MoonFall: A Paranormal Werewolf and Urban Fantasy of Suspense (Supernatural Siblings Series Book 2)

by Drew VanDyke

  “She seems to be doing really well,” Will said as he sipped iced tea in the poolhouse kitchenette with me. “Doc says she’s in some kind of weird remission and Sam’s keeping tabs on her.”

  “Glad to hear it.” And I was.

  “But what about me?” He smiled.

  “What about you?”

  “I was down with the flu the last few days.”

  “Really? Why didn’t you call me?”

  “What could you have done? You were busy. You’re always busy.” He said it pleasantly, but I caught an undercurrent of disappointment.

  “Not always…just lately. I have to make a living.”

  “And hang out with Jackson’s crew.”

  “That’s different. Just a few runs in the hills to keep in shape.”

  “At night?”

  “A lot cooler then.”

  “Whoever heard of construction workers that do cross country?”

  “They’re not just construction workers. They’re a specialized renovation crew. Very high end.”

  “Yeah, and I never asked you how the pool house got paid for. Amber sure wouldn’t have sprung for it.”

  “Adam and Amber worked something out. I didn’t ask. I can barely keep my checking account straight. And why do I feel like I’m being interrogated?”

  Will shrugged. “Sorry. I miss you, Ash. For a while, we were together every day. Since the crew showed up…”

  “We were together every day because I was taking vacation. Now I have to work. Isn’t it better that I’m working from here? And besides, I’ll have to travel sometimes. I’m running out of bullshit to fill in my old notes with. Then I won’t even be in town.”

  “Well, we haven’t been on a date in like, forever. And I was wondering if…”

  “Totally,” I interrupted. “We so need a date night.”

  “Well, I was thinking…”

  “Tell you what. It’s Friday and I’m burnt out, so give me tomorrow morning to sleep in and then it will be you and me tomorrow. I’ll take care of everything. You just make sure you’re good and rested in case I decide to keep you up all night.”

  “You want me to take a bar nap?” He was referring to the college-student habit of going down for three hours on Saturday afternoon so you could stay out till three in the morning. “And I kinda had my own ideas.”

  “Oh, right.” I bit my lip. I was totally alpha-ing the guy. “Okay, you plan the date, I’ll take care of the boudoir. You haven’t really gotten a good look at the place since they finished.”

  “Of course I did.” He laughed. “Who do you think helped get the washer and dryer in the basement?”

  I stared pointedly at the cast on his leg.

  “Okay, I supervised. But what’s with the kennel? You planning on getting a dog?”

  I cringed. Really, was I going to do this now? Well, he asked. Was I going to lie to him? I could put it off until the date tomorrow, but that might ruin everything. Better to give him some time to process it.

  Or to decide I was batshit crazy.

  Okay, here goes nothing.

  “Um, the kennel. Yeah. Um, well. Uh. I don’t know how to tell you this, Will. But, um. I’m kind of a werewolf.” And it just began to pour out. “Well, not really a werewolf. I’m a lupine. A shifter. I don’t have a half form like a hybrid, I just wolf out every full moon, and…”

  I don’t know why he did it, but Will started laughing. Not the reaction I was expecting.

  “God, I love you.” He leaned over and kissed me. “You and your freakin’ imagination. Maybe you should write fiction instead of travel pieces. Anyway, Jackson told me you were thinking of getting a pet, but with the size of that cage….”

  So, I went with it. “I haven’t decided. Better to be too big than too small.”

  Hey, at least I’d tried to tell him.

  “Mother!” I called into the ether after Will had gone. No answer. See, where was a ghost when you really needed her?

  So, I did the next best thing a straight girl can do when Ghost Mom’s not around and there are no other girls to talk to. I called my gay guy friend.

  When I told Jackson about it, he laughed.

  “Don’t laugh. Now I actually have to think about getting a pet.”

  “Why don’t you just adopt one of Luken and Elka’s litter? That way when you decide to have my puppies, they’ll feel more bonded to you.”

