8

The Den buzzed with activity, but Lexie stood in her closet, bereft. Sharmalee danced down the hallway, waving a stick of incense outside Lexie’s room.

“Hey Lexie,” she called.

“Hey,” Lexie groaned.

Sharmalee poked her head through the doorway. “You okay?”

“I have a date. Trying to figure out what to wear.”

“Tonight?! It’s the full moon!”

“I’m not going to turn, Sharm. It’s pointless to try, and I don’t want to get stoned alone and watch YouTube videos all night like last time.”

“Fair enough.” Sharmalee entered and peered into Lexie’s closet. The selection consisted of mostly a pile of dirty shirts and a few sweaters half-falling off their hangers. She cocked an eyebrow. “What are you going for?”

Lexie made a face. “Rebound?”

“Oh, yeah, totally. Forget this,” Sharmalee said, dismissing the closet. “Wait here.”

Sharmalee walked around the corner to her room, wafting the incense over her as she went.

Lexie turned to her mirror and sectioned her hair. She needed to look like she knew what she was doing, like she belonged among the motorcycle dykes and leather women. She was tying the first braid when Sharmalee reentered, clothes in hand.

“Nu-uh. Hair down.”

“She’s picking me up on her motorcycle.”

“Hair in a loose braid, then. Undo it when you get to the club. Here, try this.”

She threw a shirt at Lexie: a simple black-ribbed tank top with red floss serging at the edges. It was nothing too special, and it was soft.

Lexie tried it on while Sharmalee watched. It fit with just the right amount of give and cling, making even her boyish top look curvy.

“Yep,” Sharmalee said, then threw a pair of jeans at her. “These haven’t fit me since oh-six. You can keep them.”

Lexie checked out her reflection and was weirdly pleased. Except—

“I look straight,” Lexie said, grimacing.

Sharmalee giggled and flipped her hand, dismissing Lexie’s concern. “You look like a baby dyke.”

“Is that a good thing?” Lexie asked.

“Yes,” Renee shouted from downstairs.

Lexie and Sharmalee laughed. Hazel bounded down the hallway and peeked through her doorway. “Baby dykes are the puppies of the lesbian world. Everyone’s gonna want to pet you.”

“Yep,” Sharmalee said. “Shake out your hair and put on a little liner. It’s perfect.” Hazel nodded and ran back down the hall.

“What about a jacket? I can’t wear a flannel.” Lexie paused. “Right?”

Sharmalee looked Lexie up and down and wiggled her mouth, thinking. “Yeah, okay.”

She gave the waning stick of incense to Lexie and walked downstairs to the hall closet.

“Renee!” she called. “Come here, please!”

Lexie stuck the incense in an empty soda can and dug around her limited makeup bag for some eyeliner. She stroked the pencil along her lashes in jagged, awkward lines. She grabbed for some tissues and tried to unfocus her hearing so as to ignore Sharmalee and Renee as they spoke downstairs.

Lexie was ambivalent about not running with the Pack tonight. Relief wrestled with hurt, and a whole mixture of resentments accompanied the contradictory emotions. She wanted to blame everyone for pushing her aside, even when it was she who had figured out a new and subtle way to exclude herself from their adventures. She tried to pretend she was doing better, stepping into her fears and becoming stronger, but she couldn’t; it just wasn’t true. She was running like always, and Randy was just a convenient excuse.

Lexie wanted to change her plans. She couldn’t. She’d already said yes to Randy, and the girls of the Pack … didn’t seem to care. She turned away from the mirror and dug for un-crunchy socks in the pile of dirty laundry.

A minute later, Sharmalee stood at the door frame, offering up a black leather jacket. “Here.”

“Wow,” Lexie said. “Really?” It looked expensive enough to make Lexie recoil for fear of somehow breaking it.

“It’s no biggie, just try it.”

Renee appeared and leaned against the doorframe to watch.

Lexie took it. The leather felt like velvet. She tried it on. It fit her perfectly, molding along the slopes and angles of her body when she zipped it up over her narrow frame. She shook her hair over her shoulders and glanced at the mirror, then away. She’d never thought she could look so stunning.

A scent curled up from the leather. She pulled the collar up to her nose: freesia and peroxide.

“Blythe?” Lexie asked.

Sharmalee nodded. Renee said, “It doesn’t fit any of us. Her shoulders were narrow, like yours. Seems appropriate.”

“Are you sure?”

“None of us are very sentimental,” Renee said. “Take it.”

Lexie stared at the mirror and caught the gazes of Renee and Sharmalee sharing her reflection.

