“Devlin was pack leader before me.”

Kris and I were no longer in the water. We were dressed again and lying on a blanket near the pond but far enough away that the waterfall didn’t drown out our words. This place seemed too peaceful for everything I was learning about Kris. The sky was so incredibly blue, with fluffy white clouds drifting by. When darkness arrived, I’d be that much closer to a full moon. My body tingled with the thought—as though it couldn’t wait. But psychologically, I couldn’t accept that I was going to go all furry. I’d broken my arm when I was eight. They’d taken X-rays.

Surely a Shifter’s bones were different, were multijointed. How else could they transform from a human to such a different creature? It was inconceivable to me.

“I didn’t get a chance to kill him,” Kris said, and I heard the disappointment in his voice. “He ran off, like a coward. So my ascension to the role of pack leader is a little tainted.”

I rolled my head to the side and studied his handsome profile. He was focused on the sky. Maybe telling me all the dark secrets about his past was as hard for him as it was for me. I couldn’t imagine killing anyone—but to do it to gain power . . . I wanted to understand Kris,but his was a scary world.

“Why did you want to be in charge?” I asked.

He turned his head to watch me. “Devlin was an incredibly bad leader. He kept putting the others at risk. Taking chances. Exposing the existence of our society. He had to be stopped. But in the end I didn’t stop him. I’m pretty sure the black wolf you saw—it was him.”

“So when you said he had a wolf for a pet . . . ?”

“I was twisting the truth. Sometimes we have to do that. Just like the night Dr.Won was talking about werewolves and we were all making fun of it like it was ludicrous.”

I could see where a lot of fast thinking would have to take place in order to not give things away.

“So you think maybe he’s how the Dr.Wons found out about you . . . the Shifters?”

He gave me a dark grin. “About you, too. You’re one of us.”

“Yeah.” He was convinced. I wasn’t. Bummer for him if he’d chosen a non-Shifter. I sat up and crossed my legs beneath me. “I know I should probably be thrilled about that—”

“It’s a lot to wrap your head around,” he said as he shoved himself up on an elbow.

“Do I need to do something to prepare?” It seemed like I should do something. Obviously I no longer had a reason to shave my legs. I ran my hand over my bare legs, and tried to make light of what I couldn’t really accept. “As a wolf, will my legs be bald if I shave?”

“Was my wolf face bald?”

I released a self-conscious laugh. “No. You actually were as gorgeous as a wolf as you are . . .” I let my voice trail off. Had I really wanted to confess that?

He gave me a crooked grin. “You think I’m cute.”

“Cute, no! Definitely not. Beautiful . . . yes.”

He pushed up until he was sitting and leaned toward me. “I think you’re beautiful, too. I’ve thought that from the first time I saw you.”

I felt myself grow pleasantly warm. “Is that the reason you looked at me all the time?”

“Yeah. I figured you’d see how I felt. Guess it was kinda creepy, though, having this guy watch you and never talk to you.”

“You don’t seem the shy type.”

“The first time I saw you it was like something had slammed into my chest. Seriously. I didn’t think I was ever going to breathe right again. I didn’t know what to say to you.” He skimmed his fingers along my cheek. Looking at him now, he appeared to be any normal teenage boy.

“The night before the sherpas left, you and Suho had an argument.”

“Yeah. He knew you were one of us, thought I was being irresponsible to leave you behind. But I didn’t want to force you to go, to make you resent me, and I hadn’t figured out how to tell you yet about our abilities. And okay, to be honest, I was jealous that you were so into Mason.”

“I don’t know that I was really into him. I liked him because he was uncomplicated, because he didn’t make me feel all these insane things that you do. That pull you were talking about—I’d never felt anything like it before. So what is it? Like an animal bond or something?”

“It can be intense, but it can’t make you feel what you’re not really feeling. If that makes sense. We feel these primal urges because we walk the fine line between man and beast, but at our core we’re human. We just have the ability to shift into another form.”

“You say that like it’s nothing.”

“I grew up watching people shifting back and forth with the ease of someone clicking the remote to flip through channels on the TV.”

“So who coached you?” I asked.

“Males go through it alone.”

“Doesn’t that make it more painful?”

