“Who did it? Where are you injured?” He spun her around seeking a wound, and Kira let him manhandle her for a moment before looping her arms around his neck so she could sob into her protector’s sweatshirt.
“It hurts,” the teenager moaned. “And it’s nasty.” Meanwhile, Tank’s search found the obvious source of the red fluid and the werewolf turned unaccountably pale.
Typical male reaction. I tried to laugh off Tank’s weakness so I could step forward to take over care of my sister. But what was the right way to calm down a hysterical teenager whose fists were even now pounding a staccato rhythm on her protector’s broad chest?
“What’s wrong?” Dad had asked me twelve years earlier, after I slammed a plate onto the table so hard it shattered into sharp-edged shards.
“Nothing, nothing, nothing!” I’d howled, wanting to shift to fox form and bite him until he hurt as much as I did.
“Mai, honey. I know it’s hard without your mother. But we’re all in this together. You don’t have to suffer alone.”
His words hadn’t actually helped me, but they had shamed me into silence. Which wasn’t what I wanted—to squelch my sister’s feelings. The trouble was, I couldn’t recall what kind of reaction I’d actually been looking for when I was newly menstrual. I hadn’t known then and I definitely didn’t know now.
So once again I hesitated, frozen by difficult memories. And during that hiatus, someone pushed past me wrapped in a robe and smelling strongly of dryer sheets.
“Kira, stop it.” Oyo gently tugged my sister away from the werewolf who actually was bleeding from various wounds still embedded with wicked glass shards. “It’s just your period, honey,” she continued, setting Kira down on the edge of the bed. “We’ll clean you up and you’ll be hunky dory again.”
“You don’t understand!” Kira countered, pounding her fists against Oyo’s shoulder this time. If I didn’t miss my guess, horror had turned the corner while we weren’t looking and morphed into rage. “My body betrayed me! It’s a disaster! I’ll never be the same person I was yesterday.”
“Get us some damp washcloths,” Oyo told the hovering werewolf, giving Tank something helpful to do while he caught his breath. Then, drawing me forward with raised eyebrows, she grasped one hand from each of us, waiting until Kira and I had intertwined our other fingers and created a triangle of unity with my sister inside.
“You’re right, Kira. You’ll never be the same as you were yesterday,” the formerly quiet kitsune continued. She no longer appeared small and scared, I noted. Instead, I leaned into the younger woman, trusting her implicitly. “You’ve joined the womanhood. It’s sometimes painful, sometimes difficult. But it’s always worth the blood.”
And that was apparently the right thing to say after all. Because Kira raised our joined hands to swipe tears off her cheeks. “You promise?”
“I promise,” Oyo answered.
“Mai?”
“It’s worth it,” I said honestly, remembering how shaken up I’d been by my first period but how glad I was to be a woman now.
Which wasn’t at all what I would have told Kira if Oyo hadn’t insinuated herself into the family drama. I likely would have gone all sex ed on her, providing a rundown on hygienic products along with a tart reminder that she could now become pregnant if she risked unprotected sex.
All of the hard data could wait for later, however. Instead, what Kira needed this morning was unconditional love and support.
So I squeezed two kitsunes’ hands with warming fingers and growing gratitude. It was such a relief to take part in a ritual like Mama might have come up with. And right then and there, I decided that I’d find some way to keep everything. The pack, Gunner, and Oyo also.
Because even if the doing was painful and difficult, I had a feeling incorporating this stranger into my family would be well worth the blood.
Chapter 12
“Thank you,” Oyo told me ten minutes later as I handed over a pair of jogging pants. She sounded so genuinely grateful for such a small gift that I paused in the act of rooting through my as-yet-to-be-unpacked boxes in search of a semi-matching shirt.
“Hey, I should be the one thanking you,” I told her before delving deeper into the mess of fabric. “I had no idea what to tell Kira. You must have a big family to know exactly what to say.”
“A big family?”