“Are you sure you’re going to need it?” Sharmalee asked. “The moon’s like, right here.”

Lexie shook her head and clipped her knife sheath to her belt, making sure the jacket concealed it. “No. I mean, I feel something, but not the irrepressible beast-something. Just a presence that I’ll attempt to ignore for the next eight hours.”

“Well, if you change your mind,” Renee said, “we’ll be running in the south woods.”

“Archer’s territory,” Lexie said. Renee shrugged part of an apology that didn’t need to happen at all. “Cool,” she said. “See you in the morning.”

 

Lexie could hear the exhaust pipe of Randy’s motorcycle from two miles away. When she pulled up to the drive, the girls all went to the front door to peer out. Lexie wished she had been ready, so she could run through them, avoiding their eyes and questions. But she was lacing up her boots when Randy walked onto the porch and rang the bell.

Hazel answered. “Hi, Randy!”

“Hey, Bijou,” she said with her permanently sly grin.

Hazel beckoned her in. Lexie called from the kitchen table where she was fumbling with her laces. Randy stepped into the kitchen. The Pack drifted in after her to resume their pregame preparations: Jenna making sandwiches and placing them in the fridge, Corwin bringing up fresh towels from the basement, and Mitch in the backyard, heating up the hot tub.

“Big night?” Randy asked.

Lexie offered her an awkward, closed-mouth smile. “Yeah. The girls like to tear it up once a month. Bonding.”

“Did you want to reschedule? Spend time with them?”

“No, no, no.” Lexie waved away the question. “I can’t … handle it. It’s not really my scene anyway.”

“Lexie,” Renee called from the basement, where she was taking fresh changes of clothes out of the dryer.

“I’ll be one second.” Lexie was almost relieved to leave Randy alone in the kitchen.

Downstairs, the laundry room smelled like heaven.

“We’re going to try and catch some scent trails tonight,” Renee said. “See if we can gather any clues.”

“Be careful.”

“We’re going to avoid the Barrens, and the west where Bree was found, at least for now. But hopefully we’ll get something farther to the east. I’ll let you know what we get.”

Lexie bit her lower lip and nodded. So much for last-minute reprieves. She headed back up the stairs to her date.

 

They walked to Randy’s bike. Lexie’s shoulders tightened with each step.

Randy chuckled nervously. “You sure you’re into this?”

Lexie nodded. “I just don’t like leaving my truck behind. I like being—mobile.”

“Do you want to take it instead of my bike?”

“No, I’m cool, I’m just … ” She tried to wiggle it off. “Just a bit nervous, I guess.”

“Well, you look amazing, and you smell delicious. I’m happy we’re doing this.”

“Me too,” Lexie said, determined to mean it. “Is it going to be … ?”

“You’ll be fine, I promise. It’s mostly bark, very little bite.”

Lexie had never ridden on the back of a motorcycle before, and she wasn’t keen on getting her first lesson in front of the Pack. Randy revved and Lexie squeezed the metal bar at her coccyx. The engine’s vibrations rattled through her, and Lexie fought to suppress a squeal.

“Hold on,” Randy said.

“I am,” Lexie replied.

Randy laughed. “You’re such a dude.”

At the first turn, Randy made a sharp left. Lexie yelped and threw her arms around Randy’s waist.

“That’s better,” Lexie heard Randy mutter beneath her helmet.

The Thorny Rose was nearly an hour’s ride north, but the cool, dry night made the ride bearable, and the motorcycle’s thrumming vibrations provided enough of a pleasurable distraction from Lexie’s creeping anxiety.

Along the dark road, Lexie felt as though she were in a submarine, rolling with the curves, only able to see what the lone headlight illuminated. A low, chilly fog slithered through the trees on either side of the road. Above the forest to the east, the full moon rose. Something prickled under Lexie’s skin, like an itch on the inside. She gripped her knife and swallowed hard.

She stared at the bold white disc and felt pulled to it, as though it were a Siren and she a hapless sailor, lonely, desperate, eager to feel the touch of beauty. She squeezed Randy tighter, tying herself to the mast that was this woman. She’d be willing to hold on forever if it would keep her from being rent apart on the rocks.

A few seconds later, Randy took a turn in the road, speeding past the beginnings of an on-ramp. A sign declared it part of Governor Blackwell’s new highway project. For now it was just tamped-down dirt and construction barriers, but soon it would split the north woods in half. Crisscrossed along its path lay the fresh corpses of dozens of trees. Lexie’s heart twitched, and she buried her face back in the leather of Randy’s jacket to stifle her urge to howl their pain to the moon. The motorcycle passed the construction zone and the trees rose up again to cover the moon, freeing Lexie of its pull for the moment. She released her held breath, grateful for the respite.

