Chapter Five: Wolves In Sheep Clothing

The silence in the room was deafening.

Thirty pairs of eyes stared at me like I was a disease they didn't want to catch. My skin crawled under their looks, and I fought the urge to wrap my arms around myself.

Standing next to Axel, I felt small and exposed. Like I was naked in front of strangers who already hated me.

"She's not one of us," a voice called out from the crowd. "She's human."

The words hit me wrong. Human? Of course I was human. What else would I be?

"No," Axel said, his voice carrying across the room. "She's not. And she's mine to protect."

A massive man stepped forward from the group. He had to be at least six-foot-five, with arms covered in tattoos and scars that told stories I didn't want to know. His eyes were cold when they looked at me.

"You're making a mistake, Axel," the giant said. "Bringing an outsider here puts us all at risk."

"Malachai," Axel warned, but the big man didn't back down.

This Malachai, He looked like he could snap me in half without breaking a sweat.

"She doesn't belong here," Malachai continued, crossing his arms. "Look at her. Designer clothes, fancy jewelry. She's probably never gotten her hands dirty in her life."

Heat rushed to my cheeks. The way he said it made me feel ashamed of things I'd never been ashamed of before. My clothes weren't even that expensive - well, maybe they were compared to the leather and denim everyone else wore.

"She's running from something," another voice said from the back. "What if whatever's chasing her comes here?"

"What if she's working with them?" someone else added.

The whispers started then. Quiet conversations that made my stomach twist.

"Fifty grand bounty."

"Senator's wife."

"Could be a trap."

I wanted to disappear. To sink into the floor and never come back up. These people were talking about me like I wasn't even there. Like I was a problem they needed to solve instead of a person.

My hands shook, and I clenched them into fists to hide it.

"Enough," Axel's voice cut through the noise like a blade. "She stays. End of discussion."

But I could see it in their faces. They didn't like it. They didn't trust me. And honestly? I was starting to think they might be right not to.

What had I gotten myself into?

These people talked about borders and scents and shifting like it was normal. Like they actually believed in... what? Werewolves? The whole thing sounded insane.

But then I thought about Raven. The way her teeth had looked too sharp. The way she'd moved. The guard who'd died when I pushed him.

No. That was impossible. There had to be an explanation. A normal one.

Maybe I'd hit my head when I collapsed harder than I thought. Maybe this was all some weird dream brought on by trauma and exhaustion.

Or maybe I'd escaped one nightmare just to fall into another.

Looking around the room, I saw the same intensity in all their eyes. The same wildness that I'd seen in Axel's. These people were different. Dangerous. And they all seemed to believe in the same crazy story.

What if this was some kind of cult? What if Axel wasn't protecting me but trapping me for some insane cult ritual?

The thought made my blood run cold.

"We're done here," Axel announced. "Everyone back to your duties."

The crowd started to break up, but I could still feel eyes on me. Watching and judging me.

A woman with short blonde hair and cold eyes brushed past me on her way out. "Hope you're worth it," she muttered under her breath.

My chest tightened. I couldn't breathe properly. The walls felt like they were closing in.

"Calla?" Axel's voice seemed to come from far away. "You okay?"

I wasn't okay. Nothing about this was okay.

I'd run from Blake because he'd betrayed me. Because he'd let that thing feed on him. Because he'd looked at me like I was something to be used instead of someone to be loved.

But what if I'd just traded one prison for another?

"I need some air," I managed to say.

Axel nodded. "Come on. I'll show you outside."

He led me through a maze of corridors to a door that opened onto a large courtyard. The night air hit my face, cool and clean. I took deep breaths, trying to calm down.

"They'll come around," Axel said quietly. "They just need time."

I turned to look at him. Really look at him. He was young - probably four or five years younger than me. Dangerous. Covered in scars that said he'd lived a violent life. And he was talking about weird stuffs like they were real.

"What if I don't want them to come around?" I asked.

His jaw tightened. "What do you mean?"

"What if I want to leave?"

The temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. Axel stepped closer, and I could see something wild flickering in his eyes.

"You can't," he said simply.

"Can't or won't let me?"

"Both."

The word hung between us like a threat. Or a promise. I couldn't tell which.

"You said you were protecting me," I whispered. "Not keeping me prisoner."

"Same thing right now."

I stared at him, seeing the truth in his face. He meant it. He really wouldn't let me leave.

Just like Blake.

"I need to think," I said, backing toward the door. "Alone."

Axel looked like he wanted to argue, but something in my expression must have stopped him. "Fine. But don't do anything stupid."

I almost laughed. Stupid? Everything I'd done in the last twenty-four hours was stupid. Running away in the middle of the night. Collapsing in the middle of the road. Trusting a stranger who had some kind of weird fetish for sniffing me.

Maybe I was losing my mind. Maybe the stress had finally broken something in my brain. That would explain the hallucinations. The dreams about changing. The way my body had been acting strange.

It would explain everything.

Back in the room Axel had given me, I sat on the edge of the bed and tried to think clearly.

Blake had betrayed me. That part was real. He'd been involved with criminals - because that's what they had to be, right? Some kind of weird crime family with a blood fetish. The woman, Raven, had probably been high on something. That would explain her behavior.

The guard-Thomas- who'd died - that was just bad luck. Maybe he'd had a heart condition. Maybe the shock had been too much.

There was a logical explanation for everything. There had to be.

Because the alternative was admitting that monsters were real. That the life I'd known was just a lie covering up a world of nightmares.

I couldn't accept that. Wouldn't accept that.

I was Calla Hart. I was human. I was twenty-five years old, and I had a life to get back to.

Not with Blake - never with Blake again. But somewhere. Somehow.

I just had to get out of here first.

These people were dangerous and delusional. And they thought they owned me now.

But I'd escaped one prison. I could escape another.

I had to.

The question was how. And whether I could do it before whatever was happening to my body got worse.

Because despite everything I was trying to rationalize, I couldn't ignore the way my senses had sharpened. The way I could smell things I shouldn't be able to smell. The way my body ached like it was trying to become something else.

I touched my neck where Axel had pressed his lips. My skin still felt warm there. Electric.

No. I shook my head hard. I wasn't going down that road.

I was getting out of here. Tonight if possible.

Before I lost myself completely to whatever madness had taken hold of this place.

Before I started believing their stories.

Before I stopped wanting to leave.