“Deer for lunch again?” Ginger grumbled. Still, she was the first to shed her human clothes as we tumbled out of our two vehicles in the secluded pull-off a few miles into the national forest.
Of course, the trouble twin’s alacrity at disrobing might have been due to enthusiasm at the opportunity to parade around naked in front of our pack’s newest member once again rather than excitement at the prospect of yet another catch-your-own dinner. But who was I to complain about someone else’s overactive hormones when I couldn’t seem to get that absent uber-alpha’s amber eyes out of my mind?
Ginger appeared to be better at attracting her intended quarry than I was because Quill’s gaze immediately drifted south, caressing the trouble twin’s curvy form. But her prey’s attention didn’t remain riveted for more than a moment before he returned to fidgeting with the cell phone in his pocket.
“Are you sure we shouldn’t just stop at a sit-down restaurant along the way so we can get to our destination faster?” Quill asked after a moment of strained silence. “My treat.”
The rest of the pack paused in their pre-shift preparations, hungry eyes flicking between our newest member and my indecisive face. Their wolves were all wide awake now, and I saw Cinnamon lick his lips in an almost lupine gesture of anticipation. The trouble twin would be thrilled at the opportunity to order meat that came skinned and deboned, and I couldn’t really say I didn’t feel the same way. On the other hand, Quill had no idea how much food five young-adult shifters could eat if he thought his funds would hold up to many restaurant outings for the entire pack.
“That’s nice of you to offer,” I said, letting him down gently. “But it’s probably better to save that nest egg for when we really need it. Plus, look,” I added, gesturing at the nearby trees that displayed a browse line of absent greenery for the first six feet above the ground. “Any biologist will tell you that we’re doing our civic duty by filling in for absent predators and culling the local deer herd.”
“Yeah, that’s us, always looking out for the greater good,” Ginger murmured. I could tell she was more annoyed at Quill’s lack of attention to her naked body than at the lost restaurant opportunity, though, and I resolved to pull the young woman aside later and let her know that our newest pack member had asked after her. I suspected the cowboy shifter’s current lack of interest was just due to discomfort as he tried to fit into a new group rather than to actual apathy toward the young woman’s enticing assets.
But, for now, I decided it was better to get us all shifted and into the woods before the trouble twin in question got her panties into any more of a twist...and before a state trooper came along and decided to investigate half a dozen naked young people standing by the side of the road. “Quill?” I asked when the cowboy shifter continued to hesitate.
“Just a minute,” he said, averting his eyes in what might have been submission or was perhaps just continued discomfort. “I’d planned to meet up with a friend when we hit town and I need to push back our appointment....”
His voice trailed off and I shrugged. Hopefully whoever he was texting wouldn’t be too annoyed at being blown off. No point in our newest member breaking off all ties with the outside world as he started a fresh existence as part of our pack.
He’s not a perfect fit, my wolf whispered in the back of my mind, interrupting the moment. She seemed obsessed with square pegs and round holes these days, but I was less concerned than the wolf was about this slight chink in Quill’s usually courtly armor. It wasn’t as if the rest of my pack mates had instantly fallen into line when we set off on the road together either.
Just a week ago, in fact, Ginger had insisted in arguing against every single suggestion I made. And now...okay, so the trouble twin still argued against every suggestion I made. But I’d gotten used to her quirks, just as Quill would get used to the workings of our found family. My comrades and I weren’t quite as civilized as the average werewolf clan, maybe, but we had each other’s backs.
The thought prompted me to scan the parking area and check on the state of everyone else’s shifts. As young as Lia was and a halfie to boot, it wouldn’t have surprised me if the girl needed help with her second human-to-wolf transformation of the day. But the kid seemed to be doing okay, even though she’d staked out a spot on the far side of the car rather than joining the rest of us in our little huddle.