 

The club was a cement warehouse. There was no sign and only a small, packed dirt parking lot. Lexie’s anxiety welled within her. This didn’t seem like the kind of place where good people would hang out.

Inside the black-painted lobby, a chemical odor punched through Lexie’s sinuses, seized her skull like a vice, and pressed into a headache. She snuffed and sneezed, woozy.

“You all right?”

“Yeah, I’m just … sensitive to odors.” Lexie couldn’t place the smell—it was more toxic than rubber, more synthetic.

“This is a fragrance-free space. No perfumes or lotions. You should be fine.”

PVC, Lexie thought in a flash. She exhaled forcefully through her nose. Fragrance-free. Hah.

The sounds of chains clinking and leather slapping on skin echoed from behind the next door, stealing Lexie’s attention.

The lobby smelled like Freon and sweat, leather, steel, and grease. A chuckle came from the coat room.

“Well look what the cat dragged in.” A spherical woman with a white crew cut and dead tooth emerged from the coat-check booth and pulled Randy into a bear hug. “Nice to see you, sweetheart,” she said in a voice roughened by life and cigarettes.

Randy slapped the woman’s back. “It’s always great to see you. How’s your boy these days?”

The woman grinned. “Blacking in the back if you want a shine.”

Randy nodded. “This is Lexie.”

“Well aren’t you just a downy innocent,” the woman said. “But not for long, eh?” She elbowed Randy in the ribs and laughed.

“You a hugger?” she asked Lexie.

“Uh … sure.”

“I’m Glenda,” she said, pulling Lexie into her plush torso. The smell of her freshly-polished leather vest made Lexie woozy.

“Welcome to the Thorny Rose.” Glenda gestured grandly to the dark lobby. “This here’s coat check. You can change out of your street clothes in the bathroom.” Lexie unzipped her jacket. Glenda eyed the knife on her hip.

“We don’t allow blood play here, sweetheart, but you can use your blade for intimidation and psychological play. Just be aware that a lot of folks run around barefoot, so be extra careful.”

“Oh. No, I. Uh … Okay.” It hadn’t occurred to Lexie that they would take her knife away. She let her fingers glance the hilt for assurance.

Glenda escorted them through yet another set of heavy curtains. “Ready, youngblood?” she teased. She held the curtain back to reveal a room the size of a gymnasium decorated with chains, silver pipes, and leather. The sounds of smacks, cracks, whimpers, and moans filled Lexie’s ears, so densely packed she couldn’t discern one from the next. The scent of sweat assailed her, and she found her mouth pooling with saliva. She swallowed, embarrassed, though neither of the other women noticed.

A young, shorthaired person in a black leather chest harness hurried over to where they stood. “Glen, we’re out of nitrile gloves in the makeout room.”

“Ugh. Savages, all.” Glenda grinned, that brown tooth shadowed in the low light. “Randy, I can trust you to give youngblood here the tour and rules and regs, yeah?”

“Aye aye,” Randy said with a two-finger salute.

Lexie already felt overdressed in her black tank and jeans. The guests all seemed to dress by merely accessorizing their nude bodies with black leather. One severe-looking woman appeared fully dressed in a quasi-formal red latex gown, until she turned around and Lexie saw her complete rear exposed through a hole in the dress.

Randy wore a black dress shirt with a brown suede vest, pinstriped pants, and a fedora. Lexie only half listened to her reiteration of the rules, too captivated by the colorful setting to hear much beyond “Get permission before touching anyone.”

The rules seemed easy enough to follow, especially since she couldn’t imagine herself in the position of any these people.

“So, what are you into?” Randy asked.

Archer.

Lexie shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Nothing?”

“What? I mean, puppies. Ice cream.”

Randy laughed. “I meant more along the lines of—”

“I know,” Lexie interrupted. “Just, I’ve never really put much thought into it. I like things as they come, and I guess I don’t pay much attention until they’re not around anymore.”

The regret tied into that statement made Lexie bite her tongue.

“See anything you like?” Randy asked.

Lexie wiggled her jaw, whether out of discomfort or fear, she couldn’t say.

In the corner of the room, a large cage sat empty. Lexie’s eyes lingered on it until she realized she was staring. She diverted her gaze to a tiny, pale woman bound to a St. Andrew’s Cross. An ample, brown-skinned woman in a black corset and purple latex skirt slapped the woman’s breasts with a riding crop. The restrained woman shrieked and grunted, her skin swelling with purplish-red lines.

