by Amanda Milo
Her squeal has Shane’s head popping up, and he abandons the miniature rose bush he’s bared in favor of running for his adoring sister. He hits the fence with his paws, beginning to whine pitifully in a way that makes all three girls melt and rush to enter the pen.
“That little sod has you ladies wrapped around his paws,” Finn mutters, shaking his head.
I’m moving for the rosebush. “How did he get at this? We were supposed to be watching him.” It has thorns—how did he not start yelping? Didn’t he notice he was getting stabbed a thousand times? Sometimes the boy is almost impervious to physical inconveniences, like getting stabbed by sharp things. I’m not sure yet if it’s a good thing. Lately, he’s been eyeing Susan’s cactus, which lives on the counter. It may need to move up to a shelf. A high, high-up shelf. Thank God we’re not werecats.
“We were watching him. We saw him burrow down through all the snow and dig out all those insulating leaves and straw until he was able to tear the crap out of it. What is it?”
“Susan’s rose. The one that grows all the tiny yellow blooms.” Susan loves them.
“Aw, shite,” Finn says, clomping up beside me. “Can you save it? You ought to watch your son better.”
My tone is laced with a healthy dose of sarcasm. “Thanks. You’re a big help, Finn.”
The door opens behind us, and Susan and Brooke step out. Brooke stops dead when she sees Ginny.
Charlotte sends a stiff smile her way. Ginny doesn’t have any expression at all.
Finn claps me on the back and starts for the gate, moving around Shane who’s playing with his carrot once again, enjoying the fact that it’s now half-frozen. “Thanks a million for the advice, by the way. My flute appreciates it and commends you.”
I make a face, shoving leaves and straw back into the cavity around the little rose plant. “No more talking to me about your flute, Finn, good grief.”
“What’s a flute?” Maggie asks.
“A huge instrument,” Finn replies, reaching out and ruffling her hair. “Huge. And it makes beautiful music, if you know how to play it right.”
“Okay, enough euphemisms with the seven-year-old,” Susan warns.
Finn nods, contrite. “Sound. So about those sleigh rides. Am I getting the draft horses harnessed up, Maggs?”
She holds up Shane, who she loves to carry around when he’ll let her, like now. “Can Shane come?”
I raise a thickly folded blanket, which I’ve been keeping tucked under my arm. When or if Shane Changes, he can be swaddled and kept warm enough until we make it back inside.
If he happens to get chilled while he’s in wolf form, the blanket is good for that too. Otherwise he’s small enough he can ride with me in my sweater. An activity he loves.
I do too. There’s a sweet sort of bonding when you carry your furry son tucked over your heart, the snow melting off his fur and freezing parts of your chest.
“You bet Shane can go,” I tell her, moving to join her and Finn. “This is a beautiful day for his first sleigh ride.”
Charlotte glances at us, but her eyes go back to Ginny. And Ginny, instead of joining us, moves past me to stand with Susan and Brooke. “We could ride with you guys… if that’s okay.”
Brooke swallows, meeting Ginny’s eyes, hers turning glassy, but she blinks away actual tears. “I’d love that.”
Ginny nods. “Okay.” She looks down at herself. “Should we change, or—”
Susan smiles. “You don’t have to, but remember, you’ll never get the horsehair out of those leggings.” She gestures to herself, similarly attired in a sweater dress. “I put on jeans. I figured I’d just shove my sweater up so I’m not sitting on it.”
“Hang on. Removing horsehair is a nightmare,” I say, testing the pun—then chuckle.
Finn laughs with me, but the girls all groan. Shane wags his tail, unaware of the context but able to pick up on the fact that we’re happy.
Charlotte raises her hand like she’s in class. “I’m going to change into jeans and a regular sweater. An old one that I won’t regret if it smells like horse. Give me five minutes.”
Maggie stares at her sister’s retreating back like she doesn’t know who she is. “You don’t like how horses smell?”
Ginny winces. “It’s a good smell, Maggie, but you don’t necessarily want your whole wardrobe to smell horsey. On that note, I’ll be right back. I’m gonna quick make a costume change too.”
