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the air that his assault deprived me of. I didn't understand what was going on. He looked feral, a shell of the Cooper I knew. He was growling at me with wild, unfamiliar eyes. I wasn't convinced that he was awake yet, as he clearly saw me as a direct threat and I needed to snap him out of it and fast. Peyta's safety was at risk, as well as her sanity. She didn't know that urban legends truly existed, let alone that she was shacked up with two of them for an undetermined amount of time.
    I thought about removing my ring for a second but realized that move could make things worse rather than better in a hurry. My wolf, Scarlet (as we'd come to name her), was a bit unpredictable at best. Instead, I saw a large hardcover book laying on the rug only a couple of feet away from me. Sprawling across the floor, I desperately reached for it as Cooper looked on. Once I had a good grip on it, I flung it frisbee-style directly at his head; I had impeccable aim as almost anyone would have at that close range.
    Bam, right in the dome piece!
    It knocked him backwards for a second, then he came up moaning while rubbing his forehead. He looked at me, crumpled over on the floor, gasping for air, and crawled to me instantly.
    “Ruby? Oh my God, Ruby! What happened? What did I do?” he whispered.
    “You…threw me…sack of potatoes,” I wheezed, slightly more able to breathe than before.
    “I thought you were…,” he said, cutting himself off.
    “What? Thought I was what?” I asked, hoping to finally get some answers out of him.
    “Never mind.”
    He helped me to sit up, then brushed my hair off of my face gently. Once I caught my breath enough, he helped me stand. He reached around the small of my back to do it, and I nearly screamed, my knees buckling with the pain.
    “I'm sorry! What did I do?” he asked, not knowing how to help.
    “My back. I think…I may have…broken ribs,” I said through gritted teeth.
    He delicately picked me up over his shoulder in a fireman's carry and took me to my room. As I looked up towards the living room, I saw no movement and heard nothing.
    That kid sleeps like the dead. Lucky for her.
    He put me down gently on the bed and sat behind me, pulling up my shirt enough to see what marks my injuries had left behind.
    “Whoaaaa! That's one helluva bruise, Ruby,” he said with surprise in his voice. “I'm so sorry, but you shouldn't sneak up on me like that.”
    “I didn't 'sneak' up on you. You were twitching and mumbling on the bed when I went in to talk to you. It was getting louder and scarier. I tried to wake you up,” I said as I shuffled over to my full-length mirror to assess the damage to my back.
    “Tried?” he asked.
    “Yeah, as in it wasn't working, so I shook you and kinda yelled your name in your ear. The next thing I knew, I was flying straight backwards at the door like I was bungee-corded to it,” I explained.
    “So I threw you into the door for no reason?” he said, sounding confused. There was a hint of disbelief in his expression.
    “Oh, I'm sure there was a reason, it's just not one I can fathom,” I said only half joking. “The scariest part was when you leapt over the bed, landed at my feet and growled at me. The lights were on but nobody was home, if you know what I mean.”
    He paled in an instant.
    “I was growling?” he asked quietly.
    “Yeah, why? You are a werewolf. It doesn't seem like a big stretch to me.”
    “It's not, but I only growl before I attack,” he said, before looking away from me. “Attack to kill, to be more precise.”
    It was my turn to go pale.
    “Oh.”

7

    After the last bit of information Cooper shared, he clammed up on me and wouldn't talk about anything else. He told me he needed to bail, and was going to go out for the rest of the night. He hugged me gingerly before he left my room; he hadn't done that in weeks, maybe months.
    I slept uncomfortably that night, trying to find a position that didn't irritate my back; it seemed