Wolf: To Your Bones (Wolf series Book 2), page 2
When Josh reached my window, I stepped back to let him in. He leaped into the room and straightened to his full hybrid height. Pieces of moss and fir needles fell from his gray fur as he began to change back.
After the wolf released him, Josh grabbed my shoulders and pulled me into a hug. His skin was glistening with heat.
“Everything okay?” His voice was husky. I could tell by his pounding heartbeat how fast he must have run. “Are you hurt?”
My first breath on his skin took all the tension off me. The knot in my stomach vanished, along with the pressing fear that something had happened to him. My hands didn’t detect any injuries on his body—probably because the werewolf in him had long since healed them.
“No,” I murmured into the crook of his neck. “Everything’s fine.”
Josh sighed and let go of me. His eyes were a dark ocean that, unlike usual, filled me with tiredness. Aside from the full moons, this was the first time in a while that I had believed he might be in danger.
“Who was that werewolf?” I stepped to the window to have a look outside. Nothing. The farm and the edge of the forest were so peaceful, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened today. Meanwhile, Josh was searching in my closet for something to wear. I always stored a shirt and shorts for him so that he didn’t have to wear a bag while he was in hybrid form. Without a car, the hybrid was a valuable means of transportation—not only for him but also for me. Josh called it the “wolf express.” It was environmentally friendly, fuel saving, and really cool at the same time.
“I don’t know.”
His answer came hesitantly over his lips.
“I felt like I knew his smell, but . . .” He took a short breath. “I can’t remember.”
He saw my look. My face usually showed too clearly what I was thinking about, and that was the case today. Even in the darkness, Josh must have seen my pressed-together lips, because he put on a reassuring smile.
“It wasn’t Ian,” he said seriously. Because I was still looking out the window, he did the same. Then he wrapped his arms around my stomach to put his chin on my shoulder. The howling of the wind accompanied our conversation like background radio chatter. It was the only sound in the deep of night—that, and Josh’s breath on my ear.
“Ian I would have recognized for sure,” he continued. “It must have been a lone werewolf passing through.”
“What do you mean?” I leaned back so that I could look at him.
He took a step back to pull me onto the bed. His sleeveless shirt aroused the impulse in me to cuddle up to him. Seeing Josh in his sleeping clothes almost made me as tired as seeing my own pajamas did.
He shrugged his shoulders and lay down beside me.
“Remember the trouble I had with the pack?” he asked. “Local werewolves usually don’t relish the idea of welcoming a newcomer into the area.”
I remembered the vehemence with which Keith had tried to get rid of Josh in multiple ways. Even after they’d settled the feud, there had been silence between the pack and Josh for almost a year. Although Keith had driven us to the hospital after the barn fire, I still found it hard to forgive him for all the drama before that.
“So lone werewolves often spend quite some time looking for a place to live,” Josh said.
I put my head on his chest. I was really worried. Josh’s arm found my waist and held me as if to soothe me.
“A stray, then,” I concluded. The steady up-and-down of his chest calmed my pulse. Everything was fine.
Josh chuckled.
“You could say that,” he replied. “I was lucky. Where I grew up, there were no other werewolves. Or maybe they just never found me.”
“Do you think he’ll come back?”
My question sounded more nervous than I cared to admit, but it wasn’t just about me. In Shatterlake lived many people who wouldn’t be as fortunate as I had been if they met a werewolf—my parents, Mr. Harrison, and Audrey included.
Josh’s voice was composed. “I beat him almost to Calgary. He’s not coming back. And if he does, he’s gonna run into Keith soon. Then it’ll be over.”
His tone made it undeniably clear that Keith would be far less squeamish with the stranger. I still wondered how hard it was for Josh to control himself in the shape of a werewolf. I decided, however, not to ask. We’d agreed that I would be far away as soon as he needed to turn. That agreement was sign enough that Josh’s mastery of the werewolf was always on thin ice. He shared this characteristic with almost all his fellow werewolves.