Maggie is aghast. “I do want my whole wardrobe to smell like a horse.” She turns a direct look on me—so direct, I have to drop my gaze.
This is a recent development with her. One I don’t regret. It means she’s growing up, taking her place in the hierarchy, even if she is human.
“I’m wearing these clothes,” she declares.
“That’s fine,” I agree. “Your mom gave permission and I don’t care. I like the smell of horses too.”
“Let’s roll out then,” Finn says. He snaps a wave at Susan and Brooke. “My love will be joining you shortly. You birds enjoy your trail ride.”
“We will.”
“Thanks, Finn!”
I pass him Shane’s blanket, move to Susan, and take her face in my hand. “Ride safe,” I murmur. “Have a good time.” I kiss her.
She wraps her arms around my neck. “I intend to. And when we get back, your mom told me they’d watch the kids tonight, in case you and I want some alone time.”
Putting my mouth back on hers, purring with pleasure against her lips, I grip her hip. “I’d like that.” I kiss her gently, then pull away. Not enough to leave her arms, but enough so that our faces aren’t in easy kissing range. It’s a dangerous proximity for us when there’s people around. “I need to tell my parents that I love them.”
Susan squeezes my butt, yet manages to maintain a serene, relatively innocent smile. It’s kind of impressive, because I know she knows how much I’m starting to consider the merits of hauling her away to somewhere—anywhere—private. We just need a few minutes. “They earn the second topmost spot for my favorite babysitters ever.”
“Oh yeah?” I say to her, sliding my hand into her hair, my gaze rising from her lips and moving straight to her eyes. “Who’s your first?”
“You,” she whispers, smiling. “I love you, Lucan.”
“And I love you,” I tell her, staring into her beautiful eyes.
She smiles. “So. Was that my yellow tea rose that you let our son eat?”
I look her right in the eye. “Finn is my whipping boy. I think you should switch him with what’s left of the rosebush.”
Susan tucks her face into my neck and laughs, her arms hugging me tightly. Just as tightly as my arms, now wrapped around her, hug her back. “If your dad is sure this punishment system works…”
“A tried and true method,” I assure her, smiling into her hair.
“You two have weird foreplay,” Finn observes.
“Well,” Susan says, pulling back from me enough to look over her shoulder at him. “You’d know. I hear you guys are the king and queen of foreplay, now that you can’t do… anything more.”
Finn explodes with a noise, a sort of cross between a snorting elephant and a coughing wolf. “That IUD is the Cerberus of contraceptives! Did my wife tell you the evil beast took a bite out of my—”
“Flute,” Maggie supplies helpfully.
Everybody goes still. Susan drops her arms from around me and slowly turns to fully face Finn.
“Why,” Susan asks in a scary-calm voice, “does Maggie seem adept at using that word in that sentence?”
Finn looks flabbergasted. “I have no idea—we were speaking in code—!”
Susan crosses her arms. “That word is now added to The List.”
The list of words Finn isn’t allowed to say. Susan and Finn’s mate have a whole slew of impolite things he’s not supposed to utter. Naturally, his topmost forbidden item being cunt.
With that blow to his vocabulary alone, it’s been a
really difficult year for him.
Ginny and Charlotte exit the house, and Ginny joins Maggie—who’s holding Shane up for Brooke to pet.
Susan’s crossed her arms, and she’s gone full mongoose on Finn, all squinty-eyed scary stare. I catch her by her fur-lined hood and draw her into my arms. “The sooner you cut Finn loose, the sooner you can all take your ride—and then the sooner you’ll be back for my parents to give us a night off together.”
She twists around until her eyes meet mine. I don’t drop my gaze. “All right. I’ll let him go, just this once.”
I kiss her nose. “I’ll owe you a new tea rose.”
“Yellow,” she says.
“Of course.” I kiss her. “And maybe two of them to make up for this travesty.”
“You can make it up to me tonight,” she offers, whispering the words against my lips.
Ginny, with her werewolf hearing, covers her ears. Charlotte looks to her and gives her a sympathetic smile, spared the details but catching the gist of the topic.
