Cry of the Wolf Read Online Free Page B

the wolves talking—howling. The next thing I knew, I was able to understand the meaning of what they were saying. When I got out of the water to go after them I became excruciatingly uncomfortable. Every bone in my body hurt. After a few minutes the pain stopped and I found myself dropping to four feet. Although I kept tripping over my own paws at first, I managed to follow the sound. I finally caught up with them and I tried to join the pack.”
    “Tried?”
    “They wouldn’t have me—chased me off. Wolves have their own way of doing things, their own rules of behavior, and I did absolutely everything wrong. Luckily they didn’t kill me.
    “That year I learned how to transition from man to wolf at will. I thought I pretty much had control of the process until I saw you…” Should he actually say that it was the sight of her naked body that made him transform? He saw a faint blush color her cheeks. “But as last night proves, I don’t have total control.
    “I studied up on wolves and learned how they operate. A wild wolf pack is usually made up of a mated pair and their children. Those parents are the alpha animals and they make all the important decisions. I took to following packs around at a respectful distance, learning how they do things, learning how to be a wolf. Not one of them would accept me.”
    “But you were with a pack…”
    “I found I liked my life as a wolf more than my life as a man and so I stayed in my wolf form and roamed alone for years. Then I chanced on a young she-wolf and we, um, became a pair.”
    “You actually mated physically?”
    He wanted to be truthful with her, but wondered how she would take it.
    “During the weeks she was in heat each year we mated often.” He looked over at her as her gaze remained on the road. Was it his imagination or had she paled slightly? He prayed after all they’d been through that he wasn’t going to lose her over this. “I was more animal than human during that period. I had lived uninterruptedly as a wolf for several years. My mind had become like a wolf’s—I was no longer a man, I was a beast.
    “She never had any pups or little man-wolves or shape-shifters or whatever the hell I am—I suppose I’m sterile, at least with a wolf mate. We formed a pack with some strays whose parents, the alpha wolves of their pack, had been killed, and she and I became the alphas, the leaders. I was reasonably content with my wolf life, except that when the moon was just a sliver, I’d feel the pull to return to my human form. I resisted, though, and as the years went by doing so became easier.
    “Then a few years ago my mate was shot and badly wounded and there was nothing I could do for her, neither as a wolf nor as a man. I watched her suffer for days.” He paused and looked down at his hands, which were in two tight fists. “When she died, I mourned, and I swore I would find the men who shot her and kill them. Joel and Billy Coughlin were those men and now they’ve slaughtered two others of my pack.” His voice was harsh. “If Joel hadn’t shot me, Billy would be dead.” Michael slammed his fist into his palm. “The time will come when I will kill them both.”
    They were both silent for a few minutes and then he continued. “After she died I began thinking like a man. I yearned to be human again, yet I didn’t want to leave my pack. During the day I would be a man and I worked part-time helping out on a big farm about six miles from your place. But every night I hunted with the pack and slept with them. I figured out how to hide my clothes. I’d transition every morning, put the clothes on, work for half a day and then go into the woods, get the clothes I’d worn the day before, and go over to the Laundromat to wash and dry them. Then I’d hide them, along with the clothes I was wearing, and transition back into a wolf and hunt with the pack.
    “One day, when we were hunting—it was early spring this year and food was scarce so we