Raised by Wolves

by Bridget Essex

  “I think your cousin might like it,” she tells me with warm sincerity, and I take the book from her outstretched hand. “I haven't read it yet,” she admits, “but it's gotten great reviews. It's about a woman who falls for her co-worker on a business trip in Paris—”

  “Sounds perfect,” I tell her much too quickly as I take the book from her hands. Again, our fingers touch, brushing against each other, and I feel a wave of heat come over me. Come on, Becks, you're a wolf, for God's sake. Act like it! “Thanks,” I tell her, clearing my throat. Wow. I'm not acting like a wolf at all right now. Where the hell is my charm? Sitting in my apartment, watching Netflix and eating mac and cheese?

  Well, I'm sure as hell not there.

  And I wouldn't want to be.

  I realize, as sappy as it sounds, that I wouldn't want to be anywhere but right here, right now.

  “This...this is exactly what I was looking for,” I tell her then, holding her gaze. “Thank you,” I repeat, internally kicking myself for my lack of smoothness.

  But my lack of smoothness doesn't seem to be something that Loren is even noticing, because she stands a little straighter at that moment, and she nods to me, biting her lip. “Sure. Great,” she says, her voice a little low now, a little smoky, and I realize that her eyes aren't looking into mine anymore. Her gaze trails over my face, down to my mouth, and the heat flares deep inside of me as I realize that there's a spark in her eyes. A spark of desire.

  “Um...sorry,” she manages then, flicking her gaze back up to mine. Yeah, there's definitely fire in those green depths, and that causes my insides to melt hotly. She waves her hand toward the cash register, shaking her shoulders a little, like she's coming out of a trance. “Um, come up to the desk when you're ready, and I'll cash you out,” she tells me quickly, taking a step back from me, as if she suddenly remembered that she has someplace else to be.

  I watch her walk away, her hips swaying, her blonde curls bouncing around her shoulders, and I straighten my back a little, swallowing. Normally, when I'm attracted to a woman, I let them know right away. But, normally, I'm attracted to the women I meet in bars (which are already set up so that you pretty much assume this is a situation where you're looking to hook up with someone). So in day-to-day life, I'm not really sure how to handle this.

  I'm a confident person. I know I'm not too shabby to look at, and I have my animal magnetism going for me (um, literally), so it's usually easy for me to tell if the woman I like is liking me back.

  And I'm fairly certain that's what's going on here.

  I hope.

  I've got to figure out my next move. I wander the store a little, but I'm not really looking at the books, though my fingers graze their spines, and I even pull a few off the shelves to gaze with unseeing eyes at their covers and blurbs.

  The thing is, Rob was right: Loren is completely and utterly my type. She's got those great legs, long blonde hair, curves for days... I hate to sound shallow, but it's usually the physicality of a woman that attracts me right away. I'm not a relationship kind of girl, and you need to be attracted to someone to have interest in a tumble through the sheets.

  But there's something else about Loren. She also...kind of makes me nervous. She's so attractive—and it isn't just her scent, though the warm, delicate floral has followed me insistently throughout the shop. Again, it's not a strong scent, but there's something about it that makes me notice it, something about it that draws me in.

  Okay, again, I've never been a relationship sort of woman, and God knows that I'm not looking for a relationship right now (seriously, no, no, with a big side of nope)—but if I was...I might not mind being in a relationship with someone like Loren.

  Wow, really, Becks? I mentally slap myself a few times, and then I pour a mental bucket of cold water on myself (you don't even want to know what that entails. Just think about the saddest thing, and then think of even sadder things. Right? Pretty bad, huh?). What's wrong with me? Is there some kind of witchcraft in that perfume of hers? I'm clearly far too upset about what happened today with my mother, and it's making me think things I'd never ordinarily be thinking. I can't make any decisions about my love life right now.

  I want sex. That's all I want. And if Loren wants sex...well, then that's pretty perfect. Good sex will make me stop thinking about the horrible conversation with my mother today, will help me stop thinking about the fact that my Aunt Sonia agrees with her.

