tried to figure out what had happened. Then I saw the open window. My stomach lurched. Frantically, I sniffed the air. No scents but Lorelei’s. That should have been comforting, but all it meant was that she had run off on her own, which was arguably worse.

“Fuck,” I snarled. I didn’t have to guess to know what had happened.

I wanted to be furious with her, and I was. At the same time, I knew this was partly my fault. If I had listened to her, we might have been able to come up with a plan that kept her safebut involved. She wouldn’t have felt the need to run off on her own to solve the problem she saw as her fault.

I closed my eyes. Even if this was partly my fault, I couldn’t let that stop me. I could fix this. I knew where she was. But I couldn’t rush off on my own, even though my wolf wanted to run off right this moment to protect her. I needed backup.

Ignoring my wolf’s urge to go now, I pulled out my phone as I hurried upstairs to get the pack I always carried as a shifter.

“Lorelei’s missing,” I said as soon as Jameson picked up.

“What?” Jameson replied, then said something to someone further away from the phone. I had no doubt it was Declan. When his voice returned, he asked, “Did Inara take her?”

“I think she left on her own,” I explained, rummaging through the pack to make sure I had everything. I couldn’t find the hammer I had used to break enchantments, but I was fairly certain Jameson still had one, so I wasn’t going to waste time rummaging around for it.

“What?” Jameson repeated. “Why the hell would she do that?”

“Because she likes this place and the girls,” I said. “And I think it’s partly my fault.”

“What do you mean?”

I paused, even as I was taking off my clothes, preparing to shift the second I was off the phone.

“I kind of locked her in the house,” I admitted.

A long pause on the other side of the line. “Seriously?” Jameson asked, somewhere between exasperation and disbelief.

I closed my eyes. “Yeah.” I could have kicked myself. Maybe if I had just listened to her and her plan instead of deciding I knew what was best, she might still be here and safe. Or maybe we could have come up with a better plan that didn’t involve her running off on her own into danger. Instead, I had tried to control the situation and pushed her away in the process.

“Right,” Jameson said. “I’ll round up some of the others. We’ll meet at the rendezvous point. There’s a chance she’s still there since the twelve hours aren’t up.”

It was a feeble hope, but it was still hope at the very least. “I’ll meet you there.”

I hung up, stuffed my phone into my bag, and shifted. As soon as I had my pack situated, I raced out the door, running through the woods, hoping that I wasn’t too late.

As my paws pounded against the forest floor, my mind ran over everything I had done. Lorelei’s angry and betrayed face, the way she screamed when I locked the door, the look in her eyes when she told me she wanted to turn herself in. I should have listened. I should have tried to help. Maybe if I had done that, she would be safe right now.

Why had I become so controlling? What had it been about Lorelei that made me and my wolf want to protect her to that extreme?

Because I loved her.

The answer came so quickly that I came to an abrupt halt despite myself. The instant I thought it, the instant I realized it was the truth. I loved Lorelei. I might have fallen in love with her the second I had seen her again after all those years, or maybe I’d loved her since we were kids. Or maybe it was a slow, gradual thing, something my wolf understood on an instinctive level long before I’d figured it out.

I supposed it didn’t matter. I loved Lorelei. I loved everything about her. Her tenacity, her independence, her strong moral code, the fact she had been willing to help others even though she could have been justifiably selfish any number of times. I liked how blunt she was, and I liked the way she called me out on my bullshit. She was unlike any other woman I had ever met. I wanted her with me always, not just because my wolf wanted to protect her. I wanted to be with her because I loved her and her company.

And I realized that by protecting her the way I had, by taking her agency away, I had inadvertently driven her away. If I hadn’t tried to control her, if I had tried to help her instead of stopping her, maybe she wouldn’t be in Inara’s clutches right now.

All of this slamming into me at once only intensified the need to get to her as soon as possible. At the very least, I needed to tell her how I felt before it was too late. I pushed forward again.

Crashing sounds echoed all around me, and I sniffed the air as my paws continued to race across the earth. The smells of a dozen shifters filled my snout—the Silver Wolves and Declan’s crew. Soon, I caught them out of the corner of my eye as we formed into one group, all barreling toward the clearing Inara had indicated. We were close now.

As we neared, I caught a whiff of Lorelei’s scent, giving me a surge of hope. Maybe she was still there. Maybe we weren’t too late.

But when we got to the clearing, all we saw was an empty expanse. Lorelei’s scent lingered in the air, but the trail ended here. I shifted back to human, as did the others. “Any idea where they might have gone?” Oliver asked.

“If they portaled? No idea,” Tannen responded.

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