Page 12 of Forbidden Wolf

“Who’s the most beautiful boy?” I cooed at the big cat.

He lifted his leg as I ran my hand over his fur. There was a house cat that roamed at my school. He used to lie on my bed for hours to get a tummy rub.

A noise in the distance made the jaguar’s ears twitch and he bumped his nose against my head before disappearing into the forest.

“Do you tame all beasts, or is it just the lonely male ones you find?” Levi asked, his eyebrow raised when I turned to him.

I looked in the direction that the jaguar had disappeared into.

“Can you keep a secret?” I whispered in a tone meant for conspiracy. “Some vampires have unique gifts. I can sense all the creatures in this forest as they go about their nightly routine.”

“You can feel their blood?” Levi asked, standing and dragging me up onto my feet.

“No, it’s more like I can feel their souls. There are times I can sense those in pain and go to help them. I have a tiny monkey living in my room on the facility. No one knows he’s there, but I set his arm last week and hid him in my room until he’s healed and ready for release.”

I’d never shared my secret with anyone before. Levi was a neutral person I could confide in. It wasn’t as if he was going to run off to my coven leader Castus and report me for unusual gifts.

Levi studied me for a few seconds.

“We all have our secrets that we live with. Come on,” he said. “The sun will be up soon, and I need to get you back or we’ll have to spend another day in a cave.”

“I wouldn’t object,” I said in a low tone not meant for him to hear.

He grinned, squashing me in a quick hard hug.

“Maybe I’ll find us a bigger cave,” he said. “One that is safe for you to stay in during the day so we can spend some time together?”

The suggestion was dangerous because I already liked Levi too much. The more time we spent together, the more likely we were to be discovered.

Instead of saying no and walking away like I intended after one night with him, I found myself smiling. “I’d like that.”

He was everything I never expected, and if that was true, then what else about my life was nothing more than lies and half-truths?

The sky began to lighten far to the east.

“Tomorrow night?” Levi whispered against my lips.

“Same place?” I didn’t want to let him go. Every instinct in me said to hold onto him and run far from this place.

He nodded and pressed me against a tree, kissing me until nothing else existed but the two of us. I clung to him as if he was my lifeline. Grief sat in my chest like a heavy lump at the thought of walking away from him.

He watched me leave, his fingertips touching mine until the last moment. Amber glowed in his eyes and that magnetic force between us increased as if to try and drag me back into his arms. I walked backward for a few paces.

“Don’t be late,” Levi said.

I was bereft and lonely, but alongside those, I found hope. My lips lifted in a grin and I pressed a kiss to my fingers and waved them at him.

He caught the kiss and held it against his chest. It was a childish thing to do, but the fact that he continued the sentiment made me fall that little bit harder.

The sun was hot on my heels as I sped through the forest toward the facility. I slipped under the shutter just as it was falling into position. My pulse pounded in my ears at the thrill of my run.

Vampires moved around the facility as they continued their work. I wandered around watching what we did here through my new knowledge. We weren’t a superior race. We were just the same as the lycans—immortals trying to find our place in an evolving world. Hundreds of years ago the humans didn’t know we existed, and we could live hidden from them. Now technology allowed the humans to wander the globe twenty-four hours a day. The wealth of our covens kept us hidden because our people sat in prominent positions in governments.

Levi’s scent was on me, so I slipped into our apartment to submerge myself in a lavender bubble bath and the memories from last night. I relived every moment in my head, my skin tingling.

Peeking out from under the bubbles, I stared at the ceiling, my mind in turmoil. If there was any chance of shifting the tide of this war and keeping innocent people like Levi safe, then that change needed to start one vampire at a time. He wasn’t the monster of the history lessons I’d sat through.

Both our races were being decimated in this war. That meant that in a few months’ time either or both of us could be killed or expected to murder each other for a cause I didn’t believed in.

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