VIOLET

“So, knock on wood…” I paused to knock a few times on the polished wood grain dashboard of my car. “…looks like I’ll be there soon.”

“Okay. You’re good, right?” Janet asked.

After switching the call to hands-free mode, I placed the cell on my lap while I dug in my purse for my wallet.

“Yeah. I’m good,” I replied, plucking out a credit card. “If I don’t run into any more traffic stops or accidents, I should be there in under two hours. I just stopped to get gas at…hmm, looks like a truck stop.”

I could hear my friend fumbling with her bakery supplies in the background. I knew she had a big order coming up and I didn’t want to be a nuisance any longer. She had graciously agreed to let me stay at her house for a couple weeks while I sorted out my messy life away from my parents and especially the ex-fiancé who just wouldn’t take a hint.

“Did you say a truck stop?” Janet squawked. “Where the heck are you?”

I looked out through my windshield just as a couple of big rigs pulled into the large lot, bringing a wave of thick exhaust with them.

“Apparently, in the middle of Podunk, Minnesota,” I told her, getting out of the car with my credit card and cell phone in hand.

There was a piece of masking tape pasted over the credit card slot that read ‘Cash Only’. I blew outward in a huff. “Ugh, I’m having such bad luck. They don’t accept credit cards here.”

“Oh jeez,” Janet grumbled. “Why the hell did you stop there? Don’t they have a QT or anything?”

“What the hell is a QT? My GPS said it was the only gas station less than a mile off the interstate. I didn’t want to waste time and it’s going to be getting dark soonish.”

“Well, what did the exit sign say exactly?”

“Arrow Lake, twenty-one miles. I can see the tops of the mountains from here though. It’s so beautiful,” I said.

“Ah, I think I know just about where you are. You made good timing.”

“I was high-tailing it. Let’s just hope I don’t get caught up in a speed trap when I get back on the road.”

Door chimes rang through on the other end of the line and Janet began speaking to someone in the background. She started talking prices and custom orders, so I figured she was busy with a customer. While she tended to her business, I took the call off hands-free mode, opened the passenger side door of my car, and grabbed enough cash from my wallet to fill up the tank.

“You still there?” Janet asked.

“Yeah. Anyway, I just called to tell you that I’ll be there soon. I don’t want to keep you on the phone any longer now that you’ve got customers.”

“It’s okay. I’ve got my headset on. They’re browsing my catalog right now. If you get to my house before I do, you remember where I told you I put my spare key, right?”

“I do. Thanks, Janet. I really appreciate this.”

“No problem, Violet. I can’t wait until you get here. I took a couple days off so we could hang out like old times.”

“Aww, you didn’t have to do that.”

“Trust me. I needed the time off,” she said.

“Okay, so I’ll see you in about two hours.”

After ending the call, I threw my cell inside the console, locked my car door, and headed into the store to pay for the gasoline. The inside of the establishment smelled like cigarette smoke and dirty mop water. I walked quickly to the register.

“Twenty-five dollars on pump number three, please,” I said, placing some bills in the metal tray on the counter.

The woman behind the dirty plastic panel grabbed the money and said, “You’re good,” and then she picked up a book and leaned back in her chair.

As I made my way across the lot again, a gray van pulled up behind my little sedan. Curious as to why they pulled up so close to my car bumper, I glanced toward the windshield. Two grown men sat inside and were staring back at me. I thwarted my attention back to my objective, which was filling my tank and getting the hell out of Podunk.

I never thought I’d be in the situation to begin with, running away from my hometown because I couldn’t bear to be there anymore. I couldn’t stand the looks I got or the rising suspicions about why I broke off my engagement from one of the wealthiest bachelors in town. Everyone expected me to play a part—a role I didn’t want—and I had failed them.

The gas valve shut off with a thud. I put the spout back in the cradle, screwed the cap back on, and closed the cover.

Just as I was getting ready to turn around, a pair of arms wrapped around me, and I felt myself being lifted and hauled off.

I screamed and thrashed against the thick, massive arms holding me. During my struggles, I saw the side of the gray van and then the back of it. My captor threw me on the inside where I landed hard on my side. Another scream ripped from my throat, but my call for help was cut off when the masked man slammed the door shut.

Panting hard, I scrambled across the metal surface and beat on the doors.

“Let me out!”

The van lurched forward violently, causing me to land flat on my ass. The inside cargo area was dark and I could barely see a few feet in front of me. Aside from some pieces of metal scraps on the floor, there was nothing.

“Oh my God,” I breathed. This wasn’t happening.

I’d heard the news stories before about young women kidnapped and murdered by serial killers, but I never thought something like this could happen to me. This had to be a joke. Some sick joke. Had Donovan set me up for this? I knew my ex-fiancé claimed that he’d do anything to get me back, but this…this was going overboard.

Unable to get my bearings in the fleeing van, I crawled on all fours to the front of the van and started beating on the inside panel.

“Please. Let me out. You’ve got the wrong person.”

There were two men. I could hear them speaking gruffly through the thin panel separating them from me. Probably the same two men that stared me down as I pumped gas. They ignored my cries and pleas, turning up the volume on the radio. I fought endless, trying to find a way to escape. There was only one way out of the van, and that was through the back. The handles didn’t give way when I tugged them every which way. I even threw my weight against the back doors, praying that I wouldn’t roll out onto the highway and get run over by a car.