“Doesn’t seem fair, does it? But it’s a form of natural selection. The weaker males don’t survive.”

“Were you afraid?”

“I couldn’t wait, but then I knew what was coming. When I was a kid, my parents took me into the woods, explained things, showed me—”

“Oh my God!” I glanced around quickly because it was safer than looking at him or inside of myself.

He sat up straight. “What? What is it?”

“My parents . . . those deer hunters said they saw wolves.” I buried my face in my hands. “What if it was my parents? Showing me? We ran. Mom pushed me back beneath some brush. There was growling.” I’d repressed the images. “There were wolves,” I said with a certainty I’d never before felt. I lowered my hands and met Kris’s gaze, knowing the devastation he must have seen in my eyes. “The wolves. Could they have been my parents?”

“It makes sense that they might have been.”

Only if I bought into the whole I-am-a-werewolf-too idea. I was having a difficult time accepting that.

“If you die in wolf form, what happens?” I asked.

“Our species always reverts back to human form right before death.”

“So the hunters might have been correct when they said they shot wolves?”

Kris nodded.

I shook my head. “No, my parents weren’t . And if they were shot, wouldn’t they have healed?”

“Not if they were shot in the heart or the head.”

“But they would have been ,” I mused. And they weren’t. At least I didn’t remember them that way.

Last summer I hadn’t wanted to go to the part of the forest where they’d died. Suddenly, I realized that in order to face my past and present fears, I needed to return to that place. I didn’t even know how to find out where it was.

Later that night I prowled around the cavern with nervous energy I couldn’t explain. Or maybe I just didn’t want to face the truth of it. Spending the afternoon with Kris in our isolated world here had made me more aware of him. I thought I could smell the scent of his skin. It was going to be more difficult to lie with him tonight and just hold him and be held by him.

I walked to the edge of the cavern, closed my eyes, and listened to the water crashing down. I wanted to empty my mind of all thoughts. But one remained: If I didn’t shift tomorrow night, would I lose him?

In spite of the roaring waterfall and my closed eyes, I knew the moment he stepped behind me.

“Ye Jin?”

I loved the deep rumble of his voice and the way my name sounded when he spoke it. I turned to face him.

“Nothing between us has changed,” he said.

“Everything’s changed. I know you better now. It’s like I’ve had a crash course in Kris Wu. I’m feeling things I’ve never felt before.”

“Good things?”

“Scary things. Intense. What if I’m not what you think I am?”

“You mean you’re not brave?”

I released a self-conscious laugh and shook my head. “That’s not what—”

“You don’t have an inner strength? You’re not courageous? You’re going to change, Ye Jin, but what I feel for you isn’t because you will change—it’s because of everything that won’t change.”

“Oh.” I didn’t know what to say to that. I thought it was probably as close to a declaration of love as I might ever get.

“Come on.” He took my hand and led me over to the sleeping bag.

I drew comfort while wrapped within Kris’s arms. I could hear his heart pounding, feel the warmth of his body. It was different tonight. Our closeness had changed, evolved. He wasn’t Kris, my boss. He was Kris, my Dark Guardian. Even if I didn’t think I needed a guardian, I knew he’d always be there.

“Will it happen”—if it happens, I thought—“as soon as the moon appears?”

“No, not until the moon reaches its zenith.”

“How will I know?”

“You’ll start to feel . . . different. Don’t let it scare you. I know you haven’t known for very long, but for us morphing is a natural part of life—like puberty.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve had a lot of unpleasant cramps during puberty.”

He pressed his lips to my forehead. “So now you’ll have cramps all over, but they come and they go quickly.”

I had a thousand questions as my time drew nearer. “When you’re in wolf form, do you think like a wolf?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know how a wolf thinks.”

I released a bubble of laughter, before going quiet. “You know what I’m asking.”

“It’s still you, Ye Jin. Inside. You just look a little different. When I’m in wolf form, I’m more aggressive, better able to fight—that’s the reason I shifted when the bear was going to attack you. I can run faster as a wolf, so if I need to get somewhere quickly, I’ll usually shift.”

“I thought you were pretty fast last night—when you weren’t in wolf form.”