“It’s a date,” I tell Susan, giving her one last kiss before letting her go. “I think I’ll start the night with dessert.”
Her eyes flare. “I love the way you make things up to me.”
Finn cries, “Please stop.”
Susan grins, and pats me low on my stomach. “See you soon, dear.”
I give her a nod and a direct stare. “Can’t wait, wifey.”
During that phase when it’s perfectly normal to test out endearments on your spouse, we found out that if I call Susan my wifey, she can’t help but crack up. I use the term like it’s a rare spice, saving it for occasions when she needs a smile, or when I just want to hear her laugh.
Like now. She laughs hard enough she has to hold her stomach, making everyone crack up. With a final chuckle and a fond look, she straightens and turns away, her hips swaying, her long hair flirting with her jacket’s hood.
As Finn once said, JAYSUS, WATCH HER GO!
She’s a vision.
And for the rest of our lives, she’s all mine.
JUST FOR FUN
FINN
THE DAY AFTER LUCAN AND SUSAN’S MATING CEREMONY.
Green bills paper the wall I’ve propped my shoulder against. “Always the best man, never the groom,” I announce to the pub at large, making the crowd laugh.
But me? I may be laughing on the outside, but I’m completely serious. Now, do I regret that Susan fell for Lucan?
No. I swear I mean that. Because it means Susan isn’t my mate—but she is his, and he’s hers. I couldn’t be happier for the pair of them.
It means I’m still searching for the love of my life though. My anamcharra is out there somewhere. And someday, I’m going to succeed in sniffing her out.
“But today is not that day,” I mutter to myself, knocking back the last of my pint.
Rooker, on my left, hears me perfectly and pats me on the back. Good bloke. Not trying to fill my ears with anything. Just sitting here beside me, being supportive. We were up late having a grand time, and then we were up too early, working off the books. Doing the kind of work you don’t get paid for with money, just good ol’ peace of mind, knowing you’ve made the world a cleaner place.
“Sun is peeking out,” he comments.
I make a disinterested noise—but I shove back the scarred up stool I’ve been planted on for the last hour, and gain my feet. “The blighter is probably cooking in the boot.”
“If he dies in Esmerelda, you’ll be ripping.”
“So I will.” I’ll be eating the head off myself for letting dead stink leak into wool carpet. Again.
Rooker doesn’t say anything else, because he doesn’t have to. No matter how many tarps you put down, whenever someone dies, they shite and piss themselves, and it always, always rolls off the edges of a tarp. It will then glue itself to the vehicle and permeate the interior and it’s just damned disgusting.
“I’m off then,” I say wearily, and I glance towards the door, trying to get up some enthusiasm for taking yet another arsehole to the dens’ pig pen for some much-needed recycling.
When I glance at the door though, I don’t just see the bar’s trademark dollar bill wallpapering all over the entrance and exit.
I see a woman.
Short, curvy as an 8, with tightly corkscrewed hair in shades of chestnut and auburn that have to be dyed-in, and the biggest, prettiest brown eyes I’ve ever seen.
She’s looking right at me like she knows me. And I’ve never seen her until this moment, but I know her instantly.
Because my soul recognizes her. My soul has been waiting for her all of my life.
“Oh, feck me,” I whisper.
“Not for a million dollars,” Rooker claims.
“Look now,” I tell him, not even embarrassed at the way my voice cracks. “My acushla just walked in.”
Acushla means pulse of my heart.
Rooker’s head whips up from his Hohner backpack (it holds his accordion, which he’ll be playing today) to have a see.
Uncomfortable at the attention, my rúnsearc, my secret love, takes a step back and glances at the way she came, maybe wondering if she should make an escape.
I jump the table and the half-wall that separates us in the time it takes her to glance back.
It’s safe to say my new, sudden proximity startles her. “AHH!”
“Sorry,” I soothe, hand held out to her. “Awch, mo mhuirnín, I’ve been waiting for you—” forever “—for a long time.”
Mo mhuirnín: my beloved.
She frowns and draws her hand against her leg, takes it right away from my fingers which were reaching for her. “Hi. I, uh, came in here for help.”
