Page 31 of Monsters and Beauties

Holy shit.

Although it looked like a wolf—werewolf,my mind whispered—it held very clear intelligence behind its dark eyes as it watched me.

“Oh God. Please. Please don’t hurt me.” My voice was whisper-thin. I wasn’t even sure I’d spoken the words aloud. “W-what are you?” It was so close now that all I smelled was this wild scent that clung to it.

Here was this primitive creature crowding me, breathing on me… refusing to give me space. It was going to eat me. I was sure of it. Why else would it be here? What other purpose would it have for me?

Not it.He. This creature was clearly male given what he was working with.

“I’m the one who is going to make you mine.”

I shook my head and lashed out, raking my nails along his chest, feeling hard, defined muscle underneath. He was fast as he snapped his paw out and curled it around my wrist, my palm and fingers so tiny compared to his.

I felt this survival instinct rise as I started to scream and kick out, but I was like an annoying gnat compared to him, I was sure.

And when he let go of my wrist to grab my ankle, stopping my foot from connecting with the huge thing he had between his legs, I screamed again. But this time it was in fear. Bone-chilling fear.

He stood and started dragging me away like I was a damn sack of potatoes.

I twisted my body, clawing at the ground, dirt digging underneath my nails. Tears made my vision blurry, and then the world turned as he lifted me up and threw me over his shoulder.

For a second, the wind was knocked out of me as my stomach connected with his shoulder, and I lay there flopping around from his movements.

And then he picked up speed, running, so it forced me to grip the long, dark fur that covered him and hold on, sobbing uncontrollably.

“Don’t worry, female. I’ll have you crying for a far different reason soon enough.”

ChapterOne

Marcella

Ithought I’d gotten used to death.

The initial pain. That horrible ache in the center of your chest that just didn’t seem to ease no matter how much time passed.

But as I watched them lower my grandmother’s casket into the ground… it hurt.

I stayed at the cemetery long after everyone had left, sitting on the ground with my knees pulled up to my chest and my arms wrapped around my legs.

I’d been close with my grandmother. She raised me when my mother hadn’t been fit to do the job.

Blanchette had shown me how to ride a bike, and even helped me buy my first tampons when I got my period and explained it all to me when I started crying because I didn’t know what was happening.

She sat down and talked with me about boys, showed me how to drive, and helped me with my homework every single night. And when I graduated from high school, she was the only family I had there, but she’s the only one I’d wanted.

For all intents and purposes, she was my mother.

And now, at twenty-two, I was utterly and truly alone.

I wiped an errant tear that slipped down my cheek and felt my heart continuously break, the shearing pain of it ripping into a million unique pieces.

They always said with time it got easier, but right now I couldn’t even imagine it ever being better. I literally had no one else. I hadn’t seen my mother since she dropped me off at my grandmother’s when I was just a child.

My father hadn’t been in the picture and had been an only child. Hell, I wouldn’t even call my “friends” more than acquaintances, only seeing them at work.

I stood and brushed the grass and dirt off my bottom, glancing down at my legs to see a run in my dark stockings.

I guess it was par for the course on how things were going for me.

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