“Most Shifters are fast and strong. Our bodies constantly get a workout.” He brushed his lips along my temple. “You’re going to do fine, Ye Jin.”

A shiver went through me as his voice rumbled near my ear. His skin was warm against my fingers where they rested on his chest.

“You said I was your mate,” I said, my voice low and hesitant. “Does that mean we get married?”

“Not necessarily. Usually mates marry, but not always. We’ll go through the whole dating scene if you want to go out with me. But you’re not forced to be with me—if it’s not what you want.” His voice had grown very quiet.

“If I didn’t want to be your mate, would you find another?”

“No, I’d just be alone.”

My heart did a little stutter. I rose up on my elbow and looked down on him. The moon—just a little shy of being full—was large and bright, shining through the waterfall as though it were a gossamer curtain. “That’s not fair.”

“I know. The male Shifters get the raw end of the deal. They feel what they feel, and the females choose.”

“Do they ever fight over a female?”

“Sure. Sometimes a girl wants to know who’s the strongest, who wants her the most. We’re human, but we’re also animal.”

“I don’t know if I’ll ever wrap my mind around all this.”

He cradled my cheek with his hand and threaded his fingers up into my hair. “Are you freaked out about what I am?”

Strangely, I wasn’t freaked out by him. By myself, yes. I was definitely having some problems coping with that, but Kris was just Kris. Lying here with him, I could forget that he was sometimes furry.

“No,” I answered truthfully.

“Good.” He rolled over until I was on my back and he was above me. He cradled my cheek with his large, warm hand. “Good,” he repeated.

Then he kissed me. It wasn’t like any kiss I’d ever had before, but then, I hadn’t expected it to be. It was, after all, Kris. And he wasn’t like any guy I’d ever known before. His lips were soft and gentle, as though he wasn’t sure that I would want this. But how could I not?

I’d wished for it on my birthday.

He pulled back and looked at me quizzically. “You smile when you’re being kissed?”

I broadened my smile. “My birthday wish just came true. When I blew out the candles, I wished you’d kiss me.”

“Really?”

“Strange, I know. I wasn’t even sure I liked you. You were always so intense.” I reached up and combed my fingers through his hair. “Now I know why.”

I wanted to believe what he believed, that I was going to shift, that I was his destiny—but it all seemed too amazing.

He drew me back into the circle of his arms. I pressed a light kiss to his shoulder.

“We should sleep now,” he said. “You’ll need all your strength tomorrow night.”

Practical Kris. I wanted to get corny and say something like, “Strength? Who needs strength when I’ve got you?”

But he was right. Tomorrow everything would change. And according to him, that included me.

“Ye Jin, wake up.”

There was an urgency in Kris’s voice that I hadn’t heard before. I’d fallen asleep wrapped in the cocoon of his embrace. I didn’t know when he’d left me, but now he was crouched beside me, shaking my shoulder. I squinted at him. I hadn’t expected to fall so soundly asleep, and I resented that he was waking me up.

“What’s wrong?” I said in my hoarse voice

“I don’t know. It’s just a feeling I have.”

The words hit me like a jolt of caffeine. And I could feel it, too. It was like that first night, the tingly feeling I’d had, that sense of being watched.

“Mason. They found us,” I said.

“No way. They didn’t have trackers in their group. And this area is too well hidden.”

“We didn’t know they had scientists in their group either—and they did.”

“Good point.” He shoved a backpack into my arms. “Here, you wear it. I may have to shift.”

I started pulling on my boots. “What are we going to do?”

“Have a look around and, if we need to, run.”

He stood up with that graceful, lithe movement he had. Then he reached down, took my hand, and pulled me to my feet. Still holding my hand, he began leading me toward the waterfall. “I want you to wait by the entrance until I’ve checked—”

A figure stepped into the entrance, and just like in some corny movie, he was wielding a gun. It wasn’t anyone I knew, but Kris stiffened and shoved me behind him. He eased a little closer to the waterfall, then he tried to push me back. “Go out the other side.”

“Oh, Kris, do you really want her to miss the party? And where are your manners? Shouldn’t you introduce your brother to your girlfriend?”