Right. Kitsunes didn’t come from big families. Barring those who made a mistake with birth control and chose to sacrifice their own lives for the sake of a second child, we were a one-mother-one-daughter kind of race.
In an attempt to pull my foot out of my mouth, I pivoted verbally to the subject I’d lured Oyo into my room to talk about. “What I should have said is—your solution to Kira’s problem was both thoughtful and clever. And, speaking of clever, I was curious how you knew Kira and I were living here with the Atwood pack?”
After all, werewolves and kitsunes weren’t a predictable combination. And the two of us had been in wolf territory for only a few minutes before Oyo showed up.
“I’m not that clever,” Oyo evaded, turning her back to slip out of her robe and into the borrowed clothing. “You’re clever to convince werewolves to protect you. It’s something I’ve never seen before.”
“They’ll protect you too.” Her shoulders looked so slender, all hunched over with cold or fear as she faced away from me. But I squashed my immediate impulse to accept the change of subject and returned to my original point instead. “We’ll all protect you. But it’ll be easier if we know who might be following and what kind of trail you left behind. Did...”
Only I received no answer. Because Oyo was shifting, the air around her shimmering as she shrunk down into fox form right inside her borrowed clothing.
Then Allen’s voice came through the closed door behind her—“Everybody decent? If so, the boss brought breakfast. Better get out here before Kira puts it all inside her hollow leg.”
Whether or not Allen’s approach had been what originally spooked her, Oyo was thoroughly terrified now. She scurried for cover under my bed, wisp of a fox tail tucking away into the darkness behind her. Then—if my ears served me right—she started clawing through drywall in search of an even safer hiding place.
So I wasn’t getting any answers to my questions this morning. Well, I’d do my best to be patient. “Lead on,” I told the waiting werewolf as I opened the door and greeted Allen with an almost-genuine smile on my face.
“LOOK, MAI, GOBS OF bacon!”
Someone must have fed my sister sugar, because she was bouncing off the walls...almost literally. Behind her, Gunner raised his eyebrows at me by way of greeting, and I couldn’t quite tell if he’d been out righting wrongs or just hunting down food for the hyperactive teenager in our midst.
“I need to talk to you,” Gunner mouthed, his expression not as welcoming as I would have hoped for. But Kira was hanging onto my shoulders now, trying to leap up so I’d carry her piggyback.
“Kira, you’re strangling me!”
“Am not,” my sister countered, but she did slide off long enough to stuff an entire piece of French toast into her mouth. Which, in turn, gave me the opportunity to slip past her without being drawn deeper into her sugar rush.
“I’m on Kira duty this morning,” Allen promised as I walked toward his alpha. Then I was up close and personal with Gunner, whose face was still surprisingly grim. His fingers on my arm, however, were gentle as he guided me through the living room and out the front door.
“You know I want you and Kira here,” he started without a formal greeting. And as much as I’d been looking forward to spending a moment alone together, I suddenly wished I could join Oyo in her hole in my bedroom wall.
Still, it was always better to rip off the proverbial bandaid quickly. So, sure Gunner was going no place I wanted to follow, I still prodded him to continue. “But?”
“No ‘but.’” Gunner hesitated, then lowered himself down onto the top porch step,
placing his head a good distance below mine. This wasn’t the behavior of an alpha werewolf about to evict someone from his territory. And even though I appreciated his gesture, I still found myself sinking down right alongside him so I wouldn’t end up towering above his head.
“Gunner, you’re scaring me.”
“There’s no need to be scared.” His huge hand landed on mine, furless and clawless and perfectly human. Still, I could feel the wolf vibrating inside him, itching to get out and hold this conversation in the two-legger’s place. Given the fact that my fox form was a fraction the size of his animal, that realization wasn’t a heartening feeling at all.
“I have a single request,” he continued, unaware of my continued trepidation. “And you are free to ignore it if you feel it restricts your range of movement unduly...”
