Amber Silverblood: Silverpack

Chapter Twenty Four

When I woke up, Stark was standing at the foot of my bed.

"How do you feel?" he asked, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. His voice was soft, brooding.

I took a quick inspection of my body. "A lot better," I answered. "It even..." I pulled my lip back to show my regrown tooth.

Stark nodded in satisfaction and made for the door. "Come to the living room when you're ready. You've probably got questions, and I think you deserve some answers."

"All right," I agreed. "What about you? How do you—"

Without a word, Stark left the room and closed the door behind him.

"... feel?"

I sighed. I assumed he would feel better by morning. Victor may be a jerk, but his insults had never done more than annoy me. I mean, when you have to choose between being made fun of by someone and having them fire a magic laser at your face, being made fun of doesn't really sound so bad, does it? It didn't look like Stark shared my philosophy, though.

Great, I thought, groaning as I sat up in bed. Well, better go see what he...

"Amber?"

I froze, one foot on the floor and one still in bed, and looked over to see Kimberly turn over in bed to look at me.

"Uh... hey," I said more timidly than I liked, fighting the urge to pull my exposed foot back into bed. I knew it was stupid, but I suddenly couldn't shake the image of her pouncing out of bed and biting my poor toes off. "How do you feel?"

"Tired," she answered, her voice groggy.

I nodded like I understood, even though I really didn't. The ramidreju pills should have cured everything that was wrong with her, right? If so, why would she still be tired? I wasn't tired. Then again, she was awake, so it had obviously done something.

"You should probably go back to sleep, then," I said. I felt bad for trying to brush her off like this, but my unreasonable fear of her was still there. I couldn't just ignore it, but if she left me alone maybe I could ignore Kimberly.

Kimberly wasn't having any of that, though.

"I remember you trying to teach me how to change," she said, sitting up as well.

I bit my lip, but forced myself to stay calm. Meanwhile, my wolf was going ballistic inside of me. It wasn't that Kimberly was an alpha, she was more than an alpha. She was, like, an alpha-alpha, if something like that even existed. She was stronger than I was. She was stronger than I could ever be.

And she hated me.

"I don't remember anything after that," she went on. "But I remember what I felt. I... got big, didn't I?"

I sucked in a breath. What "Yeah. Yeah, you did."

What did I do? If I reminded her what happened, would that make her change again? Sunlight was coming through my window blinds. Could she even do it without moonlight?

Kimberly looked away, like she was embarrassed. "I... haven't been very nice to you, have I?"

Now that was a question I hadn't been expecting.

"You, um," I stuttered. Well, crap. How did I answer that? Did I answer truthfully and risk pissing off the girl who could turn into a giant wolf? Or did I lie to her face, and risk pissing off the girl who could turn into a giant wolf? Was there an option that didn't end with pissing off the girl who could turn into a giant wolf?