  Will help me stop thinking at all.

  Okay. I tug down on my leather jacket, straighten my cuffs, run a hand over my hair, and then I'm turning on my heel and sauntering up to the counter. Time to pour on the charm.

  But when Loren turns to smile at me, I falter again. It's those eyes. They're so damn green, so piercing, and her smile is as bright as the sun at noon. It does something to me: my stomach gets tied up in knots when I look at her, and that just never happens to me.

  God. I'm losing my nerve.

  I set the book for Rob down on the counter. Fine, I can just buy the book and leave the store without asking Loren out. There's not a gigantic flashing sign above my head declaring that I had any intention of asking her out. There's nothing to indicate that's really why I came into this bookstore. I can just buy the book and go, head home. Get my Netflix and dinner on.

  So Loren smiles at me, and she begins to ring me up for the book on the iPad. I hand her a twenty-dollar bill, and she gives me my change quickly. But when she puts the book into a small paper bag, she draws A Lesbian Werewolf in London out from beneath the counter and slips it into the bag before pushing the purchase across the counter toward me.

  I stare at her in astonishment, but she's glancing up at me now through her lashes, her chin down, her smile dazzling. “On the house,” she tells me with a simple eyebrow raise.

  I stare at her, realizing my mouth is open, and then I snap it shut. “Um...are you sure?”

  Loren nods with a little chuckle. “Honestly, I think you'll get a kick out of it. I have a sixth sense about these things,” she says, tapping the side of her nose with one long finger. She's wearing pale purple nail polish. Lavender.

  “A sixth sense about books people will like?” I ask, voice low, gruff.

  “No,” she murmurs, leaning forward to rest her elbows on the counter, an impish smile playing over her full lips. “About people I like.”

  I stare at her for a long moment and realize that, not for the first time in Loren's presence, I'm tongue-tied.

  “Have a great night,” Loren purrs to me; then she pushes herself up and off the counter, brushing some imaginary particles from the antique wood, casting her gaze toward the aisles—and not toward me.

  I take a step backwards, the spell broken. “Thanks,” I manage to say. “You, too...”

  And then I'm stumbling out of the store like an idiot. I actually trip on the threshold, making the bells on the door jingle a little more loudly than necessary on my way out.

  It was either hotter than the surface of the sun in the store, or it got much colder outside while I was indoors. I wrap my arms around myself, the paper bag crinkling against my leather jacket as I lift my nose to the wind, inhaling deeply. The cacophony of scents razes my lungs and senses, but I'm used to it by now. I've lived in Boston all my life, and the smells of the city don't bother me. Actually, they comfort me.

  Usually.

  Just not tonight.

  Something happened in that store. Something I could never have predicted, and if you'd asked me even earlier today, I would have said I'd never want it to happen.

  I was really attracted to Loren, yes. And that's good. Physical attraction is important. But it went deeper than that.

  And...that's a new one for me.

  I stand on the corner, and I glance back to the bookstore over my left shoulder. It's not dark out yet, but the lights in the store window look so cozy and warm. I've never given a shit about cozy before.

  Oh, God. What's happening to me?

  Frustrat
ed with myself, still turned on as hell and really, really confused, I pull the werewolf book out of the bag. I glance around furtively; surprisingly, there's no one close to me on the street.

  And then I lift the book to my nose.

  I inhale.

  The rush of delicate, soft floral overwhelms me, but there's something that lies just beneath that and beneath the scent of the paper and ink.

  It's...her. It's Loren. The sweet warmth of her skin.

  I open my eyes, and I stare down at the book, dazed. I thumb the book open.

  On the inside cover, in a small, neat print, Loren wrote Give me a call after you've finished. Maybe we could get coffee sometime. And right beside those tantalizing words, she'd written her phone number.

  I toss the book back in the bag, and then I'm turning on my heel and I'm right back in the store, the bell jingling behind me before I've had a second to think. My body moved of its own accord, because I know I have to do this.

