Chapter 1

Chapter 1

I tapped my sneaker impatiently. “Hurry up already, Gladys! I’m starving.

Elena whipped around, her bangs partially askew. I tried not to giggle. She didn’t have time to flatten them this morning. In her hand was the key Kota kept hidden under the welcome mat for us. 

She grunted under her breath as she fumbled to unlock the door. “I’m one month younger than you! Call me old again and I’ll move slower.” 

“My human body requires food! Today’s my big day. I need all of my energy for tryouts.” I reminded her.

“Half-human.” She ignored the second half. Granted I had been going on about it for weeks now.

The front door swung open, the key still jammed in the lock. I skipped inside and offered her a sinister smile. “Bless your heart, meemaw.”

“Meemaw?” She snarled, her eyes going wide.

Chuckling over the attitude she was sure to have, I immediately began raiding the fridge. My fingers brushed over Kota’s chocolate yogurt. Instead I opted for the cherry vanilla his dad kept stocked for me. 

It was a miracle he had the time for Kota being a single father and all. Half the buildings in town had his last name stamped into the foundation. Hoffman construction worked closely with Elena’s dad. 

“Alcohol for the party is secure, by the way. It’s already at the lake house waiting for us.” Her voice slid out from the pantry, tainted with mischief. 

Werewolves were legally permitted to drink at eighteen, but we could only purchase at a wolf-owned liquor store. Humans had their own silly rules. 

I could practically feel the warmth on my skin and smell the wildflowers that populated the grassy areas around the cabin. There would be plenty of room for everyone invited, and once Kota installed the rope swings it would get even better.

Running my eyes over the old dining table the three of us used to hide under, I fought a smile. “I hope your dad never sells that place. When I become a doctor maybe I’ll buy it from him.”

She barked out a laugh. “I can’t imagine you spending your years at some peaceful cabin on a lake. You’re too trigger happy for that. You’d get bored and then you’d start tormenting the locals.”

“You’d be there helping me,” I said, swallowing a spoonful of yogurt. “It can be our retirement plan. Two old baddies living out our glory years in style.”

Trotting out of the pantry with an unwrapped protein bar in hand, she took a small bite. “Absolutely. We’ll give this pack something interesting to talk about for once.”

A twinge of irritation hit me as she rounded the counter. I hadn’t even realized she had on my mauve biker shorts. I’d been looking for those for days! 

A set of arms slid around my waist, startling me. Kota’s warm, shirtless torso pressed at my back. The ridges of his muscles had my stomach tightening. 

I bit the inside of my cheek as he leaned down to kiss my jaw. “Are you two plotting again?”

Forgetting about my athletic wear grievances, I turned to embrace him and smiled sweetly. “We weren’t plotting the first time, thank you. It’s called collaborating.”

Water droplets still clung to his broad shoulders, sculpted from training and hours spent on the football field. A polo shirt hung over his shoulder in my favorite shade of green. 

He brushed the tip of my nose with his knuckle. “My girl. Always looking for trouble.”

Elena tossed the trash into the bin and propped a hand on her hip. “Wolf or no wolf, our girl is trouble.”

I couldn’t get enough of the two of them. They were the rock I braced myself against after my mother’s accident. There wasn’t a single storm that could touch me when I had Kota and Elena on my side. 

Kota slipped his thumbs into the waistband of my shorts. “You look hot in your little workout outfit.”

Not as hot as I would’ve been in my mauve biker shorts.

Satisfaction had me standing taller. I flicked my pony tail over my shoulder and as it swayed behind me the ends tickled my back.

I gathered my courage and purred. “Good, because you’ll be taking it off–”

There was a loud crack, causing the two of us to startle. Elena cursed at the shards of broken glass littering the floor around her feet. Slipping her usual distraction into her pocket, she gave Kota and I an apologetic look.

An hour later I stood outside the university gym, the sun beating down on my bare shoulders. The stone monstrosity with its wall of honeycomb windows did nothing to protect us. If anything it reflected the blinding rays, amplifying them. The thin shafts of shade were already claimed by the lucky few. Sweat was already building along my brow. 

A subtle wave of frustration rippled among those of us here to try out. 

“They could’ve emailed us or something before moving tryouts,” A girl I recognized, Jaycee, huffed..

