AllFreeNovel
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“I can’t… I can’t control it. The flames.” I look at her, drowning in her silver depths as I verbalize the very thing I fear the most. “I’m going to hurt them.” The pack. The ones who’ve accepted me. Jaz and Mila and Frank. And Jules. And Gideon.
The forest erupts into a forest fire, embers dancing in the air around us, the snow melting almost instantly.Claim your wolf to claim your mate to claim your power.Her head tilts to one side as she gazes at me.Claim it all so the witches cannot.
A hard knock startles me, and I shudder a gasp as I’m pulled from my mind and back into my body, in my bedroom, with Kaylus staring at me from his nest.
“Adara?” Gideon asks from the other side of the door.
I clear my throat, disheveled and still not showered.
“The door is locked. Let me in, or I’m breaking it open,” he growls.
I jump off the bed and unlock the door, opening it wide to see him running his hands through his thick black hair.
“Gods, finally.” He studies me from the hallway, his gaze traveling from my dry hair to my clothes. “You haven’t showered.”
It’s a statement, not a question, and my cheeks heat when I realize I don’t know how long I’ve been in here. “Uh, I…”
He laughs, the sound low and husky, making my mouth go dry. “Let’s go.” He turns, moving down the stairs, and I glance over my shoulder at Kaylus, sleeping beside the bed, before rushing after Gideon. He walks past the kitchen and out the sliding door into the yard.
“Wait, I thought we—”
“You look like you need some air,” he says, throwing a look over his shoulder. He smirks and takes off into the woods. The sun has started its slow descent toward the horizon, but there’s plenty of light left in the sky to see the pair of sweatpants Gideon tosses behind him before he shifts, giving me the briefest glimpse of toned thighs leading to his bare ass.
My wolf begs for release in my chest, and I pull my shirt over my head as I race after him. A smile breaks across my face as I shift painlessly and chase his black wolf through the shadows of the trees in the dying golden light.
Chapter eight
Gideon
Adara crashes through the forest after me, and I relish in it—her wolf chasing mine through the woods. My wolf gloats inside my head, rubbing it in that he told me this was right, that I should’ve listened to him from the start.
“What were you doing in your room?”I ask her, trying to drown out the insufferable wolf inside me.
“Bonding, I guess.”
I quirk a brow, ducking under some low branches and stomping through the brush. The setting sun lights the forest path in a fiery orange glow, the fallen leaves on the ground bright and mesmerizing.
“Have you ever… visited your wolf?”she asks, hesitation clear in her tone.
I slow my pace, and she stumbles as she catches up to me.“Twice.”After meeting my first alpha, when I first learned of the supernatural world, my wolf dragged into his realm—all obsidian mountains and a field of the strangest flowers I’d ever seen… asphodels, he called them. The second time was when I shut him out of my mind, closing off his world and his access to the rest of me… until I met her.
Her eyes snap over to me.“Just twice? Is… is it unusual to go more than that?”
I shrug, inhaling the fresh scent of the lake as we near.“It’s different for everyone. Some never enter the realm of their wolf. Some enter it frequently.”Padding through the tree line, we break into the field with the lake, and I nip her shoulder, then run off.
She laughs, the sound like a breath of fresh air on the first spring morning after a harsh winter. Jumping on my back, she tackles me to the ground, and I roll beneath her. Her teeth graze my snout, and I turn to pin her down. She wiggles beneath me as I lay on top of her, and I run my nose along her cheek.
“Bet you can’t catch me.”I bolt off her and crash into the lake, diving under the water and shifting beneath the surface. I swim a few strokes, still amazed at the water. I’ve been visiting this lake for so long, but it never freezes, the temperature always staying chilly, even in the height of summer, yet never dropping so low that ice would form on its surface.
At first, I thought it was a witch’s territory, but after researching all the covens in the country, I’ve found none anywhere near this lake. Adara’s coven is the nearest in the area, and they’re based closer to the city limits. Only Monique lived as far from the city as she did, most likely to hide her two daughters and their true abilities.
Thinking of her puts a sour taste in my mouth, and I clench my jaw, shooting up to break the surface of the lake. Panting, I look around for Adara, but there’s no sign of her. The ripples along the water’s surface all come from my direction, and there’s no signs of movement in the field. “Adara?” I call out, treading water to stay afloat as I spin myself in circles looking for her. “Adara!”
A hand wraps around my ankle, and I’m pulled under water before I can take a full breath of air into my lungs. I lurch up, swimming toward the surface as my chest burns, and the fingers around my ankle heat the water around me. Adara’s hands climb up my body, her legs wrapping around my waist, her mouth covering mine. She smiles against my lips as we push to the surface, both of us trying to catch our breath.
“Caught you,” she says, bursting into a breathless laugh.
“I’ve no idea how,” I say, smiling at the joy on her face. “Still a brat.”
