by Lola Gabriel
Penelope looked tired. She put a hand in her mouth and shook her head.
“Nah,” she said. Easton laughed.
“Okay, fair enough. Shall we get you in your PJs, and then Daddy can come and tuck you in and read you a story?”
Penelope nodded, laying her head against Easton’s shoulder, her eyes blinking with sleep. With anyone else, Ash thought, even his sister, Penelope would be screaming for him. He should feel jealousy, he usually would feel it, but with Easton, he just felt happiness. He loved that his daughter loved her, and he knew that she deserved to be loved by Penelope, and that she would pour just as much love back to his child.
“Thanks,” Ash said. “I’ll go and change.” He held up the key he’d had made. “For you,” he said, “finally.” He placed it on the hall table. “Grab it later.”
Easton nodded and took the girl upstairs. He followed a few steps behind them and walked toward the bathroom to change. Then he paused, stepping toward a door to his left. His bedroom. He only came in here to grab clothes in the morning, and even most of them were in the hall closet.
Ash opened the door and walked in. He closed his eyes before opening them again. He’d never loved the décor, but it wasn’t sad to be in here. Rebecca had gotten a designer to do the decorating. It wasn’t her and him at all. And she’d barely lived here. They’d just moved in, and Penelope had been so small when…
Ash took off his jacket and shirt, throwing them on the bed. He kicked off his shoes. When he padded in socked feet to his daughter’s doorway, he was in his undershirt and sweatpants. But they were his best sweatpants, without any holes.
Easton looked around and smiled at him. She was stroking Penelope’s hair and telling her some story about a dragon. Ash’s stomach flipped. As if his stupid crush hadn’t been enough, Helena had gotten to him. Easton’s hair was in a messy ponytail, and she was wearing jeans and a men’s shirt. He wondered who the shirt belonged to, but he stopped himself. She looked happy, making up a story for his daughter. And she looked happy to see him as he walked through the door.
But it didn’t matter, did it, whether or not she was happy to see him? She was a human. It was impossible.
Easton held up a book.
“This one,” she said. “Right, Pen?”
Sleepy Penelope nodded, and Ash sat and began to read to her about an elephant who ran away from the circus to the big city. Before the book was over, Penelope was asleep, and the two adults tiptoed out of the room, Ash closing the door behind him.
At the bottom of the stairs, they stopped.
“Thanks,” Ash said. “She’s taken to you incredibly quickly. She can be so… picky about people. Got it from her mom, I think.” Easton looked awkward, glancing at her shoes.
“Right,” she said, “yeah…”
There was a silence in which Ash realized someone must have told Easton about Rebecca’s death. Of course they had. Sitka was tiny. Everyone knew everything about everyone else; case in point, Penelope’s human nanny. Ash was opening his mouth to say something, though he wasn’t sure what yet. How could he tell her it was okay without sounding like a monster? There had been therapy, and times he could barely look after Penelope, but he was through it now.
“So,” Easton said before he had the chance to talk. “I should go. I have a thing… date. A dumb date. I should go home and change, and I barely have time.”
“You look great,” Ash said without thinking.
Easton’s cheeks colored. “Ash, I have banana on my shirt and finger-paint on my jeans.”
“It works,” Ash insisted with a shrug. Then he said, “Don’t forget your key.”
The door closed, and Ash stepped into the living room. There was a painting on the table—Penelope’s colorful mess. Ash looked down at it and smiled, leaning closer. There was a post-it on the corner: She says it’s flowers and dogs… I don’t see it, but maybe you’re a fan of abstract expressionism?
He laughed, even though he was alone. It was involuntary. And then he cursed under his breath and sat down heavily on the sofa. He had never felt like this before. He had never clicked so completely with someone. He could keep trying to blame Helena for putting it in his head if he liked, but it was meaningless to do so. Part of him had known since the first time they properly spoke that he and Easton were mates. He’d imprinted.
And now she was on a date. He tried not to imagine it, another man looking into her happy blue eyes, holding her, kissing her coral-pink lips, her long neck, undoing that shirt, button by button. He tried not to imagine any of those things, but every time he blinked, they were there behind his eyelids.
