I'm Not Afraid of Wolves (The Cotton Candy Quintet Book 4) by Erin Hayes Read Free Book Online Page B

basement. “It’s me!” I yelled, a little too gruffly. “Let me in!”
    I heard a scuffle on the other side before the door inched open and Andrea’s wide, frightened eyes peered at me. “Christine?” she stammered. “Are you okay? Who’s that? And why are you naked ?”
    Damn.
    I’d forgotten to put my clothes back on. It was amazing what adrenaline and fear could do to make you forget about everyday conveniences. Like clothes. From the moment I dropped the park ranger with a rock, my only objective was to get back to the basement and get everyone out of here.
    I didn’t even think about the clothes that were at my feet.
    “This is Officer Donnelly,” I said, nodding towards the unconscious man whose arm I had slung about my shoulders. As if that explained anything. “And I’m naked because…”
    My voice trailed off because I had no idea how to finish that statement. Thankfully, the door flew open and Sara launched herself at me, sobbing big tears. I let go of the park ranger and held my sister for a second.
    “Christine!” she cried. “I thought you’d—you’d…”
    “I’m fine,” I told her quickly. “Let’s get him inside and we need to figure out where his truck is. We don’t have much time.”
    She helped me drag him into the basement, and just before we shut the door, I grabbed my clothes. Everyone had gotten a pretty good look at me so far, but I wasn’t going to spend the rest of the night without clothes on. A girl had to have priorities.
    Emily was still lying on the couch, unconscious. I hoped she would be all right. But that also meant that we had two people who were otherwise unable to move at the moment.
    I grabbed a roll of paper towels from the sink and started dabbing at anything that was bleeding on me. I doubted there was a first aid kit down here, so the best that I was going to be able to do was clean up my wounds. I couldn’t see out of my right eye too much, but I thought it was fine.
    So much for keeping my favorite dress clean.
    “What’s that park ranger doing here?” Andrea said.
    “I think he’s with them,” I said as I snapped my bra into place and pulled my dress over it. “I caught him outside in the woods.”
    “With who ?” Andrea demanded, at the same time Sara asked, “What were you doing out in the woods ?”
    “The werewolves,” I explained quickly.
    “ Werewolves?” Andrea exclaimed.
    “And I chased the werewolves out into the woods, Sara,” I continued, my single-track mind moving a million miles a minute. “Andrea, do you have anything to tie him up with down here? Like rope or duct tape?”
    “Werewolves?” she repeated.
    “Duct tape, Andrea!”
    She gave herself a visible shake. “There’s duct tape in that drawer.” She pointed to the cabinets. I opened it and rummaged through it. Luckily, I found an almost-complete roll of the silver tape. Perfect. I was going to use all of it to tie him up. I wasn’t taking any chances.
    “Christine, what’s going on?” Sara asked. “How did you chase them out in the woods?”
    I sat Officer Donnelly up and pulled his arms behind his back. He was so muscular, his triceps nearly got in the way of me binding his wrists. I didn’t want to think about how nice and strong and attractive those arms were. Especially now.
    “I think they’re circling back,” I said, “and—”
    “ How did you chase them ?” Sara asked. She stopped. “I mean, there were lots of wolves.”
    “I caught them by surprise.” I knew, fleetingly, that the jig was up.
    Sara swallowed. “You’re one of them.”
    I stopped wrapping the tape around the park ranger’s wrists and sighed. “Not exactly,” I said at length.
    But it was too late. I saw the terror in Sara’s face, the betrayal that she thought that I was one of the monsters that was hunting her. It was true that I was a monster, but I wasn’t one of these monsters. And I had to make her see that. I had to make both of them see that.
    Andrea’s