Page 78 of To Keep A Wolf
I try to put my arms out to break my fall, but only the left hand obeys. My right arm hangs limp, and when I hit the ground, I scream as pain bursts from my insides.
Levi’s wolf howls. I don’t need to look up to know it’s him. I feel his anguish in my own body, separate from my own pain though no less potent. And then I feel the agony cut short.
Jadick uses the distraction to his advantage, knocking Levi aside and pinning him instead. A second later, I’m seized by a sense of pain so much greater than my own injury has caused.
Levi howls again, this time much softer and more desperate.
Then, he’s silent.
Footsteps sound as boots march over to where I’ve fallen. With a groan, I fling myself onto my back in time to see Frankie coming toward me. Relief floods me, and I exhale, summoning the strength to form words around the pain and the blood loss.
“Someone shot me,” I say through clenched teeth. “Find them and stop them.”
“I’ve found them,” Frankie says, strangely neutral as she steps up and aims her gun at my forehead. “But I can’t stop until I’ve finished it.”
My eyes widen, and I realize way too late what’s happening. Frankie’s finger begins squeezing the trigger, and I shut my eyes, bracing for the end.
But it never comes.
A grunt sounds and then a shuffling of limbs.
I reopen my eyes in time to see Frankie tackled to the ground by a familiar figure dressed in black. Grey lands on top of Frankie as he wrestles the gun from her hand.
“Mac’s not mated to Jadick, you idiot,” he hisses at her. “Killing her won’t harm him.”
“But—the kiss. They claimed each other,” Frankie says.
“This isn’t the way,” he grunts.
“It’s worth the sacrifice.”
“It’s not,” he roars.
She manages to yank away, and he rears back, plowing his fist into her face. She goes limp long enough for him to grab the gun from her then immediately begins fighting anew to get it back.
“Frankie, stop,” I scream, but she’s lost to her own rage.
“He can’t get away with this,” Frankie says, spit flying from her clenched teeth.
I recognize the look she wears as one Marilyn wore earlier. There’s no thread tying her to reality. Only her own twisted sense of justice. And what she must do in order to achieve it.
“Stop her,” another male voice orders Grey.
My father rushes toward us, a few guards giving chase behind him. But he ignores them, his expression urgently locked on Frankie and the threat she poses.
“Put her down if you have to,” my father yells at Grey.
“No,” I protest, but even I can see it’s going to come down to Grey or Frankie.
Skin rippling with the change coming over him, Grey tosses the gun to me with a grunted, “Here,” and by the time I’ve managed to grip it in my hands, he’s already shifted and sunk his teeth into Frankie’s throat.
She shifts beneath him, legs jerking as he severs her artery. When she stops moving, she’s a wolf. And I can only stare in shock for a long moment as Grey steps away and looks at me, his wolf covered in blood.
Before I can respond, a shot rings out. Dazedly, I look down at the gun I now hold, worried I’m the one who fired it, even though I never moved to do so. Someone screams.
My mother.
The sound of her shrill voice, so full of terror, snaps me out of my reverie. I look up again and see my father clutching his chest. Blood leaks from a wound there. On his face, I see confusion, then horror, then pain register. Until finally, he drops to his knees.