  “I think there are laws against keeping full-blooded wolves as pets. And I still haven’t decided about becoming your brood mare, er, wolf, or whatever.”

  “You know a lot of these complications will go away once we sit down with Will and Peg and lay it all out for them.”

  “Yeah, compared to the rest of my dicked-up existence, being a werewolf is just a side note.”

  “You can’t keep putting this off, you know. According to Con, if he doesn’t continue the transfusions, the cancer will come back.”

  “He’s going to keep doing it no matter what I say and no matter how wrong that is.”

  Jackson shrugged. “You demanded something of him you won’t take responsibility for, and you won’t tell Will. So you’re both wrong.”

  “I did tell Will.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “I know. Let me think about it.”

  “One more run with the pack help? Well, just this wolf actually. The others are off on an overnight job near Reno.”

  I eyed him. “Just you and me?”

  “Hey, if you’d rather not…”

  “No, it’s okay.” I wasn’t scared of being alone with him. In wolf form. Out there under the moonlight.

  Really.

  “It’s MoonFall tonight,” he said.

  “Not a blood moon is it?”

  “You know it’s not.”

  “Good. Because I put my date with Will off until tomorrow. I’ll try to tell him again then. Maybe I’ll have a better head on my shoulders after the run.”

  Jackson laughed. “Like Anubis? I’m thinkin’ it would not be pretty.”

  I growled at him. “Bite me.”

  Funny how your brain is more honest than your mind sometimes. It knows what it likes, and it lets you know. Bored? It puts you to sleep. Bone tired but faced with the opportunity to do something fun? No problem.

  And a run did sound fun.

  “I’ll meet you at the blind, already shifted,” I said.

  We rendezvoused at moonrise. Knightsbridge lay beneath us, slowly growing drowsy in its small-town bed of night. Luna was reaching near full above the horizon, and to my senses the landscape seemed more than brightly twilit. I could see as well as day, though the washed-out silvery tones imparted an otherworldly essence. And the smells! Glorious.

  I may have said this before, but being in wolf form is like being slightly drunk, slightly stoned and more than slightly cranked – and on vacation. I’m no druggie, but I’ve tried out the usual stuff, in moderation. This is far better. I’m only trying to express the feeling, but I really can’t. The best I can say is, I felt far more alive, far more in touch with myself. I think if I could, I’d live this way and only take human form when necessary.

  Jackson was a beautiful specimen. Although a gray wolf like myself, he had at least a hundred pounds on me. He was a classic alpha male, bred by nature to dominate the pack, lead at the kill of moose or elk, and face down bears and puma. I sure wouldn’t have wanted to do all that. Far too exhausting, to be the boss all the time.

  For the next few hours we hunted and we ran. During that time, I found myself growing more and more comfortable with him, and the distance I’d kept from him faded. After feeding on a raccoon or two – annoying creatures – my wolf pushed herself up against Jackson playfully, nipping at his heels and pawing at his back and head. And as she did so, I felt a warmth in my loins that traveled along my spine and exploded in the back of my skull.

  OMG. I was in so much trouble. I think my wolf was going into heat. I’d read about the experience
, but this was my first encounter with it. I soon found myself in what I can only call sparring, both of us on our hind legs pawing at the air, doing a dance of seduction.

  Had Jackson known? Had he set me up? Was I really going to do this? It wasn’t a blood moon, so according to Jackson I wouldn’t get pregnant. But to my wolf that didn’t seem to matter. Apparently, a lupine wasn’t bound by normal wolf mating habits, going into heat in winter so she could give birth by spring. It appeared that all she had to do was make a decision and my body wasn’t my own. I’d been so used to letting her have her way during my shifts, only stepping in when my human brain sensed some danger she didn’t, that this time was no different – until an alpha male came courting.

  But Will was my mate, not Jackson, I screamed inside my head. The little voice that whispered back held nothing of virtue in it: go on, do it. It’s not cheating in wolf form. Blame biology.

  There’s no betrayal, because he’s gay anyway. It’s just meaningless sex.

  What would I say if Will handed me a line like that?

