Forbidden

Morgan Walsh struggled to get the map open over the steering wheel, preferably without detouring into the ditch. It really wasn’t a maneuver to be attempted by someone who hadn’t driven in almost two years. When a horn blasted, he glanced up to see headlights in his lane. He cursed and yanked the wheel as the pickup roared past, kids shouting out rolled-down windows.

“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered.

He shoved the map onto the passenger seat and peered out the windshield. There had to be a town along here somewhere. It was ninety miles to Syracuse, and he was starving. He
shouldn’t
be starving. He’d spent the last two years in Alaska, living as a wolf, only eating every few days. Now he couldn’t seem to go a few
hours
without his stomach threatening to devour itself.

He glanced at the side of the road. He should just pull over and check the map, but the shoulder was slick with snow. Snow. In early November. Even Anchorage didn’t see this much of the white stuff so soon.

As he thought that, more began to fall. He flicked on the wipers and remembered his brother’s voice, from their call, three days ago.

“Got a foot of snow last week. If you’re coming home, you should do it soon. You know how it can get.”

Oh, yeah. Morgan knew. Compared to winter in New-foundland, Alaska was positively balmy.

“You
are
coming home, right?”

“Maybe for Christmas.”

They both knew it was a lie. Morgan had gotten out; he wasn’t going back. It wasn’t the shitty weather that kept him away. Even in the breathtaking wilds of Alaska, he’d dreamed of rocky coasts and pounding surf. He’d even dreamed of winds that could knock the breath from your lungs and set your eyes blazing.

But he hadn’t dreamed of life there, with his father and his brother, up before dawn, fishing for cod stocks that’d been depleted twenty years ago by factory fishing. And he hadn’t dreamed of long nights in their cabin, far from any semblance of civilization, listening to his father rage against the DFO—and rage against Morgan, too, when he’d suggest it might be time to find a new livelihood. Walshes were fishermen and, by God, that’s what they’d keep doing until it killed them.

Morgan had decided it was, all things considered, not really the way he cared to die. Or to live. So, at twenty-four, he’d packed a bag and set out to see what else the world had to offer. Four years later, he was still looking.

He hadn’t told his brother where he was going now. If he even said the words “New York State,” Blaine would have flipped out. Might even have come after his little brother. Which wasn’t such a bad idea—it might be the only way to get Blaine off the Rock.

To the Walshes, as to most North American werewolves, New York meant one thing—the home of the American Pack. Growing up, Morgan had heard stories of the Pack the way other kids heard stories of the bogeyman and guys in white vans. The Pack. Madmen and murderers, every last one of them, endlessly scouring the country for innocent, peace-loving werewolves and slaughtering them for sport.
Stay in Newfoundland
, his dad said,
or the Pack will find you
.

Nearly eighteen months ago, the Pack did find him. They’d been in Alaska hunting other werewolves. Not for sport, but because the others were exactly the kind of wolves his father claimed the Pack were. Madmen and murderers. Rapists and man-eaters.

The Pack had invited Morgan to visit when he was done with his wolf experiment. They wanted to recruit him. They hadn’t said that exactly, but he’d gotten the hint—come and hang out with us, and if we think you’re a decent sort, we’d like to sign you up.

Was that what Morgan wanted? He had no idea. But it couldn’t hurt to stop by. Just passing through, remembered they were there, decided to call and say hi, maybe take them out to dinner.

Speaking of dinner… His stomach rumbled again. In the distance, he could see what looked like a town sign. He peered through the falling snow until it came into view. Then he blinked. And laughed.

It was indeed a town sign…with a snarling wolfman welcoming visitors to Westwood, home of the champion Westwood Werewolves. Across the bottom, the sign declared “Westwood Loves Its Werewolves!”

Morgan chuckled to himself. “Oh, that’s just too good to pass up.”

•

Morgan found a diner at the end of the main street. There were only two cars in the lot, both covered in snow, but the light seeping through the windows gave him hope.

It was open. Empty, though. Through the window he could see a server reading a book. As he walked in, he noticed the sign on the window: 10% off for all Werewolves and their families.

Wonder if they’ll give me the discount
.

•

He didn’t ask for the discount, even jokingly. When you live in a world where werewolves exist only in books and
movies, it’s usually safer to keep it that way.

So no discount. He did get good food, though. He guessed you’d call it home-cooking, but it wasn’t the kind of fare he ever got at home. His dad was a meat-and-potatoes man. Heavy on the potatoes, usually, unless he’d been lucky enough to hunt up deer or rabbit, sometimes even a moose. Tonight’s dinner
was
meat-and-potatoes—meatloaf with scalloped potatoes—but it was a damned sight better than anything his father ever cooked. And the apple pie was definitely off their home menu. Morgan was finishing his second slice when the server stopped by.

“Hungry, I see,” she said.

He flashed her a big smile. “Always.”

She returned the smile and gave him a good view of her cleavage as she cleared his dishes. She hadn’t shown much interest in her novel since he’d arrived. He got the message: there was more than food on the menu tonight, at least for him.

She was cute, in a dyed-blond, being-Homecoming-queen-was-the-best-day-of-my-life way. Comfort food, like dinner. He was seriously tempted to partake. A hunger for food wasn’t the only appetite that’d slammed back as he returned to human life. This one was less surprising—there hadn’t been much opportunity for sex as a wolf. Sure, one of the females had thought he looked mighty fine, but
that
experience had definitely not been part of his experiment.

So he was making up for lost time, and he’d have been happy to let the cute server help, but he really did need to hit the road. Being in New York State meant he was technically trespassing on Pack territory. He couldn’t afford to linger.

