Chapter 2 : Welcome Home

*Estelle*

I stumbled down the sidewalk and looked repeatedly over my shoulder at the chaos behind us. There were people cluttering the street and shouting at us to come back. Police sirens were blaring, and I could see the blue and red lights approaching quickly.

People were crowded into doorways and windows, looking out to see what the commotion was. The blue-eyed man didn't react to any of it. He just kept walking, facing straight ahead.

My head was buzzing with confusion and the insistent keening of my instinctual side. It was too much for me to process. I trailed after the man, not sure what else to do.

"Who are you?" I asked, trying to keep up. "Who was that man? Why was he attacking me?"

"You talk too much," he muttered.

"Wha–" I stammered. I'd been criticized plenty of times for being too quiet, but never for talking too much.

The man came to a stop so suddenly that I nearly walked right into his back. In my attempt to avoid hitting him, I stumbled and fell forward. I braced myself, expecting to hit the concrete, but the impact never came. His hand closed around my bicep, enveloping it completely and easily stopping my descent.

I shuddered at how easily he held my whole weight with just one hand. This man was dangerous. I stared mutely as he pulled me upright and glared down at me.

"What are you even doing out here by yourself? Where's the rest of your pack?" he demanded.

I stammered for a moment, unable to answer him. I didn't understand what he was asking. I felt compelled to respond, even though I had no idea what to say.

None of this was making any sense.

He snarled in frustration and glanced back. A few police cars had stopped in front of the hotel and officers were trying to calm the crowd. I could see people pointing them toward us, and it made my heart rate double.

"I don't have time for this."

He grabbed me suddenly and threw me over his shoulder. I squealed in surprise as his arm encircled my thighs and held me in place. I was hanging low over his back and I wrapped my arms around his slim waist to keep myself from falling on my head.

The urge to fight my way from his grip was only tempered by the fear I felt for him. If he wanted to hurt me, he easily could. He hadn't, yet. In fact, he'd saved my life. I didn't know what to think of him.

Without warning, he started to run. The sidewalk zipped by so fast that it made me dizzy. I closed my eyes. The sound of the crowd and the sirens was fading quickly. I wanted to look at where we were going, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I could feel the wind whipping by us far faster than it should have been.

Just as suddenly, he stopped. He dropped me to my feet and I stumbled back but kept my balance.

"What are you thinking?!" I shouted at him. My heart was thundering in my chest and I whirled around, looking at the unfamiliar buildings. I was hopelessly lost. I'd never make it back to the hotel now, or to the airport for that matter. "You can't just grab people and run off with them! Are you crazy?"

"Annoying," he stated, rolling his eyes. He walked around me and headed toward the street.

"I'm annoying?!" I cried in disbelief. How could he be so dismissive of my distress?!

"Yes," he said coolly. He walked to a beat up blue pickup truck parked near the curb and opened the passenger door. "Get in."

"No," I said firmly. This had already gone too far. I was not about to get into a vehicle with a strange man. "I'm not going to a secondary location. That's how you end up murdered."

His cold eyes narrowed at me in irritation. "You can get in or I can put you in," he said. His tone was so low and commanding that I found myself stepping forward despite myself. "If I leave without you, you'll be dead by morning."

That statement made me freeze. He said it with such certainty that it was impossible for me to doubt it. "Someone wants me dead. Why?" I asked softly. All the adrenaline had left me and I didn't have the energy left to shout. I felt completely deflated.

"I don't know," he said.

I opened my mouth to ask him to explain, but the presence in my mind came to the forefront and whimpered. Its agitation was so overpowering that it took me off guard.

The scent of citrus and cedarwood reasserted itself in my mind. It never went away; I was just in such a frantic state that I wasn't noticing it. Now, it was all I could think about. It flooded my senses and created a strange warmth in my chest. Something was telling me to trust him. I wanted to fight it, but it had never been wrong before.

I lowered my head, avoiding his eyes, and got into the truck.

"Good girl."

He closed the door firmly and walked around to the diver's side. I couldn't believe this was really happening. As he started to drive, I could feel tears pricking at my eyes. He didn't acknowledge them. Instead, he just stared ahead and drove.

There would be no one looking for me if I didn't make it back home. If I disappeared in a strange city like this, no one would even know to report me missing. The hotel would throw out my meager luggage after a while and my landlord would do the same with all my belongings.

I had no family and no friends to check in on me or raise an alarm about my whereabouts. I could vanish like a mist and never be thought of again. I had never felt my loneliness so acutely as I did in that moment.