“I’m glad nothing happened to you.”
His words were so soft that I now raised my head to look at him.
“Why were you there?” I asked.
He leaned forward to put a gentle yet possessive kiss on my lips. The heat of his skin jumped over to mine—glowing coals in human form that ignited every cell in me. At times like that, it was as if I could feel the pure energy of the werewolf.
As I closed my eyes, Josh’s hand touched my cheek.
“It was a hunch,” he murmured. “When you wrote that you were going back into the shop, I felt I should pick you up, so I hit the road.”
I looked at him again and sank into his eyes. In the semidarkness they were nothing more than outlines, but I had memorized every millimeter of them.
“I followed your trail,” he added. “I would know thy scent by a thousand.”
That intrigued me. I had never thought about the fact that Josh, with the fine senses of the hybrid, could track down not only other werewolves but me as well. At least now I knew how he had found me in the barn last year.
“How does my scent smell?”
The question made Josh throw a grin at me. Immediately afterwards he started tracing his lips over my neck and beneath my chin. The shiver down my back almost made me forget my question.
“Sweet, inviting, and very fragile,” Josh whispered. He pulled me closer to demand another kiss, and a single, smooth movement brought him on top of me. With elbows supporting him on the mattress, Josh’s teeth touched my shoulder and impatiently nipped at the skin.
“Josh,” I moaned. Just turning to look at my alarm clock was a struggle, because Josh’s tingling warmth was capturing me. “We have to get up early tomorrow.”
We were supposed to go to a flea—just him and me—and a flea market was a warzone. If you aren’t there in time, the other visitors get all the good bargains. That’s why I never went there after nine.
Josh, though, was not to be put off. He just grinned and looked up at me with undisguised desire. The sparkle in his eyes ignited fireworks in my limbs.
“Who needs sleep?” he asked, while his hands found their way under my clothes. “I have a much better idea.”
The next morning I was really tired.
I sat like a zombie with uncombed hair at the dining table and watched Mom pour orange juice into a carafe. I kept trying not to fall asleep on my hand. It was the only thing keeping my head upright. Dad didn’t seem to be doing much better. He was not a morning person and looked as if it was four instead of eight in the morning.
My parents rarely got up before ten on weekends. While I had been kept awake by Josh, Mom and Dad had had the dubious pleasure of taking care of Jamie’s rotten stomach. Every now and then the dog ate something in the forest that didn’t agree with him, and he hadn’t gotten any smarter with age. At the moment, he was sleeping peacefully under the dining table, but each of us was ready to sprint to the door if there was an emergency.
“When’s Josh coming to pick you up?” Mom asked and settled down beside me. In the middle of the table, fresh rolls were steaming. I carefully cut one open and tried to keep from burning my fingers. It wasn’t easy.
“In half an hour,” I replied.
Josh had staggered out of my window early this morning to freshen up and come back here. I felt a little sorry for him, since he had gotten even less sleep than I had. Apparently, we’d all had a hard night, including my parents.
“This is usury,” my father mumbled at that moment. “He’ll never get that much money for the old clunker.”
Dad hadn’t spoken a word since his sleep had been interrupted so abruptly, and he had preferred to get right into his newspaper. It and a cup of coffee were necessary for him to become alert in the morning. The caffeinated liquid always looked the same—black as oil and without even a pinch of sugar. He was talking about Josh’s car—Dad must have found the page with the advertisements. Because Josh’s Jetta was a total write-off, my father was helping him find a new vehicle. Until then, Josh was taking the bus to work.
“Someday there will be something,” I said soothingly. Of course, I hoped Josh could get a new car soon. Unfortunately, the hybrid was not the solution for everything. He couldn’t roam around freely in Shatterlake. As much as I told myself that, though, my body seemed to disagree. A good year had passed since the car accident and I had still not entered a vehicle since then. Not even Dad’s truck. Whenever I sat down in it, my heart began to race. I couldn’t control the emotions that came over me like a tidal wave and smothered every logical thought in my head. All that remained was the firm conviction that we would be attacked at any moment.