“Are those pleasure sounds or pain sounds?” Lexie whispered.

“Yes,” Randy said.

“I don’t know that I see the appeal,” Lexie said.

“Give me your arm,” Randy said. She placed the fingernails of her right hand lightly against Lexie’s skin. “Does that feel good?”

Lexie nodded. Randy increased the pressure, so that her nails barely indented Lexie’s flesh. “Now?”

Lexie nodded again.

Randy’s nails dug further, burying themselves in the flesh of Lexie’s upper arm. “Does it hurt yet?”

“A little bit,” Lexie whispered, not wanting to draw any attention.

“But there’s still pleasure there, too, right?”

Lexie nodded, watching the shadows Randy’s fingers drew on her skin.

“Good,” Randy said. “Feel into it. Where does the pleasure end and the pain begin?”

Lexie closed her eyes and concentrated on Randy’s grip. She found the estuary in a cloudy and clear space: the pleasure a warm throbbing with a gentle tingle, the pain hard and sharp, the tingles becoming prickly shocks.

Lexie breathed into that space and savored the intermingling of those feelings. Randy dug harder, and Lexie was surprised to find not only the pain increase, but the pleasure too. It lurked just below the superficial sensation of pain. Her neck prickled as adrenaline trickled into her system. It ran through her veins, chasing the sensation, running it down and circling it. She drew air into her lungs, hard, fast. Her wolf stirred, rippling beneath the layers of pleasure and the tumult of pain.

“A little more,” Randy whispered, her breath puffing at Lexie’s ear, sending sizzles of pleasure down her arm to clash against the sharp cut of Randy’s nails.

Lexie breathed deep through her nose, not wanting to cry out. She exhaled through o-shaped lips and felt her wolf begin the slow rumble of a growl.

But the pleasurable pain Randy inflicted confused Lexie, and in the space between the layers of pleasure and pain emerged doubt. She wasn’t sure why she was here, what she was expecting to feel. She told herself she was fooling herself with this distraction. Randy wouldn’t solve anything, this pain wouldn’t heal her. She needed something else, more elusive, more personal, less carnal.

The prickly pleasure swelled again, and Lexie spoke. “Stop.”

Randy’s grip eased; Lexie’s muscles relaxed. Her blood pumped hot where Randy had gripped her. Lexie looked at her arm and saw four crescent indentations. The white of her skin gave way to pink, then purple as her blood swelled to the damaged area.

She savored the adrenaline high that came with it—a mix of relief and high-alert. She rubbed her wound.

“All right?” Randy asked.

Lexie nodded, intrigued by this sensation, though she was not sure she was grateful for it.

“Cool. I’m gonna go grab a quick smoke,” Randy said. “You okay alone?” Lexie smiled. “Take a look around. See if you find anything you like. Nobody bites. Unless you ask them to.” Randy winked and headed for the front.

Below Lexie’s feet were rubber mats that made each step spring. She had a flash of running through the woods with Archer, pine needles springing beneath each paw step.

She inhaled; her high dissipated into alertness. She wandered to the corner with the empty cage and stepped inside. She grabbed the bars over head and shook her weight. The steel didn’t budge. This was no mere party favor. From behind her, Lexie heard a metal clang. She whipped her head around to see a woman in a sling struggling until her chains rattled. Her hands were bound behind her back, and her black hair matted to her sweat-streaked olive skin. What had once likely been beautiful makeup now streamed down her face in rivers of black mascara and a smear of red lipstick. A blonde-goateed person stood in front of the woman in jeans, a leather vest, and a leather motorcycle cap. Lexie was unable to discern the person’s gender, even further confounded by the huge dildo that rose from their open fly. The person held the woman’s hair in a tight fist and forced her mouth onto the dildo. Behind the dangling woman, a large, bald, bare-breasted woman slipped a purple latex hand between her legs.

The scene troubled Lexie, but the woman looked euphoric, even as she gagged and coughed.

“Tonic?” Randy said, making Lexie jump. She glanced back and forth between Randy and the strung-up woman and fumbled for a word.

“Thanks,” she finally managed.

“You like this cage?” Randy asked. “I know the guy who makes them down in Cali. Kinky motherfucker. Does great work, yeah?”

“It’s the real deal,” Lexie said. “I don’t think I could break this apart with a chainsaw.”

“I suppose that’s kind of the point.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, all this play is psychological, though some of it comes with physical sensation. If I locked you in a chintzy dog crate, you’d probably be more rapt with figuring out how to break it rather than surrendering to the experience. Most of this whole thing,” Randy said, gesturing to the room, “is upholding the illusion so you can give yourself over to the experience.”

