Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 73170 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73170 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
A few months later, I was a few hours from his village for a complicated job that required work while shifted. I turn down jobs with that requirement, but the client was desperate for help and offering a fat bounty, so I called Linc up and offered him the gig.
He asked me to work it with him and split the bounty. I should’ve declined. But we worked well together. And he didn’t ask me why I refused to be the shifted wolf. I now know he was paying attention and gleaning information about me. And I guess I knew then, but for some reason it didn’t stop me.
Another job happened down the line that he hired me for and this time he saved my life, pulling my bloody and wounded wolf out of a fire. A spontaneous lunar event coupled with rage and self-preservation had me shifting against my will, but my guess is that an avalanche of burning debris knocked my wolf out.
Because my wolf was unconscious, Linc never saw just how wrong it was. He did remark on the size of it, on the teeth, and saying it’s almost as large as his. Linc read something in my reaction when I said it was a birth defect that halted the questioning.
I camped on the other side of Drowsy Hollow for three weeks after working that job and he when we ran into one another in town. Urges I now know I should’ve denied drew me to accept his invitation and pop into his village’s tavern for a few drinks. The way all that felt led me to accept his offer to camp on their land whenever I’m in the area, as much as I want.
That first visit to Roxy’s Bar, the place was packed with shifters and Roxy herself flirted with me, but I wasn’t about to take things anywhere with someone from Linc’s pack.
Either Cicely wasn’t there or I didn’t recognize her scent. I didn’t pick it up a few months later when I stopped in again, either.
I also met up for drinks in Drowsy Hollow with Linc and a few of his council members a couple times and got to know a few of them, especially Joel, who has helped me with a few cases.
Well, enough that more than one of them have asked why I’m not part of their pack. I maintain I’m happy to live as a lone wolf and placated them by saying camping there occasionally as well as connecting with them once in a while is enough. It seems to satisfy them, particularly the ones with the mindset that there’s something wrong with a lone wolf shifter, that he should be coerced into joining a pack.
Joel asked where I grew up, and I evaded the question. Since then, I know he’s had his eye on me. Joel and Linc have a lot of the same investigative skills and often work together, Joel at the computer while Linc is in the field. I’ve often wondered if they’ve tried to figure out where I come from, if they know more about me than what I’ve shared.
Hell, more about me than even I know, because I’ve never met anyone like me. The few cases I was brought in on where a shifter’s wolf was said to be feral sounded nothing like mine. Not that I know much about my wolf other than the few snippets of video footage I got when I set up cameras before shifting. Linc knows about the size of it, the teeth, the lack of a scent, but recently, he found out about the rage. The danger. And why I’ve been drawn to stay here.
Linc and his council will undoubtedly come to me tomorrow morning with ideas. I have no doubt they put their heads together as soon as they watched me park at the motel and will try to talk me around to whatever plan they and the Young coven come up with.
It's why I have to go back later tonight, hook up my trailer, and hit the road. Get as far away as I can as fast as I can. Because my urges feel like they’re killing me slowly and I can’t take a chance, can’t risk unleashing my monster on her.
4
CICELY
The camper is here at the spot I checked out the other day, but there’s no sign of life. I decide to hang out for a while and see if this mystery guy shows up.
Why? Who knows? Because of how weird Linc was about it? Probably. But I can’t help but feel like I need to investigate.
It’s a nice spot to set up camp. The river is right here. Beautiful trees provide plenty of shade, and there’s a perfectly sized clearing for basking in the sun and for stargazing by a bonfire, which I can tell he agrees with by the fire pit he obviously dug and bordered with stones.