My parents were pretty worried about it. I hoped that, at some point, I could leave the experiences of that night behind me. Imagining Josh in a car made me nervous too, because I automatically thought of how he had been rammed and catapulted off the road. The pack’s attack had left far deeper scars in me than I’d anticipated. It annoyed me, but for the moment I was powerless against it.
My mother seemed to catch my thoughts and gave me a determined look. “Have the police contacted Josh yet?”
Her question made me tense. I didn’t like talking about the accident. Mom and Dad had been waiting for months to finally find the culprit who had done this to us so that he would get a fair punishment. I was truly sorry that this would never happen.
I bit into my bread to buy time. So early in the morning, my mouth was unbearably dry.
“No,” I replied. “I guess they haven’t found anything.”
My parents looked at each other. I’m sure they thought it was all very strange. I myself was astonished that no one had even thought of asking me and Josh questions about the destroyed road, the split Jetta, and the deep holes in the car’s sheet metal. There was nothing to suggest that this had been an ordinary accident, and yet no one had ever approached either of us about the weird stuff. Or maybe Josh just hadn’t told me.
“How long can this go on for?” Mom sounded piqued. “There aren’t really that many people in the area.”
Dad snorted and noisily flipped a page of his newspaper. “They have other things to do,” he mumbled. “Peter told me there’s been a lot of delivery trucks driving around Shatterlake lately.” He paused, then added, “Without license plates! While we civilians wait for our rights, the state is plagued by some idiots who probably dump their toxic waste in the forest.”
I thought of Mr. Harrison. If some business really wanted to get rid of their garbage, a small sports shop in the downtown area was probably not the right place to go.
Mom frowned. Peter, a friend of my father’s, was known for his conspiracy theories. As soon as he discovered any abnormal light in the sky, it became a secret military project. My mother didn’t like such topics, so she gave me a cheerful look and changed the subject.
“Josh hasn’t been over for dinner in a while. You should invite him soon.”
I nodded obediently while I finished my roll with the jam. Mom’s colleague had cooked the jam herself. It contained real blueberries and tasted just great.
Dad drank his coffee in one go. “Tell Josh I’m talking with Ernst,” he said. “I’m sure he’s got something useful.”
Ernst was another of Dad’s friends, a German emigrant who had opened a small used car dealership.
“Thanks, Dad.” I threw him an honest smile. I appreciated how concerned my parents were about Josh. I honestly had it really good. They liked Josh, he liked them, and I even felt that Josh’s life had become a little better because of it. It was good to know that someone besides me cared about him.
Dad seemed like he was about to say something else, but he fell silent under the knock at the door. The rhythmic tapping made Charlie and Jamie jump up. They rushed to the door like two torpedoes, whimpering and barking and scratching at it. I could’ve sworn they already knew who was behind it. I could tell by how happy Jamie was. Whenever Josh entered our house, Jamie’s tail circled like a fan. He only did that with Josh, his great love.
I cleared a path through the dogs to let him in. Josh looked even more tired than I felt, with hastily combed hair and deep rings under his eyes. He seemed to be coping better than I was with this state of affairs, though, because he was grinning as if everything were well.
“Good morning.” He bent over to stroke Jamie’s head and kiss me at the same time. “Or should I say good night?”
“Laugh all you want,” I replied. “You’ll see. If we’re late, the cool stuff will be gone.”
Josh chuckled before he turned to give Charlie a sufficient portion of love. Then he looked at my parents. Dad was still sitting at the table with the newspaper open, but my mother had scurried behind the kitchen counter in a flash. She probably didn’t want to be seen in her bathrobe.
“Hello, Josh,” she said happily. “Have fun! And don’t let the bags get too heavy.”
Josh laughed. “I’ll try.”
“How much have you saved?” Dad asked. He didn’t beat around the bushes. “I may have a prospect.”
