Page 20 of Big Bad Wolf

That’s not enough, either. I know it isn’t, but I push myself faster, legs burning as I duck between two thick trunks and swing right, then left, trying to use the forest against him.

Last night he chased me as a wolf. I would’ve guessed that he was doing the same now⁠—

—until his rough voice finds me in the darkness.

“Run if you want to. Wolf will always find you.”

My head swivels on my neck and there he is, about thirty feet behind me.

Still in his man shape. Still huge, still half-furred and clawed and impossibly attractive, but running upright through the trees with an easy, ground-eating stride that makes my stomach drop.

He didn’t even need to change to his wolf to chase after me. He managed it as the wolf-man, and there’s a touch of amusement to his shout that has my pulse thudding wildly.

And I know without knowing how exactly that Wolf… he let me escape. He let me get as far away as I did. Sure, maybe he hoped I wouldn’t take the chance to go, but I did, and he let me run anyway because… fuck… because he enjoys it.

What is this? Foreplay for one of the beasts of Blackmoor? My stomach goes tight at the thought and, damn it, I think it is. He’s not chasing me down because I escaped. Oh, no. Wolf wants to catch me to prove that he can.

I’ll say one thing. I give it a good try. Bolting through a narrow path, I veer sharply downhill, branches slapping at my arms in a way that should be able to give Wolf’s big body some pause. Thinking I beat him, I get a little giddy when I finally reach the bottom of the slope and turn⁠—

God fucking damn it! Wolf is right in front of me.

I skid to a stop so fast that my boots slide out from under me, but before I can go down to the forest floor, one huge hand catches me at the waist.

“Found,” he says happily.

I’m breathing too hard to manage a proper reply; I’d give him my middle finger if I thought he’d have any idea what it meant, or if he didn’t take it as a proposition. Instead, I struggle to get my breath while my body buzzes, way too intimately aware of the possessive hand on my waist and the fact that he isn’t the least bit out of breath while I can’t catch mine at all.

“That,” I gasp, “was unfair.”

His mouth curls, just enough that the edge of one fang shows. “Wolf said he would always find Red and he did.”

“That wasn’t a challenge.”

“Yes, mate. It was.”

The sheer confidence in his answer should be insufferable. Instead, it lights something in me that I very much do not want lit.

Turning into him, I brace both hands against Wolf’s chest. I’m intending to shove him back, hoping to make some kind of point, but all I do is press my palms into warm skin and soft fur while staring up into those impossible golden eyes of his and forget all other intentions.

I grit my teeth. “Look… you can’t keep chasing me every time I run from you.”

His eyes flash. “Can.”

“Wolf—”

Something happens. At first, I have no idea what, but it’s enough of a distraction that when Wolf growls, “Mine,” again, I don’t bother arguing with him. Not when⁠—

I dig my nails into his chest. “What are you… what are you doing to me?”

The strange sensation is there and gone again, so quickly I shake my head before he can answer me.

Instead, I relax my fingers, patting him between his pecs before murmuring more to myself than to him: “I can’t believe you stayed like this instead of…” What the word for it? “Shifting.”

He cocks his head slightly. “Wolf is Wolf.”

“No.” I shake my head again. “You could’ve chased me like you did last night. When I heard the howl, that’s what I thought… that I would see the wolf again. Not… not Wolf.”

He’s quiet for a moment, and then, “Four legs scare Red.”