  What would Will say if he knew?

  Jackson approached me with his tongue lolling out of his mouth and circled me, sniffing my hindquarters. I turned a nip toward his nose and he mouthed my muzzle, sending tingling all up and down my body. I rolled over onto my back as Jackson nosed my fur, grooming me, and then lay his legs over my neck in what I instinctively knew was flirtation.

  And my wolf? The minx, she just let him do it, albeit with a few growls and snaps of her jaws.

  Then she jumped up, whipped her tail into his face and ran off as Jackson gave chase.

  He caught me half a mile later, in a ledge high on the Canyon’s ridge, and this time I knew it would be for real. Who was in charge? Me or the wolf, or was the wolf me? Where did human morality end in the face of instinct?

  What must Jackson be feeling? Anything more than lust? Friendship? And what about Sully?

  My wolf froze and crouched, hindquarters in the air, and I realized she was presenting, burning with desire, ready to be mounted like an animal.

  She was an animal.

  Was I?

  But I’d pretty much done the same to Will – mounted him like an animal…and he’d liked it. My wolf was going to like it, too. Would the human part of me like it?

  Jackson’s wolf approached and circled once, then reared up, placing his forepaws on my back. I felt his weight and it was good, so good. Yes! Yes! Do it, my wolf screamed.

  No, wait, not yet!

  That was the rest of me.

  Who was I, anyway?

  Then the weight came off me as I heard the gunshot ring out.

  Chapter 10

  I felt myself tumble down the hill as Jackson howled in pain and I scrabbled for purchase on the undergrowth. Not again! My mind raged at the injustice of it all. Never knowing a single moment’s wolfish bliss without some stupid shit happening.

  It must be Sierra, I thought. Who else could track us or figure out where we were, out here in the wilds of the Canyon?

  Jackson began to shift and he growled, “Stay down.” He staggered a bit after he had shifted to hybrid form – wolf-man, Hollywood would call it – I checked myself for wounds, finding the wound on my hindquarters I’d fully expected. Something about that spot seemed to attract damage.

  I could walk, though, so I took off after him. Hell, I wasn’t going to just sit there licking my ass. A moment later, I heard the sound of an off-road vehicle driving away as fast as it could.

  I found Jackson standing on a logging road, gasping and bleeding from his side. He’d once told me a lycanthrope can heal his body just by transforming; something in the DNA remembers its perfect form, lucky him. But doing so wounded would wipe him out without the pack magic support, so I guess he’d decided not to, in favor of trying to chase down our assailant.

  Who? I thought at him.

  “Can’t tell,” he growled in a throat almost human. “Something’s blocking me.”

  I tried, sniffing the ground in widening circles, trying to catch some scent, but this time my senses failed me. Oh, I could tell it was human, but I felt like there was a short-circuit in my brain.

  And then I sneezed.

  Con, I thought.

  Jackson said, “No. Makes no sense. Not his style, and what’s the motive?

  But I sneezed.

  “That just means you’re reacting to something mystical. A spell of concealment, possibly.”

  Who casts spells?

  “Vampires, warlocks, witches, some of the Fae, priests…” He clutched at his side in pain.

  Let’s go home. Can you walk?

  “I’ll manage. Lead the way.”

  I turned and found my way unerringly back down the canyon toward the edge of Knightsbridge and my abode. Fortunately, most everything was downhill. Jackson limped grimly after me, grunting faintly every other step. I wanted to heal him, but I had no idea how. Our bodies might mesh in wolf form, but metaphysically, we were little alike. While it appeared I could benefit from pack magic, I couldn’t do much of anything to help him in this situation.

  Now I regretted not putting on my harness, with its pouches for things like phones. Mental note: first-aid kit. Or maybe I should just get Kevlar ass-armor. I bet Adam could hook me up with that.

  The blind was a welcome sight, and once through the tunnel and in my basement, Jackson grabbed his phone and called Sully.

