Page 23 of Rabid
This pack is exactly like the rumors made it out to be.
Terris looks down at me with zero expression on his scarred face. “Get up.”
When I don’t move, he rolls his one eye before latching onto my ankle chain again. He drags me off the litter and across the ground, and I cry out from the immediate road rash. “Okay, okay, I’ll walk!” I try to yell as I kick out, but my voice is as dry and brittle as sun bleached bones.
He drops the chains, and I roll over, pushing to my feet. I almost fall again in the process while Terris looks on, noting every weakness I display. My wolf nudges me with an internal nip like she’s shoring me up, reminding me we can’t appear frail and vulnerable in front of these shifters, even in our human form. Every muscle burns and shakes with the effort it takes to walk, but my anger and her ferocity keep me from collapsing.
He grabs hold of the chain between my aching wrists and tugs me forward. I’m led around the side of the slipshod house, its plank siding made from the same wood as the trees surrounding it, aged from years of wear. In the back, there’s a fire pit, cold and unlit, composed of kindling found in the woods and a circle of rocks surrounding it. Terris leads me past, but when my eyes swing to the shed he’s aiming for, my heels dig in.
It doesn’t matter. Not that I stop walking, not that I pull back, not that I start to kick and scream and try to claw him. He still drags me into that wooden shed. Still tosses me inside of it.
My wolf bays and shoves, wanting to tear into him as he wraps a rope through an iron hoop in the wall and ties it in a tight loop around my forearm. I have to shove her down, all effort going to stopping the shift as my body shakes all over with the force of the resistance. Unfortunately, that internal struggle exhausts me, and I fall to my knees.
Terris looks down at me, unimpressed. “Stay here,” he grumbles, scratching a hand down the puckered flesh cut into his cheek. “You get caught out in them woods tonight, and you’ll be sorry.” With that threat, he walks out, the shed door slamming behind him as loud as the heartbeat that slams against the bones of my ribs.
The shed smells like fear. Piss, dirt, and fear. The smell is sticky and nauseating, and I can only wonder how many people have ended up in here just like me. It looks on the verge of collapse, like it’s just waiting for some big bad wolf to come blow it down. As much as I want to curl into a ball and drift away to the nothingness of rest, I need to get the fuck out of here.
A screen door slams closed somewhere on the house next to me, and I peer out between the cracks of the shrunken wood beams of the shed. When it seems as though the coast is clear, I turn away from my slivered view of outside and begin pulling on the knots in the rope with my teeth. I drag it down my forearm, closer to my wrist where I can reach.
Focusing, I try to call on my wolf to get her fangs to drop again, but she doesn’t listen. She’s too tired and still fighting with the remains of the drug. But I can’t give up, so I focus all my strength and efforts on getting loose with my own teeth, hoping I can find some tools under the tarps in the corner to relieve me of my chains. Chomping ruthlessly, I gnaw on it, ignoring the pricks of pain as the rough material of the rope scrapes my skin off every time it moves. I just start to get through one twisting cluster of knots when the door to the shed flies open, and I jump in surprise.
I yank the rope from my mouth and drop my wrists, looking up to see a man carrying two dog bowls in his hands and some kind of clippers tucked under one armpit. He’s dressed in similar hand sewn clothes as the couple, his pants made of some kind of hide and the shirt a rough-looking linen or itchy cotton.
A golden gaze fixes on me, and he brushes long strands of dark blond hair from his eyes with his bicep. I wait for his gaze to dip down my nude body, a ready snarl tickling my lips, but to my surprise, his eyes never leave mine until he looks at the rope I tried to chew through.
“If I make things more comfortable for you, will you be good?” he asks me with a scratchy voice, the tone thick and slightly dull as though he doesn’t speak much.
I don’t answer. My wolf and I just watch him, not trusting him for a second, but he still doesn’t leer at my breasts. He doesn’t seem to be bothered by my lack of response either, but his stare never leaves mine as he bends and puts a bowl of water on the ground and another stainless-steel bowl next to it that has cut up chunks of raw meat. My wolf wants to dive for the offerings, but I stay back. Warily, we watch him, not willing to take our focus off the stranger for anything.
A small smile pulls at the corner of his mouth, my lack of reaction clearly amusing to him, and he pulls the tool out from under his arm. It looks like a rounded pair of hedge trimmers, and I really hope he’s brought them in here to deal with my chains and not anything else actually attached to my body.
With the Ruin Falls pack, I’m thinking it could go either way.
He pulls apart the arms, opening the mouth of sharp clippers, and then waits.
“Well? What’s it gonna be?”
I stare at him, wondering why he’d be removing one of the obstacles that’s keeping me here. I study his face and then the tool, trying to see the catch. My wolf gives me an irritable nudge, so I tentatively stretch my clinking chains forward. Maybe she’s right and it doesn’t matter why they’re doing it. Getting these chains off is vital.
Instead of snapping the chains, the golden-eyed stranger moves the tool to my wrist, and I automatically yank back in horror.
He clicks his tongue. “Relax.”
Opening the blades wide, he slips the mouth of the cutters between the inch-thick cuff around my wrist. I tense, but with strong muscles and precise movement, he snaps the metal clean off me. I try hard not to sigh in relief or rub at the raw skin and sore joint that’s now free of the imprisoning metal. He doesn’t say a word as he snips the cuff off my other wrist and then lowers the mouth of the curved blades to my ankles.
I smell the air for any hint of lust or interest, any sign that this is about to take a turn for the worse for me, but the male is focused on severing the metal and is even careful not to cut my skin.
“You smell like you could be from Twin Rivers, is that who left you here?” he asks, his nostrils flaring as though he’s confirming his suspicion.
I don’t say anything, not sure if confirming or denying or even speaking to this shifter is a good idea.
“I’ll bring a bath in for you,” he announces, as he stands up, clearly not bothered by my silence. He kicks the food a little closer and then turns around and leaves, just like that. The door snaps shut behind him, and I hear the telltale click of a lock being put in place on the other side. I stare with a frown of confusion for a moment as I gently rub my wrists and ankles. The rope is still tied around my arm, but the chains are blessedly gone.
Why did he just do that? Why would this pack care if I’m more comfortable?
Is it a trick?
Leaning forward to peek through the slats, I stare at the rickety old cabin of a house as though the answers are written in the sun-bleached siding. My wolf gives me another nudge though, and the smell of fresh meat hits me. I turn back to the food and shuffle over to both bowls, trying to scent if anything is off. Burke was a fan of drugs, so maybe this pack is too. Yet all I smell is fresh meat and clean water.
