Page 88 of Bad Medicine

It had been inside me for along time. A long damn time. But it was like the silvered beating had knockedsomething loose, and there was no putting it back. I’d ignored it. I’d ignoredthe pain in my head, the memory loss, the fact that I’d somehow killed everynonhuman Elder Alpha had sent my way. That hadn’t been just me. That hadn’tjust been my wolf. None of it had. There was something growing inside me and itfelt like a cancer, a disease, a horror of a nightmare that I needed tocontrol.

But I could not control it. Notanymore.

I groaned, then yanked thesteering wheel, pulling the car off the nearly empty highway to Huntersburg.

“Kait,” Joe yelled, as Islammed on the brakes. “What’s happening?”

But I couldn’t speak. I groanedagain, then shoved open my door and leaped from the car. I’d shifted before myfeet hit the ground, and then I was off and running toward the woods that laybetween me and my mother’s house, my rabid howls turning to low, ferociousgrowls, death in my heart.

ChapterForty-One

As my wolf, I didn’t feel somuch pain. Only hunger and fearlessness. The part of myself I referred to as my“psycho” felt only rage. It wanted to kill the world. And the woman part of me wantedto save it.

Talk about a mess.

Strangely enough, or notstrange at all, since all parts of me were stillme, the wolf and thepsycho wanted to save Lucy as much as the woman did.

I exploded through the coldday, my breath whooshing from my lungs, leaving gray fog hanging like miniatureghosts in the frosty air. The pressure inside me continued to grow, but as mywolf, I could handle it better. Still, it was uncomfortable.

There were two things on mymind. Killing Sam and saving Lucy. I wouldn’t think about the past, and I wouldn’tthink about the future.

I didn’t try to sneak up on theshapeshifter. He knew I was coming. He would feel me as I felt him, like aheavy, expectant pressure that surrounded my brain instead of my body, wherethe other pressure sat.

He was waiting. He stood in theyard, his hands at his sides, feet spread, watching for me. And he was wearingmy alpha’s skin. Despite the fact that I knew he couldn’t possibly be Jared, Istumbled. I hesitated.

Only for a few seconds. Irighted myself and flew at him, but he held up a hand and yelled, “Talk first,Kait!”

But I was long past talking. Iwas, quite literally, an animal, and I was there to fight. To defend those Iloved, and to take away, once and for all, this massive threat to them all.

I gathered my feet beneath meand sprang through the air, and he didn’t run. He was fast, and he could have.He could have avoided the bone-crunching collision of our bodies, but hegrinned and readied himself for the fight I was bringing.

“Come on, then,” he yelled, andseconds later, I was slamming my big wolf’s body against his smaller form.

It didn’t matter that I wasbigger, though. He was one strong son of a bitch. Stronger than anything oranyone I’d ever fought, and that was saying something.

But as we tumbled over thefrozen ground, and flew through the air, and bit and punched and clawed androared, he held back. He was obviously attempting not to hurt me too badly. Oh,hedidhurt me. But not nearly as badly as he could have.

I, on the other hand, did nothold back. He had to die, and I had to kill him. That phrase repeated itself inmy mind, over and over and over, but even as blood flowed like a sorrowfulriver from both of us, he did not die. I could not kill him.

And I remembered the braceletthe council had given me to capture him. If I captured him, I could find a wayto kill him. Maybe I’d even give him to the elders. I was mad and hurt, and atthat moment, I didn’t care if he were tortured or not.

In order to get Saul’s braceletof magic on him, though, I needed to shift to my human form. I’d be lessprotected, but I needed to shift back anyway. The pressure inside me had grown,and it was now hurting my wolf. It was worse than the injuries I’d sustainedfrom the shapeshifter, and it was making me weak. I had to release it—eventhough I didn’t know how.

It was fucking me up, and I wasafraid it was going to kill me.

I shifted.

The second I did, three thingshappened.

Sam, now dressed in the skin ofmy mother, backed down. He frowned and even through the blood masking his face,I could see concern. “Kait?” he asked. “I wanted to wear you out—I didn’t wantto hurt you.”

The second thing was, I sawLucy, standing against my mother’s house, her hand over her mouth, sobbing. Shewas not bound, she was not injured, and she’d dyed her hair red.

The third thing was that thepressure inside me finally exploded. It burst out of me in a chaotic,uncontrolled mess of blue, red, and silver magic.

Magic.

Andthatfucking time,the shapeshifter ran.