“I’ll help you,” I vow quickly. “I’ll help you with anything you need.”
Her eyes narrow, and she searches me thoroughly and not in the complimentary manner you’d hope for in a mate. “I need a ride.”
God bless Yanks. ‘A lift’ is what most of you mean.
In Ireland, her asking me for a ‘ride’ would involve me bucking up between her thighs, and that’s the kind of ride I want to give her, believe me. Oho, do I.
I gesture to the car park. “My mechanical steed is just over there, where ah…” Oh shite. “In that patch of sun.”
I bet the boot is smokin’.
It’s bound to smell like high hell inside. I knew I should have gotten that bloke out.
Then again, if I’d driven all the way to the dens to drop him off to the piggies, I wouldn’t be here, now, to meet my mate.
“You know, I can call an Uber,” my girl says suddenly, her voice wary.
And I realize she must have caught something in my expression; she saw my dismay or hesitation, and it’s spooked her. She has no idea that she’s perfectly safe with me. I’m not wasting time just now thinking up ways to cut her into pieces; I’m simply wondering if the scent of the dead bloke in the back half of my car is going to be a deal-breaker for her. I mean, if it’s not really how I’ve pictured our first date, surely this wasn’t in her script either.
“Finn. Take my truck,” Rooker calls.
“GOD BLESS YE, MAN,” I shout at him, twisting and catching the keys fast. Inhumanely fast. When I turn back to my colúr, my sweet dove, her eyes are wide and she’s staring at me in a new way.
“I’m a shifter,” I explain to her—and interestingly, this makes her relax. “And,” I tip my head to the window showing the car park, “I have a loving relationship with my car out there—proud as hell of Esmerelda, I swear, but I’m afraid she needs her interior detailed something awful at the moment. Anyway, here’s my I.D. if you’d trust me better to see it.” I’ve snagged my billfold from my back pocket and I’ve got it flipped open to show her my driver’s license. “I’m from just outside of Dublin, my parents still live near there, and I’d never hurt a woman. Also, I think my new favorite color is chocolate.” The exact shade of her eyes is what I’ll be in love with for the rest of my days. “
What’s yours, a chroí?” My heart.
“Esmerelda?” she asks.
This is why my car has a name. Women respond to men with cars who have pretty names. It’s a fact.
This is normally where I love to walk a woman out to my car and watch her face as she gets a look at it for the first time, but I’m too leery of her catching any dead body whiffs that I’m going to have a hard time explaining, so I say instead, “Rooker’s truck is the big black Dodge riiight there,” I tell her, pointing to it. Out of the corner of my mouth, I add, “I’d like to point out that not all of us need to overcompensate with such a beast. Why, I have a very modest car. The only modest thing about me.”
Then I look at my lady and bounce my eyebrows.
She bursts out laughing and takes a step sideways. Which I find interesting. It’s a retreat, but not a you’re scaring me or I don’t like you. It’s maybe an ‘oooh, I feel compelled by our matebond to rub myself up against you right now, but I’m trying desperately to resist.’
A’right, I might be projecting.
“Is, uh…” she pauses, and I’d swear she’s beginning to blush. My ears perk up—and I mean that in both senses. I need to be careful before I go wolfhound on her. “Is Rooker Scottish?”
I slow blink.
“I thought I heard a Scottish accent when he said… Never mind,” she says with a quick shake of her head. “Actually, I’m not sure why I even asked. I have absolutely no reason to—I need a ride,” she says again.
And again, hearing naughty words come out of her pretty mouth, no matter how innocently she means them, makes me think bold, bold thoughts.
“I just got done with an interview and my car decided to quit on me. I need to pick up my son from school,” she explains.
“Where did your car die?” I ask, brushing past her to get the door and hold it for her.
This move seems to make her shy. She drops her gaze from mine like a submissive, but she’s no such thing—she’s doing it in reaction to how I’m making her feel, and it makes my blood fire.
Wait—son?
My gaze plummets to her left hand...
Oh feck no. Please no. “You're married?” I ask—and I'm surprised she can hear my question with the way I'm suddenly sucking for oxygen.