Thrown to the Wolves (Big Bad Wolf) Read online

  “I didn’t realize the, uh, species needed maintaining,” Cooper said.

  “It’s...difficult. We need more room than you, access to land for shifting, et cetera. Many wolves just don’t have the space to raise kids.”

  “But your family does.”

  Park laughed darkly. “Yeah, we have space. And I’ve got eleven nieces and nephews to prove it, with more coming. At this rate we will be the species. Though at least my older sister Jackie and her wife, Mai, adopted. Mai’s a cardiac surgeon,” he added proudly.

  Cooper stopped playing with his brace. “Your sister’s gay?”

  “She’s bi,” Park corrected, then caught Cooper’s eye. “What?”

  “Nothing,” Cooper said quickly. He could feel Park examining him, so he looked up to meet his eyes. “Just...do they know about...me?”

  Park’s curious gaze froze and he looked almost uncomfortable before understanding relaxed his face again. “You mean do they know you and I are dating? Yes. I told you that’s not a problem.”

  Cooper frowned. “What did you think I meant?”

  Park looked distracted as he put the car into a lower gear to climb the next brutal hill. “Hmm? Oh, nothing, I was just confused. We’re about fifteen minutes out from Port Drove, the last town before the estate. Do you still want to stop beforehand for the cat?”

  Cooper smiled at Park’s “I only tolerate that animal for you” tone. While their relationship had gotten closer with all the time they spent together, Park and Boogie’s relationship was as one-sided as ever, with Boogie constantly trying to knead Park’s lap or sneak a nap in the small of his back in bed while Park grumbled and avoided and gently relocated her to Cooper’s side whenever he caught her.

  Cooper twisted in his seat, ignoring the spike of discomfort in his shin, to examine the cat carrier on the floor of the back seat. Boogie had been even quieter than usual during the ride, completely shut down by her unfair captivity. She squinted at him now through the bars before looking away, as if the very sight of him disgusted her. In other words, the traveling hadn’t seemed to affect her usual personality.

  With his young cat-sitter-extraordinaire neighbor Ava away at journalism camp, less than ten hours to make other arrangements and—okay, let’s be honest—a pretty empty contact list of friends, he’d been forced to bring Boogie along on the trip.

  “Yeah. Anywhere I can pick up some tins and litter would be great, thanks.” He felt bad asking Park to stop now that they were so close, but it hadn’t made sense to pack supplies he could pick up anywhere. Especially when neither of them was sure how long they’d even be here. “Unless you think your family—”

  “No,” Park said. “They’re not big cat people.”

  Cooper made a face at Boogie, who was still ignoring him. “Are you sure they won’t mind that I brought her?”

  Silence. Apparently Park was ignoring him as well now, too. Well, seven hours into this venture and Cooper had successfully alienated both traveling companions. Right on schedule.

  He turned back around to face forward and tried to readjust his own leg, heavy with the brace, as subtly as possible. He needn’t have bothered. Park was busy frowning down at the wheel. “Oliver? What’s wrong?”

  “The car’s started pulling to the left,” he said as they crested the hill, took another steep curve with a cute little lookout point over the sea and started down again. “I think the—”

  The car gave a sudden jolt to the right, and Park’s expression changed to pure alarm.

  “What? Is it the tire?” Cooper asked, even as he knew that a flat tire wouldn’t explain what was happening or the smooth, near-silent descent of the car down the mountain road.

  “No,” Park said gruffly, his whole leg twitching as he aggressively pumped the brakes. They were slowly but steadily gaining speed now. Going faster on the sloping, icy road than they had all day. Cooper’s right foot was pressing hard against the car floor, subconsciously trying to brake himself, and his freshly healed shin bone protested at the tension. He checked the speedometer. Forty crawled past forty-five and approached fifty.

  “Is your seat belt on?” Park said tightly.

