This Dark Wolf (Soul Bitten Shifter #1) - Everly Frost Page 0,15

like me. You can hate me, but you will never fucking lie to me. Now, I’ll ask you again: Will you run?”

“What do you think, asshole?” I snarl, thumping my fist against his back. My hand is full of my human strength, but it has no impact on him.

“You’ll just have to get through the pain,” he says, a cold response as he resumes his quick pace.

“No—” I stop myself before I beg.

Crying is bad. Begging is worse.

“Tristan.” Jace’s voice carries a warning, but this time, I don’t think it’s about me. “Cody’s coming after her. Baxter’s coming after him. We need to run.”

“Fuck.” Tristan exhales, tension thrumming through his shoulders. “Cody got too close to her. Watch my back, Jace. Use full force. Don’t underestimate how badly Cody needs to get to Tessa right now.”

Jace breaks into a cold grin. His daggers gleam in his hands. “Permission to hurt that fucking family? Gladly.”

Tristan doesn’t hesitate another second. He breaks into a sprint, and I nearly bite my tongue because the pain is so bad.

I try to exhale the aching, gasping every inhalation. Tristan’s arms are like a vise around me as he darts between the trees, taking the slope at a dangerous speed. One misstep and we’ll both take a tumble. At this elevation, hitting a tree means a broken back.

Just when I don’t think I can take the pain anymore—when a scream works its way up to my lips—Tristan hits his stride and I suddenly feel weightless.

It’s like leaping off a cliff and not touching ground.

In those few moments while the pain eases, I sense what Jace warned us about. Cody is following us—I can sense his power signature. Baxter is on the verge of catching up to him, but he’s not alone. My half-brother and Peter Nash are with Baxter. Their scents are even stronger now, which means they’ve shifted—and they’re gaining on us because of their wolves’ speed. I remember the look in Cody’s eyes when he tried to mark me—the dark obsession that seemed to drive him beyond logical thought.

I don’t like my chances with Tristan, but I’m dead if Cody and the alphas catch up to us.

Behind us, Jace suddenly spins and drops to the ground, drawing two more blades from his boots. It’s difficult to see the details in the dark while we run away from him, but these daggers don’t look like normal blades—they are made purely of flattened steel with one gleaming sharp end and one rounded end. Jace is now holding two blades in each hand. They glint in his hands before he lets the two in his right hand fly at the same time.

My jaw drops at the speed and skill of his throw.

One of the blades hits the first wolf that darts around the nearest tree—I recognize Dawson’s gray wolf as it yelps and falls. The blade juts from his shoulder when he shifts back to his human form, shouting in pain.

The other blade flies to the right, thudding into the chest of Peter Nash’s wolf as he leaps toward Jace. Jace sidesteps smoothly to avoid Peter’s flying claws and spins to drive his third blade into Peter’s hind thigh.

Tristan doesn’t wait for Jace and that’s all I see before the trees obstruct my view. It’s difficult to make out much at the speed we’re moving. It’s also getting darker, although my eyes are quickly adjusting to the night. I hold my breath, straining to hear and sense what’s happening behind us while my heart beats wildly in my chest and my wolf’s energy buzzes inside me.

Finally, I make out Jace’s figure, running behind us again, his chest gleaming with sweat, thigh muscles straining, arms pumping. I doubt he’ll catch up to us in his human form because Tristan is practically flying now. The power radiating from him hits me in waves, pounding through me. I sense his wolf and his human, working in harmony in a way that I’ve never sensed in another shifter. He’s harnessing his wolf’s speed and strength without shifting form, the same way I harness my wolf’s energy to make myself stronger.

Except that Tristan definitely has a wolf’s soul—a soul I can’t relate to. The energy inside him is as foreign to me as an animal in the wild.

He leaps over a fallen tree, holding tightly to me at the same time. I recognize the path he’s taking—it’s the same one I would have chosen. My pack believes I never leave pack territory,