Page 61 of Wolf Cursed
My stomach clenched.
“What does he want?” I asked, knowing whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. Not from the serial killer look he wore.
“You,” Idrissa said simply, which still didn’t really answer my question.
People wanted me for a lot of things these days. None of them sounded like fun for me, though.
“Take her through the back,” Isaac said. “I’ll hold him off.”
Idrissa didn’t argue. She grabbed me, tugging me to follow her in the opposite direction.
“Wait, we can’t leave Isaac,” I said, but Idrissa was strong, and I had to nearly run to keep up with her or risk faceplanting.
“He’ll be fine,” she assured me. “We need to get you out of here.”
Behind us, Isaac said something to Silas in a growly voice. Silas responded, a lot closer than he’d been before. I couldn’t make out the words, but judging from the animalistic sounds, they were either already shifting or were about to.
I picked up the pace, ready to be out of here. Suddenly, the garden wasn’t so much secluded as isolated. If Silas did something to me back here, who would know? How long would it take Oscar to find me?
I hurried ahead with Idrissa, but at the mouth of the alley, she stopped short.
I peeked around her shoulder and spotted Presley, the James Dean look-alike. He was just as pretty as the other day. But he looked a hell of a lot meaner and intent on violence now.
“Pres, you don’t want to involve yourself,” she said in warning.
“She needs to fight, Dris. You know that.”
Shit.
“She can’t shift,” Idrissa told him.
Her voice held no trace of the panic I felt. She shoved me behind her as Presley took a step forward.
“She should have thought about that before she decided to crash our hunting party the other night.”
Hunting party? Is that what their gathering had been about? And why Kai had said I was lucky he’d been there to protect me from them?
I shuddered.
“If Cohen sent her, we’d know by now,” Idrissa said.
I blinked. There was that name again. I really needed to find out who this Cohen person was. So far, he’d only made things complicated for me, which was bullshit considering I’d never heard of him.
“She has to prove it,” Presley said. “You know that.”
“She didn’t grow up as a wolf,” Idrissa told him. “She doesn’t understand how it works.”
“I’m just following the rules,” he said.
“What rules?” Idrissa demanded. “Lone Wolves do what the hell they want.” But I could hear it in her voice. Presley was going to win this argument. Maybe not today but eventually. It was some sort of code they had.
“Not when Silas is involved,” he said.
“Fuck Silas,” Idrissa hissed.
Pres smiled in a beautiful-yet-deadly show of teeth. “I think Isaac’s doing his best.”
Idrissa started to turn back to check on her brother, and Presley’s eyes glittered in anticipation. I realized too late he’d only said the words to distract her. The moment Idrissa looked away, he dropped into a crouch, and before I could even blink, he’d shifted. His clothes exploded off his body, the shredded fabric flying in all directions.
