by Chant, Zoe
Nicole just nodded, head down. She remained subdued for the rest of the ride into town.
Chapter Two
When they got out of the car, they were met by her father, two more cousins, one of the Fannon alphas, and a man with startlingly blue eyes, like a wolf child's. His skin was either tanned or naturally light brown, and his hair was a dark crew cut.
Nicole had reunited with her family earlier in the day, before they all headed out to the fields to check the damage. Now, she trailed her mother over to the others, resisting the impulse to stare at the man. Either it had been way too long since she'd had sex, or her wolf was responding to being among her own kind again.
“Nicole,” Sheila Fannon greeted her, extending a hand. “Nice to see you again, how've you been?”
“Good, thanks.” Nicole accepted her hand and shook it. “I heard about Andrew, I'm sorry.”
“We miss him, but it gets better with time.” Sheila smiled tiredly, the lines around her eyes creasing. “Now. This here is Adam Langley, who your mother tells me you're interested in meeting. He's the first generation in his family, but he works hard, and you can hardly tell the difference when he's shifted.”
That was good. A lot of first generation wolves had problems, whether because they didn't get the trick of changing forms or just because they hadn't grown up around wolf behavior and never really understood it. Not everything was instinct.
Nicole smiled at him, careful not to show her teeth and maybe scare him, and he returned it confidently. “Adam,” Sheila continued, “This is Nicole Blackwood, the Blackwood pack's heir. She's been gone to school for a while now, but I remember her as a kid, and I think you'll get along okay. Just bring up your old job, and you should have plenty to talk about.”
“It's nice to meet you,” he said, stepping forward and offering a hand.
Nicole jumped slightly at the unexpected intrusion into her space and resisted the urge to snap at it. He hadn't even done anything wrong, even by wolf logic; she was just prickly. She managed to accept his hand before it looked too weird. “Nice to meet you, too.”
Just as his fingers were closing around hers, the wind shifted, and Nicole was hit in the face with his scent.
Oh. Oh. She breathed in slowly, flaring her nostrils to try to gather in as much as she could. He smelled like spices – curry and cinnamon, and overpoweringly of witch hazel, so strongly she wondered for a moment if he had been performing first aid earlier and failed to shower. She breathed in again, and verified that it was his scent. The spices mixed with the astringent plant to produce something that said home to her. She could imagine curling up with their pups while he cooked, something that actually had flavor. She'd grown fond of human seasoning while she was away, too.
She snapped back to earth and registered his hand tight on hers. Watching her from below lowered eyelashes, he raised her hand to his face and sniffed at the pulse point of his wrist, investigating.
Nicole was suddenly screamingly aware of their audience, particularly of her mother waiting to see if she'd jerk away from him and maybe bite him for the presumption. She didn't want to. He smelled like home. Her wolf wanted to shift and rub against his legs and feel his fingers scratching into their ears and neck.
“Apricots,” he said slowly. “You smell like apricots. And wild honey.”
“I know.” She waited a moment before tugging her wrist out of his hand. He whined reflexively, and when he stepped closer she slid to press into his side, feeling his arm around her. It felt right.
“Well,” Sheila said. “That's finally some good news. Not much of it lately.”
“What?” Adam said, disoriented.
“Our wolves like each other,” Nicole told him, nuzzling into his shoulder. “That's what the feeling is.”
“Oh. And that means, what?” Adam asked. His arms closed around her, holding her against his side.
“It's hard to say,” Sheila said. “But they usually have more sense than us humans. Don't get caught so caught up in drama and romance. Chris'd never have married that girl if he was listening to his wolf.”
“They like humans sometimes,” Nicole disagreed, breathing in again against Adam's chest, trying to memorize the scent. “And sometimes they hate someone and those relationships never work out well. My Mom thinks everyone has a wolf mate, but some of them haven't been made into wolves yet, so they can't be found.”
“So they're like soul mates?” Adam said.
