Chapter 2

He leaps.

He leaps straight into me.

The air escapes my lungs and I fall with the wolf on the metal platform.

I groan as I duck away from the black wolf, but his massive body takes most of the space in the rather large boot. It's a metal box and is only one and a half by two meters long, big enough to keep a Brown bear and this wolf close in size, so not much space for me to move, let alone this wolf.

The wolf plops down, crushing me with his weight. He snuggles a bit to get more comfortable.

The pain long forgotten, he sniffs me, only moving his head.

I shift under him to turn and face him. He starts panting and wagging his tail, his tail hitting the metal walls with a rhythm.

I throw him a questioning look and didn't it expect when he suddenly starts licking my face. I squeal and giggle as he slobs me all over my face.

"So that's what you were trying to do," I continue squealing after talking to him through a fit of giggles.

I burst with laughter when he licks my ear, never slowing down. For a moment I thought he wanted to attack me, but all he wanted was to give attention. Strange for a wild wolf, though.

The ride comes to a halt and I want to shove the wolf off of me, but he is one big and strong being.

For a few minutes, I'm being licked and sniffed. The giggles don't stop since it's ticklish and I managed to slow him down a bit.

After another few minutes, while he is calmly breathing and stuffing his face in the crook of my neck, someone finally opens the door.

The wolf limps to a standing position facing the open door.

"You okay?" Demetri shoots me a worried look. I sit up in a position next to the standing wolf. He growls at the male dressed in white and without thinking I reach out to pet him.

Demetri's eyes grow wide and his face is covered in horror.

"We have to somehow get him inside so we can help him. He's already getting his energy back, so we should hurry before we can't control him," Zack pops out beside Demetri. I want to tell him he got his energy back for quite a while, but I know now's not the time for that kind of statement.

Instead, I nod my head and shuffle out of the car. As soon as I reach the edge of the boot the wolf growls even louder.

I turn around, my face not very far from the wolf's snout. He huffs in my face and I flinch.

"Eliah, hurry," Zack urges me on, but I shake my head. The wolf is for some reason provoked, so I can't just walk away and not expect to be without a scratch.

I see in the corner of my eye that Zack is reaching for my arm and in the next second, the wolf has jumped on me. It felt like I bumped my head, but I ignore it due to the situation. He keeps me under him while continuing to growl at the two men. Zack backs up and Demetri disappears behind the car door. When I move, the wolf will scratch his front paw as if pushing me backwards.

"Here!" Demetri emerges again and throws me an injection. It rolls to my side and I grab it with caution.

My heart rate picks up and I know the wolf senses it. Before he can figure out why I'm suddenly flooded with emotions, I pop the lid off and manoeuvre the needle into his skin.

He lets out a cry when I pull it out and I couldn't feel more guilty.

After a few seconds of wobbling, he crashes down on top of me. I cough up air and wriggle out from under him with the help of Zack and Demetri.

"What's this? I thought you wanna calm him, not sedate him," I shove the empty syringe into Demetri's face. He shrugs and I respond with a scowl.

"You gonna help carry or not?" is his only response to my threat.

Without giving me a chance to respond, he ushers oncoming assistants into the boot to carry the sleeping wolf out.

I heave a heavy sigh and lead the vets with the stretcher into the building after they placed him on top of it.

"ELIAH!" a voice interrupts my dream and I fly off the couch in shock.

"Stop screaming," I groan into my hands and then start rubbing my future bruise on my hip. Two times in one day, damn.

"Your friend's awake," Demetri informs me with a bored tone.

"Mr Wolf?" he continues in a playful tone when I don't respond. "It's already twelve o'clock. Stop sleeping."

"Yeah, well, I was catching up on some sleep after this morning. The extra hours I did cancels out the hours I spend sleeping," I finally answer him. I stumble and trip trying to stand up and I spread my body out on the floor, too tired to bother.

"The floor hasn't been washed today, you know," Demetri states with amusement and I bolt upright.

I dust myself off in every spot of my body and glare at a smirking Demetri.

I swirl around and out the door, leaving the waiting room and my annoying friend behind.

The white walls surround me as I walk down the hallway of rooms. When I see the door that leads to the animal patients, I pick up a jog.

I swing through the doorframe and almost fall over a plushie ripped inside out. While handing the purple bear back to his owner, a small Pomeranian, whimpering starts up.

Looking up, I see the wolf in the bear cage just outside the room, his torso wrapped in bandages and blood spots that seeped through have already dried.

With the number of bears we rescue, we eventually build a cage to keep them away from the other pets, until they're moved. Now, a large wolf is occupying the space. Although the cage is outside, it's attached to the back of the building, right next to the room full of waiting pets.

I skip over toys and beds, making my way to the cage. The wolf stands up and I'm surprised he's able to stand after that big surgery.

He nudges his snout between the bars and whines again. A soft laugh escapes my mouth and I poke his nose. He flinches backwards but nudges his face into the bars again.

"Boop," I fall over laughing as his reaction is exactly the same as the first time.

"Boop," this time I nudge him with my nose.

I smile when I see he didn't flinch but instead is whining for more.

"Boop."

"Boop."

"Boop."

I'm switching between my nose and my finger and having the time of my life. When I start poking his paws he raises them like a dog giving its paw and he falls over. He rolls around with his paws in the air and I can't help but laugh.

The next moment he tries to reach through the bars to my hands.

"You're pretty tame and comfortable for a wild wolf," he gets playful again at my observation and gives small yaps at the bars.

For the next few hours, I spend my time playing with the big black wolf.