Willing Sacrifice by Cree Walker Page B

me sleep then kiss me goodbye. It was the same chair I sat in for nearly two days after he died.
    Sarah looked at the chair and sat up to better face me. "We miss him too."
    I nodded and entered the room of pale yellows and blues. It was like Jack was thinking of my hot temper when he chose the color palette. He was always trying to soothe something inside me that couldn't be tamed and it had nothing to do with being a wolf as much as it had to do with being like him.
    I looked at my closest friend in the world and asked the question that had been bothering me for months. "Sarah, how come I can't change into a wolf?"
    She froze while looking through one of the shopping bags of clothes and turned to face me again. "How long has it been?"
    I shrugged, "Since the last time Jack helped with it." It seemed that since I was so dominant, Jack was the only one who had ever been able to draw the wolf from me, but now he was gone, and I didn't know yet how to do it on my own, and I didn't think I ever would. This exact cause had been responsible for the death of a lot of teenage werewolves in the beginning of the war. My parents had targeted Alphas leaving the untrained teenagers to suffer once they were ready to join the pack’s ranks.
    Even the drug created when the war was at its worst had stopped working on me. It was a mild sedative with a bunch of other stuff thrown in. It had been made by the Born packs because of the fact that my parents were deliberately taking out pack Alphas, and it was the Alpha’s job to teach the young wolves how to make their first changes. I knew my wolf was there inside me, sleeping; but the only time I ever ran in my fur was in my dreams.
    Sarah looked worried for a moment but then sobered. "If you were to have died from it, it would have been long ago." She ran her hands over her jeans nervously. "We will figure it out, okay? Just don't tell anyone else." She nodded her head awaiting my agreement in the matter.
    I nodded and sat down next to her on the soft foam mattress then leaned over and rested my head on her shoulder. "I'm sorry I'm not the hero you guys need."
    "Hero's are all messed up, Sugar." She patted my head in a mothering way. "You're going to need to change that outfit in order to meet the Alpha."
    "Again, I don't see what the point is?" I held my hands out in frustration. I was getting tired of being called the ugly duckling.
    "The point, sweet girl, is that you are a former Alpha, posturing as a prospective girlfriend. You need to look less utilitarian and a little more... like a hooker."
    "How did you know about the undercover secret operation stuff?" I asked, surprised.
    She poked herself in the forehead and gave me a frustrated face. "Do I look dumb to you?" I shook my head no quickly because she looked mad. "No, not dumb," I agreed.
    "Good, go put on a mini skirt," She ordered with a serious expression.
    "You don't think that seems a little desperate?"
    "Honey, I am way beyond desperate." She tapped her chin and grabbed my hand. "I've got something you can wear."
     
     

 
    Chapter Eight

    Sarah was the type of girl who liked to shop even though most of her wardrobe never saw the light of day; she pretty much had it all. She disappeared inside her overflowing closet for a few minutes and I was about to send a search party into Narnia after her when she threw something through the portal, stuck her head out for a few good breathes of fresh air before going back in.
    I looked at what she had thrown out. It was the color and texture of a strawberry fruit roll-up and about the same size as well.
    She popped back out of her closet with an armload of clothes with the tags still on them.
    I held up the fruit roll-up skirt and shook my head.
    She snatched it away. "Oh, that's not for you, that’s for Kyle." She quirked her eyebrows and held it in front of herself. "I've been looking for this thing nearly as long as we've been looking for you."
    I nodded. "So what did you find for me