Another female omega shrugged. “At least it’s at Pepper’s dance studio. That’s not too far from here.”

I hitched a ride with an omega I recognized from the high-school squad. A few of the people here were from the two neighboring high-schools. I only knew a handful of them from parties Elena and I had been to.

Pepper’s studio was just as lavish as the university’s gym, with its wall of tinted windows, allowing a clear view of the mountains in the distance while also giving us privacy. My favorite thing, however, were the padded mats. They were much thicker. I was stronger than your average human, but being dropped from several feet in the air still hurt like hell.

The college cheer coach waited with her back against the wall, watching as we filed in like obedient recruits. 

Quickly the air in the studio turned tense as the coach began belting out orders.

We were judged on everything from execution to our facials. Smile, but not too much. Bob your head, but not like a crazy person. No one liked that. 

Two girls tripped during the final routine.

When I finished the final tumbling pass, the coach stopped writing on her clipboard. I had to give two hundred percent, whereas the female betas–and even omegas–only had to give one hundred. That was the curse of being born without a wolf.

We were dismissed that evening with little fanfare. The coach wasn’t one to mince words. She also wasn’t one to offer reassurance, but that was fine. 

I knew I’d be receiving a call on Monday. 

A permanent smile brightened my face as I emerged with the rest of the girls and was hit with a wonderful breeze. My smile began to falter when after a few minutes of waiting I didn’t see Kota’s truck. It hit me a second later. 

I forgot to tell him tryouts had been moved! He was probably waiting for me on campus.

I sent him a quick text and leaned down to stretch while I waited. Once he got here I’d let him know how well I did. 

The minutes ticked by and the parking lot continued to empty. As the last three cars trickled out, I shifted foot to foot. Practice must’ve gone late. It happened in the past. Calling Elena was a risk. She’d been spending every night this week planning my birthday party, and when she got in the zone it was nearly impossible to pull her away. 

If you did, you risked her becoming a major you-know-what.

Letting out a big, dramatic sigh that I was sure my ancestors could feel if they bothered to listen, I started walking. 

The lot emptied onto a long stretch of backroad. This far in the mountains every road had you coasting up–or down–a hill, your stomach twisting with each sharp curve. Rocky walls hung to the left, or sometimes the right, but there would always be a cliff or the forest on the other side.

My irritation reached its boiling point when the sun dipped behind the mountain range, coating everything in this hue of cobalt that made the shadows stretch and dance. 

Call it a defense mechanism, but I hated the sensation of fear. I grabbed the squealing little beast and tossed it into an incinerator. I was practically spitting embers as I gave in and called Elena. 

Voicemail. Voicemail. Voicemail.

My feet slapped against the asphalt. “This is what happens when you constantly forget to drink water and charge your phone. Your best-friend is left walking alone in the dark like some kind of cheesy horror movie, and her feet really hurt. I’m even a damn cheerleader.” I snarled at the stars, “I will not be a cliche!”

The stars did not answer.

A chill swept through the trees as night fell, permeating the last dregs of the delicious summer warmth. Not a single car had passed me, but I had little reason to worry. This was wolf territory. The hunters knew to steer clear.

When it came to vampires the civilized ones often kept to themselves, while the ones that descended into blood madness lived in nests, ravaging humans and any supernatural species with endless hunger. 

That thought alone sent a chill down my spine, followed by another surge of irritation. 

My fingers clacked against my screen as I called Kota for the thirteenth time. If my mind hadn't drifted off I might’ve never seen the flash of silver weaving in between the trees. The trunks were so thick that the wolf had to dig its paws into the earth, kicking up a spray of dirt and rock as it veered left and right, up the mountainside.

My heart stuttered as a lone bead of sweat trickled down the back of my neck.

There was only one wolf I knew that looked like liquid moonlight doused in melted silver.

Roman Graves.

The boy I swore to never, ever think about. 

There wasn’t a soul in this state, human or wolf, who didn't know better than to mess with the Graves family. And still, years ago, that was exactly what I did. Just not in the way anyone expected.

My hand lowered, the phone still ringing until Kota’s voicemail picked up. I turned on my flashlight and after a split second of deliberation, I stepped into the forest.

