2

"Why did you take me?"My heart pounded, watching the guy in the back with laser focus as his body continued to change. The van was still flying down the road, but a car crash was the least of my worries considering I'd been taken by werewolves.

I'd have loved to deny it, but I heard the animal-growl in Veggie Guy's voice when he grabbed me. And now, I was watching him turn slowly and painfully from animal to human.

"You're his mate. When a wolf finds his mate, he goes wolf and hunts until she's his," Seatbelt Guy explained quickly. "Staying with him will buy you more time."

That second part was kidnapper bullshit, for sure.

"Why would staying with a 'hunting' werewolf ever buy me more time?"

"Because he's going to be stuck in his wolf form until he's either changed you into one of us, or killed you. You're the she-wolf he wants, and he won't back down until you're his. He'll try to get you to offer yourself first, to ask him to change you—but there's no telling how long he'll wait, and then he's going to bite you. Werewolf venom changes the strong and kills the weak."

Well, if it killed the weak, I was in trouble. I hadn't exercised in months.

Wait, no.

It had been an entire year.

The last time I'd attempted to visit the gym was the day before classes started my freshman year, and I was currently a few weeks into my sophomore year.

"Staying with him will prolong his hunting, giving me more time before he starts biting?" I checked, still 100% planning on running as soon as I had the chance.

"Yes. It will make him feel like he's winning," Seatbelt Guy confirmed.

The van took another turn, harder and faster. My head smashed into the window, and a savage snarl broke out from Veggie Guy, who now looked almost entirely like Veggie Wolf.

"Shit! Sorry." Seatbelt Guy held a hand out toward the wolf in the back of the van. "Trying to keep her safe and get her away from the humans isn't easy, Jesse."

Veggie Wolf twisted his already-freaky face and made a menacing sound.

"We'll be back soon," another guy in the back with Jesse (AKA Mate-Guy-slash-Veggie-Wolf) snapped at him.

But being back soon was good.

It was good for me at least, because it meant that their place wasn't insanely far from mine. Which gave me at least a tiny sliver of a chance at escape.

The van turned sharply, and I slammed against the seatbelt hard enough to bruise my chest. The sudden pain made me scream. My honey-colored ponytail smacked me and Seatbelt Guy in the face as the van's tires squealed, and the floor started to sort of vibrate beneath us.

Crap. We were on a dirt road.

That was not a good thing as far as my chance of escape went. Dirt roads and I were not well acquainted.

Hell, nature and I weren't well acquainted.

"Faster!" someone behind me yelled.

Faster? Were they completely out of their minds?

"She's got to stop screaming or he's going to kill one of us," another guy snarled from somewhere in the van.

I screamed again, this time in hopes that he really would kill someone to give me a chance to get the hell away from them.

"Brakes, now," another guy barked.

The driver slammed on the brakes, no question asked. The van squealed and swerved as it skidded to a stop. There were five other guys in there with me—six if you counted Jesse's newly-furry ass—so half the group must’ve stayed at the sandwich shop.

All five of the non-furries bailed the second the van stopped. The doors opened and closed in record time, leaving me trapped with a wolf.

I shoved on the seatbelt, pressing and pulling and tugging, but the damn thing was stuck.

A hairy monster jumped over the seat, landing beside me on the bench. I opened my mouth to scream again.

Before I got the sound out, the monster—okay, maybe it was a wolf—shoved his head toward mine and legitimately climbed on my lap.

"You're not a dog," I yelled at it.

It licked my face.

"Not a dog," I repeated, my voice faltering a little.

It barked.

"Not a... What am I doing? I'm losing my damn mind. Get off me!" I shoved his furry body. I'd expected a werewolf to be gigantic, but he wasn't. He was only a little bigger than my mom's German Shephard, Gallifrey.

I wiggled and jiggled the seatbelt while the wolf watched me.

When I decided that wasn't going to work, I huffed and leaned back against the seat I'd been trapped in.

The wolf gave me a look, almost like it was asking, "are you done?"

I gestured toward the seatbelt, still scared out of my mind but growing angrier by the minute. "Don't just sit there, dammit. Help me!"

The wolf slashed his claws at the seatbelt. They sliced right through, and the seatbelt flew up toward the spinning mechanism.

The claw-slash reminded me what the guy had said about the wolf.

He was hunting me, and wouldn't stop until he'd bitten me.

And changed me into one of them.

"Stay back," I warned, scooting out of the seat and toward the door.

The wolf surprised me by listening.

Moving at snail speed, I slowly lifted my hand behind me, to the door's handle. When he made no move to attack, I pulled. The door clicked as it opened, and my body tensed, waiting for him to make a move.

He didn't.

The wolf just sat there, watching.

"I am so confused," I mumbled.

But when he still didn't attack me, I slowly opened the door up.

"No sudden movements," I said softly, partly to myself and partly to the wolf, because it seemed like he was listening to me. If he was, I would definitely take advantage of it.

I lowered one foot out of the door, poking around with the toe of my old red Converse until my foot met the dirt.

The wolf stayed where he was, watching me silently.

I slowly straightened, my hands landing on the faded fabric of the seat as I carefully lowered my second foot to the dirt.

"What's she doing?" someone whispered. One of the non-furry guys from the van, I assumed.

"I think she's trying to escape," another said, with some amusement.

"He hasn't tried to stop her yet," a third pointed out.