Chasing Her Tail by Katie Allen Read Free Book Online Page A

woods and head to her car.
    Retreating back into the trees, she turned and headed west, parallel to the parking lot. Although the route through the woods wasn’t the most direct way to Bridget’s house, it was probably the safest. Any chance of driving home was quashed when she remembered that her clothes were in a heap somewhere in the parking lot. She was pretty sure that even if she was able to change back into her normal shape, it would definitely be a naked shape, and that would attract way too much unwanted attention, as well as being extremely embarrassing. She might give the elderly taxi patron a heart attack.
    The trees were thin enough for her to trot along at a good pace and Bridget enjoyed the easy stretch and flex of her muscles. When she’d tried to jog in the past, she’d been wheezing and gasping before she’d gone half a block. As a dog, she felt as if she could maintain this pace for hours. She wondered if any muscle she gained would stay with her when she shifted back to her human form— if she could shift back.
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    The thought sobered her, made her wonder what she was doing, thinking about such trivial things. She needed to make a plan.
    A plan for what? she wondered. She decided figuring out how to turn back into a person would be a good start. After that, maybe she could find a way to get rid of this turning-into-a-dog disease for good.

    “You what ?”
    At the sight of his nephew’s bloodless lips and wide, stricken eyes, Micah squeezed his eyes shut, clamped his molars together until they squeaked, took a breath and counted to ten. Then he counted to twenty.
    He was on fifty-eight when Sam spoke.
    “I’m sorry.” The little boy spoke on the inhale in a sort of whispered gasp, a sound that mixed a good chunk of guilt in with the utter horror that had swamped Micah.
    “We talked about this,” Micah finally gritted out, totally at a loss with where to start, how to impress upon Sam the magnitude of what he’d done, the complete wrongness of it. The shock of finding out was still reverberating through Micah—how was he supposed to explain to a six-year-old? “Over and over. You know better!” Micah shut his mouth with a snap, cutting off the torrent of words about a ruined life and the painful reality of consequences when he saw the huge, unblinking eyes glistening with pooled moisture, those white lips shaking with potential tears. Sammy hardly ever cried.
    “Shit,” Micah muttered, which just added to his guilt.
    “I’m sorry.” The first word was whispered and the second inaudible as the first tears overflowed and trickled down his face.
    Micah sat down on the kitchen floor, feeling as if the weight of his own body was too much to support, and slumped against the island counter. Tipping his head back, he stared at nothing and tried to figure out what to do.
    Staring at his uncle, Sam’s silent tears turned to sobs and Micah focused on him.
    Reaching out an arm, Micah tugged the little boy onto his lap. Sam burrowed into his chest, crying harder.
    “It’ll be okay, Sammy,” Micah sighed, rubbing a hand over the boy’s thin, shaking back. “I’ll fix this.” Even as he said it, Micah realized that he had no idea how the fuck to even start.

    Huh.
    Bridget sat between two of her lilac bushes, totally stumped. What now?
    She’d slipped through the woods, darting through the occasional clearing or across a street if she’d been forced. When she’d reached her neighborhood, she’d twisted between houses, moving from hiding place to the next sheltered spot a few feet closer to her own home.
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    It had even started being fun, a game of hide-and-seek, and Bridget had tested out her new body. How high could she jump? Over the chain-link fence? No problem. The eight-foot wooden wall, however, had led to an inelegant scramble at the top and a breath-stealing thump of a landing on the other side. Of all her new skills, her favorite part was how she felt like