8
Easton
Easton had washed her face and changed into a moderately nice dress and woolen tights, and then it was time to head out for her date. Hannah wasn’t wrong, Easton was lonely and bored—she was in a new place, so of course she was! But this probably wasn’t the answer. She’d been on plenty of dates with men she’d met on apps, and although some had been fine, usually they were just something to endure.
Frank’s was a dark bar: not too loud, with a duke box, moose head on the wall, and decent bar food. It was pretty much as soon as she walked through the door that Easton realized she’d not only forgotten the guy’s name, but she also barely knew what he looked like.
She was fumbling around for her phone when she heard her name.
“Easton?” It came from the bar area, from a slight man with brown hair long enough to curl around his ears, almost to his chin. “Simon,” he said, gesturing at himself as she came toward him. Well, at least she wouldn’t have to MacGyver that one.
“Hey,” she said and smiled at him. “Good to meet you in person.” Simon nodded, looking at her a little too intensely.
“Isn’t it?” he agreed. “And you look just like your pictures.”
Easton narrowed her eyes at him. He had a thin face and nice cheekbones. He was quite striking, but not necessarily attractive.
“Yeah,” she said, “they’re pictures of me.”
“Sure, sure,” Simon replied, pushing his hair back from his face, tucking one side of it behind his ears. “But you’d be surprised. I’ve got some real horror stories.”
“Right,” Easton said, trying to get the attention of the guy behind the bar. “Well, what you see is what you get with me.” What the hell was that supposed to mean? Urgh, dating!
“What do you want to drink?” Simon asked, and Easton looked back toward him. Clearly, she was trying to get herself a drink.
“Just a beer,” she said.
“Great.” Simon grinned at her. He had surprisingly large teeth. “I like a girl who drinks beer. I think it shows a lot of self-confidence.”
Easton honestly had no idea how to respond to this. After a beat, she settled on, “I think it shows that I like beer.”
Simon wasn’t looking at her, though; he was waving the barman over.
“Two beers, my tab,” he said. He looked back at Easton. “I’m an architect, don’t worry.”
“Thanks,” she told him. “I wasn’t worried.” And then a few seconds later, she said, “Thanks,” again, this time to the barman, as it seemed Simon wasn’t going to. He slid her beer over to her.
“M’lady,” he said. Easton narrowly resisted an eye roll.
“Why, thank you,” she said, deciding it was probably just easier to play along for a little while and get out of there.
“Do you do a lot of dating?” Simon asked. Easton shrugged.
“I mean, I just moved here, so I kind of need to meet people. I’ve done my fair share. Doesn’t everybody?” Simon had his elbow on the bar, and he was leaning forward, like he was listening intently.
“Interesting,” he said. “Yes, I suppose it’s deeply embedded in our culture as millennials, the use of dating apps. Hard to meet people in the old-fashioned ways.”
Easton really wanted to shuffle her chair back, but she was trying not to be rude. “Traditional ways, like in a b
ar without talking a little first? Doesn’t seem so different. And it’s convenient. We’re busy, right?”
Simon still had the stupid thoughtful look on. “We are, we are. We’re pulled in so many different directions. But like I said, dating apps can lead to such duplicity.”
He was about to tell her a story. Easton took a slug of beer.
“So what do you—” she tried to ask, but it was too late.
“This one woman,” Simon started, “and this was in Juneau. This one woman, her pictures were great. She was brunette, slim, about our age. And really, I should have known when she asked me to pick her up from her house because she didn’t have a car—”
“What’s wrong with not having a car?” Easton managed to get in.
“Well,” Simon replied, his eyes darting around Easton’s face, “I mean, nothing specific. It’s just weird, isn’t it? Anyway—” He was talking faster now, socially aware enough at least to understand that Easton wasn’t into this story. “Anyway, I get there, and not only does her house stink of cats. I mean, I didn’t go in, it stank from the doorstep, but she was at least twenty pounds heavier than her pictures, and she’d cut all her hair off!”
