Brody stared out at the rocky beach from the inside of his tiny eight by eight cell unsure if he'd last another day in this hell hole.
As far as holding cells went, this one wasn't so bad. The room was clean and he had a comfortable bed with plenty to eat.
None of which did a damn bit of good when the wolf inside him stirred constantly.
If this is what it felt like to live with multiple personalities then those afflicted had his heartfelt sympathy because this shit sucked, keeping him on edge day and night.
The security detail assigned to watch over him kept calling him feral and he was sick and tired of hearing that too.
Several of the pack assured him he'd only be held here until they were certain he wasn't a danger to anyone else. But he knew better. In the midst of his frenzy he'd bitten an innocent girl, the mate to one of the pack leaders as it turned out. She survived, but that situation did not bode well for him and he knew it.
Not that he blamed them.
He spent his whole life hating and hunting down shapeshifters without ever understanding anything about them.
Shifters called the hunters fanatics, where Brody simply called them family.
Now, forced to walk in their skin it was easy to see just how narrow-minded he had been.
Is that the way it always went? Hindsight and all that bullshit.
A growl formed deep in his throat.
With the sun hidden behind the dark grey clouds, the outside seemed to match his inside as a storm continued to brew.
In the midst of his confusion after being accidentally bitten, the scent of a mate had given him hope and lured him to Devil's Point Island.
The disappearance of that scent had created a monster. One that refused to settle down no matter how hard he tried.
According to the pack living here on the island, his frenzy should have ended with mating season.
The one time of year when all wolves go a little crazy with the need to find and bond with a mate. Only it didn't.
Weeks had passed and nothing changed. He still wanted to tear down the walls of his cell brick by brick and go on a hunt. Except he had no clue where to start.
The beautiful brown-haired girl he'd found on the beach had disappeared just as she appeared—without a trace.
After first scenting her in wolf form, he'd followed her scent for miles before finally coming upon her sitting on the beach in front of a campfire roasting marshmallows and laughing with her friends.
Night had fallen and the golden glow of the burning logs cast an ethereal aura around her. Instead of shifting and approaching her, he'd been a dumb ass and chosen to sit on his haunches and watch her from afar.
After traveling so long to catch her and not understanding the irresistible draw, he simply wanted to savor the moment.
He couldn't see the color of her eyes and had no idea what her name was, but in the soft light with the cool breeze blowing through his fur, none of that mattered.
Listening to her laugh with her scent wrapping around him calmed the chaos raging inside him. For the first time in weeks he'd felt a semblance of peace. Something even his human life never gave him.
Of course he'd been an idiot and waited too long. By the time he was ready to talk to her she'd disappeared into her tent and he didn't want to scare her by stalking her in her sleep.
Instead, he resigned himself to let them both get some rest before he approached her. He took cover in the tree line for the night and laid his body down in a soft spot of grass and fell asleep almost before his chin hit the ground.
When he woke she was gone. Somehow he'd slept through her departure and no amount of searching the island and surrounding areas had turned up even a trace of her.
He'd lost his mate.
His human side still balked at the idea of a fated mate. His sister, Allison, had been led down that path not long ago and now seemed somewhat settled with her new mate Diego.
She visited him everyday and he believed she might be happy if not for the worry lines that creased her forehead every time she saw him.
Brody pulled his gaze back from the beach and dropped to the floor and began doing push ups. Since he couldn't run free, he was forced to do calisthenics to ease some of the energy constantly overloading his system.
It didn't exactly work. But it made him almost civil so, he continued to do it everyday.
Like every other day the number of reps flew by, sweat coated his body and his brain temporarily focused on the task at hand.
He wasn't thinking about anything beyond the determination to keep going so the new scent from the open window slammed into him unexpectedly.
Brody dropped and rolled, his hands ripping at the pants that confined his shift.
It couldn't be.
Before he registered what was happening claws tore at his zipper as he began to change and he barely got the denim off his legs before the bones popped and fur sprouted across his body.
He jumped on the window and inhaled deep, sticking his snout through the bars. It was there. The unmistakable scent of the woman never far from his mind.
No way.
The wolf began clawing at the walls below the window despite the fact the concrete construction gave him absolutely no way out.
He didn't care. All that mattered was getting to the woman he needed more than anything else. He scratched and scraped until his forearms ached and his claws were worn down to the quick.
"Brody, what the hell are you doing?"
The wolf jerked at the sound of his sister's voice behind him, giving his human half a chance to regain control. As quickly as he shifted to wolf, he changed back.
"Holy shit." Allison jerked away from him and turned her back. "Give a girl some warning. I do not need to see your junk—Ever!"
He looked down at his nudity and almost smiled. Any other time he would have teased her mercilessly about being so squeamish.
Not today.
Not when the answer to his prayers stood right in front of him.
"Allison, you've got to get me out of here." He grabbed his pants and shoved his legs in them, barely taking the two seconds to fasten the zipper and button.
"You know I can't do that." She sighed. "How many times are we going to go over this? It's not safe. "
"For who?" he growled. "Me? You?"
"The whole pack, Brody. This isn't just about you and me anymore. There's a lot more at stake."
He rolled his eyes and groaned. "I can't believe how easily you accepted the whole pack mentality. What happened to bucking the system? Being an individual? Not being a sheep?"