The tears just kept coming, and at some point the exhaustion got the best of me and I fell asleep.

When I woke, it was to the feeling of the truck rattling over an unpaved road. There was the thinnest sliver of a moon in the sky and the pale yellow headlights didn't do much to illuminate the surroundings. I could tell that we were in the forest and the trail he was driving on barely qualified as a road, but I couldn't make out anything that might serve as a landmark. There was no way I'd be able to find my way back.

The fear that I had felt earlier came back with a vengeance. Why would he be driving me deep into the forest if he didn't have nefarious intentions? I tried to keep myself calm, but it was impossible.

He must have heard my erratic breathing and realized I was awake, because he turned toward me. His gaze was piercing and analytical. He took a deep breath through his nose and let it out slowly.

"What's wrong with you?"

I shifted in my seat, putting as much space between us as I could in the crowded truck cab. "Where are we?" I asked softly.

"Almost there," he said simply. That didn't help at all. I had no idea where he was taking me. "Now answer my question, what is wrong with you?"

"I don't know what you want me to say," I muttered. "I'm afraid. I don't even know your name. I don't know what's going on. You just forced me into your truck and drove me off into a deep forest. Can you not understand why that's scary?"

Maybe it was a bad idea to be that blunt about it, but I didn't know what else to say.

There was a long, tense moment of silence before he exhaled deeply.

"I suppose it would be," he said. "My name is Gabe."

"I'm Estelle," I said quietly.

He nodded to show that he'd heard me.

"But that's not what I meant."

He looked at me intensely. I wanted to tell him to stop, or to focus on the road, but I didn't say anything. He was staring at me like he wanted to eat me, and I was afraid to make a wrong move.

"Your scent is driving me crazy," he mumbled before looking back at the road. Then, louder he said: "Why are you acting like an idiot human?"

"Because I am one?" I said uncertainly. If that was supposed to be some kind of slang, I didn't get it.

He lunged at me and I yelped and pulled away. His nose brushed the side of my neck and he took a long, deep breath through his nose. A pleasurable shiver ran down my spine and I blushed in shame. Why would having him this close feel good when he scared me so much?

"No, you aren't," he said slowly.

I could feel the rumble of his voice against my skin and shivered again.

"We're going to crash," I said breathlessly.

He sat back and glanced at the road. "Where is your pack?" he asked. "Your family?"

"I don't have a family," I answered bitterly. I probably shouldn't have admitted that to him, but at this point I figured if he was going to kill me, then nothing I said would change his mind.

"Who raised you?" he demanded.

"The state," I said.

He looked at me strangely and I shrugged.

"I was raised in foster care."

"What happened to your parents?" I don't know why that made him angry, but he really sounded mad.

I looked down at my hands and shook my head. "I don't know. They abandoned me when I was a baby. They're dead, for all I know," I said quietly. I hated talking about that. It made me feel like garbage.

"Shit," he said, hitting the steering wheel in irritation. "So you were raised by humans?"

"Why do you keep saying things like that?" I demanded.

What kind of nut was he, anyway? He couldn't honestly be telling me that he wasn't human. The other side of me was making me angry, too. The way it seemed to trust this man implicitly made me so confused. Everything was telling me not to trust him; everything but my instincts.

"You must know that you aren't one of them. Surely you feel your wolf, and you must have shifted by now," he said matter-of-factly.

"Wolf?" My internal presence practically preened at the recognition. My confusion as I woke up nude in my bed flashed through my mind. My heart rate increased. "So–" I looked at him closely, trying to see the truth in his eyes. "I'm not crazy?"

"No," he said. There was no sympathy in his expression, but his voice was soft. "You're not crazy. Just lost."

I had a million questions to ask him, but before I got the chance, he parked the truck and killed the engine. Cold dread flooded through me. We were still in the middle of the forest; why were we stopping? He got out of the truck and walked around to my door, opening it and holding his hand out to me. I took it hesitantly and he held me steady as I jumped to the ground.

I was sure that this was it. He was going to kill me. I followed him silently down a well-trodden path. There was no point in fighting or fleeing; he would catch me easily.

When my feet hit a cobblestone path, I looked up in surprise. A sprawling, quaint village lay before me. Small shops, single-story homes, and a tree-lined street had appeared as if by magic. It looked like something out of a fairy tale. I couldn't believe it.

I looked at him questioningly.

"Welcome home," he said softly.