Devlin? This was Devlin? I peered around Kris for a better look. I thought if it weren’t for all the hatred in his eyes, Devlin might have been handsome. At one time he probably was. What had changed him?

Kris emitted a low growl and went very still.

“Don’t even think about morphing,” Devlin said. “I loaded a silver bullet into the gun. If I shoot you while you’re in wolf form, it’s hopeless—you’ll be dead. Maybe not immediately, but eventually.”

“I know how silver works. What do you want?”

“The return of my rightful place as leader of the pack would be nice.”

“The pack leader serves as leader of the Dark Guardians. He protects the existence of our kind. You led Dr.Won to us.”

“That’s just a guess on your part, but it so happens that you’re right.”

“Did you lead them here?”

“No. Those idiots. I washed my hands of them when they didn’t kill you. They took off in their choppers. I imagine they’ll be back. But I don’t care. They were supposed to do an autopsy on you, study you. Instead they planned to draw blood and swab your mouth. Where’s the fun in that?”

“You’ve put our entire existence at risk.”

Devlin released a deep sigh. I kept trying to find even a hint of Kris in him, but I couldn’t. His hair was only one shade: black. His eyes were a lifeless gray. What had happened to make him the way he was?

“Our existence was already at risk. There are so few of us left. Do you think any Static female is going to mate with us? God, I hate what we are.”

“Just because one girl—”

“One girl? She was everything to me. My own family wouldn’t accept her. She wouldn’t accept me. I shifted to save her life one night when some thugs attacked her in an alley, and all I did was horrify her. Do you know what it is to name your mate and then know you can’t have her? To know you’re destined to spend your life alone and lonely? To always be empty and have no love to fill the void?”

“I know it was hard—”

“You don’t know anything! But you will. Before the next full moon, you will. You’ll know what it is to hate what you are. I went to Dr.Won because I wanted to find a cure for what I am. I wanted him to make me normal. Instead he wanted to make everyone like us.”

“So you’re not working with them?” I asked.

I felt Kris stiffen again. I knew he wanted me to quietly disappear, but his brother was dangerous.

Devlin didn’t answer my question. Instead he said, “If you’re not with her when she shifts for the first time, you could lose her completely. Your heart will break and then you’ll understand my pain.”

“I’m going to be there for her.”

“We’ll see.” Devlin began moving slowly into the cave. Kris turned to face him, pushing me away in the process.

I don’t know what I was expecting. Maybe I thought they both would shift and go at it. I mean, if Devlin wanted Kris to suffer, he needed him alive.

So the explosion echoing through the cavern and Kris flying backward into the waterfall stunned me, and my instincts took over.

My horrified scream was lost in the roar of the rushing water as I dove in after him.

Being a strong swimmer was an advantage when tons of water was crushing down on you.

Those rescue lessons I’d taken when I’d worked as a lifeguard didn’t hurt either.

Any other time I might have marveled at how luminescent the pool was with the moon shining through the clear water, but all my efforts were focused on retrieving Kris. I wrapped an arm beneath his arm and around his chest before shooting back to the surface. I swam to the edge of the pool, away from the waterfall.

“Help me, Kris,” I ordered.

I heard him groan, felt him trembling, and was aware of his warm blood flowing around me. I tried to push him out of the water. “Kris, please.”

With another groan and herculean effort, he surged up and belly flopped onto the grass. I shoved him completely out of the water. Then I hauled myself out and knelt beside him.

“How bad is it?” I asked.

“Bad,” he answered through clenched teeth.

I eased up his T-shirt. With the moonlight and the faint rays of the approaching dawn, I could see the dark ragged hole in his side and the blood flowing from it. I tore off my shirt, leaving just my tank underneath it. I’d tear it off, too, if I had to. I pressed my shirt to his side to try to staunch the river of blood.

“Are you sure you can’t shift?” I asked. “Just for a few seconds?”

“If he does, he’ll die.”

I was startled by Devlin’s voice. I wasn’t sure when he’d joined us, but I should have known he’d want to see his handiwork.

“He can feel the burning of the silver. He knows I wasn’t lying about the bullet,” Devlin said with satisfaction in his voice. “I don’t want him dead. I just wanted to prevent him from stopping me.”