“What illusion?”

“That you’re powerless,” Randy said, nodding to the black-haired girl in the sling. “Or, that you’re all-powerful.” Her gaze shifted to the person with the goatee. “Both are lies, but here, you can let yourself believe they’re true. And that’s where the magic happens.”

Lexie watched the bound girl gag and fight against her restraints. Both her frustration and her joy seemed real, their synergy driving her to ecstasy.

Randy pulled Lexie into a kiss. Her practiced lips artfully tugged on Lexie’s. Lexie opened her mouth wide and let Randy’s tongue tumble onto hers. They kissed with the insides of their mouths, locked and playing with pressure, their tongues doing all the work. The sharp cracks of leather against flesh filled Lexie’s ears, and she willed herself to relax into Randy’s strength.

“C’mere,” Randy winked. She dragged her fingernails down the tender flesh of Lexie’s forearms to grasp her hands. She lifted Lexie’s arms aloft and placed her hands on the top bars of the cage.

“Hold the bars,” Randy growled. “If you let go, I’ll stop.”

Lexie’s heartbeat quickened. The wolf paced, eager to confront the threat.

Randy pressed her mouth against Lexie’s, hard. Her lips were cool and firm. Her kiss was like a sharp intake of breath: a dart and a dodge.

Lexie felt the heat of her dampening groin and the steel bars against her palms. The collection of screams, grunts, and moans in the room drowned her brain in the delighted anguish of strangers, allowing her to slip outside her own mind and hide in the cacophony.

Randy grabbed Lexie’s hair in her fist and pulled, taking her exposed throat in her jaws. Not like Archer, Lexie thought. Not at all. She was rough where Archer was gentle, aggressive where Archer relented.

Randy was hitting all the right notes, but she wasn’t listening to Lexie, else she would have noticed her hesitation, the passive resistance that kept her from giving in. Lexie tried to release Archer’s tawny image from her mind, to replace it with the cool black and white of her new, leather-clad seducer. Randy’s teeth bit into her neck: hard against soft skin, grinding muscles and tendons. They clenched in response. Inside Randy’s jaws, she recognized the same power that teased her that night in the forest, the allure of strength that could overpower her. She felt the beginnings of panic, but Lexie told it to quiet and it did.

Lexie’s breathing quickened. Randy’s hand found the crotch of Lexie’s jeans and pressed against the moisture there.

“Naughty girl,” she purred.

Lexie rubbed her cheek against Randy’s ear, wanting to speak the word “Yes,” but failing. She removed her hands from the bars, and Randy flinched.

“Y’alright?”

Lexie scanned the room for curious eyes and found none; everyone was enraptured with their own scenes. She grabbed Randy’s wrist and forced her hand down her jeans. Randy searched Lexie’s face. Lexie met her gaze, returning her grip to the bar above her head. She closed her eyes and willed her mind to go blank—without allowing her wolf to take hold.

Randy made a sound that wasn’t quite a chuckle. Her fingers slid against Lexie’s flesh. The clinks of chains and slapping skin dissolved into the rhythm of Randy’s breath in her ear. Lexie let herself fall into the sensation, releasing her memories and fears into precious white noise.

Lexie followed the trail Randy led her down, using her hips and her moans to push her ahead, and then running to catch up. She could run all night like this, mouth open wide and grinning, Randy’s fingers coaxing her along. But something was catching up with her. It matched her steps, gaining ground with each pace. It was closing in. Lexie squeezed her eyes shut, willing it away as she had before. It didn’t listen. She heard its paws breaking branches beneath its steps, its hoarse breath hot on her neck. Its teeth were just close enough to … 

“Stop.” Lexie released the bar and grabbed Randy’s wrist.

Randy stopped but didn’t remove her hand.

“You all right?” Randy asked, voice clipped.

“I just … feel a little out of control,” Lexie said.

“That’s kind of the point, sweetheart.”

Lexie shook her head, and Randy eased her hand out of her jeans.

“I already feel out of control all the time,” Lexie whispered. “I don’t think I need your help making it worse.”

Randy sighed and wiped her palms on her pants. “I’m gonna go smoke.” She didn’t wait for Lexie to offer to join her.

Lexie wandered to the front and poked her hand through the condom jar while the coat girl fetched her jacket. For a fleeting moment, Lexie wished she was in the woods with her sisters, running open-mouthed through scattered moonbeams, pleasures chaste but meaty.

“How you gettin’ on?” Glenda slapped a heavy hand on Lexie’s shoulder. It released a little of the tension knotting there.

