I reached a clearing, staggering to a halt at the sight of a cluster of naked blue and brown women piled on top of each other, clawing, hissing, and fighting over what lay beneath them. Their heads jerked up as my growls built into a hateful roar.

They growled in challenge, their beauty gone, replaced by shriveled, sagging skin, and sunken faces that bared their thirst and hunger. One by one they slithered out of their pile, flashing their pointy teeth and wicked claws. I advanced, only fifty yards remained between me and them. I was going to kill them and then find Dan. They would pay for hurting him. . . .

I didn’t see Dan until the last of the Ciguapas lifted from his unmoving form. His head lay twisted in an odd angle and blood smeared the lapels of his polyester suit.

They’d killed him. They’d killed my best friend.

Something fired deep within me, a trigger of rage I’d always kept carefully in check. But there was no need to slap the safety on now. I buried the torturous pain of my mending and exploded with fury, changing into my wolf form and surrendering to a beast whose need for carnage knew no end.

They’d murdered my friend, my brother, my family, my pack, and now these f**kers were going to pay!

My claws dug into the frozen earth, kicking it behind me as I sped forward. The Ciguapas spread out. They refused to go to hell without a fight.

But they had no goddamn clue who they were fighting.

A long-forgotten scent from my past stopped my onslaught like a whip strangling my neck. My eyes widened as I ground to a halt. My body tumbled and rolled from the force of my sudden stop, lashing at and aggravating my injuries. But the pain was secondary to the rush of emotions I felt then. I scrambled to my feet, my throat tightening into a hard knot that threatened to choke me.

Shit.

Before me stood my human mother, her arms outstretched and her face breaking into that familiar look of love she’d always greeted me with.

I shook my giant head, trying to clear my vision. This isn’t happening. I blinked my eyes opened, convinced she’d vanished. But there she stood, smiling patiently. I inched forward, wanting and needing to believe it was her. My father had killed them both when he tried to turn her werewolf, I reminded myself. He’d failed, I insisted. They weren’t coming back.

And still there she was.

She strode toward me, moving in her signature determined walk, her dark curly hair bouncing against her shoulders. “Bren,” she said quietly, speaking in that same melodious tone I remembered and struggled to forget. “My son!”

Without fear, she knelt and embraced my wide neck, her aroma of sunflowers claiming it was undeniably her. She smiled softly and stroked my head, just like she had when I was a scared little boy. “Everything is going to be all right. I promise, Bren.”

That’s when I tore out her goddamn throat.

The body that crumbled at my feet was not my mother. I was positive even before she morphed back to one of those goddamn Tundas. My mother never promised shit. Even when I begged her to tell me she and dad would survive the turn. That should’ve been my first damn clue they would die.

The taste of her blood riled my wolf and made him crave more. My hind legs launched me forward, throwing me into several of the remaining freaks at once. They fought like rabid animals, raking my back, limbs, and face with their sharp nails and piercing my flesh with their fangs.

It did jack against my beast.

I tasted their fear as it spilled down my jowls in pools of gray blood. I wanted them to suffer. And I wanted them to convulse in misery for what they’d done to Dan.

Dan had never hurt anyone. He was kind and smart and loyal. He was the first person I ever told about my pathetic past. I thought he’d pity me. Instead that beanpole looked me in the eye and told me he was proud of me for surviving without parents, a pack, and a dime to my name. He had the purest heart of any man in this goddamn world and now he was gone.

My claws cracked open chests, my fangs severed necks. Fuck you for taking him away from me, from Celia, from her sisters, from the world. Fuck you!

“Bren, leave them . . . They’re dead, Bren, they’re dead.”

Celia’s pained voice tore me away from the chunks of gray flesh my fangs continued to shred and gnaw. She knelt over Dan in her human form, pushing down on his chest and filling his lungs with her breath. Tears streaked her bloody face as she sobbed and pleaded him not to die.

My body lurched forward and bound to their side. Dan’s vacant and unblinking stare was like a punch in the gut. My wolf eyes took in his chalk white skin and blue lips, while the man within me begged him to move, to speak, to breathe.

I sniffed at him. . . . Christ, he was still alive, but my wolf could sense the light in his soul dwindling away with every passing moment. Every muscle in my body tensed. I couldn’t let him die. He needed a chance.

So I shoved Celia away and pierced his heart with my fangs.

I vaguely remember her screaming and trying to wrench me off him before the world faded into black.

Chapter Eight

Sunlight beat against my heavy lids, resolute it was time to wake my ass up. I blinked several times, fighting the haze that followed one hell of a nap. I swore and rubbed my eyes. Damn, I was friggin’ starving. The warm sheet slipped from my chest, exposing my pecs as I pushed up on my elbows and took in my bedroom at a glance. Hell, someone had tidied up. A basket full of clean laundry lay folded on top of my bureau, filling my nose with the clean scent of “summer breeze” fabric softener. And shit, had the babe lying next to me vacuumed?

I did a double-take when I realized the “babe” sleeping beside me was Celia. She cuddled against my pillow and tucked her bare feet deeper beneath her long brown skirt, causing the collar of her light blue sweater to droop between the swells of her br**sts. I yanked her by the waist and pulled her to me, burying my nose into her neck. “I always knew we’d end up in bed.”

She laughed and pushed me off of her, smiling as she wiped the sleep from her eyes. “I see you’re finally awake, sleeping beauty.” Her smile softened as she sat up. “Do you feel okay?”

“Yeah, I guess.” I scratched at my beard, pausing when I realized how thick it was. “How long have I been out?”

Celia reached for her cell phone. “Hmm, almost forty hours. You missed a full moon last night.”

I jerked up as a swarm of memories came flooding back. The spirits . . . the witch . . . Shit— Dan!