  “Of course,” Cooper said. The words slurred a bit and his lips felt weird, tingly. “Wait!” He twisted in his seat again to grab Boogie’s carrier—why the fuck had he left it loose on the floor?—tugged it up front into his lap, and tucked it between his body and the chest belt while a loud hissing and thumping sounded from inside. If his leg hurt at the twist, this time he didn’t notice.

  “Hold on.” Park grabbed the emergency brake and yanked it up.

  Nothing happened.

  “Oh, good,” Park said.

  Cooper laughed. He didn’t even realize he was doing it until Park looked at him with concern. Nothing was funny. He certainly didn’t feel amused. The tingling in his lips had spread across his face, across his scalp and down his spine until he couldn’t sit still. His arms ached where they dug into Boogie’s carrier. But the fluttering in his chest insisted on erupting as laughter, anyway. Beyond Park’s disbelieving face he saw the speedometer tease fifty-five.

  How many times can you cheat death? The unwelcome thought burrowed into Cooper’s head like a parasite. Surely four is one too many.

  Up ahead the road disappeared where it curved once more around the mountain. Beyond it the sea glittered like a dark gem set between the colorless snow and sky. They wouldn’t make it at this speed. Cooper reached out and put his palm against Park’s chest as if he could brace him from impact.

  Poor Boogie. I should have left her at home.

  “Hold on,” Park said again. Not that tired old line, Cooper thought, and gripped the front of Park’s coat while pulling the cat carrier closer to his chest until the metal latch bit into his skin. It wouldn’t make a difference in the end.

  Park downshifted, and Cooper jolted forward as the car tugged back a little and whined in protest. Park exhaled loudly. It wasn’t a dramatic drop in speed, three miles at most, and the bend in the road was directly ahead of them now, but it was something. Cooper was tempted to just yank the damn thing all the way to first gear but resisted. Instead he watched as Park downshifted again and again, one gear at a time, each drop in speed nowhere near as much as he wanted it to be, each jolt forward harsher, and each whine of the engine louder and more strained.

  Park dropped them to second gear just as they entered the curve, and Cooper slammed forward as the speedometer dropped one last time. It was still too fast. The tires screeched as they took the curve and he barely heard them over the engine, so high-pitched and stressed-sounding now that Cooper half expected something to pop and give beneath them. Abruptly the back tires fishtailed over a patch of ice, and for just a moment it felt like falling.

  Park gripped the steering wheel with both hands and Cooper held his breath. He remembered being fifteen and just learning how to drive, with his dad in the passenger’s seat. He remembered the feeling of taking that first turn at any speed over twenty-five mph.

  “What if I tip the car over, Dad?”

  “You won’t, Coop.”

  “But how do you know?”

  “They’re built not to. Trust me.”

  He remembered leaning away from the turn as if he could counterbalance the whole car, and his dad’s subsequent annoyance. “Get your butt back in the seat! We’re not going to tip!”

  Cooper felt his left ass cheek digging into the cushion now, instinctively trying to keep some equilibrium...

  ...and then suddenly they were on a straightaway again, going thirty-four. He laughed again, this time sounding slightly more relieved and less like a cartoon villain in a haunted asylum.

  “Yes!” His voice was loud, ragged and shaking with adrenaline. “Now what? Do we wait for the next uphill?” he asked, avoiding looking at the angry sea stalking his periphery.


  “Too risky,” Park said. “It might get worse again before it gets better.”

  “So we...” Cooper looked to the left. Several miles ahead, the inner cliff face they were skirting eased way to what looked like steep hills and small trees, though the topography of the land was hard to determine beneath the snow.

  “We hope another car doesn’t come,” Park said. “Or any hidden drop-offs.”

  He put his hand over Cooper’s—still gripping the front of his coat—and pulled it to his mouth for a brief kiss, then guided them onto the wrong side of the road, inching toward the barrier-like buildup of snow on the left that a plow had made. The car jumped and tilted before they could even touch the barrier as it crushed the runoff on the side.

  Inside her carrier, Boogie hissed and swatted at the cage door, finally attune to the danger.

