He leans against the door a moment, chest heaving as he catches his breath and realization spreads across his features. He has broken ties with the Mafia man who trained him, marked him as his second and threatened to ruin his relationship with Jess. He has finally and ironically cut himself free of his mother’s rescuer and the man who would be his master. The leash has come off, but beneath its control there is no longer a wolf—just a young man feeling the cure race through his system eradicating the wildest parts of him.
Sinking to his knees, a smile twists across his lips despite everything and he embraces it: the pain, the strange “noise” Cat spoke of, the panicky death of the wild beast, and the freeing of the mild-mannered man who has struggled to correctly define himself as either man or monster since the noticeable parts of his change began at age thirteen.
Suddenly Jessie is beside him, one arm slipping between his back and the door, the other stretched across his chest to hold him tightly to her as he prepares to make his final change.
From the dining room come the sounds of Catherine, sobbing before she races through the house and out the back door, and Max as he gags and coughs, spitting before he launches away from them all and races up the stairs to lock himself in the bathroom and away from all curious eyes.
CHAPTER ONE
Jessie
I wrapped myself around Pietr, holding him while the cure tore through his body. Together we tumbled the rest of the distance to the floor; my arms never once relinquished their hold on him. Within the human halo of my grasp, his clothing ripped and fell away in shreds and tangles of cloth. Fur sprouted in thick tufts, filling in awkwardly and obscuring the way his muscles slid beneath his sleek human skin as he became the wild-eyed wolf.
One last time.
His fingers curled tight into the meat of his palms, bones slipping free to re-form and reshape into broad paws that thrust out claws and scrabbled weakly against the hardwood floor of the foyer, catching in the rug’s long fringe. Frantic at knowing its time was over, the wolf struggled, whining in my grasp, and I adjusted my grip—glad the cure already weakened the beast. I would have never been able to hold back Pietr in his wolf form if he’d been himself.
The thought spun loose in my head, seeking traction like wheels slipping in mud. If he’d been himself … I laced my fingers together and buried my face in his thickly furred side, breathing in deep the scent of pine forests and winter’s vast chill—the scents I’d come to recognize as his.
If he’d been himself … Closing my eyes tight, I dragged in another breath, my arms burning at the stress of holding on. Wasn’t this Pietr, human and free of the beast always clawing at his heart and shortening his life span—wasn’t this Pietr as himself?
He’d been at my side when things were undeniably dangerous—the least I could do was embrace the danger that plagued him since he became a teen. I loved him. And I had promised him I always would.
This was only one small test.
The wolf snapped its wicked teeth threateningly, closing inches from the top of my head—toasting my scalp with its fiery breath. I felt it twist, struggling to escape by dragging us some other direction. The bones in its spine and ribs wiggled against my rib cage, wobbling between wolf and man. I pulled my nose out of his soft fur to glimpse his eyes. They glowed the red of some dangerous sun setting the laws of gravity in a distant galaxy, and I knew we were close … close to a freedom he’d wanted but had never been free to choose.
There was a sound like a clap of thunder as his wolfskin ripped brutally in half. Pietr, completely and undeniably human, slipped free of the animal to rest nude and slick with sweat on the foyer’s Oriental rug. His body heaved with the effort of being nothing but human after four fast and hard years of being so much more.
I released the damp pelt, empty and strangely like the husk of some alien lifeform as it cooled, and I scooted forward on the floor to embrace him—my Pietr—once again.
After everything—all the fighting, the danger, and the drama—finally, we were going to have our chance at being a normal couple. Everything was going to be okay. I was going to get my happily-ever-after after all.
“Jess,” he whispered, his voice ragged. Worn.
I squeezed him gently, tucking my head into the curve of his neck. “I’m here, Pietr.”
He sighed and pulled back from me, slowly opening his eyes.
They seemed different somehow, a softer blue, like the sky after a summer storm washes the darkness away, leaving nothing but a gentle, flat shade perfect for institutional clothing. I looked away a moment, shoving the thought back. When I refocused on him I noticed his forehead had wrinkled, a crease settling at the end of one dark eyebrow. He blinked and looked at me, cocking his head; puzzled. Pulling completely out of my arms, he sat straight up and rubbed his ears.
“What?” I leaned forward and stroked his hair. Odd. The red highlights—such small and seemingly obscure bits of color that sparked within his nearly ebony shock of hair—seemed dull now. I glanced up at the light hanging above our heads. Of course. The trouble had to be with the lighting. Or the fact I was still shaken. I was imagining things. I was seeing differences everywhere because I wanted him to be as different, or as much the same—I wondered now which it truly was—as he wanted to be. “Is something wrong?”
My heart sped as soon as the idea formed words.
Was it possible the cure killed his mother—that my blood or some other ingredient in the gruesome mix had somehow poisoned her and now was taking hold of Pietr?
“What’s wrong?” My eyes scoured his lean form.
“What time is it?”
“What?” Pietr always knew the time—it was as close to him as breathing, as regular as his rapid heartbeat.
He grabbed some anonymous shred of clothing and threw it across his lap.
My eyes narrowed at his suddenly discovered modesty, but I pulled out my cell phone and told him the time.
He blinked.
“Talk to me, Pietr—tell me what’s going on.”
He shook his head, and his eyebrows tugged together as he fought for words. “I don’t … I can’t … I can’t hear the birds.”
“What?”
He straightened and leaned his head back against the door, eyes wide and darting.
I shifted, twisting one arm around his while I stroked his bare shoulder with trembling fingertips.