  Loren is putting on her long red coat. I just realized that the “Open” sign on the store, above the window, has been switched off. She's closing up.

  When Loren sees me again, she smiles brightly, and again my knees go a little weak, but I try to strengthen them as she inclines her head toward me, her full, red lips turning up at the corners. “Hi. Did you forget something?” she asks me.

  I nod. “Yeah,” I tell her, my voice low, throaty, almost a growl. “I forgot to ask you if you'd like to get some coffee with me.”

  Loren doesn't skip a beat, but she lifts up her head and laughs, the sound bright and warm in the space between us. “Have you finished reading the book already?”

  I grin at her. “Did I mention I'm a speed reader?”

  This surprises her, and she laughs again. “So,” she says, glancing up at me through her long lashes, “what did you think of the part where the werewolf eats the apple pie?”

  My heart is beating a steady, fast drumbeat as I take another step toward her, shrugging my shoulders, curving my entire body in her direction. “Stirring. Inspiring. Fascinating.” I incline my head over my shoulder. “What do you say we go get some apple pie ourselves?”

  Loren considers this for a long moment, her head to the side, her lips quirked up into the most disarming smile. “That sounds stirring,” she says, her voice dropping lower. “Inspiring. Fascinating...”

  I was trying to make my grin wolfish, but I'm fairly certain I'm only grinning like an idiot as I take a step backward, holding the door open for her. A thrill runs through me at the way she looks at me, how beautiful she is...but there's something more than beauty in those bright green eyes. Something more than that good old physical attraction that zings between us like a live wire.

  Get a grip, Becks. The sex is going to great, and that's going to be it. End of story. No happily ever after.

  Okay, so the truth of the matter is that it's not that I don't want a relationship. People (hell, even my best friend, Rob) have this perception of me that I'm a love 'em and leave 'em gal, and that's definitely what I've portrayed to the world. I'm not a good actress by any stretch of the imagination, and I know there must be some part of me that loves to have sex and then extricate herself from the situation before any attachments form (either on her part, or mine).

  But my deepest, darkest fantasies aren't really sex-based. Well, I have some of those, too, but you know what I mean.

  I want a girlfriend. The type of woman I'd spend the rest of my life with, the type of woman I'd someday marry. I know that sounds all hokey and sappy, but it's the truth. I've wanted someone in my life for as long as I can remember.

  But I'm a werewolf. A real, genuine, honest-to-God, changing-into-a-wolf werewolf. And people mostly think we exist in books or movies, and there are some crazy cryptozoologist types who try to sell blurry photos of dogs to supermarket tabloids too prove that we're real...but no one knows that we exist. Like, really exist, in real life.

  Werewolves, for the most part, choose to marry each other. We don't often wed with—or even date—humans, because it's unsafe to broadcast to the world the fact that werewolves exist. And who wants to live that kind of lie? It's a lie by omission, not to tell your spouse or lover exactly what you are, and I'm unwilling to be so deceptive.

  Of course, some werewolves do tell the humans they're involved with the truth. It's rare, and the person has to be someone you really trust... But of the few cases I'm aware of, none of them ended well.

  My Uncle Kevin is one of my favorite people in the universe. He was married to a human woman named Amelia. God, he loved her. Uncle Kevin and Aunt Amelia had what everybody dreams of finding: true love. They loved each other with a kind of tender passion and fierceness that, even as a little kid, I knew was special.

  But Uncle Kevin had never told her the Big Secret. Not before he married her, not on their wedding night...not at all. And it was eating him up inside. He always wondered if she would still love him if she knew everything about him, warts—or...fur—and all.

  So, one night, he just told her. It wasn't a particularly special day. Just a day like any other. They were eating dinner, and he told her, matter-of-factly, that he was a werewolf born to a family of werewolves.

