Wolf Marked by Alexis Calder

20

Sheila looked at me, then over at Alec. Then her eyes found the broken cot.

“I knew it!” Sheila said.

“Fine, yes, you were right. Can we get a couple of minutes?” I asked.

“This is my tent,” she teased.

“Please,” I said.

“Fine, I’ll wait outside,” she said dramatically. “Next time put a sock on the door or something.”

“Is that even possible on a tent flap?” I asked.

“Alec does live alone, just saying,” she said on her way out.

I looked over at Alec and the two of us burst into laughter. “I guess we weren’t fast enough.”

“What did she mean by that?” Alec asked. “When she said she knew it?”

I rolled my eyes. “She’s been saying the two of us should hook up for a while.”

“She’s smart,” he said.

I pulled my shirt over my head. “She’s pretty great.” When I poked my head out of my shirt, Alec was glaring at me.

I looked around. There was nobody else in the tent. That look was aimed at me. “What’s wrong?”

His eyes moved down to my still naked hips. “Were you going to tell me?”

I looked down and caught sight of the mark. “Fuck. I forgot about that.”

“This is why they’re after you, isn’t it?” he asked. “You’re marked as an alpha. How could you not tell us? You put all of us at risk.”

“No,” I said. “It’s not like that. I didn’t even know this mark was here until after I arrived.”

“I can’t believe how foolish I was,” he said. “You can probably shift, too, can’t you.”

“Are you kidding me right now? You think I’ve been lying to you?” I couldn’t believe what he was saying. How could he think I’d do that to him? “Why would I do that? How would that benefit me?”

“If you show up in Wolf Creek with that mark, they have to hand the pack over to you. Is that why they wanted you dead? To keep you from taking over?”

“You’re not listening to me. I didn’t even know until I got here,” I said “And I can’t shift. No pack would have me as their alpha even if that’s what I wanted, which I don’t. You believe me, don’t you?”

He leaned down and grabbed his jeans, then pulled them on.

“Alec, talk to me. You have to tell me you believe me,” I said.

“Okay,” he said, his voice tense. “I believe you.”

He said the words, but it was clear he wasn’t being honest.

“Don’t do this to me,” I said.

He turned and grabbed his shirt from off the floor. In the dim light of the lantern, I could make out a familiar mark above his right shoulder blade. The same crescent moon surrounded by a circle. The mark I wore on my hip. The mark of an alpha.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

He stood up and turned to face me.

I walked over to him and shoved him. “You have the mark of the alpha. You, who refuses to claim the title and lead these people. How can you judge me?”

“I might have the mark, but I have no pack to lead. Your pack is still alive. You don’t know me. You don’t know anything about me.” His expression was dark, his tone angry.

I stepped back, my chest tightening as anger and fear mixed. “I don’t know anything about you because you won’t tell me. I’ve been nothing but honest with you since we met.”

He pulled his shirt over his head. “I was the last of my pack. The only survivor of a massacre. When the mark showed up, it was the fates way of reminding me of all I lost. My family, my mate, my home… It was all taken from me by your pack.”

“They’re not my pack,” I said through gritted teeth.

“They are and you are supposed to be a leader and you walked away,” he said. “If you gave a damn, you’d step up and be the leader you were marked to be.”

“I’m sure that would go over well. The cursed girl who can’t shift wants to step up and take over as leader of the people who spent years abusing her. You have no idea what I’ve been through.”

“You can change that,” he said. “You don’t have to give up.”

“Don’t you dare lecture me,” I said. “You have a pack right here that you refuse to step up and protect.”

“I do everything for these shifters. I lead them,” he said.

“You deny them and yourself of true family by refusing to form a pack,” I said. “You know what you’re risking by keeping them feral.”

I knew that not everything I learned was accurate, but I had been taught the importance of pack. It strengthened shifters to have that bond with others. It also gave them legitimacy in the eyes of our king. Packs could ask for resources, they could find allies in other packs, and they could grow and thrive. Staying feral kept Alec’s community weaker. If they were a pack, they’d probably have the funds for homes and schools and infrastructure. Instead, they live in tents.

“Don’t lecture me on pack,” he said.

“Get out of my tent,” I said.

To my surprise, he didn’t argue. When he walked out the door, I thought I’d be happy to see him leave. Instead, I fell to the ground, my whole body shaking. I took deep breaths, trying to calm myself.

