Page 16 of The Coyote's Veterinarian Omega

Both Wyatt and Cal turned to look at me, Wyatt with confusion and Cal with derision. “Can’t what?” Wyatt asked.

“Leave,” I blurted, then bit my lip. I shifted my weight from foot to foot as the silence weighed on us.

Cal’s expression clouded over. “Right,” he said. “Wyatt, go get in the truck. Get Vern to bring you down here tomorrow to get your car. It’ll be fine here overnight.”

“O-okay,” Wyatt said, clearly confused and startled by this turn of events.

“You can’t,” I gritted out, reaching for his arm as he hurried out of the kitchen. Cal slapped my hand down.

“When I get back,” he growled, and if I’d been in my fur, I would have flattened my ears against my head. Maybe even rolled over and showed him my belly.

Without another word, Cal turned and strode out of the kitchen. I heard the back door close, shoes on gravel, the sound of a car door opening.

My mate was leaving. My mate was leaving me.

I couldn’t stop the shift this time either. I found myself with all four paws on the kitchen tile, and I tossed back my head and howled.

Wyatt

Iwas still shaking after cal dropped me off at vern’s. vern was, unfortunately, still out, which meant i’d had to fumble around in the dark for where he kept the spare key. i cursed myself for locking the doors. vern had looked at me like i was out of my mind. i guessed out here, in the country, you didn’t worry so much about people breaking in. still, for me, it seemed like a huge liability. the nearest neighbor was almost a mile down the road. an unlocked, unoccupied house seemed like a prime target for any thief.

Vern had just laughed and muttered, “City-slicker,” under his breath, but he hadn’t stopped me.

Cal had waited until I was inside before he’d turned the truck around and driven off down the lane. Now I was standing alone in the kitchen, listening to every creak and groan of the house, the wind in the branches of the budding trees outside, theincessanttick-tockof an ancient clock on the wall.

All of that faded into the background as my brain spun circles around the idea ofshifters. Werewolves. Were-coyotes. Whatever the hell Cal and Cam were.

I swallowed, then slowly made my way to the counter and checked the kettle. Vern had said his gran was English, so she insisted on making tea “the proper way” when he was little, and he’d stuck by it ever since.

Tea sounded good right now, though. Something to calm the nerves a little, without any alcohol involved. Although a good, stiff drink might have done wonders for my nerves.

A good stiff something, I thought, then gritted my teeth and pulled the kettle off the base. I filled it from the tap, then put it back on the base, listening to excess water pop and hiss as it heated up.

Cam and Cal could turn into coyotes. Apparently, it wasn’t just them. There were other people who could turn into other animals.

I stared out the window, into the dark. I felt like my entire world was crumbling. Everything I’d ever known was falling away. Could you tell shifters apart from regular animals? Had I met one before, and I just hadn’t known it? Had any of my patients been shifters? Other than Cam, of course.

Cam. Fuck. Did the rules of medicine I’d learned at school evenapplyto him? If he could shift back and forth between forms, what good was it to set a bone in one form? Fuck, was he screwing up his shoulder forever by flip-flopping between human and coyote?

“I gotta go back,” I muttered, then nearly jumped out of my skin when the kettle clicked, signaling my water was hot enough for that tea.

I set about finding a mug and filling it. I’d have to go back tomorrow and check on Cam. I’d thought he was a coyote. Ididn’t know a damn thing about humans—or, well, not enough to treat them, at least.

Did Cam even count as human in his … non-coyote form? Was he some kind of … super-human? God. I rubbed my forehead.

I needed to calm down. All this thinking was giving me a migraine. I took my tea and sat down at the kitchen table. I’d just lifted the cup to my lips when there was a howl.

I jumped, knocking my knees into the tabletop, spilling scalding tea everywhere. I barely missed burning myself with it.

Another howl cut through the stillness of the night. I gritted my teeth and turned to the window.

Sure enough, there, trotting down the laneway, was a coyote.

No, notacoyote. Cam.

I knew it was him, even before I got a good look as he trotted past the house, up to the back door. I stalked through the kitchen, then flung open the door. “What the hell do you want?” I snapped.

When golden eyes burned back at me through the dark for a second too long, fear curdled my gut. Had I just made a mistake?