Lexie growled a bit under her breath.

“Randy not treating you right? Seemed like you were having a good time.” Glenda set her fists on her stone-washed denim hips and gave Lexie a hard look under a concerned brow.

“She’s fine,” Lexie said. “It’s me.”

Glenda pulled a candy from her pocket and popped it in her mouth, listening.

“I feel a little out of control.”

“Alcohol? Drugs?” Glenda asked with a no-nonsense, non-judgmental tone.

Lexie grimaced. “No. Just me. My body. My mind. Stuff.” She laughed again, embarrassed at airing such ‘stuff’ to a stranger.

“Well, you look pretty in control to me. Maybe a bit too much for your own good.”

“How can you tell?”

“That’s usually what brings people here. Well, it’s number three on the list, after curiosity and a fierce need to get laid.”

Lexie laughed. “Number two might be more like it. And number one too, I guess.”

“Well, hate to say it, youngblood, but all three tend to go pretty well together. Randy’s a good egg. I’ve seen her beat on ladies, and she’s pretty dern excellent at it. She’d be a good one.”

Lexie lowered her voice. “I don’t know what I need, but I don’t think it’s that.”

“Well then,” Glenda said with another friendly shoulder slap. “I think when people get into a situation like yours, they know exactly what they need, they just aren’t admitting it to themselves. You just gotta tell your brain to shut the fuck up and follow your gut.”

“That seems dangerous.”

“Usually is,” Glenda said with a sure nod. “But that’s the fucking point isn’t it?”

“Of BDSM?” Lexie asked.

“Of life!” Glenda said with a hearty laugh. “Everything worth doing is a little dangerous. You’ll see.”

 

On the ride home, Lexie wrapped her arms tightly around Randy’s torso and leaned into the curves. She didn’t fight or shift her weight. She followed like a dancer guided across the floor by a skilled lead. She found the ride far more pleasant for it. The motor vibrated between her legs, and she sank her haunches around the seat, losing herself in the hearty thrum of the engine.

Randy hadn’t said much between the cigarette and their departure. Lexie knew she’d hurt Randy’s feelings by ending their scene so quickly, but she didn’t particularly care. She’d felt out of control with Archer, but she had also felt safer. She knew she’d give herself over to Archer any time. Randy, not so much.

Lexie looked to the apogee of the sky, finding the white pearl of the moon. It found her back. The white light bathed them, its reflection adding a sheen to everything: chrome, leather, exposed skin, and the moonstone in her knife. The gem shone as though it were sentient, magical, somehow more than it appeared. A well of nausea crept up her throat. She buried her face into Randy’s shoulder blade, hiding from the moon and what it begged her to become.

At a lonely stop sign five miles outside of Milton, Lexie raised her head. A metallic tang drifted through the cold, fresh air. Randy lifted her visor and said, “What’s wrong?”

Before she knew why, Lexie said, “I need to get off.”

“We’re five minutes away from your place. Can’t you hold it?”

Lexie removed her helmet and leapt off the motorcycle, running to the edge of the road. A deep ditch separated the pavement from an incline down to a large marsh dotted with young pines. She sniffed the air.

It smelled of wet rot, and running through it was a blazing throb of metal and salt. Blood.

She leapt over the ditch and into the mud. Randy shouted after her.

She ran, marking her pace with the trees, and stopped where the ground sloped down to a pond. A maggot-pale shape lay amidst the tall grasses: a dead man, his guts shining in the moonlight, a gash from a claw widened by feeding. The blood pooling in the chasm of his torso mirrored the pond just beyond, black and glimmering.

Randy shouted from the road. “Lexie what the hell—?”

Something rustled in the shadows at the curve of the pond. Lexie crouched, training her eyes on the shadow, struggling to find its scent.

A shaky growl burbled in the cold, dry air.

“Lexie?” Randy’s shout echoed from the road.

Lexie drew her knife from its sheath, hopeful it would work on another wolf as well as it worked on her own.

“Lexie!” Randy shouted again. Lexie snarled and silently pleaded for Randy to stay where she was. I got this, she thought, willing it to be true. She didn’t know where this bravery was coming from. Just months ago, her instincts would have told her to flee, but now a different, wordless voice goaded her to move toward the shadow with the will to fight.

She stepped forward and caught a whiff of the wolf’s scent. He was restless, unsure whether to fight or flee. Lexie would decide for them both.

She faked; he braced. He growled a warning, but Lexie didn’t flinch.