How had everything gone so impossibly wrong so quickly?

“Hey, you okay?” Sheila asked.

I looked up to see her standing in the doorway. “You heard all that, didn’t you?”

“Do you really have the mark?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Look, try not to take it personally. Alec lost everything. He struggles with the idea of pack because he thinks he’s cursed or some shit. I think he feels like if he was in a pack, he’d lose it all again,” she said.

“Then why give a shit about what I do with my pack?” I asked.

“You have a pack. They suck ass and they should probably all die a fiery, explosive death, but they’re alive.” She sat down on the ground next to me. “Give him a little time. I think he was surprised.”

“He was surprised? Imagine how I feel.” I shook my head. “I didn’t ask for this.”

“I know what you mean.” She touched her scar.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to be insensitive.”

“You weren’t. You’re fine.” She stood. “I know what we need.”

“About a gallon of tequila?” I asked.

She laughed. “Come on. I have just the thing to help us clear our minds.”

Curious, I followed her out of the tent. We hurried past the common area and ducked into the woods. My heart beat faster as we approached Alec’s house but thankfully, we didn’t slow down.

When we reached the lake, Sheila started to take off her shoes. “The kids will be gone any minute and we’ll have the whole place to ourselves.”

She sat down on the sand and leaned her head back, her eyes closed. “Isn’t the sun marvelous today?”

I didn’t see how this was going to make me feel better, but I joined her. Closing my eyes, I leaned my head back. The warmth of the sun did feel amazing on my skin.

“You know, Alec is my best friend. But he can be a real dick sometimes,” she said. “But he’ll stick to his word. Whatever you two have planned, he’ll follow through. Even if things don’t work out romantically.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. I still wanted that bond broken, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to face Alec.

The sky was streaked with pink and the heat of the day made the cold lake water feel blissful. I’d let Sheila talk me into a swim and we’d spent the last ten minutes floating in the water. It was dinner time for most people and the kids playing at shore had run off shortly after we arrived.

It was peaceful and calm. I was starting to understand why Sheila was so happy here. It was a good place to at least figure out where you wanted to go next as Anja had mentioned. I wasn’t sure what my next steps would be. Especially after the way Alec and I left things.

I didn’t want to talk to him, but I had to know what was going on. The unknown about our next steps with the plan were getting to me. Would we still be going to remove my mating bond? Or had he decided he no longer wanted to help me at all?

I turned so my legs touched the bottom of the lake. We were in chest deep water, my head barely above the surface. “We should probably head back now. I need to find Alec and figure out if I still have plans for tomorrow.”

The last thing I wanted to do was talk to him again, but the need to break the bond and get even the slightest revenge on Wolf Creek was pulsing through me. I had to follow through with this. Returning home and facing my past, instead of running, was important. I was starting to wonder if it was exactly the step I needed to finally connect with my inner wolf.

“Your return to Wolf Creek?” she asked.

I opened and closed my mouth a few times, not sure how to respond. Alec had made it clear he didn’t want me to tell anyone about me looking for information about the toxin, but I wasn’t sure what he’d told people.

“I know what’s going on,” she said. “Alec doesn’t keep much from me.”

“You were here all week while he was out doing who knows what,” I said.

“Someone has to stick around here sometimes when he’s out. Especially if we’ve got trackers from Wolf Creek on the prowl,” she said.

I scrunched up my face, guilt making me feel like shit for bringing threats anywhere near this blissful community. While I was confident my old pack knew nothing about the mark, Tyler and I had that bond intact. I winced at the memory of kissing him before I was tossed in the cave. I’d wanted him to miss me, but I hadn’t wanted him to come looking for me. Why didn’t I think of that possibility?

“Don’t worry,” she said. “Alec has a plan to take care of it. It’s all going to be fine.”

“You really trust him, don’t you?” I asked.

“He takes care of his friends,” she said. “Come on, let’s head back.”

A weight settled in the pit of my stomach. I wasn’t sure where I stood with him in that regard. We were friends? After what just went down, I had no idea. The part that bothered me the most was that I wasn’t quite sure what I was hoping for. I wasn’t great with relationships. I’d never had an actual friend before let alone a lover. While I was pissed at how he’d reacted, I had no idea where to go from here.