“Stopping you from what?”

He jerked me to my feet and before I could protest, he’d looped and lassoed a rope around my wrists, securing them tightly, then jerking me toward him. “From taking you away.”

He started pulling me and I dug in my heels. “You’re insane.”

“According to Nietzsche, ‘There is always some madness in love.’” He glanced over at me and smiled a cruel smile. “I was a philosophy major.”

“Kris did what he did to protect the pack. You can’t punish him for that.”

“Of course I can. What I’m doing only has to make sense to me. That’s the beauty of madness. Now, you don’t want to fight me, because I have more bullets in this gun. Killing you would take you away from him permanently.”

“I’m going to die anyway. Kris said I wouldn’t survive if he wasn’t with me.”

“Guess we’ll find out.”

He tugged on the rope, pulling me along behind him. I wasn’t afraid of dying. Okay, I was. I was terrified by the thought. I didn’t want to leave Kris behind, but I didn’t have a choice. I didn’t go easily, but neither did I resist with everything in me.

I glanced back over my shoulder. Kris was struggling to his knees. Please don’t follow, I thought. Save yourself. Wait for me.

I was optimistic that one way or another I could escape and find help for Kris.

It was a hard climb up the side of the forested slope that created the basin around the waterfall and pond— especially as my hands were bound. Kris and I had come in at the bottom of the slope. Devlin wanted to leave from the top.

I was exhausted when we finally reached our destination. The sky was awash in a reddish orange to herald the new day. From up here, I could see the river that created the powerful waterfall. I had no time or desire to appreciate its magnificence.

Breathing heavily, I dropped to my knees. “Give me a minute to rest, please.”

“I forget how little stamina humans have before the first shift.” He was still holding the rope attached to my hands. I wondered if I tugged on it could I jerk him over the edge of the cliff and back into the valley that we’d crawled out of.

“Kris is your brother,” I pointed out, panting.

“Your point?”

“How can you do this to him?”

He crouched in front of me. “He challenged me! He took my place as leader. Okay, so maybe I was dancing at the edge of responsibility—but I’d lost Jenny. They could have cut me some slack.”

“Mason told me that his college roommate—”

“Yeah, that was me. He was such a geeky kid, in awe of his father. When he started talking about Bio-Chrome, I thought it was destiny.”

“If you wanted a cure so badly, why not let them experiment on you ?”

“Because I didn’t trust Dr.Won not to portray me for what I am: a freak.” He shrugged. “Besides, I was in the mood for a little revenge.” He stood up and jerked me to my feet. “Now let’s go.”

I heard a low, threatening growl. There were probably a hundred wolves in this forest, and I had no idea how many Shifters. But I knew before I turned around and saw the familiar coat of fur that it was Kris in wolf form. He bared his sharp incisors.

“Dammit, Kris, what did you do—dig the bullet out? You are determined to prove yourself, aren’t you? Unfortunately I don’t have any more silver bullets. Do you know how expensive they are?” Devlin shoved me to the ground. I hit with a jarring thud. “So I guess we’ll settle this in the way of our kind.”

From my position, I could see Kris’s side. He was still bleeding. Even with the bullet gone, I guessed he couldn’t heal completely. He’d be weaker—

A shirt flew at me and landed over my face. By the time I could snatch it off, Devlin had shifted and a black wolf was crouched near me. The black wolf I’d seen the night of the beer party. He was larger than Kris. His teeth seemed longer, sharper.

Mason had mumbled something about the eyes not changing. I understood what he meant now. Shifters retained their human eyes.

I knew this would be a fight to the death, as it was supposed to have been when Kris first challenged Devlin’s place as pack leader. I knew Kris was weak and wounded. I knew Devlin was strong and insane—and there was a certain strength that came with madness. Kris was risking the loss of everything. Devlin had already lost it all. He risked nothing, and that made him the more dangerous of the two.

I knew that Devlin had every advantage. That I was likely to lose Kris, lose what I’d only just discovered.

I love you.

The words were just a whisper in my mind. But it was enough. Kris heard them. His head jerked toward me.

It was a tactical mistake. As Devlin launched himself at Kris, I realized that with my words, I’d sentenced Kris to death.