Her mind flashed to the dungeon, to the woman in the sling. Dominate, her mind roared, as if it were a simple concept. Dominate, because that is what you’re meant to do right now. Simple as that. Lexie stood. The wolf flinched. He wasn’t so big, Lexie thought. Only two-thirds the size of the one she fought before: four feet tall and maybe four-hundred pounds. The size she was when she changed.

Her grip tightened on the hilt of her knife. Piece of cake.

She leapt into the shadows. The wolf dodged and ran. The marshy ground made them both clumsy. She tried to track him with her nose, but the breeze kept slithering in odd directions. He hid behind tree trunks as Lexie stalked sideways. She heard her breath, and his, and Randy’s nervous key-jingling back on the road.

The wolf lunged at Lexie from his hiding place, but he fell short. With a rabid cry, Lexie pounced, aiming her knife for his spine, but catching a bony shoulder blade. The knife glanced off the bone, slicing a gash through fur and skin. He squealed. Lexie slipped in the mud and fell. The wolf swung his heavy head at Lexie’s prone body, sneering and snapping. Lexie raised her arms in defense just as he dropped to the ground in convulsions. His wolf form slipped and flickered, giving way to a human body.

In a moment everything silenced except for Lexie’s heavy breaths.

The boy lay naked on his side, shivering, then crying.

Lexie turned to face him. His head rested on the marshy ground. The moonlight glanced off his corn-silk hair. Blood and mud caked the pale skin of his torso. She recognized the cluster of freckles at his temple and the smooth upward curve of his nose.

“Stefan?” Lexie whispered.

Stefan, the boy she let live when her Pack commanded his murder. Guilt stabbed her gut.

He raised his head, his tears falling freely.

“Oh, oh, Stefan.” She crawled to him and took him in her arms, the knife still clenched in her left hand and the blade flat against his bare back.

Lexie groaned. “What did you do, Stefan?” she whispered. Had she made the wrong choice when she let him live? Should she have done what the Pack commanded and offed him before he hurt anyone else?

His sobs came freely. “If I told you he deserved it … ”

Lexie sighed and stroked Stefan’s naked back. He felt as fragile as an infant and as sinewy as a street cat. “Did he?” Lexie whispered.

Stefan nodded vigorously through his heaving sobs and pressed his cheek to Lexie’s chest.

Lexie glanced over at the man’s glistening viscera. “Okay,” she said, wiping tears from Stefan’s cheek. “For now.”

Randy called out from beyond the trees, “Lexie? Are you okay?”

“We’re okay,” Lexie called. “Where are your clothes?” she asked Stefan.

Stefan gestured to a turnoff from the road hidden by trees. A silver Jaguar sat cold and still.

“Were you in it?” she asked. Stefan nodded, his face streaked with tears.

“He picked me up. And things got … wrong.”

Lexie sighed hard. “Okay, Stefan, listen. If the cops find you, you say you met him online and had a date tonight, and that he dropped you off at eleven. Okay?” Lexie gripped his chin and stared into his eyes. “You got that?”

Stefan shook his head. “They’ll find out.”

“They won’t,” Lexie said, stroking his cheek. “No one knows about us. What we are. Okay? You’ll be okay. The cops will come and they’ll ask you questions but they’ll know that a Rare wolf did it and not you, okay?”

Stefan whimpered and nodded.

Randy tromped through the marsh to where Lexie and Stefan lay together on the ground. She saw the corpse and stifled a shout.

“I’ll explain later. Can we get him home?” Lexie said.

Randy stared aghast at Lexie clutching Stefan. “Not with that!” Randy said, gesturing to the corpse laying exposed in the moonlight.

Lexie shot Randy a cold look. “They were attacked by a Rare. We need to get Stefan home. Can you carry both of us on your bike?”

Randy seemed to have no choice but to nod, stunned and silent. She dropped Stefan at the back door to his house and took Lexie back to the Den. They stood on the creaky porch, the fog descending, a slow erasure of the sky and scenery.

“What was that?” Randy asked, finally.

“Bad luck. Bad timing. Bad wolf,” Lexie said.

“Did that kid kill the man?”

Lexie chewed her lips. In a manner of speaking. “No. A Rare did.”

Lexie zipped up her jacket as far as it would go and shoved her hands in the pockets. She didn’t have any more words to address any of it. She was learning to just trust word and instinct. Integrity had a certain scent that Lexie couldn’t parse, but she understood nonetheless. She’d smelled it on Stefan.

“Some night,” Randy said, dropping her eyes to the porch and digging her hands in her pockets. She turned and wandered back to her bike, muttering something about needing a drink. Randy sped off into the night. Lexie watched from the porch, her breath fogging in the street-lamp glare.