I screamed for help until my throat was dry and raw. It even hurt to swallow. I lost track of how much time passed but based on the roughness of the ride, I could tell we had moved off the main highway onto an uneven surface.

The van stopped and I scrambled away from the door. My hand brushed against some of the scrap metal on the floor and I wrapped my fingers around a thick piece. The sharp object pierced my skin, but the pain seemed pale in comparison to what would happen to me if I didn’t fight back.

When the men opened the door, I charged forward with the sharp metal weapon in hand and slammed into the bigger of the two men. He grunted once when my elbow came down on his head, and then we went crashing to the ground. Like a wildcat determined to break free, I jabbed at his face with the sharpest end of the metal. He shielded his face with his forearms, but I straddled his chest and stabbed him repeatedly with the weapon. He screamed in agony.

The second man grabbed me from behind and threw me across the ground. I landed against a thick shrub and the bloody vines punctured the exposed parts of my forearm.

“That stupid cunt!” The man who I had scratched up something terrible cursed and sprang up from the ground.

There was a deep gash on his eyelid and his bottom lip was split open.

“Just let me go, you son of a bitch,” I screamed, my anger taking control of me.

He charged for me again. My fingers wrapped around a hard object—a rock. On instinct, I hurled the thing at his face. I was a lousy throw, so of course, the rock missed his face but socked him square in the left shoulder.

“You…” He spat and continued coming at me. He bent down and grabbed me up with one hand and slammed me into the trunk of a tree. The growl that escaped his mouth terrified me to my core. His eyes looked like a wild animal’s. His lips were set in a nasty snarl. He loosened his hold on my chest only to wrap his fingers around my throat.

“Stop! You can’t kill her,” the second man warned.

“Please…” I sputtered as I felt the light leaving me.

“You’ll pay tonight for what you did to me,” he taunted.

“Please don’t hurt me,” I pleaded.

A shiny black high-end luxury vehicle pulled up behind the van. The man released his hold on my neck and stepped back a bit. The snarl was gone from his face, replaced by a more neutral expression. The abrupt change in circumstances gave me a moment to process my surroundings, despite how late it had gotten. I realized that I’d probably been in the van for longer than I realized. It was now dark outside. I was in a small clearing in the woods, surrounded by trees and scary looking men.

Two men exited the black vehicle that drove up and two others emerged from between two trees.

“I told you to bring a human woman to me unspoiled.” This statement came from the man who had emerged from the passenger’s side of the black car.

The man who I had attacked took a step back and bowed his head. “My apologies, alpha. This one has a lot of fight in her.”

Alpha? I looked between the men, confused and dazed.

“A lot of fight, huh?” the alpha exclaimed, a sinister grin marking his face. “Did you cover your tracks?”

“Yes, alpha. We caught her unawares and snatched her from a rest stop. She’s a traveler. License plate says Wisconsin. Green Bay area. No one saw us,” my attacker replied.

“Are you sure?” the alpha leered.

There was a pause and then one of them replied, “Yes, alpha.”

“Very good.”

“Please,” I pleaded. “This is all a misunderstanding, I think. I don’t know who you men are. I didn’t do anything wrong. I’m just passing through. I want to go home.”

The one called alpha laughed. “You can’t go home, little human. This is our lottery and you’ve just won.”

“Lottery? What do you mean? I don’t understand.”

“It’s not for you to understand. We’re going to play a game. You have one objective and that is to run. Run as fast as you can. You might be able to get away.”

“And…a-and if I don’t?” I stuttered.

“We’ll take turns breeding you,” he stated flatly and then began taking off his clothes. “You won’t get away, by the way. We didn’t drag you all the way out here, showing our faces so that you could get away. No, little human. That’s not how the lottery works.”

“I don’t want to play the lottery,” I mumbled, shaking my head.

They laughed.

“Let me go. I won’t remember your faces,” I begged.

From the way he grinned mercilessly as I pleaded with him, I knew he wasn’t going to let me go. He stuck his chest out like he was proud for making me fear him. I noticed that he had a distinct tattoo on his upper left chest—a solid black star inside of a circle. He was right. I wouldn’t forget his disgusting face. The other men followed the alpha’s lead. They had the same mark—a star in a circle.

Horrified and frozen to the spot by fear, I looked on in disbelief. Was this some sick cult? Did I hit my head on something and lose my damn mind?

Two of the naked men kneeled down on all fours, arching their backs, and twitching until both of them started sprouting fur. My hand went to my mouth as I cried out in shock.

“You’ve heard of wolf shifters before, haven’t you?” the alpha asked, with the fully turned wolves flanking him.

I had.

“Well, the legends are true…” he drawled.

I had thought it was a myth until I graduated high school when news media and other sources began talking about the supernatural beings more and more.

I started to back up, but the alpha closed in on me.

“That’s right, little human. That’s what we are. You’re going to help us with a little problem.”

“What little problem?”

“You’ll know soon enough. Run, little human. Run.”

When the alpha dropped to the ground and bones started cracking and shifting, I didn’t wait for his wolf to emerge. I took off blindly through the forest.

I had nowhere to go. Nowhere to run. But I ran like the devil was after me. I’d been given no choice.