Wolf Ways (The Madison Wolves Book 9) by Robin Roseau Page A

darker.
    I wondered how well she saw in the dark. I bet it was a lot better than I did.
    It was only a couple minutes before she found me. I wasn’t surprised. She moved silently, or at least silently to my ears, but then suddenly a streak leapt past me on my right, and then there was a wolf skidding to a stop perhaps five paces in front of me. She spun around to face me, her mouth open and her tongue hanging out.
    I came to a stop, panting, and then leaned down with my hands on my knees, trying to catch my breath.
    I couldn’t recognize most of the wolves. They didn’t look identical. They weren’t even all the same color. Some were all black; some were almost entirely silver. There had been two that were pure white. The rest were some sort of patchwork colors. Both Elisabeth and Lara were largely silver with black streaks, although the patterns were quite different, and I could readily identify either of them. And Michaela, of course, was the only fox. Portia was almost the opposite color from Lara and Elisabeth. She was mostly black with wide streaks of silver.
    They were all gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous.
    This wolf was Elisabeth of course, and I found myself staring at her. She was just so stunning; I loved looking at her.
    “God, you’re beautiful,” I told her.
    She grunted agreement, but then she lowered herself a little bit in what was clearly a stalking posture and took a slow step towards me.
    “Do you have to touch me to catch me?” and she grunted. “You haven’t touched me.” She snorted that time. “Then, technically, you haven’t caught me.” And she grunted again before taking another slow, measured step.
    “Wait,” I said, and she froze. I pulled my phone out and made a point of stopping the timer. I held it out towards her. “Can you see? I stopped the timer.” A grunt. “If I run, you’ll still catch me.” She grunted several times. “And knock me over?” She grunted again. “Or I can just surrender.” She grunted.
    I cocked my head, and then, in something I always found amazing, she flowed from wolf to human, standing slowly. She stood in front of me, entirely naked, and it was as if it didn’t matter.
    “It’s your choice, Zoe,” she said. “If you run, it’s going to be a little rougher. I won’t hurt you, but the chances of bruises or sprained ankles is higher.”
    “What do you want?”
    “I want you to do what is natural to you. If you surrender, then you’re accepting one form of submission. If you run, well, it will still turn into submission, but it’s of another style. Michaela would run, and she makes it very, very hard to catch her. But we still catch her, at least sometimes, and we don’t hurt her when we do it. But I would be very, very surprised if you don’t scream.”
    I eyed her, and then she went on. “You’re not making a permanent decision. I’ll always do what I did now — run past you and give you the choice. But if you run now, then I’ll tackle you when I catch you. If you don’t run this time but submit, you can still run next time.”
    I nodded, then turned left and ran.
    I don’t know if I surprised her, but I imagined that I did. But it was only a moment later before I heard scrambling behind me, and a second or two later, I heard her as she leapt. I tried to duck to the right, hoping to evade her, but large paws wrapped around me from behind as a heavy, furry werewolf body slammed into my back.
    She bore me to the ground, but somehow she rolled us so when we landed, I was on top. I had a moment of glee and tried to take the advantage, but she was fast. Fast! And I found myself on my back with a very, very large wolf pressing me to the ground.
    My heart was pounding madly. It wasn’t fear, but I could feel the adrenalin slamming through my body. I tried scrambling away from underneath her, but she settled her weight more completely, panting down at me with her forelimbs pressing my shoulders and arms into the ground.
    I was reminded