Wolf Girl (Wolf Girl, #1)(36)

Was I cursed? Was I a fucking creature?

Why would Sawyer hide this from me? Did he know or was he just checking out the books to find out?

Holy shifter.

The adrenaline was coursing so fast through my veins that my wolf came to the surface.

“Miss Calloway?” The librarian waved a hand in front of my face as my teeth lengthened.

My wolf rattled against my skin until my whole body vibrated. Reaching my hands out, I hugged myself tightly, trying to keep her in. She sensed danger in my fearful reaction of what the librarian had said.

“Sorry, I don’t feel well,” I told her.

She nodded knowingly. “Full moon. Happens to all of us, dear.” I gave her a weak smile and turned around and ran. I ran past Sage and past Walsh, through two students trying to enter the library, and out into the garden. Students were lazing about, some of them in wolf form but most human.

‘Stop it,’ I told my wolf, as pelts of white fur ran down my arms.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

The fact that my teeth could lengthen, I could howl and fur could grow on my arms, had to mean I was capable of a normal shift, of my human form shifting into a wolf … right?

As my shirt ripped, I realized I was out of time.

“Demi!” Sage called out from behind me as I took off into the woods. People turned to stare and I heard another seam of my shirt rip.

“Stop it!” I shouted out loud this time as I cleared the tree line. My eyes looked up to see that the moon was already out, faintly in the sky in the middle of the day. It had never affected me this badly, but then again I’d had magical cuffs on and never lived in a pack before. Now that I was in the privacy of the thick trees, I let go of holding her in; it hurt too much, so I just took a deep breath and let go.

I expected to shift; I was a quarter of the way there with furry arms, lengthened teeth, and a bulked-out chest, but then my wolf began to separate from my body, the fur pulling off of me as my wolf went transparent, like a ghost so that she wouldn’t tear my clothes, and then once she was out, she fully materialized.

What. The. Fuck?

How?

Why?

No!

“Demi!” Sage burst through the trees just as I slipped behind a giant boulder, crouching so that she and Walsh wouldn’t see me.

When she skipped to a stop before my wolf, I blinked and suddenly I was looking up at her from the view of my wolf.

Sage sighed in relief at the sight of my wolf. “You fucking scared me! I thought something was wrong. First full moon?”

My wolf nodded up and down and she grinned. Walsh burst into the bushes, gun drawn, and my wolf growled for a slight second until she realized who it was.

She trusted Walsh, and Sage too.

“It’s her first full moon. I’m gonna shift so we can run,” she told Walsh, and started to pull her top off.

His gaze flicked to her black bra for a millisecond before he nodded once and gave us his back. It was so weird to be in my human form hiding behind a rock but also feel myself as a wolf, looking at Sage as rust colored pelts of fur broke out on her skin. I could see from both realities and it made me feel a little insane. What if this wasn’t real and I was losing my mind?

Sage nipped at my tail, pulling me from my dark thoughts, and took off into the forest as my wolf bounded after her. The wind rushed through my fur as I jumped over damp earth and a fallen log. My paws pounded the mossy floor and tears lined my wolf’s eyes.

The feeling … it was…

‘I’m free,’ I thought. ‘I’m finally free.’

This was what my wolf had wanted all along. Every time one of those assholes at Delphi riled me up and poked my wolf, daring her to come out, this is what she wanted, to run free, no more cuffs, no more suppression; she could protect me when needed unlike that night with the vampires. It was weird to live with the guilt that you weren’t able to protect your own self during an attack. The night of my rape, I’d been so helpless without my wolf. Pinned down, beaten into submission, my wolf tried, but with the cuffs I was just human. No match for one vampire, never mind four.

This feeling, her being out and running with Sage like a real wolf … it was everything.

“I can hear your heartbeat, you know?” Walsh turned and faced the boulder I was hiding behind.

Fuck.

I froze, not even daring to breathe.

“Sawyer is my best friend. He told me about … your condition, so that I could better protect you.”

I slowly stood, and tentatively caught his gaze.

He took one look at me and shook his head. “I’m going to have to tell Sawyer what happened today.”

Unfortunately, I was not wearing my Snitches Get Stitches shirt, but I really wanted to say it.

“Come on? What am I, twelve? You gonna tell Daddy on me?” I crossed my arms and pinned him with a glare. I didn’t want Sawyer knowing I almost shifted in the library, not after our weird yet amazing kiss.

A slow grin pulled at his lips and I realized that he was pretty good looking when he wasn’t scowling. “I’m going to have to tell Sawyer you called him daddy too. He’ll like that.”

My eyes bugged. “Don’t you dare.”

He shrugged. “I have orders. Come on, let’s get you back to your dorm and I’ll have Sage bring your wolf there.”

“She doesn’t know?” I asked.