  She thought he was joking. It's a common reaction to someone telling you they're a werewolf, after all, and she went back to cutting up her broiled chicken. But then Uncle Kevin stood very calmly and, just as calmly, changed into a wolf.

  I thought Kevin and Amelia had had true love. So did Kevin. Until that night.

  Amelia watched him transform, began to cry, went upstairs, packed her suitcase, and left.

  And he never saw her again.

  That story is one of the saddest from my childhood, because before Aunt Amelia left, my uncle was a completely different person. He was happy in the deepest, truest sense of that word. He had a life about him that I tried to emulate in everything I did, a happiness, optimism, and sense of humor that were off the charts.

  And when Amelia left...well, it was like she took all of his life with her.

  I glance sidelong at Loren and reel myself back. I was really close to my uncle, and Amelia leaving broke him into a million pieces. I know that there's a risk when anyone tells their significant other, who isn't a werewolf, that the creatures they thought were only Hollywood creations or mythological beings are, in fact, real. There's going to be a steep chance they won't believe you. Uncle Kevin should definitely have told Amelia the truth before their relationship got that far.

  But I'm getting so ahead of myself. I already know that all I want from Loren is a nice hour—or two...or seven—of sex, and then we'll say our goodbyes, probably never see one another again.

  Because that's just...what I do.

  I've been silent for about twenty seconds while my brain worried away, and Loren seems to notice that something is up. She glances sidelong at me and flashes me a bright smile. “Having second thoughts?” she asks quietly, and though her voice is gauged to be bright and warm, there's an undercurrent of concern, self-doubt.

  “No,” I tell her, and I mean it. I smile at her, too, and then my mouth is running away from me. “We're just going on a little date,” I tell her, shrugging my shoulders. “No strings attached.”

  A spark flashes in her bright green eyes when she looks at me. “No strings,” she repeats, her warm, alto voice pitched for humor, but there was something sad about the slant of her mouth—or did I just imagine it?

  Stop overthinking this, Becks.

  No strings attached.

  I can handle no strings attached.

  Chapter 3: Strings Attached

  Susie Q's is a little diner around the corner from Quincy Market and not that far from the bookshop. I've eaten here before; it's the type of place that locals go to. Few tourists make their way inside, which suits me just fine. Loren seems to like the place, too, because when she enters, the waitress looks up, beams her a bright smile, and shows us to a booth right away, bringing two cracked but cle
an mugs full to the brim of coffee.

  Loren curls her long fingers around the chipped mug and inhales the brew deeply, breathing out a sigh of happiness. “Diner coffee is the best coffee,” she tells me as she fishes out two creamers from the vintage bowl on the table, peeling the tops off and pouring them into the cup.

  “You'll get no argument from me,” I tell her with a wry smile as I lift the cup up to my mouth. Loren's eyes glitter with amusement as she stirs her coffee with a spoon after pouring about a quarter cup's worth of sugar into it.

  “You drink it black?” she asks, surprised.

  “Does your sixth sense just involve books?” I ask her with a little smile, setting the cup down and nodding in thanks to the waitress who gives me a menu. She doesn't give one to Loren.

  “I'll be back in a few minutes,” the waitress mumbles companionably, then trots away, her low kitten heels clicking on the peeling linoleum floor.

  “My sixth sense,” says Loren, leaning back in the booth, that bright smile never leaving her mouth, “extends to books, people who buy books...women,” she says, drawling the word and glancing up at me again through those long lashes in such a disarmingly sexy way that the breath is knocked out of me for half a heartbeat.

  “That's a pretty good sixth sense,” I manage, glancing down at the menu and trying to read the words printed on it, but all I can see is the curve of her forearms, her wrists, as she rests her cup back down on the table, the dip of her head as she picks up the spoon again to stir the still-swirling coffee in her mug.

  The waitress comes back to take my menu. “I'll just have apple pie,” I tell her, and the waitress nods to me, winking at Loren.

  “Your usual, kid?” she asks with a laugh, and Loren nods eagerly, glancing coyly at me with a raised brow.