Forbidden by Cathy Clamp Page A

he’d explained the rules?
    Pushing harder to reach town before night completely stole her vision, she made her tired muscles move faster, forced her burning lungs to pull in even more air as the town began to appear in the distance.
    â€œ Ten … nine … eight … seven…”
    The sound, distant but pure, filled the still air. It was a chorus of voices, young and old, male and female. It was a happy sound, like at the celebrations for the New Year.
    â€œ Six … five … four…”
    The wall of trees finally gave way to a wide clearing and Claire saw a crowd of people at the far end of town, gathered around a wooden stage. They were all looking at the speaker at a podium. “ Three … two … one! ”
    The man at the podium was the mayor and Claire felt her feet falter and slow. “That’s it!” he called out to the crowd. “The challenger has defaulted. Ascension is over and we have a new champion!” He held up the arm of a buoyant, wildly excited Rachel like she was the winner of a prize fight. A moment later she was accepting hugs and pats on the back from townspeople as she descended the stairs into their welcoming embrace.
    Claire’s mind buzzed and her stomach felt like she’d been punched. She’d missed it. She’d lost her first challenge in a new pack … by default . Claire felt her face begin to burn hot, partly from embarrassment and partly from sheer anger. Damn Alek! Damn him straight to hell! And damn her too, for believing that he would be honest and help her.
    She smelled him before she saw him race out of the woods just a few seconds behind her, but her inner wolf was too shaken to respond to the musky scent. “Claire … I—” He touched her shoulder, his scent a wet mix of sorrow and shame.
    Claire didn’t want to hear it or smell it. In fact, she wanted nothing to do with him. “Go to hell, Siska. Thanks for nothing.”
    She strode forward toward the crowd, head high and defiant, leaving him standing alone on the dirt road. She was ready to accept whatever humiliation the mayor and police chief were likely to heap on her.
    Rachel saw her first. She broke out from the crowd. Rather than the sly smile at her failure that Claire was expecting, the other woman’s expression flicked between horrified, terrified, and relieved. “Claire! Where in the world have you been? Are you okay? What happened?”
    Claire didn’t get a chance to open her mouth before the police chief chimed in. “What happened is she missed the challenge. So she lost the challenge. We take timeliness seriously around here, Miss Sanchez.”
    Someone shouted out from the crowd that began to gather around them, “You snooze, you lose, newbie!”
    It shouldn’t bother her—the visceral glee from the town at her humiliation—but she was accustomed to a more supportive pack. It was clear that she wasn’t going to be happy in Luna Lake. She’d do her job anyway, of course, but she didn’t see that she had to protect the person who was really at fault. “My so-called mentor ran off and left me in the woods. I couldn’t make it back in time. Congratulations, Rachel. You won fair and square.” She turned to the police chief, who was nearly salivating under watchful, predatory eyes. “So what happens now? Locked in a cage? Taking a strip of hide?”
    Rachel flinched visibly. She pulled Claire into a hug and whispered, close to her ear, “Not that, hon. Nothing like back then. It’s not so bad, being the Omega. You’ll get through it. It’s only a month and you’ve always been stronger than me. I’ve done it most of the time I’ve been here.” Rachel pulled back and gave Claire a shaky smile. It was clear she wanted to be happy she was no longer the Omega, but wasn’t happy enough to wish it on her