Page 44 of Runaway Wolf
“She can feel the change coming on. She’s begging for someone else’s bite.”
“I don’t understand,” the news anchor said. “She’s already bitten, though.”
“Yes, but she didn’t want a stranger’s violent wolf to create hers. She could feel the inner turmoil inside already beginning. She wanted another to smother the one just sparking inside her. She begged and Isaac, the alpha of my mate’s pack, agreed to use his one change. Since the law was enacted, all shifters are pretty much aware they can only do it once. He didn’t hesitate to use his on my sister.”
Isaac turned to her. “Penny didn’t want to let on that we were seeing each other. She was afraid of the ramifications for us. She made it sound like I was sacrificing my chance to willingly turn someone for you.”
“I didn’t thank you,” she whispered.
His smile was gorgeous. “You don’t need to thank me. There’s no one else I’d have used it on but you. You’re my person.”
She reached out for his hand, holding it tight like she’d never let it go. He brought it to his leg.
The image of him biting into her injured arm and her mouth stretched out in silent screams were horrific.
Penny’s television voice continued its narration. “Thankfully, the second bite took in time. We’re not sure if it’s because Isaac’s wolf was stronger or if her will was more ready to accept his, but the first time she changed? She recognized his animal. It was the first break we’d gotten. You could feel the relief wash over the pack.”
Caitlin leaned forward, unable to believe the writhing image on the program was her. That the wolves all around her, watching carefully, were all the others.
“But we weren’t anywhere in the clear. Caitlin’s wolf wouldn’t allow her human consciousness to surface. It couldn’t remain one hundred percent of the time, so when Caitlin did finally rouse, it was to a body full of pain, and being sick because she wasn’t accustomed to hunting and eating raw meat.”
There was a shot of her vomiting in bed. A shot of her in the midst of another painful change. A shot of her unconscious, her hair like a tangled rat’s nest with leaves and twigs in it, and the scars on her arm barely healed, still raw and wounded.
“How is your sister now?” the newscaster asked when the images stopped rolling.
“Still unconscious. So while the good news is her wolf is becoming manageable, her human side hasn’t awakened. My sister could still die. And next spring, when I go through this, it could be just as horrendous. My father agreed to enact Turn Limitations and it’s ironic that he could lose both of his daughters to it.”
The camera zoomed in on Penny’s sad face. “How many more daughters will be lost before humans take a stand and realize what the law has really accomplished?”
“Murder,” the newscaster whispered.
The footage ended and the camera returned to the two anchors still in the news studio.
“Wow, Rebecca, that was a horrifying story. Our best goes to those sisters. We wish them both well and a speedy recovery—”
Someone flicked off the television.
“Well, we should probably notify them I’m alive,” Caitlin half-jokingly ground out.
“Nah, let them all worry.” Penny’s voice was cold. “I’ve been sending your videos to Dad from your phone. He’s been watching your progress live. The next big news they present after everyone shares this story? I’m sure they’ll realize the phone at the end matches the dates that everything was submitted to him. Along with news footage of me walking into Dad’s office months ago when I explained the ramifications of the law. Everyone will know Dad knew everything all this time.”
Now the mood was somber.
“Welcome to the pack,” Joaquin said. “I think this marks the day that we go on the map. The Montgomery sisters are going to change shifter laws between them.”
Everyone cheered, began to congratulate them, and then Isaac pulled her onto his lap. He pressed his forehead to hers and said, “I love you. I know you didn’t get a chance to choose me in your human way, but I’ll wait. I’ll guide you, I’ll support you, I’ll protect you. I’ll be here until the day you decide you want to be my mate.”
She opened her mouth in surprise but he held a finger up and laid it across her parted lips to keep her words inside.
“No pressure. You’re automatically in this pack. But one day you’ll choose me on your own, just like Penny’s chosen Noah.”
Chapter Thirteen
JUST LIKE PENNY’D chosen Noah.
He didn’t want her declarations of love that night she woke… maybe he wouldn’t have believed them. Hell, maybe he would have wondered how sincere they were, wondered if they’d have been uttered because she had no other choice. But she could give him time… time to realize she’d left her human life unfinished.
So far, there wasn’t anything between them to disappoint him. She’d been staying in his pack house because she had nowhere else to go. Sure, she could have stayed with Penny and Noah, but she’d snorted when Amos mentioned for the umpteenth time how they made everyone nearly gag with their PDA.
