But, at that moment, he couldn’t fight it.
He didn’t want to fight it.
He wanted—needed—to be as wild as he felt.
Bones began to shift. Some lengthened, others shortened, all drawing muscles, cartilage, and ligaments into their new forms. Sully fell to his hands and knees, agony screaming through every cell, his breath rasping in his throat as, against his primeval instincts, the part of him still human fought against the change.
In the span of a heartbeat, fur sprouted over his skin. One more and his shuddering transformation to wolf was complete.
After a few seconds, waiting for the pain to fade, he lifted his head. So much clearer now.
Smells, stronger. One in particular. His nose twitched. What was that? He bent and sniffed at one leg. Whatever the smell was—kind of woodsy with underlying scents of pine and citrus—it emanated from him.
He lifted his head and padded into the living room. Stopping in front of the patio doors, he stared through the glass. A hummingbird fluttered near the bushes. Sully could see the edge of every tiny feather, the flutter of its wings.
He had to get out there, outside, now.
He lifted one paw and pressed down on the door latch. As the handle moved, his paw slid off it and the gold latch went back into its original position. He growled in aggravation and tried again, slightly curling his paw over the handle.
The door popped open. Sully nudged it open farther with his nose, then slipped through the doorway and into…
Freedom.
Ignoring the hummingbird and a small lizard that skittered across the concrete patio, he shoved his way through the oleanders. On the other side of the bushes was a small gulley—a wash, he remembered hearing them called.
He trotted down the wash on all fours, nose twitching as he took in the new smells of this foreign place. The flap of large wings caught his attention, and he stopped, head up, and watched a hawk circle overhead.
Free.
Run.
With a low grunt, he dug his paws into the sand and took off. As he found his footing, he increased his speed, running full out for several minutes until his lungs felt like they would burst. He settled into an easy lope. A jackrabbit, startled from its cover beneath a large bush, darted out in front of him.
Its heart raced and big feet threw sand behind it as it ran. Sully gave chase, scrabbling in loose dirt, trying to keep up as the smaller animal twisted this way and that with incredible speed. Just as he was about to close his jaws around it, something else caught his attention.
The jackrabbit skittered off while Sully lifted his nose to the wind for a better sniff.
There was that scent again—the one something like pine and citrus. Like him, yet different. This one smelled…
Female.
Chapter 3
Olivia sighed and wiggled on the driver’s seat of her rental car, trying to get comfortable. Mid-April, and it was already well over ninety degrees in the Sonoran Desert. She didn’t want to keep the car running—more because she didn’t want to draw any attention to herself and less because of environmental concerns—so without any air-conditioning her T-shirt stuck to her back and sweat trickled down her cleavage.
Hell, she was getting ready to kill a man. She didn’t have the luxury—or the energy—to worry about things like comfort and car emissions.
She sighed again. At one point, on the airplane from London to New York to Phoenix, she’d rethought her plan. She wasn’t stupid. There was no guarantee, even if she did kill Sully, that Eddy would let Zoe go. And if he did, the little girl and Olivia would still be in danger from him—
For the rest of their lives unless she could find a way to escape.
That way could be Sully and his friend O’Connell. But only if Eddy wasn’t surrounded by his pack. No way could three werewolves take on an entire pack.
And Eddy was never away from his pack. Ever. So she was full circle back to the original plan.
Kill Rory Sullivan.
She’d found out where Sully’s friend Declan O’Connell lived—easy as pie to do an Internet search on the man—and had the car parked on a little dirt road off the larger street where O’Connell lived.
Far enough away to not draw attention, but still close enough that she could keep an eye on things with her enhanced werewolf vision.
She’d seen the three drive up in a low-slung Mustang almost half an hour ago. Using her citrus-based perfume liberally in order to mask her scent, she’d already scoped out O’Connell’s place and knew the best options for a quick entry and exit. The last thing she needed was for them to be on the lookout for a strange werewolf that had been on the property.
She figured she’d wait until closer to midnight, when they should all be asleep, and then she’d go after Sully.
This was something she had to do. For Zoe. Olivia pushed aside the guilt that insisted on tapping her on the shoulder. Perhaps if she’d been able to establish some alliances within the pack she could have gone to someone for help. As it was, everyone took out their bad moods on her. She highly doubted if any of them were willing to help her, though she figured that sooner or later someone would try to seize power from Eddy.
Whoever took over—it would be a bloody battle for dominance—could be even worse than the Alpha they already had, although she was hard-pressed to imagine how.
Eddy had turned her into a werewolf, made her the Omega of the pack regardless of her natural assertiveness, and threatened the life of her daughter. As far as Olivia was concerned, it couldn’t get any worse.
Or, at least, she couldn’t let it get any worse.
Giving up on comfort, she opened the door and climbed out of the car. After carefully and quietly closing the door, she stretched, hands on hips, shoulders back. That didn’t help. She felt…antsy. Like thousands of the little critters were crawling across her skin.
She needed to run. As much as she sometimes hated being a werewolf, one thing she did enjoy was running as a wolf. There was such freedom, such exhilaration in being alive. When she went the way of the wolf, there were no worries. No fears. Just instinct.
She went around to the passenger side of the car and, after checking to make sure no other vehicles were coming down the dusty, barely there road, she took off her shoes and socks, tucked her socks inside one shoe, and tossed the shoes onto the floor mat in the back. She unfastened her watch, checking the time—five-thirty, which meant it would be dark in just over an hour. Then she quickly took off her clothes, folded them haphazardly, and tossed them onto the backseat. Closing her eyes, she pictured her wolf form in her mind.
Deep breaths helped her control the pain as she went through the transformation. Eventually, as she got used to it—or so she’d been told—the pain would manifest itself as mere discomfort. But, as she panted through the last shift of muscle and bone, it hurt like hell.
She opened her eyes and saw the world differently. Shades of gray, black, and white, with some smatterings of blue and yellow, met her gaze. Turning, she darted into the desert and, as she picked up speed, dodged various cacti and thorny bushes.
Does everything out here have prickers?
She’d been running at full tilt for only a few minutes, the wildness on the inside churning with each step, when she skidded to a stop, halted by a strange yet vaguely familiar scent.
Lifting