I raised my eyebrows in question as I watched the naked girl slowly sprout fur. In reply, she shot a glance toward Quill by way of explanation. Yeah, the teenager probably had a point, I thought as I pursed my lips and nodded. No reason to flaunt her nubile but unavailable body in front of a shifter who hadn’t yet entirely fallen in with our pack’s casual approach toward nudity.
Speaking of casual, there was such a thing as being too casual. Ginger—who I knew for a fact could shift at the drop of a hat—was still hovering a hair’s breadth away from the cowboy shifter, her two-legged form twisting and turning as she tried in vain to capture the latter’s attention.
I rolled my eyes and removed the sword I’d been wearing ever since that morning’s altercation, stuffing the sheathed weapon behind the back seat for safekeeping. I felt oddly naked without the blade, my still-present clothes making no impression when I lacked anything pointy and sharp with which to defend myself.
You have me, promised my wolf, wide awake now that the prospect of finally donning her favored fur form was at hand.
Sure, I soothed her. Like every other shifter, I felt the pull of being four-legged deep within my bones after staying human for so long. But in my case, the attraction was always tempered by the reality of being saddled with a woefully weak wolf.
Our pack is strong, my wolf promised me. And I’ll do whatever you say.
Of course she’d do what I said. That was the entire problem with our partnership in a nutshell—lack of leadership potential on the wolf’s part.
Still, I quickly kicked off my shoes, then folded jeans and undies and tossed the whole pile of clothing onto the back seat with the rest of my pack’s apparel. Finally, taking a deep breath, I rejoined the other shifters—half of us already four-legged and the rest, even Quill, now naked.
Everyone except Ginger appeared calm and collected as the onset of our hunt rapidly approached. Lia had padded around to join us and was now tussling with Cinnamon on the ground, the larger wolf letting our youngest member win despite her youthful lack of muscles. In contrast, Glen stood poised in lupine form, waiting for Quill to fall onto four legs before he relaxed his guard.
And Ginger...Ginger was advancing on me with eyes flashing even as she slid covert glances at the cowboy shifter. The latter still hadn’t properly admired her visible assets and was instead watching me with hungry eyes, a definite slight that I knew the young woman wouldn’t let slide.
I saw the attack coming before she launched herself forward, but I misgauged the volatile redhead’s intentions. By the glint in her eye, I’d assumed she was pissed and needed a cat fight to get it out of her system. So I raised both hands to repel her imminent strike.
But Ginger didn’t hit me. Or, rather, she did let her body slam into mine, pressing my bare butt up against the warm metal of the car door.
On the other hand, the trouble twin didn’t intend to cause harm. Instead, the slightly taller woman dipped her neck even as she pushed my chin upwards by cradling the back of my head with two firm hands.
Then she pulled me into a deep, uninhibited kiss.
***
For a split second, I imagined that Hunter was the one merging his lips with mine. The uber-alpha would taste just the way he smelled—like cold root beer, the refreshing aroma enveloping me and beating back the summer heat. I’d kiss him back....
I opened my eyes and pushed Ginger away as I regained my senses. “What the heck, Ginger?”
The trouble twin’s cheeks were flushed, and I expected her to shoot another pointed glance at Quill. After all, my friend had gone for a classic catch-the-guy’s-attention move and would be wanting to know if her girl kiss had paid off.
But instead, my pack mate just gazed into my eyes, searching my face as if trying to decide whether the lipstick she’d smeared onto my skin suited my complexion. I wiped the goop away in disgust. It was bad enough to watch Quill and Ginger tiptoeing around each other without being caught in the middle of their mating dance.
“Just a good-luck kiss,” she said after a moment, and I caught a flash of something I couldn’t quite name in her eyes as she turned away. Cinnamon, ever alert to his sister’s moods, scrambled out from beneath his cousin’s furry body and trotted over to rub up against Ginger’s bare leg in sympathy.
And then there were two reddish wolves on the ground instead of one, and Quill and I were the only humans left standing. “Let’s hunt,” I said curtly, still a bit annoyed at the trouble twin and concerned over the cowboy shifter’s foot dragging.