“Gunner.” Now I finally smiled, understanding at last what he was so on edge about. He wasn’t getting ready to evict me to ease the strain on his pack mates. Instead, he was trying not to send me fleeing with wolf demands couched as human requests.
Given my past problems with similar behavior, the alpha’s caution was sweet...but we were well beyond that stage. “Talk,” I told him. “I’m not leaving unless you kick me out.”
“And I’m not kicking you out.” At least that got his lips moving. “Everything you did last night was powerful,” Gunner continued, diving into the heart of the matter at last. “The pack bonds actually look better this morning than they did yesterday. Still not good, but you solved as much in one evening as I have in four months.”
It made me feel good to hear that. And yet...Gunner had looked undeniably sour when I stepped into the kitchen this morning. “What’s your request?” I prodded him.
“Next time you walk into danger, please take me with you,” he growled. He pulled out a brand new cell phone, texted me its number right there and then. And yet, despite the humanity of the gesture, I could see his inner wolf wild and angry behind sienna human eyes.
The two-legged pack leader was impressed by my lancing of the pack’s metaphorical boils. But his four-legged counterpart was terrified I could have been even more badly hurt. And he was right to have sat us down for this conversation, because for one split second I was spitting mad.
How dared he distrust my ability to protect myself from danger? How dared he make a fox come begging for a wolf’s help every time she felt like taking a piss?
The anger washed over me...and out of me. Then I was taking Gunner’s hand in mine, glad to see my fingers were no more furry than his had been.
Because I wouldn’t have asked any less of Gunner. I wouldn’t have wanted him running off into battle on his lonesome. So—
“I promise,” I told him. “I won’t do anything dangerous without telling you. As long as you make the same promise in return.”
Chapter 13
We sealed the deal with a kiss...or would have if a shiny steel blade hadn’t sliced down between us just as our lips were a whisper away from meeting.
“Really?” the voice emerged from the other end of the blade even as the weapon twisted so it menaced only me. “You want us to be trained by someone who doesn’t notice an armed swordswoman walking up beside her in a public space?”
I tried to see who was speaking, but I couldn’t move without slicing my own jugular. So I used half of my attention to create a metal choker around my sensitive neck while responding to the opponent I still couldn’t see.
“You want to be trained? It seems like you already know what you’re doing.” With my words as cover, I materialized the other half of my magic into a sword that clanked ever so slightly as it settled on the step below me.
Meanwhile, Gunner—darn him—merely chuckled as he stood and descended down the stairs away from the female with her sword at my neck. “Looks like you’re busy,” he noted. “How about we meet up for lunch later?”
“What happened to our promise?” I complained. “You watch my back, I watch your back?”
“You appear to have everything under control.”
As we bantered, I used half my senses to guess how many werewolves had snuck up on us. Because I wasn’t just facing the single female whose blade was now separated from me by a thin sheet of magical metal. No, from the scents and sounds, I’d guess there were half a dozen here at least.
Despite his dismissal, Gunner still hovered, ready to assist me. But this was clearly a problem I needed to solve myself. The trick was to make my escape not only effective but also flashy enough to prevent a repeat occurrence....
Stepping onto my sword hilt with one foot, I flicked it upward with the other. Then I twirled and caught my own weapon even as I used the metallic choker to knock my opponent’s blade aside.
Edward’s daughter. I wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or daunted by the fact that my opponent was instantly recognizable. Ditto by the sheer number of females arrayed behind her back.
There were fifteen bystanders, most young but a few middle-aged or older. Becky wasn’t among them, and even though a few faces looked vaguely familiar I didn’t know anybody’s name. Had they really come to me for lessons, or was this the female version of the welcoming committee that had left me black and blue yesterday when I failed to respect my place within the pack?
Whatever the sword wielder’s purpose, I didn’t slow my steps to debrief her nor did I bother to introduce myself. Instead, I slipped beneath my primary opponent’s guard, gauging my angle carefully. She was clearly a clothes hog, her outfit perfectly coordinated and apparently tailored to her form.
