"Never," she muttered.
"Molly," I smiled at my oldest friend, "you need to, we have been friends forever, and I know for a fact that he feels the same way about you."
"Ellie," she shook her head, blonde hair falling around her face, "you know I can't do that."
"Sure you can; nothing is stopping you."
"Hierarchy is stopping me."
"Psssh, whatever," I shrugged, "no one cares about that anymore."
"Well," she frowns, still watching the door of the store, "your dad cares, his dad cares."
"I'm pretty sure your dad would ecstatic if you two got together."
"You two are meant to be," she sighs.
My heart drops to my stomach, and it breaks for her, "I don't think so."
Her eyes glisten, "that's what you say, but your dad is the alpha, and he is the beta," she swallows, "and they've been planning you two being together since you were both born."
I sigh.
"It doesn't matter what the three of us want."
"Yes, it does," I told her, "it matters."
But we both grow silent as Ryan comes out of the store.
"You guys ready for pizza?" he asks as he starts his car.
"Sure," we both said in unison.
With short giggles, our heavy conversation from moments before was forgotten.
Our Friday night tradition was to go eat pizza at the local pizza joint. We would stuff our faces and unwind from the busy school week and our home lives.
"Did you guys see Carmen and Luca at lunch today?" Molly asked.
I frowned my nose at her because Luca was always doing the most douchy thing that you could imagine.
Ryan just shrugged from his seat next to Molly.
"They were arguing in the hallway," she said.
"What else is new?" I asked.
"Nothing," she laughed.
I shook my head as the door to the restaurant door opened; in walked Luca and a couple of the other guys in our class, "speak his name, and he shall show up," I tell the other two.
Ryan snickers, his sandy blonde hair falling nearly to his shoulders, and he turns to look at the newcomers.
"What's up, guys?" Ryan greets the newcomers as they get in the booth next to us.
"You guys going out to Mac's field tonight?" Luca asked, making eye contact with me, his blue eyes probing mine.
"Probably," Ryan said.
"I'm in," Molly agreed because she would do anything that Ryan wanted to do.
"What about you, Ellis?" Luca questioned me.
"I don't know," I told them.
Molly kicked me under the table.
"I might," I finally tell them with a wince.
It was the same thing every weekend. Friday nights, nearly every team in town would gather in Old Man Mac's backfield and light a fire and drink beer that they had conned one of the town burnouts into buying for them.
The only time we didn't gather in the field as if there was a full moon, and on those nights, the whole town would converge in the national forest.
Those days were also the only times that I would see my mother since she had left town to be with a human she met in the city.
I was really not in the mood for going to the field; as soon as I could, I was going to walk home and go to bed.
The other three boys turned to a waitress and ordered their pizza and drinks. I was definitely wondering why Luca had wanted to know if I was going. He should be more worried about his social-climbing girlfriend.
Carmen's family had always been on the lower end of the pack's hierarchy, kind of where Molly's was, while Luca's father was on the council with Ryan's father and my own father.
Carmen was perfectly lovely, but it was common knowledge that she was only dating Luca for status. I guess it was a case of a girl's gotta do what a girls gotta do for her future. I just try to avoid all mentions of the future and what I have to do for the pack after I become an adult.
Pack affairs were so messy, and being the daughter of the Alpha just put me in the middle of all of it.
When we finished eating, when we got out front, I turned to the other two.
"Guys," I started with my hands in the pockets of my jeans, "I think I'm just going to walk home."
"Ellie," Molly started, "come on," she pleaded.
"I'm beat," I told them, "I will go with you guys next weekend."
"Okay," she finally conceded, "I'm holding you to that."
I follow them over to the car and grab my backpack. They offered me a ride home, but I insisted that it wasn't far away.
"Call me tomorrow," Molly called after me as I walked off.
"Will do," I told her as I took off down the street in the opposite direction.
The sun was barely peeking over the horizon still, and cool Spring evening temperatures were setting in. It was quiet in town, most stores were closing, and families were home having dinner, and the teens were either at the small two-screen theater or gathering out at the field.
It was nice.
I turned off of the main drag and had a few blocks before I would get to my own street.
Pausing to adjust my backpack, and suddenly the hairs begin standing up on the back of my neck. I rubbed my arms as the goosebumps formed.
Everything on the street looked like it always did. The houses were all lined up off of the main drag with manicured lawns.
I kept walking and froze in place.
It was the van from earlier, it was just sitting there. I glanced around but didn't see anyone.
With an inhale, I sniff the air.
The scent from earlier was lightly in the air.
The sound of crackling leaves hit my ears, and I begin to pick up my pace.
A popping sound sounds out, and I feel a stinging in my butt.
I tried to move faster, but it felt like I was running in quicksand, and my legs began to grow heavy.
"Help! Help!" I called out, but no one was coming.
My legs would no longer move, and my heartfelt like it would beat out of my chest.