But I didn’t want to initiate my own shift with murky emotions at the forefront of my mind. So I took a deep breath just the way my previous alpha had taught me, then I relinquished human control for a split second.
I transformed as I fell forward, arms that would have kept me from hitting the ground becoming legs and my tail thrusting to one side to steady my descent. At the same time, the wolf brain rose up to take over our shared form—my least favorite part of the shifting process. This changing of the guard always felt like diving into a deep, frigid ocean, the chill making my bones ache and only slowly receding as I acclimated to the abrupt change in virtual temperature.
Our shared ears popped. Now I was entirely subsumed by the wolf, and for a split second I drifted in darkness. Then, desperately, I clawed my way upwards.
I’d made this journey many times before, but today the faint pinprick of light showing through the wolf’s eyes seemed impossibly far away. In fact, I appeared to be falling deeper into the wolf’s subconscious rather than rising to join her at the helm. This is the shift where I lose my footing and drown, I thought in dismay.
This type of slippage was normal the first few times a teenager tried to change forms, of course. But my transformations hadn’t gotten any easier during the last seven years since I hit werewolf puberty.
Today’s shift was the worst experience to date. Always in the past, I’d scrambled upwards as best I could, clawing my way through the wolf’s throat with torn fingernails while hoping I’d make my way back into the light. And each time, I’d thought I’d failed before finally managing to emerge breathless back in the wolf’s body.
This time, though, I was just so very tired. The hour was only a little past noon, but the day had already been long and the preceding night short. Quill’s addition to our pack was a triumph, but the change in group dynamics left everyone off kilter and in need of a little extra alpha attention.
I barely felt up to the task.
Then there was the confusion of Hunter’s sudden presence and equally sudden absence. My stalker had dropped his verbal bomb last night, throwing out the M word as if “mate” wasn’t an expletive in my lexicon. And, yes, I’d been too chicken shit to call him on it. But did Hunter have to find it so easy to hare off in search of another halfie girl this morning with barely a word of farewell?
No matter the reason, I had a sinking suspicion that this was the time I wouldn’t make it back into human form at the end of my shift. I’d already spent way too long down in the wolf’s belly, drifting further into her virtual intestines with every second as if my struggles were mired down by quicksand designed to pull me under and keep me there.
My pack mates would be wondering why the wolf was frozen in place, but I could neither hear them nor feel their furry bodies nudging against my shoulder. And without the presence of my clan, I wasn’t so sure I cared that my heavy eyelids were drifting closed. A little nap was called for....
And then the wolf brain was beneath my human mind, pushing me gently but firmly upwards until I could share the view from behind her lupine eyes. Within our corporeal body, she licked me in welcome and my human mind covered virtual face with ethereal hands in order to repel her advances. As usual, the wolf was absurdly happy to see me, as if I wasn’t always present, always in control of our shared body even when we donned fur.
Well, as long as I don’t drown betwixt and between. I was ashamed of myself for wallowing in that moment of weakness, and I was probably more curt with the wolf than I should have been as a result. Leave me alone, I ordered, and her enthusiasm abruptly waned.
Now the captain of our shared ship, I dropped into downward-facing dog to stretch our four-legger body and relax our spine. Then I glanced back over one shoulder to make sure Quill had followed suit. Sure enough, our newest pack mate had nearly achieved lupine splendor, although he was taking even longer than me to get his feet solidly beneath him.
Everyone else, though, schooled by our old alpha, was surefooted and ready to run. And I realized that I wasn’t quite ready for Quill to understand our strange lupine dynamics anyway, to figure out that the alpha werewolf who he’d agree to answer to was actually the weakest one in the pack.
So I raised my chin to the sky and let my wolf howl out her joy at finally being surrounded by her favorite furry companions once more. Then the five of us loped forward, Quill trailing a full measure behind.