 

Lexie was dreaming of drowning when a clatter shook her from her sleep, like hailstones hitting her window.

“Lexie,” a muffled slur came from the backyard. Delirious, Lexie scanned the voices of the Pack, wondering who would be disturbing her so late. No one would even be home yet. There was still night and moonlight left. Another clatter hit her window. Not hail. Pebbles. A plea followed, and Lexie realized it was Randy.

Lexie stumbled to her window and looked out. Randy stood in the yard. As Lexie watched, she threw a fistful of gravel at Corwin and Sharmalee’s darkened window.

“Randy?” Lexie called.

Randy started and swept her glance past all the windows before seeing Lexie eight yards to the right of her target. “Can you let me in?” Randy asked.

“Why?” Lexie asked.

“I just…. What was … ? Can we talk?”

“We can talk,” Lexie said warily, pushing open the window. She pulled her blanket tighter around her and leaned on the sill.

“Let me in.”

Lexie knew it was a simple request, but it was too odd to be wrenched from her dreams like this, by a new, strange person, at her house, before the morning’s frail hours.

“What do you want, Randy?”

Randy stumbled and whined. “What’s up with you, Lex? What was that all about?” Her language was halting and clumsy. From the grass below, Lexie could smell a queasy mixture of whiskey and bile.

“It was … just a thing. Just part of who I am.”

“Part of you,” Randy repeated. “Please let me in. I’m scared.”

Lexie hesitated and scanned her bedroom floor for a t-shirt. “I’ll come out.”

She crept down the stairs in a t-shirt and pajama pants, sliding open the back door and meeting Randy on the deck.

“Randy?” Lexie asked with more than a hint of concern.

“You scared me tonight, Lex,” Randy said, her brow furrowed. “You were acting so weird. And so mean.”

“Yeah, I’m—” Lexie wanted to come clean, but Randy was still too new in her life; she didn’t know if she could trust her, though she wanted to. “I have things I should tell you.”

Randy fell to her knees and wept. “I’m so confused.”

“Randy, it’s okay.” Lexie patted Randy’s head.

“No it’s not. There was a dead guy … .”

Randy clung to Lexie’s legs like a koala. Lexie grew impatient. She wasn’t sure if it was trauma or booze that was making Randy so maudlin.

“Come on. Stand up, Randy.” She pulled her to standing and Randy shoved her mouth against Lexie’s.

Lexie pushed her away. “Randy, quit it.”

“Can I stay here tonight?” she begged.

Lexie pushed. Not hard, but enough to break the contact with Randy. “No. You need to go home.”

“I’m scared,” Randy said, reaching for her.

“You’ll be fine. Come on, let’s go.” Lexie extricated herself from both Randy’s grip and her sleepy misapprehensions. She pressed her palm into Randy’s sternum and forced her to her feet. With another gentle push, Lexie forced Randy backwards down the steps to the grass. “Good night, Randy.” Lexie stepped back into the house, closing and locking the sliding door.

Randy had no time to react before she was in the dark backyard, alone. She laughed once and then ran to the deck. “Lex, come on. I was just playing.”

“Go play somewhere else,” Lexie said through the glass.

“Come on. Lex, this isn’t like you. Be nice.”

“You don’t know anything about me. Nothing real.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Obviously,” Lexie sighed.

“Please open the door.”

“No.”

“God! Why do you have be such a bitch!” Randy kicked the door with her heavy boot twice. The glass shuddered.

“If you’re trying to get me to open the door, you’re doing it wrong,” Lexie said.

Randy sighed hard. “I’m sorry, Lex.” She let her head rest on the door. Lexie felt the glass vibrate with Randy’s breath. “Can’t you just tell me what happened?”

Lexie shook her head. “No. I really can’t.” The truth of the admission twinged like a toothache.

“I’m a fuck-up,” Randy said at last, her voice gravelly and shame-filled. “I’m a fuck-up. But with you—you make me feel like less of that. I felt cool tonight. I felt like you liked me. I like you.”

Lexie sighed and squeezed her eyes shut. “We just met, Randy. I’m not the me you saw tonight. Not really. You like the lie of me.”

“It’s not a lie. You’re wonderful. You’re so much better than me.” Randy placed her open palm on the glass, begging for Lexie to touch it.

“That’s not true, Randy. And it’s why this isn’t going to work. Go home.” She turned and ran up the stairs, back to bed.

The glass door rattled when Randy leaned against it and slid to the ground, where her sighs turned into silent sobs. Lexie curled up and pulled her pillow over her head.