Page 39 of Rabid
I find a blow-dryer in a drawer, which makes me smile at the thought of the big bad alpha blow-drying his precious locks in place. I wipe a streak of steam from the mirror so I can see what I’m doing, but the eyes that stare back at me make me flinch in fright. I drop the dryer and step back from the mirror as though a monster is trying to break through from the other side.
“Holy shit.”
My hands shoot up to cover my mouth as though I can trap my shock between my cupped palms and then throw it away. My heart gallops through my chest, distress riding it like a jockey. After a minute, I build up enough moxie to slowly approach the mirror and try to make sense of what I see.
I wipe more steam from the mirror, leaning closer to it as I turn my head left and right. My skin is tan, with some light freckles dusting my nose and cheeks. My lips have the same full pout they’ve always had. But my eyes...the windows to my soul, look like someone took a rock to one of them and smashed it.
My glacier blue hue is normal and untouched in my left eye, but in my right eye, half of my frigid blue iris is cut into with a jagged shard of bright violet. I lean even closer until I’m nearly nose-to-mirror, and realize that no, my left eye isn’t unchanged. There’s the thinnest ring of brown encasing the pale blue.
“What the hell…”
What’s happened to my wolf, to me, is written all over my stare.
No wonder people have been looking at me strangely with a mix of fear and judgment. My wolf is always peering out at them. She’s a constant threat, a constant reminder of what we’re capable of, staring at them between each blink. I think through the unsettling split-vision that occurs when I’m at my most rabid or vulnerable, and it all makes sense now. My wolf and I are constantly fighting to see out of the same eyes.
There’s no gentle back and forth between her and me. We were both crushed together and forged anew by chaos and cruelty, andthisis the result of our rushed joining, our need for life-or-death savagery. Our accession was so violent that it’s visible in the torn half of our irises.
I drop my eyes from the mirror just like so many others that have rushed to look away from me. This physical manifestation of what I am inside makes me feel raw and bare. Once again, I’m divided by how much I hate that my wolf and I have been brought to this, but how proud I am that we’ve survived.
Trying to get a hold of myself, I pick up the blow-dryer from the floor where I dropped it and turn it on. I stare into my eyes the whole time I dry my hair, forcing myself to get used to them, stomping out any shame and self-consciousness that tries to take root in my chest as I do.
I cannot cower away from who I am.
No, now it’s time to find my way.
Once my long brown hair is dried, I pack the dryer away where I found it and tidy up. Tightening the towel around my body, I walk to the closed door that leads to the room I was told I’d find clothes in. It creaks slightly as I crack it open, my breath held in my lungs for safe keeping, but when no one is there waiting for me, I release it, relieved.
I step into the space, and the smell of Tyran wraps around me like a poisonous snake. I’m not sure if his entire home smells like him this strongly or if this ishisbedroom. Either way, I’m not going to stand here naked and risk him barging in here, frying my ability to think with something other than my vagina.
Looking around, I don’t spot a closet door. There’s only the doorway I’m standing in and one that I assume leads out into the hallway. There is, however, a large armoire with an equally large dresser taking up one wall. Quietly, like I’m sneaking around instead of doing what I was told, I tiptoe to the dresser and start opening drawers.
I find what looks like hand sewn boxers, socks, pants, shirts and a couple drawers of clean bedding. I try on a pair of boxers, but they slip right off me, so I fold them back up and return them. Moving to the armoire, I pull open the doors and discover animal pelts that have been sewn into coats and shawls, plus some scuffed boots and folded blankets at the bottom.
There’s one small cubby that has what looks like smaller versions of the various pants and tops I saw in the dresser, and I even spot a skirt. I pull them out, holding them up, but worry slinks through me when they look too small. There’s no underwear of course, which has me setting the tiny skirt aside.
I step one foot and then another into the suede animal hide pants and pull them on. Surprisingly, there’s just enough give to the material, and I’m able to pull them all the way up. They’re tight, so I sure as hell won’t be doing any lunges in these things, but it’s better than free lipping it all around this place and hoping Tyran doesn’t read into it the wrong way.
I pull the shirt on, expecting it to be smallish too, but to my surprise it’s big. It’s also white, which doesn’t do a whole lot to hide my nipples without a bra. The neck is supposed to tie closed, but the neckline is so damn big it hangs off of one shoulder and the sleeves drape well past my hands. Rolling my sleeves as I go, I move back into the bathroom to have a look. Yep, just like I thought. I look like some braless pirate pilgrim who stole a shirt four sizes too big.
Surveying the state of my outfit in the mirror, I try to come up with a way to fix it. I tuck the front into the ties of the pants which sort of helps, although the Musketeer vibe is undeniable. I snort out a laugh and let go of how ridiculous I look, because it could be worse. I move back to the bedroom to see if there are any shoes to go with this little number. A pair of swashbuckling over-the-knee boots would be in order, but as I root through the armoire, I realize that everything is way too big. Grabbing a pair anyway, just to see if I can make them work, I plop down on the side of the bed to try them on.
Just as I bend down to slip a foot in the buttery looking leather, a distinct scent hits me. It’s Tyran’s, but there’s a layer of something else mingling with it. Boots abandoned, I lean over to smell the bedding. I pull it back and practically shove my face in the pillow. Immediately, an image of Strawberry Bitch waves to focus in my mind. I jerk back sharply as though the bedding just took a swipe at me. Quickly, I reach over and grab the pillow from the other side of the bed.
Maybe I’m mistaken.
Maybe this is a guest room and I’m reading the situation all wrong.
I bring the cotton and downy feathered pillow to my nose and inhale. A deep growl resonates in my chest as my wolf and I find only Tyran’s smell here. So this is definitely his room, which means…
I launch to my feet and start to pull at the clothes from my body as though they’re infested with fire ants. The shirt, the shoes, the pants, they all come flying off, while my entire body shakes with fury. Did he seriously just give me some other bitch’s clothes to wear? Did he honestly have me come into this room so that I’d smell that same bitch all over his goddamn bed?
My vision splits, just like it does every time my wolf and I are set off. But this time, I don’t even care that it’s further proof of our ruin. I don’t try to hold her back. My wolf lends me her claws and her fangs, and in a complete and total rage, I find myself unleashing.
I tear into the bedding like the animal I am. Claws rip through the pillows, the sharp ends raking down the very mattress that sits atop an exquisitely carved arolla pine bed frame. I let my anger loose, let my wolf growl and snap and bite. All we can think about is destroying every single thing in here that was tainted by another female’s scent. A female inourmate’s bedroom.
Feathers explode all around me, raining down like shrapnel as I tear through the bed. My outrage and acrimony are only slightly settled by the satisfying tearing of fabric as I rip Presley from this space. My razor-sharp nails shred her pillow to bits. My teeth snap at the air, as if I can rip out her lingering scent from the very molecules I’m breathing in. Yet the more I decimate, the more I start to uncover.
The deeper I dig and shred, the more I’m able to smell others.