Easton finished her beer. She put it on the bar top.
“Right,” she said. “So, what did you do? Did you take her out?”
Simon looked surprised. He sighed, then sort of stuttered, “Uh, well, yeah, for a bit. Drink or two, then I said I had a headache and took her back to her cats.”
“I see.” Easton nodded. “And did you ask her any questions about herself, or did you just talk about yourself and tell horrible stories about other women?” She started to get up.
All the same, Simon asked her, “Do you want another beer?”
“Actually,” Easton said, pulling her coat on and grabbing her bag. “I have a headache. I’m going home to my cat.”
Back at the apartment complex, Easton considered knocking on Hannah’s door to tell her about the awful date, maybe laugh about it, but she couldn’t face it. It had been depressing and wasn’t yet funny. Instead, she unlocked her own door and dropped both her bag and her coat on the floor. She headed to her bedroom and let herself fall face-down onto her comforter. In a moment, Pickles was sniffing at her face.
“Hi, sweetie,” she said to him. “You’re the only good man in the world, aren’t you?” She scooped him toward her and held him, and he let her. “Well, one of the only good men. You’d like my boss, too. What am I saying, you’re a cat. You’d like him if he fed you.”
Pickles meowed, almost as if he were arguing with her on this.
“Sorry to minimize you, Pickles, you’re right. And I’m an idiot.” Easton released her cat and rolled onto her back. She stared at the ceiling and let out a very self-indulgent sigh.
Simon had been a particularly awful example, but she didn’t want to date. She hated dating. She was proud of herself for actually leaving. She didn’t want to spend her evenings with strangers, even if they were okay strangers, rather than clear narcissists. She wanted to spend her evenings watching TV with Hannah, or—and this was bad, and she knew it was bad—drinking wine with Ash, who was a virtual stranger, anyway! But the pull he had on her…
Easton had begun dreaming about him, waking up flushed with images bouncing around, even once she opened her eyes and turned on the light. He was an attractive man, sure; a good father, kind, a good boss. Funny. Of course she’d noticed him. But why couldn’t she stop thinking about him? Why did she so badly want to touch him, feel his skin against hers? Not in a sexual way, necessarily, though that, too. She wanted to know what that spark jumping between them would be like if she just held his hand and cupped his stubbled cheek.
Before she knew it, Easton was asleep, on her back on her bed with the light on. But she was still thinking of Ash, letting him fully into her dreams.
9
Ash
Ash turned with a jump as Easton walked into the kitchen. He was dressed this morning, hair as kempt as it ever was. “God, you scared me!”
Easton smiled. “I have a key, remember?”
“Right.” Ash nodded. “Can you feed Penelope?” The baby was in her highchair, happily babbling half-words and bashing a couple of blocks around.
“Sure,” Easton said. Ash poured himself coffee. She looked tired… like she’d had a good date. He poured a second mug of coffee, turned, and held it out to Easton, who was pouring cereal into Penelope’s bowl.
“You look tired,” he said as she put down the bowl and took the mug.
“Thanks.” She knotted her eyebrows and took a sip from her mug. “Guess I didn’t sleep very well. Vivid dreams, and I left the light on.”
Ash smiled into his coffee mug. No ‘we’ there, and if he’d come home with her, then surely the light would have ended up off.
“The date involved a lot of cocktails?” he asked. He knew he was prying, but he couldn’t help himself. He needed to know exactly what Easton had done last night, which he was aware was a terrible urge. Easton laughed, and for a second, he thought it was about him.
“Definitely not,” she said, and she leaned down to help Penelope find her mouth with her purple plastic spoon. Penelope managed to flick milk in Easton’s eye.
“Ah!” Easton exclaimed, and she stepped back. “Wow, thanks, Pen.”
Automatically, Ash grabbed some kitchen towel and stepped over to her. He was about to dab at her himself, but he stopped suddenly and handed it to her instead.
“You have a dangerous job,” he said. Easton wiped her eye and cheek.
