That motherfucker was just lucky he didn’t finish what he’d set out to do. Since I apparently had the ability to control him, and with that power, I could make him eat a silver bullet. He’d do well to remember that.

“Want to shift now?” Sam asked, already lifting her shirt. “The moon is fairly high, and I can feel the pull.”

“Yep, I’m ready.”

I got undressed too, and when we were both naked, I noticed the tattoo that started on her right side and wrapped around her back. From what I could see, it looked like a wolf, but one that was half-shifted into a red-and-silver beast.

It was such a contrast to the prim and proper teacher façade she had going on that I was genuinely surprised. “Amazing tattoo,” I said, gesturing to the part of the image I could see. “How did you get it to not heal over?”

Her smile was wistful as she pressed a hand to her side. “Before I turned, I ran away with a human. This moon-loving, crystal-wearing dude who was covered in ink. He convinced me to get this done, and I didn’t think it would stick, but somehow he managed it. Must have been due to me not shifting for the first time yet.”

She ran a hand over it, and in the weird play of light, it almost looked like it moved under her touch. “Why that image?” I asked. A regular wolf would have been the logical choice, not one that looked like the werewolf of human lore.

“It called to me,” she said with a brighter smile. “My beast.”

I was going to ask her more about it, but she had started to shift, so I did the same. My wolf didn’t fight me for once, and thankfully, her lethargy faded as our bones cracked and reformed into the wolf.

When I was on four paws, shaking off the change, my red fur bright under the moonlight, Sam padded toward me. Despite our heights being similar in human form, she was a smaller wolf, with shaggy black fur, and the most striking silver eyes. If I had to guess, her eyes matched the silver in her tattooed beast.

She yipped low at me, and I returned the sound, nudging her toward the door. It was thankfully unlocked and slightly ajar, and since I hadn’t even thought to check, it was a damn good thing my practical friend was here.

The interior of the school was dark, cool, and quiet, but with the monochromatic wolf sight, I could see everything as clear as in the day. It took us no time to make our way down the hall and into the cordoned-off section of the school. In wolf form I could smell the soot and char before we even entered the theater basement, and as we descended the stairs, it grew strong enough to fill my nostrils completely.

I sneezed a few times, and when Sam did the same, it was clear the sensitive wolf nose was reacting to more than just a long-ago fire.

Something big had gone down here, and whoever had tried to clean it up might have missed important clues.

We just had to find them.

13

This time in the basement, there was no swirling in my stomach. Maybe the wolf was able to filter it better, or maybe the swirl had turned into a flutter in my chest, since that was what I felt as I stepped into the room.

Sam stayed close behind me, and I kept my nose to the ground, following a familiar scent. It wasn’t until I was near the center of the room, right in the spot that had clearly been hit the hardest by the flames, that I figured out why it was familiar. It had a lavender and aniseed undertone. Two smells I associated directly with one person: Simone.

She had been in here. Either before or after the fire, and the thought that the hints of death that lingered here might be due to her presence almost sent me back into my human form.

I couldn’t think like that. I had to stay calm and keep searching, for her sake.

And my own, because if anything had happened to Simone…

Yeah, not a sentence I could finish.

We ended up farther back in the room than I’d gone with Sam earlier that day. Simone’s scents were soon intercepted by a different scent, one that was rich and spicy, and even in wolf form, it curled my toes in a way that was purely sexual. Human sexual, not anything to do with my beast.

It was a smell that, once found, I couldn’t release as it dragged me to its origins.

Sam stayed right beside me, probably wondering what the fuck I was doing as I zigzagged across the room, rumbles ripping from my chest.

I just… finally felt like I was on the right path.

More flutters rose inside me, and the pressure in my brain was stronger than ever as I tried to follow memories and scents. I was bracing myself for the usual stabbing head pain, but… it didn’t come. Was my wolf insulated from the worst of that as well? Had she been the key all along to figuring this shit out, and was that why she was so sluggish? Maybe someone didn’t want me in this form because this form was how I’d get my answers. And that meant we were on four legs until I figured this shit out.

That darkly enticing scent led me to the farthest wall from the entrance. I nosed around, trying to find an opening in the scorched and blackened concrete. Sam nudged me after I’d spent a minute trying to pry this wall’s secrets free, with very little success.

She jerked her wolf head away from the wall, and I followed her the few steps back until I figured out what she had been showing me. The bigger picture of what I was sniffing at.

The burned shape looked exactly like a giant silhouette of a person, scorched into the brick. The silhouette was larger than even the biggest shifter I’d ever seen, and I wondered if it was just a random coincidence, or was this the literal outline of someone bursting into the room?

But from where?

The basement had thick brick and block walls. Bricks and blocks that were still completely intact, outside of the blackened outline of a giant. Moving forward again, I placed my nose right in the silhouette, and the flutter in my chest really kicked into gear.

I sniffed harder, and in the next inhale came a whiff of spice and books and… magic.

My wolf tilted her head back and howled, stronger and with more emotion than she’d had since we’d awoken in Torin’s bed. Her call was a lament of pain, and I had no idea why, but the feeling of loss was so strong, it almost sent me to my wolf belly.

Beside me, Sam joined in with our howls, spurring on my wolf even harder, drawing up more of our power that had been trapped inside. As our burning energy increased, it pushed past barriers I hadn’t even known were there. Power flowed from me until my howls echoed through the basement at an almost-deafening decibel. Sam eventually had to drop down and cover her ears with her paws, and while I didn’t want to hurt her, I couldn’t make myself stop.