“You could think of that way.” Nicole half smiled, trying to keep the bitterness from leeching into her tone. Five minutes of conversation and her choices had narrowed to one. She wanted to pull the bitterness around her mind like a sheltering jacket, but already she was losing grasp of it. “All wolves can feel each other, and for pack mates it's stronger, I'm sure you know that by now. For mates, it's stronger than that still, and our wolves already think of each other that way.”
“Cool.” He grinned down at her. “I used to daydream about finding a soul mate in high school, you know, before all this shit happened to me.”
Nicole giggled, imagining a young Adam doodling his name in hearts on a pink notebook. “Did you read romance novels?” He was cute. She wanted to want this. It would be easier if she could want this.
“By the dozen.” He laughed, too, chest rumbling against her cheek. “I thought it would be a little more dramatic, though.”
“Just wait until we're both shifted,” Nicole said teasingly, and reluctantly pulled out of his arms. She had so little touch when she was away. She felt like she was starved and someone had set a feast in front of her. “We should go sit down, I bet everyone's waiting on us. Aren't you hungry?” There hadn't been time to hunt like they usually did today.
“Starved,” Adam said, licking his lips and staring at her pointedly. Nicole felt herself blush, and turned her back pointedly to walk into the restaurant before they got distracted again.
The restaurant was a steakhouse and grill, the kind of thing that focused on quantity over quality. It was almost always the choice for pack meetings that included meals if they weren't hunting, because wolves ate a lot and liked most of it to be meat. The owners were humans, but over time had become accustomed to the way that there would sometimes be huge, wolflike “dogs” coming in with customers, the occasional howling, and infrequent bite marks. The wolves didn't quite make up a majority of the scattered population of the county, but they were close. The humans were used to it.
Two of the bigger tables had been pushed together, and much of the Blackwood and Fannon packs were either seated around the result, or hanging out at the bar watching the football game playing. Nicole tugged Adam over to sit by her father and the empty seat reserved for her mother.
“So I sit with you guys, huh?” he said.
“Yeah. I mean, nothing's set in stone yet, but that's sort of the idea of introducing us.” She smiled at him, and breathed in, trying to gauge if he was nervous.
A little, she decided, but mostly confident. That was good, if she had to do this. She could mate a beta guy, but it would leave her managing the pack by herself when her parents died, and a single alpha was never competitive.
There was also the fact that she really preferred guys who didn't need her to tell them what to do in her personal life. Especially in bed. Nicole much preferred being caught to doing the catching.
Adam slid out a chair and sat down, then tugged on her waist. She yelped and tumbled into his lap. “Hey!” Was he feeling her thoughts already?
“Just wanted to save you a spot,” he said, the innocence of his tone ruined by his smirk, and twanged one of her curls.
“Uh huh, sure.” She elbowed him into shifting so she could settle herself between his legs on the chair, but didn't get out of his lap. This was plenty comfortable.
“Having fun, there?” Katherine MacCrae called, sitting down. She had a toddler in her lap and a slightly older child on her shoulders, and looked heavily pregnant as well – she and whichever Fannon she'd mar
ried had been busy.
Trying to be bitter about Adam was like trying to grip water in her fingers, but everyone else was fair game. Nicole bared her teeth at Katherine in response to the taunt, and added a slight growl when it just touched off laughter. She felt Adam's hands tight on her hips and snuggled back into him, then directed another warning to the table in general. Mine.
“Isn't that kind of rude?” Adam breathed in her ear. “Sheila told me not to do stuff like that around the other pack.”
“You were an outsider,” Nicole murmured back. “If you didn't behave someone would smack you into line. I am the future alpha of Blackwood pack.” She'd just been thinking about falling into old patterns, hadn't she. “And if you marry me, you're the other one.”
“Oh, well, in that case.” Adam nuzzled her hair, then lifted his head. His growl reverberated through the room, making several of the wolves at the bar startle. Nicole's cousin, Alex, fell off the stool, to general entertainment.
