brown wolf I had my
eye on, but good enough.” The killer adjusted his glasses, looking disturbingly
unconcerned that Jules began to dangerously circle him like a large predator
circling its prey.
The small trapped
wolf made a pleading whining sound at Jules, but Jules ignored him. He had to
focus on the killer. Nothing should go wrong. Jules took a threatening lunge
forward, and the killer took a step back. Jules practically snapped his teeth
at him, but the killer only laughed as if Jules was a small annoying dog that couldn’t
do him any harm. Rage rippled across Jules’s body in waves.
Damn him. Jules
would show him the consequences of messing with a werewolf. Thinking of Cole’s
broken body, thinking of all those sleepless years living like a zombie, some
part of Jules couldn’t help but think that this was finally it—the final
movement of a very long piece. After all those years, months and days of being
consumed by vengeance, it all culminated in this final moment.
He could almost
hear and taste the satisfying crunch of the killer’s face when he finally put
his deadly teeth to work. Let the bastard feel what his mate felt in his last
moments on earth—helpless and utterly powerless to his inevitable fate.
Aiming for the
killer’s vulnerable throat, Jules opened his muzzle wide to unveil his
sharpened rows of teeth. He saw the killer abruptly swing the whip and lift the
knife, as if he was undecided which weapon to defend himself with. Jules would
laugh if he had a human mouth, but the man chose to wield the whip and the tip of
the lash caught him on his face.
The momentum of
his leap faltered. His paws wavered in the air like a fish suddenly swimming
out of water, and he fell with a hard thump on the forest ground.
The little wolf
wailed again and Jules understood suddenly that it wasn’t whining for any silly
reason. The wolf was warning him. Pain shot through his right paw and he
snarled, realizing his stupid mistake a second too late. He could already feel
the poison of the silver teeth surging up his bloodstream.
The killer was
purposely luring him to the trap and he was too blind in his rage to notice.
For someone who claimed to have hunted the killer for so long, how had Jules
become so stupid?
“Not very smart
are you?” The killer sneered, peering down at Jules like a scientist studying a
subject in an experiment. “Big and stupid animal.”
Jules snapped his
teeth at him. The maniac only laughed, staying away from his reach. “You stay
put, you hear? I’ll work on the small doggie first, and save you for last. As they say, always save the best for last, no?”
The killer walked
over the smaller wolf, fingering his whip. The little wolf cowered away from
him. Jules only watched the killer with narrowed eyes.
“You asked why I’m
doing this, little fella? ” The killer bent down to look
at the frightened wolf. “All I wanted was to be like you beasts once. To be one
of the powerful big mean wolves, but the local alpha in my town rejected my
application. Said I was too fat and unattractive.”
The whip whistled
through the air, striking the side of the small wolf, who cringed away.
“Well, guess what?
Now I lead an exciting life hunting you animals down. I can’t even remember how
many of you I’ve killed, but it doesn’t matter now. I’m bigger and badder than
any of you dumb animals.”
Jules’s ears
prickled. His sensitive wolf ears barely caught the sound of rustling bushes.
The human killer didn’t even hear it. It was the sound of movement. The sound of his mate. Pat is still out there!
Sudden fear
stabbed at Jules, washing away whatever rage that still lingered. It was
replaced with stark white naked terror for his mate. Jules could clearly
visualize Cole’s broken body on the ground and it was replaced by Pat’s face
again.
Oh Gods, Pat. Don’t fall the same trick like I did. Run! Get your
pack to help!
Pat couldn’t hear
him. Not yet anyway, until
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