  When the side of the car hit the icy bumper, the car rocked and Cooper couldn’t hold back his shout. The sounds of the ice grinding against the metal made it feel like they were going faster rather than slowing down, now that the distance was measured with slaps, bumps and screeches.

  “Ready?” Park had to shout.

  “I trust you,” Cooper said. He could feel the pounding of Park’s heart against his fist just before they turned fully off the road and he was thrown into the passenger door as the car leapt and skidded across the snow.

  A horrible screeching sound rang out—so there was a real guardrail beneath all that after all—and then the screech continued as Boogie took up the war cry. Cooper had lost hold of Park and was just clutching the carrier with his right hand while his left hand shot out in front as if he could stop what was coming.

  Another teeth-clattering thump came from beneath them, and Cooper lurched forward. Boogie yowled and the right side of his face slammed into the protrusion between the windshield and the passenger-seat window.

  “Fuck!” Cooper grabbed at his face as a rave party briefly went off in his eye. He felt a lurching in his stomach and his thoughts tripped like a skipping record before abruptly going black.

  Chapter Two

  “Speed up, Coop. You’re not going to tip the friggin’ car!”

  “But what if I do, Dad?”

  “Stop being such a scaredy-cat. Just do it. Do it now! Don’t be scared!”

  “Cooper! Are you okay?”

  “Dad?” Cooper mumbled, feeling hands running over his chest and prying at the fingers pressed against his eye. His fingers. He was clutching his own face. Which hurt. A lot. His eyebrow in particular was pulsating so hard he could feel it in his palm.

  “What? No, it’s me.” The voice was even more worried now.

  “Oliver,” Cooper said, nodding and relieved, reality slowly slipping back into place. Then, “Oliver! Get your hands back on the wheel!”

  “It’s fine. We’ve stopped. Does your neck hurt?”

  “No.” Cooper groaned. “Just my fucking face. You?”

  “Fine.” He felt cool, gentle fingers grip his chin and tilt it back slightly. “Can you open your eyes?”

  Oh. Were they closed? Cooper blinked them open and felt his right eye immediately start streaming tears as steel needles masquerading as sunlight shot through his cornea.

  “Fuck!” He closed them again and felt Park’s fingers delicately trace his socket, brow and cheekbone. They felt cold and wet.

  “I don’t think anything’s broken, but you’re bleeding and could be concussed,” Park said. “We need to get you to the hospital.”

  “No!” Cooper groaned against his own arm. “No more doctors.”

  “You lost consciousness.”

  “Didn’t. I was just closing my eyes,” he muttered. Park was silent. “I can sense your disapproval from here. Surely that means I’m not concussed.”

  “You’d have to be dead not to.” Park sighed, but he was already resigned. He’d seen just how much Cooper hated hospitals this last time around and wasn’t going to force him to one now. “We can have Mai check you out first, but if she finds something—”

  “She won’t. Besides evidence of the three heart attacks I just had. One for every time you—Boogie!” His eyes shot open again, the pain was still there but not as bad this time, just general burning and irritation. And tears. A lot of tears.

  “She’s fine,” Park said.

  “Oh, so you speak cat now?” Cooper’s shaking fingers undid the latch. Eleven pounds of animal shot out in a streak. Her fur was standing completely on end, and she launched herself off of Cooper’s chest and into the back seat, managing to claw through his coat and into his skin in three different places on her way.

  “Jesus!” Cooper said, twisting to look back at her, but she’d already disappeared into the trunk and seemed to be sprinting around and scratching the shit out of their bags. “That’s gratitude for you. Are you sure she’s okay?”

  “Yes, she’s safe in the carrier and the crash wasn’t that bad. The airbags didn’t even go off.” Park frowned. “If you had been wearing your seat belt properly and not sharing it with the cat, you wouldn’t have gotten hurt, either.” He looked seriously annoyed, as if someone was going to dock him points in a driving test.

  Cooper grinned at the thought and another slightly hysterical laugh escaped his throat. The adrenaline was still pumping through him, and now that his head fog was clearing, he had the overwhelming desire to get out of the car. The seat belt resting against his chest might as well have been choking him. He undid the belt, fumbled with the door handle and tumbled out into the snow, legs shaky.