Suddenly I was grabbed from behind, and there was nothing I could do to fight back.
The world went black.
Chapter Two
I blinked my eyes open and blinked again and set myself up. I glance around, and it appeared that I was in a cage in the center of a large room.
It looked like I was in some sort of warehouse. It was dirty, and there were red stains on the floor of the cage.
I sniffed the air.
It was blood.
"Oh, wow," I swallowed, and I hurriedly got to my feet.
Looking around the warehouse, I walk over to the entrance of the cage.
"Hello!" I yelled and begin trying to open the gate to the cage.
The metal just clanked together, and the gate wouldn't open.
My heart was beating fast, and there were no windows that I could see around me; only the lights directly above the cage were on.
I swallowed and closed my eyes. No one was around, and there was only one way out.
I had to change.
With one last look around, I let out a low grumble in my throat.
My body began to tingle like it always did before the change, and I began to change.
"Arghhh," I screamed, and the world went dark again.
"Uhhh," was the only sound that would come out of my mouth, "mmmm," I groaned.
I slowly opened my eyes again and rubbed the back of my neck, and felt something metallic around my neck.
"What the hell?" I muttered, feeling the surface of the collar.
Rubbing the surface, I find where it clasps, but it had a sort of a lock. It wouldn't come undone, no matter how hard I pulled on it.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," a voice came out of the dark.
"Who is there?" I called out, "let me go."
"We've got plans for you," and out walked the red-haired guy who had been pumping gas into the old white van.
"Wh
at the hell," I rolled my eyes; I knew something hadn't been right about this guy, "damn humans," was the only thing that I could mutter.
"First, we want to see what you can do," he laughed.
"What do you mean what I can do?"
"Hahaha, bring it in."
Bring it in?
The other two from the van came out of the dark and was dragging a body behind them. It was a guy near my age, with sloppy brown hair and bruises over most of his skin. The faint smell of wolf was in the air.
As the gate begins to open, I start to make a run for it.
"Bzzzz!"
"Ahhhh," as blinding light consumes me, and I fall down to my knees.
"I wouldn't try that if I were you," the red-haired guy informs me.
I begin to claw at the collar, "let me go," I growled.
"We can't do that," he crouched down in front of me and looked at me from between the bars.
I sat up onto my bottom.
I heard the clicking of metal and look to see the gate was now shut.
"You are going to want to stop him," the guy laughs.
"Huh," and I turn back to the unconscious guy rising to his feet, "are you okay?" I ask him.
"Sorry," the guy shrugs, and his eyes begin to glow red.
Oh no. He was changing.
"It's nothing personal," his voice was deepening, "it's just you or me."
I watched in shock as he went to all fours, and his nose began to elongate, and hair started growing all over his body.
"Great."
I closed my eyes and tried to see if I could change. Suddenly my instincts kicked in, and I dropped to the ground. My body shifted, and my face changed shape, and I could see my arms changing, and my hands being replaced by paws.
Most thought the change was painful.
To me, it was always rebirth, and it was exhilarating.
I didn't know what pack this kid was from, but like he said. It was him or me, and I was going to be walking out of here.
Entirely changed, we both began to circle around the cage.
Suddenly the now completely brown wolf lunged at me. With instinct taking over, I met him in mid-air with teeth bared.
He was able to dodge my attack and managed to graze my side with his claws. My wolf form rounded quickly and was ready to strike him, and I pounced on his back.
And with fury, there was fur flying, and the wolf completely took over.
Chapter Three
Slowly I opened my eyes; I rubbed my face, "what the hell?"
"Morning, sunshine," a quiet voice got my attention.
"Where am I?" I questioned. The room or should I say cell I was in, and the room was putting it nicely, had one solid wall, and three walls of bars.
"Well, you are here," the voice said.
"Where is here?" I looked over and found the source of the voice on the other side of the wall.
It was a guy in the next cell that was handsome with dark hair seated with his back against the solid wall. He was watching me curiously.
He shrugged, "I'm not sure where here is."
"Well, why?" I wasn't exactly sure what to ask. My head hurt from being knocked unconscious and from fighting the other wolf. My body hurt, but I mostly had superficial scratches and bruises on the exposed skin of my arms.
"We were brought here to fight each other," he said plainly, "I guess those humans have to get their kicks somehow," he said dryly.
"Oh crap," my eyes widened, "wha, what about that guy last night?"
"He's alive. They drug him down the hall after they brought you in here."
I sniffed the air; he was a vampire.
"Yeah," he said, knowing what I was doing, "and you're a wolf-girl."
I shot him a dirty look, I hadn't dealt with vampires many times, and usually, those encounters often involved a fight, and they either ran or I killed them.
"I'm Sebastian," he told me, "and it looks like that we should work together if we expect to get out of here."
With my eyebrows scrunched, "Ellis," I supplied, "and what is exactly going on?"
"Well, apparently," he stated, "these people drug people like us and bring us here and make us fight each other to the death."
