Initiation (Wolf Blood Academy Book 1) by RaShelle Workman (best book club books for discussion txt) 📕

telling me not to let him get the best of me. For the test, he was an enemy, but it felt more significant than that. I was so much more than our bond founded in blood. He was good looking, and he seemed nice. Beyond that, I didn’t know him. He meant nothing to me.

I can’t, I said and turned, leaping off the cliff and hoping I hadn’t just made the worst mistake of my life.

Chapter Fifteen

Wyatt

When Diana jumped off the cliff, she took a part of me with her. I rushed to the edge to verify she landed in the water. When I saw she did, I waited for her head to bob up. Wolves were good swimmers. It was innate in us. But she didn’t appear. Knowing her body would float downstream, I took off that direction, passing a confused Billie, and kept going until I was down the mountain and along the water’s edge.

Thoughts swirled through my mind. Had I killed Diana after all? Had it always been her fate to drown?

I didn’t want to believe—even though it freaked me out that she had a monster ghost within her, even though she talked to one of them, and even though she was a silver wolf—none of that mattered as long as she was okay.

Truth be told, I’d always believed the monsters of the Shade were so much more than vicious killers. When I trained to be a Rasa Keeper, they’d taught us differently, but I just knew that wasn’t true. Because how could our blood be descended from them, and they not be smart and able to think? What I’d seen between Diana and the monster she called Kya proved what I’d known.

That didn’t change the fact that I was freaking out. Plus, there was guilt. I’d killed one of the monsters in cold blood to prove myself even though I knew it was wrong.

When I reached the edge of the stream, I kept watching for her. The stream moved quickly, and I raced down to the end where there was a waterfall, hoping to catch her before she fell over.

“Diana!” I shouted her name every so often, desperate for her to hear me and tell me where she was. There was a part of me that wondered if she’d slipped from my view and crossed the river. She could be long gone. What would she do? Become part of the Shade—a monster like those that lived here.

No one else heard her, but I did, and I figured it was because of our blood bond.

As I continued to search the water and the shore for Diana, I debated what was wrong between us. Usually, a blood bond was like an aphrodisiac for the mind and body of those connected. At least that was what I’d been told. Plus, I’d seen it many times. In human form, the two bonded could barely keep their hands off each other, let alone be separated for long.

Sometimes I got the feeling Diana felt that way, but mostly she seemed on the verge of not interested. It was difficult because I had to continually make an effort not to touch her. If she wasn’t around, then she was in my thoughts. Hell, I even dreamed about her.

According to family and friends and even schoolbooks, that was how it should be. Yet, like everything else with Diana, it was different. I wished there was someone I could talk to about what was happening between us. Before, when it was my pack and me, talking to them would have been a no brainer. Sure there would’ve been copious amounts of teasing, but in the end, they would’ve offered me an opinion I could trust and use.

Since they became part of the Rasa Keepers, we were no longer in a pack. They were part of the warrior pack, and I was alone. Except I shouldn’t be. With the blood bond, I should never feel alone.

Up ahead, near the falls, I saw something floating in the water. Diana! I shouted her name in my head, demanding she hear me, but there was no movement.

The closer we got to the falls, the louder they became, so it was like a constant roar drowning out everything else. All of my senses were focused on helping Diana, and I jumped into the water, paddling over to her. She was shifted back into her human form, her body bobbing in and out of the water, her long blond hair dragging out behind her like silk.

The water was moving much faster than I expected. When I reached her, I shifted. “Diana,” I said, doing the gentlemanly thing and doing my best not to look at her naked body. She was glorious, and my body tightened at the sight of her. Grounding my teeth together, I shoved the lust away and rolled her onto her back, then put an arm across her chest and worked to swim us both back to shore.

Pretty quickly, I realized the current was too strong, and we were going to go over. When we got close, I pushed Diana away so I wouldn’t hurt her with a stray arm or leg.

The sound was so loud, the roaring seemed to be coming from inside my head, and we went over. For a brief moment, I had a feeling of elation. There was something about falling that sent a rush of adrenaline through my body. When I hit, it stung my body like a thousand hot needles. The water pushed me down, and I worked to find Diana and swim out. Away from the falls, the water was cold and still. I found Diana. She was coughing and sputtering. With a massive sigh of relief, I swam over to her.

“It’s okay,” I called out to her.

She quickly faced me, her light blue eyes studying me. “How did you get here?” she asked, working on getting to the edge.

I grabbed hold of her arm. Now that I knew she was safe,