“They're cute,” Mary said, dropping into a chair on the other side of Nicole's father. “I'm jealous. Anyone have a guest room I can stay in during the honeymoon?” Laughter again.
“Don't you have headphones?” Nicole flipped her off.
“Girls, girls.” Nicole's father finally turned his attention to the table. “And boys,” he added when Mary's younger brother Ethan opened his mouth. “Quiet, please.”
“That means shut the fuck up,” Sheila Fannon said, settling next to her wife at the opposite end of the table.“All of you.” The last few people who'd been inattentive were very swiftly silent. “Great. Scott, you want to start the agenda?”
When Nicole was a child, the meetings had been a lot less organized, and very rarely inside. The current MacCrae alpha couple included a first generation wolf who had been in school for business when she was bitten. They had convinced the others to try running meetings a little more civilly one at a time, and the results had been effective enough that indoor meetings with schedules were standard by the time Nicole left for college.
Of course, they didn't have paper copies of agendas or anything. No need to go too far.
She sat up and resolved to put aside her personal feelings. This was important.
“First thing is the landslide damage,” her father said. “The casualty list in the region is six as far as we know, although no one's gotten a hold of the Hirsch pack yet. Four of the casualties were in the Priddy pack,” he said, and began to list the names. When the list of the dead in the three packs that had lost members was finished, he paused for a moment, then threw his head back and keened.
Nicole joined him an instant later, hearing her mother and cousins join in. The Fannon pack, led by Sheila and Dawn, joined at a very different key after a longer delay. The eerie notes harmonized in the air, seeming to shimmer and distort the picture of the restaurant. She felt the back of her neck tingle, and a sort of phantom impression of her fur stiffening along her back, although she was not shifted.
The howl phased out slowly, and she twisted to nuzzle Adam. His hands rubbed at her shoulders soothingly.
“Thanks, everybody,” Sheila said, after several moments. “We thank the mountains for leaving our children alive and wish the affected packs reconciliation with the earth soon.” There was a moment of quiet before she added, “How's the Blackwood damage look?”
“My daughter is the expert here,” her father said, looking to her.
Nicole swallowed. She hadn't been at a pack meeting in so long... she straightened slightly, feeling Adam's hands resettle cupping her hips. The contact was reassuring. She had his support, physically at least.
“Our territory's pretty heavily forested,” she began, “And because of that the damage wasn't as bad as it could be. The worst was on the northwest slope, by the road up, where there was the tree blight a couple decades back. The trees on that slope were all young, without extensive root structure, and they couldn't hold the soil together.” There was nodding, all around. “We're going to need to replant the whole slope again, and I think we should – since we're going to have to rebuild the road anyway, it would be best to relocate it some. Anywhere there's a slide there's a risk of it happening again, and the trees won't be big enough to protect against it for a long time coming.
“Apart from that, most of our buildings are intact. I had a look at the communal kitchen building, and while it's still standing, unfortunately the ground under the foundation was pretty badly affected. It should be safe to retrieve most of what's inside, but we're going to need to tear it down and rebuild somewhere else.
“Overall, we got off lightly, and I'd like to offer my services in deciding where to rebuild to the Fannon pack if they need it, and any others.” There should be representatives from some of them there, and the meeting summary would be emailed to all of the packs after so that they knew about the decisions being made.
“Thank you, Nicole,” Dawn Fannon said. “We're likely to take you up on that, especially if Adam is going where you go now.” She glanced meaningfully at them.
“Hmm?” Sheila had said something about his old job. She twisted in his lap to give him an inquisitive look.
He cleared his throat some. “Right. Most of the Blackwood pack doesn't know me, so – I guess I should introduce myself. I'm Adam Langley, I'm a first generation wolf. I used to be a ranger at one of the federal parks,” he added wryly, and noises of comprehension came around the table. Nicole glanced back at the table and saw Mary giving her an approving look.