"I'm going to kill them," I muttered.
"Good luck with that," he said sarcastically, "I've not been here long, but I've seen what happens when people like you try that."
"People like me? I questioned, disgusted with the way he said it.
"Hot-tempered wolves," he said matter of factly.
I rolled my eyes, damn stereotypes, "so what do you suppose we do?"
He glanced around, his grey eyes darting around, "I don't know yet."
I settled down against the wall and sighed.
"From what I know, they drag people like us in here," he told me, "and keep us in these cells and then drag us out to fight each other."
"First of all, we aren't the same," I was disgusted that he would even suggest we were.
"No, we aren't," he said dryly with a slight air of superiority, "I just meant people who were more than human."
I shot him a dirty look and turned to look down the hallway in front of the gate.
We were surrounded by other cells, but I was unable to see anyone else.
"The others are further down or in different rooms," he told me, "I'll see them bring them out two at a time, and then only one comes back."
Staring at the floor, "so they are making us fight to the death for their amusement?"
"I've overheard them; basically, it is a money-making scheme."
"How many have you killed?" I asked him thinking of the boy that I had just encountered in their ring.
"A few," I look at him, and he frowns, "it was either them or me."
I nod, "have you tried to escape?"
"No, I've had a front-row seat to what happens when you try."
"What does?"
"That collar around your neck," he touches the one around his neck, "goes boom, and your head is no longer attached to your body."
I shook my head in shock.
"But, I'm sure they wouldn't want to kill a beautiful wolf, such as yourself."
My face crinkled in disgust; how could he be saying such things right now.
Chapter Four
Over the next few days, Sebastian and I would talk about our lives and just made casual conversation. He had told me that he had come to the city to meet his cousin to get to know her. And that he had been taken one night while leaving a club.
He wasn't as bad as my first impression, but he was most definitely a cliché. He was rich, spoiled, and came from a powerful family. I was pretty sure that he came out of the womb with the silver spoon already connected to his mouth.
Despite those things, he was easy to talk to, and we were both glad to have each other while we were here.
"I miss school," I told him after we had sat a few days with only each other to talk to, "and I hate to say that."
He laughed, "I can't say that I've ever missed school."
"Don't laugh at me," I sighed, "I'm being serious."
"Fine," he said, putting his hands up in defeat, "I won't laugh at you."
"I miss my school too," piped up the quiet voice of Alice.
Alice had been brought in a few days after I had been, she was only fourteen, and they had grabbed her when she was walking home from school. The cowards had used a tranquilizer gun on her in broad daylight, and because of the neighborhood she lived in, no one said a word about it.
I just hoped someone was looking for her.
I smiled in her direction, "see, I'm not crazy," I said pointedly to Sebastian.
We heard the clicking of locks and held my breath. They were either bringing someone else in, or they wanted a fight.
One of the men walked down the hall, surveying us as if we were prize cattle being put on the auction block.
There was about to be a fight.
He stopped in front of Alice's cell, "no,"
I whispered, "Hey man," I spoke up, "why don't you take me instead?" I questioned, and I could see that Alice looked terrified. The poor kid may have been a wolf from a tough neighborhood, but she wasn't a fighter.
"No," he grumbled, "we need to see what this one can do," he laughed, "we will come for you soon."
Poor Alice was too scared to fight them; she just followed them with her shoulders slumped and head down.
I slumped down onto the cot and just stared into the direction that they took her.
"She will be okay," Sebastian spoke up, breaking the silence.
I nodded, "I hope so."
We both settled into a comfortable silence, he tried to say some comforting things, but I just couldn't listen to them.
Click.
We looked at each other and then immediately turned toward the entrance. A young guy entered who was covered in blood; the guy looked horrible and wore the expression of a guy who hated every decision he had ever made.
The red-headed guard was the one with him, and they walked past us and went a little further down the makeshift hallway of cells.
As he came back through, he wasn't looking at us.
"Where is she?" I asked him.
"Worry about yourself, dog," he grumbled back to me.
"Tell me where she is," I saw red, "where is she?" I asked again, and my breathing picked up, and I could feel myself fighting to transform.
"Don't worry about it, bitch," and he raised the remote control up at me.
"Ahhhh," I screamed, feeling the blinding pain as my world went black.
Chapter Five
"Oh my god, let me go," I could hear a voice shrieking as I opened my eyes, "when, when, my dad finds out about this."
"Your dad will what?" One of the guards sneered to the girl that I couldn't see "vampire bitch."
"Vampire?" the girl questioned. The voice sounded so familiar, I moved over in my cell to see if I could see past the guard, "oh wow," I gasped when I spotted a familiar dark head.
The guard moved to push her in the shoulder as if he was trying to herd her into a cage without harming the merchandise.
"Get in," he huffed to the stubborn girl in front of him, "before we have to put you back to sleep."
Falling for Shifters: A Limited Edition Autumn Shifters Collection Page 95