Chapter 32
THIRTY TWO
Gryff
All I set out to do as I shed my human skin and take off at a run is to get the hell out of Mosswood.
In the end I was too much of a coward to look Honey in the face and tell her goodbye because I knew the minute I saw her pretty face crumple into a smile there’s not a chance I would be able to carry through, and I needed to.
For her sake.
If I’d ever thought for a moment she could get feelings for me, I would never have let her get tangled up with a broken wolf like me. But that’s just it; what makes her so beautiful is the way she can overlook a monster’s flaws and doggedly see the good and only the good.
It’s why she never would have seen all the reasons I can’t be hers. Well, physically.
I am hers, though, in all ways but sinking my teeth into her flesh: my heart, my soul, my wolf.
So it feels like tearing off a limb as I trot further and further from Mosswood, my paws stumbling to a halt as I reach the outskirts of the town.
I look back over my shoulder, wishing things could have been different.
A howl grows in my chest, but I force it down, suppressing the urge to let out the long mournful sound.
A howl is for pack, and I don’t have one.
I can never have a pack. There’s no one I can call on to share my misery.
I don’t really have a destination in mind, so I let my nose take me toward the wild, into the national park, and for a while the wind in my fur and the scent of clean water and rich soil numb some of my pain.
My four-legged form helps. Pretty soon those busy human thoughts fall away like flies, and I’m left with my senses and my instincts.
It’s just a shame that every instinct in my body is telling me to turn right the fuck back around and seek out that particular butter cotton candy scent that is hers and only hers.
Nope. Not doing that.
She will be better off without me.
I crest a ridge, and the trees give way to the bare red dirt walls of a massive crater. Far below, the dark blue waters sparkle in the last of the afternoon light, their depths already an impenetrable black. An unsolvable mystery.
The wind that fills my nostrils and ruffles my fur carries the scent of small, warm prey and cool water and freedom. Standing up here looking out over the lake makes me wonder why I ever bothered trying to return to my human life after the war.
I keep to the ridge for a while, skirting the exposed caldera. Above a hawk circles, searching for a meal, and my own belly rumbles, reminding me I haven’t eaten since the breakfast I cooked Sonia and Honey this morning.
When my nose picks up the scent of a fawn, I track the young deer and its mother for a while, but the doe is watchful. She keeps her little one close by, and eventually I give up and trot on, ignoring my hunger for now.
It’s dusk as I reach the far side of the caldera and the thicker woods on the other side. As soon as I get deeper beneath the trees the dark cloaks me, and I run with my nose to the ground until I scent something warm and frightened.
This area is familiar to me. I’ve run these woods many nights under the full moon. Tonight the moon is a tiny sliver in the sky, peeking just above the canopy. An owl hoots.
I lift my nose to scent the air and my prey, and I stop in my tracks.
I must be mistaken.
For a moment there I thought I smelled a warm candy scent that makes my heart pound faster and my tail rise from between my legs. I get a grip before I can actually wag it, huffing out my breath and shaking my head to clear it.
But when I draw in another breath the scent remains, teasing up memories of sweet, salty slick on my tongue, impossibly soft, smooth flesh under me, and achingly perfect moans as her pleasure overtakes her.
Impossible.
I left her behind in Mosswood. There’s no reason for her to be here, unless…
I turn away, refusing to think about the reason she would have come all the way out here into the wilderness, but even as I lower my snout to the ground again, refocusing on my prey, a niggling worry intrudes, as if my human side refuses to be forgotten.
Is she out here alone?
I don’t like that. I don’t like that at all.
You don’t get many wild bears out here, what with all of us shifters in the woods all the time, but occasionally a male wanders across the area searching for new territory, for a mate. Or a female with a cub to feed decides it looks a likely spot.
I will circle her camp just to make sure. Just to check on her.
She won’t even know I’m there.
Decided, I veer north toward the campsite by the smaller of the two lakes, senses alert for anything untoward in the surrounding area.
The closer I get, the more the rich, sweet smell fills my senses and the faster my paws cover the ground.
It’s stupid. Even though I told myself it was for the best to make a clean break, I can’t help the excitement I feel just being near her one last time.
If I was smarter, I’d read that for the warning sign it is. My wolf is too busy trotting toward his doom with his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth. Fucking collar me and call me Fido. I could not be a more pathetic sight right now.
I taste the air for any sign of another human with her, but all I detect is the smoke of an active campfire and a trace of the sandwiches she had for dinner. Gas from a vehicle that smells suspiciously like mine, and the far too tempting scent of her sex.
Fuck, just the faint trace of that scent has my mouth watering and my blood singing in my veins.
It’s ripe and feminine and delicious, and there’s something there beyond the hunger I know she’s feeling.
No surprises there. My little omega is always hungry.
Always primed. Always in need of my knot to satisfy her.
So what is that other layer? Hope? Hope for what?
I don’t know what I expected. It wasn’t that.
Grief. Anger. Not hope.
I don’t know what to make of that.
I turn to leave but hesitate. Though I’ve scented nothing dangerous in her immediate vicinity, it doesn’t mean that won’t change. Especially with her smelling like that.
Who am I kidding, she always smells like a convict’s last meal. I have a horrible vision then of an escaped prisoner on the run, stumbling on Honey’s campsite. Finding her alone…
A growl rises in my throat, and I choke it back.
That settles it. I’ll wait her out. I’ll hide and watch and keep her safe from a distance until she gives up on me. It shouldn’t take long.
I should have known my sweet omega would do something like this.
She’s too soft-hearted for her own good, so of course she’s worried.
Of course she’s out here looking for me.
But she’s a smart girl. She will work out I’m not coming back soon enough, and once she realizes what an ass I am she’ll stop regretting me.
When she accepts that I’ve really left town without even saying goodbye, that will dry her tears.
A wolf like me isn’t worth crying over.
That’s what I tell myself as I find a spot overlooking the campsite and lay with my head on my paws. I was never good enough for her, and the sooner she realizes that, the better for all concerned.
Bill and Sonia will be there to see her through whatever disappointment she feels, and before she knows it she’ll be back to her life in the big city and will have forgotten all about the dirty old man who should have known better.