  The car was tilted slightly into a ditch at the bottom of a hill. Around them were dozens of young pines, small enough not to crowd one another but large enough to do damage if they had hit one. The awareness of his own aliveness surged through him again, and Cooper had to resist the urge to start running. Only his brace stopped him. He hadn’t felt this awake in months. He was as keyed up as Boogie. The thought of them scampering around in the trunk together made him laugh again.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Park said, getting out of the car as well and crouching to peer underneath it. “You’ve been giggling way more than usual for our near-death experiences.”

  “Yeah, fine.” Park was right. But it was different. Hurtling toward death in a car as opposed to facing off with any number of deranged killers they’d chased over their partnership. All that fear with no opportunity for fight or flight, Cooper supposed. “I guess that’s what happens when I’m in a jam and there’s nothing I can do but sit back and watch you kick death in the teeth. See anything?”

  “The whole underbelly’s too torn up to tell anything now.” Park stood and came to stand by Cooper. “It’s not uncommon for the salt to corrode the brake lines up here. But I’m surprised the rental company wouldn’t check them regularly. And weird that the emergency brake line was out, too,” he muttered, looking thoughtfully at the car.

  “Lucky you knew what to do.” Cooper ran a hand up Park’s arm to the back of his neck and tugged him closer until he stumbled and his weight pinned Cooper against the car. “That was some pretty impressive driving back there.”

  “I wasn’t going to let you get out of meeting my family quite that easily.” He shrugged, but there was the slightest shake to his voice and an intensity in his eyes that wasn’t all coming from their switch to a glowing, inhuman gold.

  Cooper thought he wasn’t the only one still caught in the whirlpool of an adrenaline rush. He reached up to touch Park’s face, smoothing out the worry lines. “Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked.

  “As good as ever.” Park kissed Cooper’s fingertips as they passed over his mouth. “Perfect.”

  “Well, make up your mind. It can’t be both.”

  Park nipped at his fingers, catching them between his teeth for a moment. He held Cooper’s gaze, sucked two slightly into his mouth, then released t
hem.

  “Hmm.” Now it was Cooper’s voice that shook. He rested his fingers against Park’s lower lip and traced the outer seam. The cold air stung where it hit wet skin. “I guess we should call a tow, huh? Although, to be honest, with the high I’m coming off of, I could probably push the car all the way to town.” He didn’t add with my dick because he wasn’t totally crude, but Park smirked knowingly anyway and licked the tips of Cooper’s fingers, the bastard.

  “Good luck getting a signal out here. We’ll need to fetch help the old-fashioned way.”

  “Yelling?” Cooper guessed as he looked around. Old-fashioned was right. They might as well have driven off the modern map and landed in a prehistoric ice age. There was no sign of human life. He couldn’t even see the road from this angle.

  “I’ll walk to town and bring help,” Park was saying. “It shouldn’t be farther than ten miles. I might even get a couple bars of service closer than that.”

  Cooper blinked rapidly and dropped his hand. “You’ll—While I do what, pray tell? Sit around here awaiting your return and composing a ballad on your bravery?”

  “I mean, whatever strums your mandolin.” Park waggled his eyebrows. “There’s no point in us both going.”

  “Except I don’t really want to hang out on the frozen tundra wondering if you’ll come back and drawing straws with Boogie on who eats who first.”

  Park laughed. “You think I’ll leave you out here?”

  Cooper looked around them again. “Of course not. But the guidebook said...” He trailed off, embarrassed. “Well, what about safety in numbers? I don’t want us doing anything...dangerous.”

  Park tilted his head. “You’re constantly rushing headfirst into the clutches of psychopaths and murderers. I just listened to you cackle your way through a potentially fatal car accident. You like danger.”

  Cooper protested, but Park cut him off. “Please. Don’t try to deny it. You were practically humping me a minute ago. You get off on this shit. So don’t tell me you’re scared of being alone in nature for an hour.”