Page 47 of Bad Blood Wolf

And Jasmin couldn’t be locked in. She’d only been in the crazy shed once, and Tank and Flynn had ended up opening the door and sitting outside the whole time to keep her in, because being locked in made her jag even crazier.

But she couldn’t leave him. Just the thought of it made her feel like she’d swallowed broken glass.

“Jaz—”

“I’ll stay up with her,” Tank said quietly. “The two of us should be able to handle him.”

“Fuck it all,” Flynn muttered, tugging on his hair. “Fine. I’ll stay too.”

They all ended up staying. Jasmin sat inside the shed, Brody’s poor misshapen head on her lap, stroking his patchy fur.

Tank and Flynn sat outside next to the door, backs to the wall and shoulders touching, passing a whiskey bottle back and forth. Lissa curled up on the other side of Tank, all bundled up, dozing against his side.

Xander dragged over a galvanized steel tub that had once held a beer keg, and built a fire in it. He and Sloan Changed and lounged around it in cat form, basking in the heat. Every now and then Tank got up and threw another couple of logs on the fire.

Nobody spoke.

Near morning, the tranquilizer wore off, and Brody began to stir. Jasmin murmured to him as she stroked him, telling him all the boyfriend things she was going to let him do. Take her for ice cream. Carve their initials on a tree. Take her on a balloon ride. Dance in the rain.

Slowly, his skin began to ripple and pulse. Bones broke with slow, excruciating ‘cracks,’ like sticks too green to snap. From his muzzle came a long, low moan.

Xander and Sloan raised their heads off their paws, the fur down their backs standing up. Flynn and Tank got to their feet, poised, ready to shift. Lissa had the trank gun ready.

“Get back, Jaz,” Flynn said.

It wasn’t an order, and she wasn’t doing it. She held on to Brody, kept petting him, kept talking. “Come on, Brody. Come on back. You can do it. Come back to us. Come back to me.”

There was a great ripple and heave, and then Brody was lying in her arms, bruised and bloodied, but human again. Flynn leaned against the side of the building, huffing out a huge relieved breath. Tank’s face split in a grin, and Lissa clung to his arm, smiling.

Brody opened his eyes. “Demazon,” he rasped. “You look good.”

Jasmin’s eyes stung, and she blinked back tears. “Enjoy the sight,” she said, her voice thick. “Because I’m going to fucking kill you.”

Once they were sure that Brody wasn’t going to go berserk and start Changing again, they hauled him into the house, and Tank and Flynn took him into the giant shower in Tank’s bathroom to wash the blood and dirt off him.

Jasmin cooked. She’d already made a frittata and coffee cake before they brought Brody in, clean and dressed in Tank’s too-large sweats.

He was still walking like he was drunk. Jasmin didn’t know if it was fatigue or an injury or the remains of the tranquilizer or some other drug, but she hated it. She hated Brody being hurt and sick and weak, and maybe a drug addict, and almost dying somewhere in the woods instead of being here in her bed, in her shed, where he should have been.

She hated this feeling like her heart was in pieces, and she hated caring.

Hated. It.

All these years of protecting her heart, and he’d undone it in less than a week.

Brody sat on the fat leather couch, his head cradled in his hands. He felt like he’d been wrung out like a wet towel and then beaten with mallets. While having the worst hangover of his life and simultaneously still being drunk.

The only thing keeping him going was knowing Jasmin was there. He’d felt her holding him, heard her talking to him, as time stretched on and on and he was sure he was going to die.

Flynn sat down opposite him, with Tank standing behind the sofa. Jasmin was curled up in a big chair, but she looked anything but relaxed. There were deep shadows under her eyes, like bruises.

Flynn had kicked everyone else out.

Tank had put a glass of water on the table in front of him, but Brody didn’t even have the energy to pick it up.

“Okay, talk,” Flynn said. His tone was gentler than his words, but Brody could feel the alpha power rolling off him. “You’re in my territory, and whatever fucked-up shit is going on in your life, you brought it to me, so now it’s my business.”

Brody nodded. Even that small movement sent pain shooting through his skull.