“Yeah,” she said. “Used to it.”
“Tell me about it,” Ash said. Then he cleared his throat. “Better get to work.”
Easton looked at her watch. She’d been early, as usual. “Already?”
“Stuff to do,” Ash replied. “Just lots of… paperwork. Minutes from a meeting yesterday. And we, um, we got new mobile phones for some of our staff, and… Anyway. Big day. Help yourself to stuff, obviously. I’ll, uh, try not to be too late. I’d like to put her to bed.” He was finding it hard to look at Easton. He felt like she’d see right through him, see how he felt about her, see her lovely face reflected in his eyes and know who he saw.
He put down his coffee mug, and it tipped over and rolled off the countertop.
“Damn it!” The exclamation came out way too loudly, and Penelope got her screaming face on. Easton grabbed her.
“Hey, it’s okay, Pen! Daddy just dropped his coffee. It’s because he’s clumsy, isn’t he clumsy?” Penelope was hiding her face in Easton’s hair. His daughter loved this woman so much after barely a week.
“Sorry,” Ash said, squatting to grab the pieces of mug and sop up the small pool of coffee. He threw everything in the trash and walked into the hallway. Easton followed him.
“Say bye to Daddy,” she said to Penelope, and Ash realized he had been about to leave the house without saying goodbye to his daughter. He almost cussed, but he remembered again that Penelope was just learning to talk. He turned to Easton, who was looking right at him. His heart flipped in his chest, and he could hear his blood rushing in his ears.
Ash held his hands out for Penelope, and as Easton passed her over, their hands and arms touched. It was like a shock. He almost dropped his daughter. He dropped his gaze from Easton’s again and held Penelope up to kiss her cheek.
“See you later, sweetheart,” he said, and he handed her back to Easton, trying his hardest not to brush her skin, which made it an awkward transition. Then he turned and went out the door.
Ash got in his car, though he didn’t drive toward the Town Hall. He had told everyone who might ask that he had work to do out of town, and he was indeed driving out of town, but not to any important meeting with other local alphas. Ash was playing hooky. His hands were sweaty on the steering wheel, and he turned the radio up very loudly to drown out his thoughts.
He was heading north, up the peninsula, toward the Ambrosia Coven outpost. He need
ed to see Helena again, to talk to her about what she had said. He was bonded with Easton, he had no doubt about that now. But could she feel the same way? Did humans even bond? And how could they possibly be together, with her lifespan and the prejudices of his and all packs?
The Ambrosia coven was the most powerful coven of witches the Alaskan shifters knew of. Their alliance spanned a thousand years, since both had come to the Americas. It had been a symbiotic relationship, physical protection from the bears and magical protection from the witches, but things had changed over time. Now, both groups would offer help whenever necessary, and often there were personal friendships involved. Helena and Ash had been friends since his father had brought him to observe meetings and find out the workings of the pack and the coven, long before he had been called upon to be alpha. Long before his father had died.
The Sitka outpost of the Ambrosias was a surprisingly new, brick-built building with half-cladding painted a sky blue. It was in the middle of nowhere, but it looked almost like a townhouse, with three floors and sweet peas in window boxes, which made no sense for the climate. Ash parked up beside the house, climbed out, and rang the doorbell. It played a tune.
To his relief, Helena was the one who answered. She was wearing a t-shirt and jeans and carrying a mug of tea.
“Oh, hi,” Helena greeted him. “I thought you might want to talk, but I could have had some warning!”
Ash shook his head. “Not likely, Helena. You knew you’d throw me for a loop yesterday. And now my head is all over the damn place.”
“Sort of.” Helena let him in. “But I could see how you felt. I was saving you time.”
“Maybe I needed the time!” Ash stepped into the hall and took off his coat.
“Tea?” Helena asked.
“Sure.” Ash knew where the living room was, so he walked through and sat on the sofa, hands folded in his lap. When Helena joined him, he took the mug of tea she handed over. “So,” he said, staring into the light-brown, probably overly-milky tea, “what did you mean? The stories, the other times this has happened?”