“Anything else I can get for you?” she asked, standing close enough for him to smell her rich, soapy scent.

“Just the check,” he said with regret. “I need to hit the road before this snow—”

A wave of nausea rocked him. The room seemed to swirl, lights dimming. He gripped the edge of the table and blinked hard.

“You okay?” the server asked.

“Yeah.” He took a deep breath and straightened.

“Maybe that second slice wasn’t such a good idea?”

As he nodded, his back started to itch. He looked down at his hands. The skin bubbled, like something was trapped under it. He yanked his hands under the table, one rubbing the other.

Damn it. He needed to be more careful. Take things slower. Like
not
going on a cross-country trip when he was accustomed to being in wolf form.

He reached for his wallet and slapped a twenty on the table, then rose, hands shoved in his pockets.

“You sure you’re okay?” the server asked. “You shouldn’t be driving if you’re not.”

“I’m fine.” His voice came out a little too close to a growl, vocal cords straining, and he coughed to cover it. “I’ll walk it off first. Get some fresh air.”

“We’ve got a couch in the back.” She slid in front of him and smiled up. “Or my place is just down the road. I make a pretty good nurse. Got two terms of schooling before I dropped out.”

He shook his head and started to walk away. She caught his sleeve. He wheeled, eyes blazing, fever coming fast.

“No,” he said, his voice a deep growl.

She staggered back. He hurried out the door.

•

Morgan tramped through the snow, almost to his knees. Luckily, the diner, being on the edge of town, backed onto forest. He’d headed straight there, cursing himself the whole way.

He should have Changed last night. He should Change
every
night until his body got used to being human. Sure, twice a week had been fine until now. Sure, willingly transforming nightly was akin to volunteering for nightly anesthesia-free surgery. But he could not take chances. Seeing the look on that server’s face, he knew he’d taken a chance. And on Pack territory, too.

Goddamn it!

The snowfall lightened as he trudged deeper into the forest, but he barely noticed, too caught up in his thoughts. What exactly had the server seen? Did his face start Changing? Or was she only startled because he’d growled at her? He hoped that was it. God, he hoped that was it.

A branch slapped his face and he shoved it aside, growling, only to smack into a tree trunk. He blinked and rubbed his eyes. Everything looked slightly out of focus. He blinked harder.

He felt disoriented, like he had in the diner. That wasn’t normally part of the Change. How long had he been driving? He calculated. Shit. Too long. No sleep. No exercise. Not nearly enough caffeine. That might explain this sudden need to Change.

He stumbled into the nearest clearing. Off came the clothing, shivers turning to near convulsions as he tried to hang it in branches, up off the snow.

Then he got down on all fours and started the transformation.

•

The process went faster than usual. No less painful, but the compressed timeframe made it seem better.

Lies we tell ourselves
.

At least it was warmer with the wolf coat. His fur was dark red, like his hair. Once, when he’d been spotted by hunters in Alaska, they’d mistaken him for an Irish setter, which was kind of insulting. Maybe the coloring was close, but he was clearly a wolf. A wolf that weighed in at about a hundred and eighty pounds—his human weight—which made him nearly twice the size of a regular one. Still, being mistaken for a setter was better than having the hunters go back to town with stories of a massive, dark-red, green-eyed wolf.

He chuffed and looked around. Normally, it would be time to run. Work off the excess energy that came with being part canine. But he was woozy and dinner felt like a dead weight in his gut. A nice, leisurely evening stroll seemed more his speed—

“Are those footprints?” a distant voice said.

“Looks like it,” a second man answered.

Shit. Rule One of Changing in a populated area? Get away from the damned population first.

Morgan had barely leapt from the clearing before he stumbled and plowed into a drift. He pushed up, shaking snow from his fur and looked back at the branch that had tripped him.

Where’d that come from?

He blinked and when he looked again, he saw two branches, blurred.

Where did they
both
come from?

Shit. He was really out of it. He should get farther into the forest and rest until it passed.

A branch cracked to his left. He peered through the trees. He could make out a bulky shadow about twenty feet away. Hunter? Bear? He wasn’t in any condition to deal with either.

He ran. The snow had stopped falling, leaving the forest pitch-black, the dense treetops barely allowing any light from the quarter moon. His night vision had kicked in, but everything was blurred.

He stumbled over another branch and pitched head-first into a gully, his skull cracking against a half-buried boulder as he fell. When he hit bottom, he managed to get to his feet. He teetered a few steps, then dropped as everything went dark.

•

Morgan surfaced to consciousness to the sound of a woman’s voice. He groaned and struggled to remember the night before. Something about a woman. A server in a diner?

“Come on. Wake up!”

Obviously she was in a damned hurry to get him out the door. Was she married? Shit. He was usually careful about stuff like that.

It took some effort to pry open his eyes, and when he did, a blast of light almost made them close again. He squinted and saw a blurred figure bending over him. Then an icy wind blasted over his bare skin.

“Jesus,” he muttered. “Someone close the damned—”

The figure above him came into focus. It was a very pretty dark-haired, dark-eyed woman, his age or a little older. Huh. He’d lucked out last night. Now if he could actually remember—

“Get up!” she said.

He blinked and rose on his elbows. Damn, it was cold. Why was it so—?

He got a good look at the woman. She wore a dark-brown parka over a khaki shirt and trousers. It was some kind of uniform. Including a gun in her hand. Pointed at him.

A ray of sunlight glinted off a police badge on her parka.

Morgan sat up fast, realizing as he did that he wasn’t in a bed. He was lying in the snow. Naked. Surrounded by cops.

“Uh…” he began, as he looked around.

His gaze fell on the tracks in the snow. Wolf tracks.

Shit.