  Me, I shifted in the shower, which would have been a pleasant experience except for the blood and pain. The wound seemed superficial, from either a ricochet or a bullet that had passed through Jackson first, resembling what you’d get if you stuck a leather punch an inch into your thigh.

  Ouch.

  I dried off, slapped a big band-aid on it and dressed in thirty seconds flat. I found Jackson lying on the floor of the basement, staining the tile red. Grabbing a washcloth, I made a compress and applied it to the hole in his gut.

  “How bad is it?” he rasped, still in wolf-man form. I imagine he had no strength left for another shift.

  “How should I know? Sam’s the nurse, not me.”

  “Geoff will fix me.”

  I guffawed. “You sure you want to use that word?”

  “Oh, please, don’t make me laugh. It hurts.”

  “How long until they get here?”

  “Three, four hours, maybe.”

  “What about Con?”

  Jackson closed his eyes. “I don’t want to owe him anything else.”

  “Else?”

  He didn’t say anything for a minute, but eventually he said, “You.”

  “Me?”

  “I owe him for you. To leave you alone. You’re a prize, Ashlee. Lupines are rare, and potentially far more powerful than lycanthropes. You’d be a plum intimate for any vampire. And others…”

  “Others?”

  His trailing off hadn’t been rhetorical. He’d fallen unconscious. Great. Every time I start to learn something important, the wellspring of information runs dry.

  I was no nurse, but I’d taken my share of first-aid courses. When I took his pulse, it seemed thready and uneven. I wasn’t at all sure he would make it three or four hours. Racking my brain for an alternative, I slapped my forehead and reached for my phone.

  “Adam, it’s Ash. Jackson’s been shot.”

  “I’ll meet you at the ER.”

  “Uh…”

  “What!”

  “He looks like a Warren Zevon song right now.”

  “Can you be more obscure?”

  “He’s unconscious here in my basement and stuck in hybrid form. Wolf-man. The pack’s three or four hours out, I have no medical training and I was thinking about calling Shelby, but he said not to. You were in Afghanistan together. Can’t you do some cool special ops shit?”

  “We’ll be right over.” The call ended.

  “We?” Dammit. What we, Kemo Sabe?

  Ten minutes later he was knocking at my door. When I opened it, Con Shelby st
ood next to him.

  “This is your solution? After I told you no?” I snarled.

  “He’s here to help,” Adam replied, pushing past me. “Wait there!” He hurried down the basement stairs.

  “Don’t you tell me what to do in my own home!” I yelled after him.

  “Not you. The fang.”

  Con smiled at me, showing his canines already extended and sharp.

  “Is that some kind of slur?” I asked.

  He shrugged theatrically. “I’m used to it, especially where Knights are concerned. So righteous, so insensitive.”

  “Knights?”

  “Knights Templar. May I come in?” He gestured at the threshold.

  “Oh, hell no.”

  Adam’s voice floated up the stairs. “Let him in, Ash. Jackson needs him.”

  “Shit.” I recited the other six of George Carlin’s Seven Words You Can Never Say on Network Television, and then stood aside.

  Shelby swept in and set aside the cashmere overcoat he wore like a cape, took off his top hat – I shit you not – and handed them both to me along with his silver-topped walking stick. “Be a good girl and find a place for these, would you?”

  I tossed them on the sofa and glared.

  “Temper, temper.” He glided across the floor and descended the stairs, me at his heels. On the lower level, the vampire tsk-tsked at the sight of Jackson on the floor. “He’s lost a lot of blood.”

  “Too much?” Adam asked.

  “Possibly. If you want to be sure of saving him, he’ll need some of mine, but I’m not exactly brimming right now.” He made a motion toward me with his eyes.

  “Oh, no you don’t!” I said. I would have said, “bite me,” but that’s exactly what I was refusing. “I got shot a little too, and I only weigh one-twenty. Okay, maybe one-thirty lately. Take some from Adam.”

  Shelby sighed and took off his tight kid gloves, one finger at a time. “Would that I could, but I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because battery acid would probably be less harmful to me.”

  I looked at Adam, who shrugged apologetically. “It’s true.”