“Anyway,” he continued, “I'm not a specialist in landslides or anything, but I got my bachelor's degree in earth sciences so I know a little more than the average guy. I guess Nicole's in my field, too?”
“I'm supposed to defend my dissertation in May,” she affirmed, taking a moment to be grateful the crisis had happened in her last semester. She could probably get an okay to leave for a month to finish up the degree she'd spent most of the last decade on. Years would have been iffy. “Geology stuff on the composition of the Catskills.”
It struck her for a moment that a lot of men didn't like being outsmarted by women in their fields, and she shot a slightly nervous look at Adam. What would she do if her mate rejected her? A minute ago she had been angry about having her choices constrained by the bond, but really, she had few enough other options. That was the problem with first generation wolves, really – you could get caught out for violating human or wolf norms.
She needn't have worried. He beamed. “You really are perfect,” he murmured against her hair, and she wriggled, imagining her wolf rubbing against his chest.
“Anyway,” Sheila said dryly, making them both jump and incurring snickering and a few yips. “My expert seems to be occupied, so I'll summarize our damage. We had two injuries, neither life threatening. Mark is home with a broken ankle, but Logan had to be taken to the hospital with a head injury. We're assured he'll be fine soon.” There was nodding around the table. “Most of the damage came when the pack meeting hall collapsed, during which time a meeting was in progress with the Blackwood pack. Tara Blackwood was also injured at that time.” She nodded to Nicole's mother, who smiled tightly back and squeezed her husband's hand.
“Two of the closest houses to that area have similarly had their foundations destabilized. The families are accommodated. We haven't had any slopes totally deforested like the Blackwood pack, but there's some damage to fence lines in the pastures that needs to be fixed, and we're still determining which of the fields are safe for livestock.”
Adam was playing with her hair again. Nicole drifted out slightly as the alphas of both packs discussed repair work and the lending of members with related skills. She could do threat assessment, but construction wasn't really her thing.
She guessed Adam must be bored, too. Nicole wished she could twist around and look at him, but as the adult heir she really should at least pretend to be putting her father's words about how long it would take to get houses raised for the two temporarily hom
eless families, and then the communal buildings for both packs, if they all pitched in to mind. Instead, though, she found herself thinking about the heat of Adam's chest pressed into her back, and the very distracting way he was fidgeting with her curls. Her wolf wanted to curl around him and never move again.
She imagined the hands in her hair, not stroking and playing but grabbing, pulling her around. She imagined them lower on her body and his lips on her neck instead. She didn't usually let people kiss or touch her neck, but for Adam she might make an exception. Her mate would never really hurt her, and she didn't have to assert dominance against him.
Nicole would be free to let him not just kiss her throat, but sink teeth into it while his hands slid under her skirt or down her ass. She imagined being pinned like that, unable to escape the grip of his teeth or hands, and bit her tongue to make very, very sure she would not whimper at an inappropriate time.
It was a great relief to Nicole when the meeting wound down.
“On a happier note,” her father said, standing, “I'd like to ask everyone to welcome my daughter and heir, Nicole, home.” He was greeted by a chorus of barks, yips, and at least two howls from the back of the bar. Nicole threw her head back and let out her own howl, greeting the pack again. She felt her wolf's pleasure in her mind, much less mixed than her own; to the wolf, they were home after a long and stressful parting. Why had they even left in the first place? Now that they were back, they had a mate and could settle down and start having pups.
Nicole shut that thought down rapidly. The cacophony of canine greetings was quieting enough to let her father speak again. “Nicole will be going back to school for the next month to finish up her degree, but after that she's home for good – and in other excellent news, she seems to have found her mate wandering in the parking lot here.”
This got another group of entirely human howls. Nicole glared furiously at them. A bark at the one closest to her got him to flinch back and quieted most of them – or at least the offenders old enough to remember her and the way she bit when she was mad.