It would’ve been the best opportunity for him to tell Josh about Ernst. However, Dad seemed to have decided to leave it up to me. He was not a man of many words—especially not before ten o’clock.
Josh’s eyes lit up like a child’s at Christmas. It was obvious how much he was looking forward to a new car. “If it’s cheap, I can afford it right now. If not, then in two months.”
Dad nodded curtly. “Let’s see what Ernst says.”
And with that, he immersed himself in his newspaper again.
Shatterlake, despite its small size, has always been keen to offer something to its inhabitants. The town fair was a good example of this, but there were also many events organized by small associations. For example, there was the monthly garage sale, or flea market. During the warmer season, a different part of the town was called upon each month to muck out its apartments and sell everything that had accumulated that residents didn’t need. All around us there were tables covered in decorative items, and on the lawns were indoor fountains, potted plants, and aquariums, all waiting for new owners. We strolled around, dodging the passersby and enjoying the morning sun. The market was fuller than I remembered. The last time I’d been here was two years ago with Audrey.
Activities like this were balm for my soul. Whatever Josh and I did together, it always filled me with a feeling of peace and security. Knowing he was beside me gave me ease. Ever since Ian had disappeared, our daily routine had looked almost exactly the same. We were a perfectly normal couple with perfectly normal problems, except that Josh could turn into a wolf. I couldn’t have wished for a better life. I needed no danger and no action, only Josh’s hand and his leisurely steps beside me.
“What are you looking for?” he asked.
I hadn’t been paying attention to the stands, and we had already walked a good distance and left the first street behind us.
“Nothing specific,” I lied. The truth was, I was planning to redecorate Josh’s house a little. I could no longer bear to look at his empty walls and the sparsely filled cupboards. His apartment didn’t have to be as crowded as my room, but I wanted to bring in some soul. I’d take care of finding decorations at this flea market. I didn’t care if all I got was just a magnet to put on his horribly bare fridge.
I didn’t really need anything for myself. My wardrobe was almost exploding, and placing new decorations in my room always turned into a round of Tetris. I bought too much whenever I was out with Audrey. With her, I could never say no to anything. This time, I was determined to stick to a budget—at least, until I saw the stand with the jewelry. When I approached and it got even more colorful, I couldn’t resist looking closer.
Josh laughed as my steps quickened. He gave me time to glance at the real and fake gems.
“Shall I buy you a new bracelet?”
His words took me back to the night of the prom. I had worn a silver bracelet, but, as a werewolf, Josh was severely allergic to silver and had ended up burning himself on it. I hadn’t worn it in his presence since. He must have noticed.
“No.” I smiled, then I took his hand again. “No need.”
We skipped the next stalls because they sold collectible cups, dolls, and old paintings. Directly behind, a bearded man was offering compasses and other outdoor tools. Josh flirted with the idea of getting a weatherproof tent, but he didn’t want to carry it all the way home.
“I would never have done this on my own,” Josh eventually admitted. We had started walking again and I took the opportunity to lean against his shoulder. He hadn’t been to the hairdresser for a quite some time, so a few strands rested against his forehead. I knew it annoyed him, but I thought it was incredibly cute.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “The flea market?”
He squeezed my hand. “Yeah. I rarely had the motivation to go anywhere. Apart from work.”
His eyes struck me. Whirlpools of such a clear blue that it competed with the cloudless sky above. Then he came closer to whisper in my ear.
“You had to appear and pull me out of my cave,” he added quietly and put a tender kiss on my temple. My heart started hammering. Not only because of his proximity, but also because of his words.
“Cave sounds good.” I giggled and purposely lifted my chin. “Just once in a while a wolf needs a little oxygen, though.”
Josh understood my gesture and kissed me. Everything around us had become unimportant. I never thought I could fall in love with Josh even more, but I had over the past year. With every day we spent together—even when our lives weren’t at risk—we became more important to each other.
