Page 9 of Scarlett's Wicked Wolf
I should hate him. I should slap his beautiful, rugged face and demand he undo this.
But when I look at him, all I feel isheat. The pull. The ache. It coils around me like a vine wrapping around bone.
“What’s happening to me?” I ask.
“The fever,” he says, still not looking at me. “It’s part of the change. Your body’s adjusting to the new magic in your blood. Soon, you’ll shift. Because of the bond.” He finally looks at me full-on, those amber eyes catching the firelight. “The mate bond.”
My breath catches. “That’s not real.”
“It is.”
“But we just met?—”
“I didn’tchoosethis, Scarlett,” he says, voice sharp.
“How do you know my name?”
“You told me when you were sleeping.”
“I-I did?”
He nods. “I wasn’t born a wolf. I didn’t grow up waiting for a fated mate. I’m just a man who was turned into a monster at a Halloween party because he was stupid enough to drink something he shouldn’t have.”
My eyes widen. “Screaming Woods,” I whisper, knowing all about Dr. Karloff’s Frankenpunch that turned half the residents into monsters from myth and lore. I’ve met several myself, including Xander, a griffin, and Galina, a white dragon, Gregor, an ogre, and Arya, a shapeshifter.
Reid nods. “It turned me into… this.” He gestures to himself like he doesn’t know what he is anymore.
And maybe he doesn’t.
I study the lines bracketing his eyes, the tension in his shoulders, the guilt he wears like armor. Dangerous, yes. But also… wounded. I see it in his eyes, sense it through the bond.Ourbond.
“I’m sorry,” he mutters. “I should have found another way. But I couldn’t let you die. Not once I knew.”
“Knew what?”
“That you’re mine.”
The room spins a little, and I press a hand to my head. “Your mate.”
“Yes.”
“But… you’re not even a real shifter.” I regret the words instantly, but it’s too late to take them back.
He flinches. “I know. And that’s why I’ll let you go, if that’s what you want. You don’t owe me anything.”
But somethingin medoes.
The bond pulses—tender, confused, alive. What I want is suddenly hard to define.
“I want to go home,” I whisper.
He nods once. “I’ll take you. You can stay here until you’re strong enough to travel.”
“And the fever?”
“Should break in a few days.” He hesitates. “Try to rest. The change can be hard, but you’ll survive. You’re stronger than most.”
My eyes flick to a narrow door in the corner. “Is that a bathroom?”
