Hunt Me! (I Crave The Chase) - Page 198

I should’ve questioned why I was alive. How I was alive. But for the moment, I remained laser-focused on what was most important.

“Can we bargain?” I didn’t know what I could offer. “If he says no. Do we have something we could barter?”

“Not anything that he doesn’t already have,” Theo grunted sadly. “It’s a long shot. But since Harry and Jules got themselves captured, it’s up to us.”

“I better stay in the car,” Butters fretted from the front seat. “I’ll fuck it up.”

“No, you won’t.” Theo moved one of his hands from the steering wheel to the back of Butters’s neck. “I promise.”

“Okay—but—there’s a reason I haven’t been to any of the other meetings. He hates omegas.”

“I know.”

“And I just…did the thing that makes most people hate us.”

“I know.”

“I’ll fuck it up.”

“You won’t.”

Gravel crunched beneath the wheels. My head was spinning, and I leaned heavily against the cool glass, watching the trees whip by, my head full of cotton.

I need to save him.

“Tell me what to do,” I said, interrupting them. “Tell me and I’ll do it. Anything.”

“Just stand there and look pretty,” Theo laughed, eyes crinkling with affection as he peered at me in the rearview mirror. We were in Blair’s car. Which meant Theo and Butters’s car had gotten left behind.

Cramped in the back seat, I curled in on myself, focus fizzling in and out as I reached down and laid a hand over my chest. Where the gaping hole in my t-shirt sat. My clothes were still damp with blood, though it was tacky now—like it’d been hours since I’d been put down.

“How long do we have?” I asked, heart thumping.

“Three hours max,” Theo grunted.

“We had to drive around for a while to ditch the hunters.”

“Fuck.” I pulled the bullet hole in my t-shirt wider, staring down at my chest expecting the worst. I had no idea how I’d survived. At least—I didn’t—until I moved the fabric aside and saw the smooth flesh where a fatal wound had sat.

My head jerked up and I stared at the two wolves, head spinning. “What?—”

Butters smelled contrite, but proud too. “Look, I know this is gonna be super weird for you.”

“What did you do?” My heart thumped. So fucking loud. A rapid fluttering sound. “What did you?—”

“I didn’t have a choice,” Butters whined, his ears flattening. “It was turn you…or let you die.”

“Turn…me?” My voice was reedy soft. “But I thought—I didn’t—I mean. I didn’t think wolves could do that. Wolves are born. Not made.”

“Yeah…” Butters twisted to look at me, lavender eyes swimming with emotion. “It’s not exactly a normal thing to do? We’re not…supposed to do it. It’s against the rules. And there will be repercussions.”

“And you…” My head spun. “You did it anyway.”

“You’re Mutt’s mate,” Butters said simply, like that explained why he’d break the law for me. Why he’d betray their secret. Why he’d offer me this horrible, wonderful thing—this thing I hadn’t even known was an option. “I had no choice.”

I think…someone else would’ve been angry.

But I wasn’t someone else.