“Because we're not human anymore,” she hissed. “Wolves need the pack.”
"So you've said."
"I'm not the only one," she retorted. "Don't discount what Diego and his brothers have to say. They've dealt with ferals before."
He cringed at the word. The fact even his sister called him that did not give him much of a chance. But he had to try.
"Have they ever saved a feral? It would seem our captors don't say much about that."
"We aren't captives."
He looked around his small room. "Really? I know I can't go anywhere. Are you so sure you can? What if you wanted to leave the island?"
"Don't be ridiculous. I chose this life. I chose Diego and I'm happier for it. Can't you understand that? We just need to stick together. All of us. The pack."
He stepped forward and leaned against the plexiglass that separated them. "If that's true then how am I supposed to be getting better being isolated in here? It's impossible to acclimate in isolation."
She shook her head. "I'm not letting you out. Not until Diego says it's safe."
Brody banged his hand on the clear divider. "Don't be like this, Sis. I'm not trying to get free so I can go on some insane killing spree. Being locked up is the problem. I just want..." He stopped, unable to say the words even to his sister.
"You want what?" Suspicion rose in her voice.
He considered his next words carefully. He didn't like having to manipulate her, but he was desperate. No way in hell he'd lose the woman on the beach twice.
"There's a woman. I can smell her."
Allison crunched up her face. "Eww, seriously? I don't want to hear this."
"Oh for fuck's sake. I am not talking about sex. She is far more important than that. It's the mate bond." He swallowed down the distaste of his lies. But he had to do something...
"We connected during mating season before I understood what was happening. She was here on vacation, but by the time I realized the true nature of what she was to me she'd left the island."
Allison's stance and features were softening as he spoke. The curse of someone in love is that they want everyone around them to be in love too. It made his sister easy prey.
"I saw her on the beach this morning. She's returned and I think she's pregnant with my baby."
Her hand flew to her mouth. "How can you be so sure?"
He tapped his nose.
"Heightened senses, baby. This thing tells me all kinds of stuff now."
She nodded, obviously agreeing with him.
"So you see? You have to help me get out of here so I can find her. I can't let my pregnant mate suffer."
Suddenly the sound of clapping filled his small cell and Creed, one of the men keeping any eye on him, walked out of the shadows.
"Wow. That was quite a performance. That's some serious balls you've got there to feed that bullshit to your sister though."
Allison's face hardened and her eyes narrowed. "Is that what you were doing? Lying to me to get what you wanted?"
When he didn't immediately answer she stomped her foot and exited the room without another word.
"Thanks, bro," Brody muttered.
Creed smiled back at him. "I don't think she was going to let you out anyway. Diego would have given her hell and probably tried to lock her up again."
"What do you mean again?"
He shrugged. "They didn't exactly meet under the best of circumstances. Before he figured out what to do with her he had to detain her somehow."
Brody shook his head. "Let me guess. It didn't work."
"Nope," Creed paused. "I heard she got herself free in less than ten minutes."
"That's my sister. The escape artist."
"Too bad you didn't get that trait. Maybe you wouldn't be making up strange stories to get loose."
"It wasn't all lies,” Brody said. "I did sort of meet a woman during mating season."
"And? Don't leave a brother hanging. Mating season is a kick ass time for us unattached wolves. For some it means finding the elusive true mate. As for the rest of us, we just want to screw every available woman who will have us. "
Brody had to fight the urge to lash out at Creed. As much as he respected the man for his loyalty to the pack and the respect he gave him, he didn't like his mystery woman being lumped in with the conquests he and Sawyer bragged about.
"It wasn't like that. There was—I don't know—something about her scent that made me feel different."
"No shit. Are you serious?"
Brody lifted his shoulders. "Like I said. No big deal."
"Uh huh. Did her scent make you desperate to get close to her? Or did you feel unusually settled when you were around her?"
Yes. It was exactly like that, but he didn't like the direction Creed was headed. He didn't want to talk about their mating crap anymore.
"I wouldn't know. Before I could talk to her I got a text from Allison that she was on the island looking for me. I took cover and by the time I made it back to the beach, the woman was gone."
The other man nodded. "I knew you were bullshitting Allison. She is going to kick your ass."
"Probably. If I ever get out of here that is. Not a whole lot she can do with me in here and her out there." He was really fighting the need to snarl at Creed by this point. The scent of the woman on the beach was making the damned wolf insane, beating at his brain.
"Was anything you said real? Or are you bullshitting me too? I've got a much better nose for lies than your newbie sister."
"I caught her scent again." His words were clipped as the aggression in him rose.
"And you need to get out there, don't you? The wolf is riding your ass to do something and do something quick."
He nodded, gritting his teeth. "How do you know? You aren't mated. Not that I'm putting a lot of stock in that nonsense."
Creed reached into his pocket and pulled out his keys. "That's a story for another day." He slid the metal into the cell lock and opened the door.
"Don't make me regret this. If you pull something stupid I will put you down and then I'm going to be really pissed."
Brody failed to see how his logic worked, but he didn't care. The only thing standing between him and freedom was this one shifter. And he was willing to tell him anything he wanted to hear if it meant he got what he wanted.
"You won't regret it. Unless you keep toying with me. Then we'll both have regrets."