The Appalachians had a way of wrapping around you, cradling you in its mossy embrace the moment you crossed its threshold. I had stepped into a new world. One built from shadows as old as the trees themselves. One where the creatures within could see me, but I couldn’t see them. 

My eyesight and sense of smell might’ve been above average but it was still a far cry from a full-blooded wolf.

The flashlight helped me navigate the rocky terrain for several minutes. I used trees to support myself as I climbed over a slope of rock, the bark digging into my palms. 

I wasn’t sure how long I lasted before my own shortcomings caught up to me. 

I stepped off a lopsided stone, aiming for a flat one two feet away. As I landed, the stone shifted and sent me tumbling to the side. I twisted at the last second to keep from breaking an ankle. 

The bitter sting of shredded skin raced up my forearms as I caught myself. I huffed out an irritated breath as I climbed to my feet.

This was a waste of time. Not only were my arms scraped up, but my phone had a long crack running down the screen. I tapped the glass and sighed with relief when the background photo of Kota, Elena, and I brightened the screen.

The snap of a branch sounded somewhere off to my left. My muscles locked along with the breath I’d been about to release. Shadows danced between the brush on either side of me, twisting into sinister shapes.

A gust of wind had the trees trembling in warning.

I squinted past the oaks, forcing my eyesight to adjust. To give me something. 

There was a patch of shadow darker than the rest.

Was that a person standing there?

I lifted my nose to scent the air, but all I caught were traces of Kota and Elena lingering on my clothes from earlier. The silence stretched on, and on, until I was forced to exhale and suck in a breath.

The air was beaten from my lungs when a pair of hands slammed into my back, nailing me right between my shoulder blades. Another gust of wind swallowed my shout. Pain arced up and down my spine in deep lashes.

My feet left the ground and I threw my hands out desperately. Two of my nails tore free as I fought to grab onto the base of a tree, but the bark shredded as it slipped through my fingers. 

I careened head first down the slope, somehow managing to miss the trees that watched in deafening silence. All the while I prayed the ground would flatten–that there would be some kind of grass or moss to break my fall.

My shoulder collided with the trunk of a fallen tree. The crack reverberated up my neck and through my teeth. On instinct I screamed, and dirt flew into my mouth, rubbing against my lungs.

I couldn’t breathe. 

I couldn’t stop.

There was another crack, this one coming from my knee as I clipped a boulder. 

My heart slammed against my ribcase, pulsing in tune with the pain that was rapidly growing–swelling inside of my body until my organs were sure to be crushed. It was lava sluicing through my veins, melting its way through my skin. Goddess, what would I look like after this? 

Three heartbeats later and I felt the ground vanish from beneath me, the edge of the cliffside grazing my bloody fingertips as I tumbled off the edge.

There was no smothering the fear that enveloped me as I realized there would be no gentle stop–no cushion to break my fall.

The only thing that was sure to break was me.

My entire body tingled as I fell. For a split second I could’ve closed my eyes and imagined I was back at the state fair with Kota and Elena, nestled between the two of them at the top of the drop tower.

A sharp ringing exploded in my ears and something wet splashed down my head, spilling across the side of my face. It stained my vision, tinting the forest in crimson.

Then, there was this sudden impact. It happened so quickly that I couldn’t tell where it had come from or what part of me it had hit. All I knew was that it swept everything away. Every sensation, every lick and lash of pain. 

It was as if someone had disconnected my mind from my body.

I couldn’t feel my arms…

…my legs.

Finally, I came to a stop. The Goddess must have heard my begging.

I was on my back. The sky was clear above me, the stars glowing in the distance. I tried to blink, but I couldn’t close my eyes.

Goddess, they were so bright. 

They looked like the fireflies that would flood the space around the trailer I’d grown up in. I’d stared up at these stars since I was a child, but they were never this bright.

A feeling of peace washed over me.

No! I shoved it away. I bared my teeth at it. I snarled and thrashed within the prison of my stupid head.

My fingers twitched…

…but my body…it was broken.

The weight of my own chest moving was something I could no longer feel. Darkness licked around the edges of my vision. The stars grew brighter, their light spilling down until I was sure they were fireflies and not stars at all. They reached into me, lifting me from my broken body.

Wrapped in starlight, my soul began to fly.