So I hit her where it hurt the most. Turning my blade at an angle, I sliced off the lace collar lining the top half of her shirt. Her free hand rose to catch the descending fabric even as I slashed slices into her tight-fitting pants.
There was an art to ruining clothes without scratching the skin beneath it. Good thing I was a pro at that art.
Behind her, the other werewolves were wide-eyed, some gasping, a few giggling. Meanwhile, Edward’s daughter seemed torn between anger...and was that amusement fighting for dominance on her face?
I’d almost forgotten Gunner was waiting until he spoke into the silence. “Yep, you definitely have this covered,” Gunner noted. “Enjoy your girl time.” And he strode away down the sidewalk, leaving me to teach swordsmanship to females who might or might not actually want to be taught.
“I’M ELIZABETH,” EDWARD’S daughter told me as she shifted her sword to her left hand and stretched out the other so we could shake on it. “And you’re impressive.”
“Well, you’re clearly not a beginner yourself,” I countered, providing a bit of well-deserved praise to reduce the sting of her recent loss.
“Gunner gave us a DVD to practice with in August,” the youngest girl interjected from behind the group’s spokeswoman. “But it’s hard to understand if you’re not face to face with your teacher.”
“So we’ll practice face to face,” I assured her. “Just give me a minute to gather some gear....” And I headed back up to the cottage in search of face masks and blade protectors, glad I’d packed all of my teaching equipment even though Gunner hadn’t bothered to give me a heads-up about my soon-to-be place within his clan prior to my move.
I had this covered, though. So it was hard to blame Gunner for his omission as we started with the basics, giving me time to take stock of my students one by one. They were better than I would have expected after just two months of DVD lessons, but they did have shifter agility to call upon after all.
Still, there were inevitable blunders. “No, not like that,” I corrected, stepping up to place my own hand over the hilt of the oldest woman’s weapon. “You want to—”
“—Get back in the kitchen where you belong!”
We all turned to face the interrupter of our lesson, and I didn’t need to see the pack bonds or smell the sulfur to know there was definite rot developing between this twenty-something bystander and the females armed with swords. What I couldn’t dec
ipher was the reason for the former’s venom. Had he been spurned by one of the young ladies, or was he simply threatened by any shift to the status quo?
“If you’d like to join us,” I told the male carefully while waving in the appropriate direction, “there are extra masks over on the porch.”
“Join you?” The werewolf looked like he’d smelled something vile. And maybe he had with his head stuffed so high up his own butt. “I’d rather f—”
“Move it.”
Yet again, a werewolf had snuck up on me while I wasn’t looking. But this time the arriving shifter was a friend. Tank’s hand landed on the other male’s shoulder so hard the latter stumbled and almost fell to the pavement. Nonetheless, the nameless male puffed up his chest and opened his mouth to spew out more invective...until, that is, his gaze and Tank’s met.
I reached out my hand, wanting to warn Tank that fighting my battles wasn’t going to help matters in the long run. But Gunner’s lieutenant was too intent upon subduing his opponent with a single glance. Sure enough, our unwelcome audience member shriveled beneath Tank’s stare-down, turning without another word and beating it out of sight.
“I guess that’s our cue to get back to work,” I noted, trying to keep frustration out of my voice. How was I supposed to do my job as the alpha’s mate if well-meaning werewolves kept stepping in and doing that work for me?
But this time Tank’s gaze met mine as he shook his head. “They’ll have to finish up by themselves, chica. Because there’s someone here to see you. She says she’s your grandmother.”
Chapter 14
Grandmother. It was almost as if my struggles with Kira and the resultant yearnings had created a family member where none previously existed. Not even realizing I was leaving Tank behind me, I padded down the road in the direction he must have come from, drawn forward by what I suspected was a pack-like bond but couldn’t confirm without werewolf blood to energize my latent skills.
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