We swam to shore and shook off the water as best as we could before slipping back into our clothes. My shorts and tee were soaked, making my shirt completely transparent. I guess a perk of going back to my mom’s trailer was that I could pack a bag of clothes. I’d lost my best clothes wherever I’d dropped my bag, but I would give just about anything for some clean underwear.

Our walk back took us past Alec’s place. I paused, wondering if he was there right now. All the windows were dark and I figured there was a good chance he wasn’t there so I continued on. Sheila either didn’t notice my distraction, or she kept quiet.

I was shivering by the time we reached the common area. “Any chance you have another shirt that might fit me?”

“I got you,” she said.

Sheila turned on a lantern when we reached her tent. My heart sank when I saw that the cot was back to normal. Alec had either had it fixed or found a replacement. Was that his attempt at an apology or was he simply fulfilling his role as the leader of the feral shifters?

“You’ll want to get some sleep tonight,” Sheila said. “I don’t know all the details, but I think tomorrow will be a big day for you.”

“If it’s still happening,” I said.

“You had a fight. It happens. But we never let disagreements take us away from our plans. We have to be careful out here to survive,” she said.

I swallowed down the guilt again. I shouldn’t be here. I’d put them all at risk. Alec knew it from the beginning, yet he let me stay. I should have taken my chances walking to town and found a job. Stuck to my plan. Moved on with my life as a human. My wolf seemed to growl at the notion.

I sighed. I’m not going to go back to the old plan. I couldn’t now that I’d started to wake my wolf. I had to break the bond with Tyler and learn to shift. Once I passed off the information about the toxin, I could rest easier knowing that Wolf Creek would get the punishment it deserved.

I finished buttoning up the plaid shirt I’d borrowed. It was nice to have something with long sleeves again as the evening grew colder. “What exactly do you know about my return to Wolf Creek? Because Alec has been minimal on the details with me.”

“That sounds right. He never really tells me the plan until it’s time to go. I do know he got a car so you don’t have to hike back there,” she offered.

“That’s good news.” I hadn’t even considered that part of it. A days-long walk with Alec might have been something I’d enjoyed not long ago. Sleeping under the stars, cooking over an open fire, sharing a single sleeping bag…

I shook the thoughts away. That wasn’t going to happen and this trip wasn’t a romantic tryst. Driving meant a few hours there and back and then hopefully, I could put this all behind me. Once it was finished, I’d either stay here and avoid Alec, or I’d move on to somewhere new.

My wolf felt restless. Same, girl. I hated the lack of information. Was it possible that Alec was out in the common area? Most evenings, it was the place to be. The shifters here shared meals and stayed up until the fires died. Sometimes they’d shift and run in the woods. Sometimes they played cards or sat and talked. Whatever was going on tonight, there was a good chance Alec would be there. If we were heading out tomorrow, he wasn’t going to leave camp tonight. I wasn’t sure how to handle talking to him, but I knew the longer I waited, the worse I was going to feel. “You think there’s some food left from dinner?”

“Good call,” Sheila said as she finished getting dressed. “I’m starving.”

We headed out into the dark. In the distance, I saw a few tiki torches and some solar lights that were used in front of various shifter tents. It was an eclectic place with a variety of different styles all coming together.

The common area was still hopping and I could smell burgers cooking on a grill. “Follow the smoke.”

Sheila laughed. “That smells amazing.”

Mario, my new friend who had been fixing up the car, was grilling burgers on his camp sized propane grill. He waved when he saw me. “Hungry?”

“You always have the best food.” It was true. He was by far one of the best cooks in the camp. Possibly one of the best cooks I’d ever known.

His wife, Paula, beckoned us to the picnic table near their tent. We sat down and joined the couple for burgers and tomato salad and watermelon slices. It was like summer on a plate.

Now that I wasn’t soaking wet, and I had food in my stomach, I was handling my emotions a little better. I should have expected something like that from Alec. He could deny it all he wanted, but he was an alpha through and through. His outburst was exactly why I wanted to shield myself from males like him. I didn’t need him. Sure, the sex had been amazing, but I had nothing to compare it to. For all I knew all sex was that great. I could find someone else. It wasn’t like the two of us were heading to relationship status anyway.

So why did my stomach do somersaults when I noticed him walking toward us?

As he got closer, I realized the expression on his face was grim. Something was wrong. He stopped at our table.

“Hey, pull up a chair. There’s plenty of food,” Mario said.

“Thanks, but I’m not hungry.” He looked down at me. “We need to talk.”