by Terry Spear
“So how far back do you go?” Nicole sounded worried, and that bothered him. She must be a royal.
But it was better to get this out in the open rather than wait and cause hard feelings. If she were a royal and she couldn’t live with what he was, it was better to end this deep-seated infatuation he had with the she-wolf.
Blake cleared his throat. “We’re all wolf lineage back to my grandfather. My great-grandfather was the one who had been bitten. He was a sheep farmer and trying to protect his livestock from a wolf.”
“A lupus garou was attacking his sheep?” Nicole sounded horrified that one of their kind would do that and jeopardize all the wolf shifters.
“In defense of her, a hunter had killed her mate and she was on her own, trying to teach her three wolf pups how to hunt. But one of them found sheep were easier to tackle. He didn’t believe she was teaching her wolf pups to go after sheep. Of course, he didn’t know that she was a lupus garou. Werewolves were the stuff of legends, not real.”
“He didn’t kill her pup, did he?”
“No. He loved animals. He knew enough about wolves to realize she could abandon them if he tried to seize the pups first. He planned to relocate them far away from his sheep farm, but he needed to capture her initially. They came at night, and he shot her with a tranquilizer gun, then hurried to place her in a cage. He assumed the pups would go to their mother, but not when he was putting their sleeping mother in the cage. He was certain they’d be wary of him. He was going to leave food for them in other cages so they’d be tempted to come for a free meal, except one of the six-month-old pups bit his hand.”
“And broke the skin,” Nicole said.
“Yep. My great-grandfather wasn’t angry, just surprised. Then again, the pup had to be more alpha than the others and he was defending his mom. My great-grandfather understood that. He kept thinking the pups would go into the cages for the free meals, but they wouldn’t go near them. He didn’t know what else to do. He was afraid the pups would starve. Mom finally came to and was pacing in the cage and whimpering for her pups, so he thought. But later he believed she was telling them to stay away. He couldn’t move her and not gather up the pups first. He had a real dilemma.”
“Until he turned, I bet. Did he have a family?”
“No. He was young, a bachelor, his parents had died of typhus, and he continued to run the sheep farm. So he was all alone.”
“That was a good thing for his family.”
“True. That night, he thought he was hallucinating. He knew it had to do with being so concerned about the wolf and her pups that he thought he’d turned into a wolf and was on a mission to rescue her.”
“Did he release her?”
“Or one of the kids did. She could have shifted during the night while he was sleeping, and the alpha son opened the cage and released her. In any event, they ate the meat he’d left for them and took off. He thought he was back to square one. The mother was out with her pups hunting in the nearby woods, and he assumed they’d go after his sheep again.”
“He didn’t intend to kill her this time, did he?”
Blake smiled at Nicole and rubbed her arm. “No. He loved animals, and none of us in the family give up easily when we’re challenged with what seems to be an insurmountable task. But everything was changing for him too. He could see them in the dark, lurking in the woods near the pasture, observing him. He could smell their scent on the breeze when they were close. He was certain that the bite that had healed so miraculously had made him connect somehow with the wolves and he was seeing their plight more clearly now.
“Despite knowing it was a bad idea to feed the wolves, he put out meat again so they wouldn’t go after his sheep. He didn’t want them getting used to him and then being unafraid of other humans who would kill them. But he was trying to come up with a plan to capture them again to safely relocate them much farther from any sign of civilization. Yet the third night after he’d been bitten, he had the greatest urge to run with the she-wolf, to court her. He thought he’d been alone on the farm for way too long and was losing his mind.”
Nicole smiled. “The wolf love bug had bitten.”
“You could say that.” Blake was feeling the same way about Nicole. “Instead of following the crazy inclination he had to chase after the she-wolf, he decided to make his monthly trip into town a few days early and see if he could get up the courage to talk to a young woman who worked in the mercantile. Her father owned the shop and also worked there. Other than going in to buy supplies, he’d never been able to actually speak to her about anything other than the weather.”
Nicole laughed.
“He wasn’t shy about anything else. Just about her.”
“But it wasn’t to be.” Nicole seemed interested in the story and seemed to approve of the fact that at least his great-grandfather hadn’t wanted to harm the wolves.
“Nope. The she-wolf made sure of that. When he was gone, she entered his unlocked home. The kids joined her, and they found some clothes to wear. My great-grandfather never got rid of anything. So she wore one of his mother’s dresses, and she found some of his kid-size clothes and dressed her kids in them. She cleaned the place and baked an apple pie and made beef stew for him, a way of thanking him and letting him know she was moving in.”
Nicole laughed. “He didn’t know what was in store for him.”
Blake smiled. “He didn’t know it, but he really needed her and the kids in his life. When he arrived home, she and the kids were sitting on the front porch, waiting for him. They were wary, none of them smiling, and he was just as wary. Until he smelled her scent and that of the two boys and one little girl. The same as he’d smelled on the she-wolf and her pups. He smelled the stew and the apple pie too. He didn’t know what to think.”
Nicole snuggled up next to Blake. “No way was he going back to the girl in the mercantile shop.”
“Yeah. The she-wolf teased him about that for years. My great-grandfather didn’t do much talking. He just went inside and found the meal set out, and he sat down at the table to eat.”
She laughed. “Too funny. He didn’t ask her where she’d come from?”
“Nope. Eventually, once he learned her son had turned him into a wolf shifter, she told him she’d lost her pack in a flood. She’d hooked up with a lone wolf and lost him when a hunter shot him. She had been barely surviving with her three little ones, who had been born after her mate died. My great-grandfather’s whole world changed from the moment he tangled with the wolf. His kindness to her and the kids meant the world to her. He had been her hero when she’d so needed one.
“Still, changing a human hadn’t been in the plans. That night, they all ran as wolves together, and she and the kids showed him the ropes. She was a royal and didn’t have any issues with changing during the full moon. Her kids couldn’t change unless she did until they were about six or so. He suddenly had a family, wolf and human all in one. And he never regretted it for a minute.”
“I love that story,” Nicole said, kissing his jaw. “We’re royals. But so was your great-grandmother and that helped to add more wolves to the mix. Still, it must have been hard for them to become mated wolves when we have to find a mate who is our forever companion. How did she feel about it? Since she didn’t make the choice to turn him?”
“My great-grandmother knew he was the one for her and the kids. She’d been watching him ever since her pups were born. There were no other wolves in the area, and she couldn’t travel very far with her young charges. She saw the way he helped his ewes with difficult births, how he took care of the moms and the lambs, and he’d even saved a bird that had fallen out of a nest during a storm, taking care of it until the bird could fly away.
“My great-grandmother never once killed one of his beloved sheep either. She’d actually been chasing a rabbit for her little ones when it had taken off toward the sheep f
arm. She had been so focused, she hadn’t realized how close she’d come to his sheep in the pasture. That was when he saw her the first time. After that, she was trying to formulate a plan. The problem was that he was human. He had no family, sure, but it didn’t mean he could accept wolves or being one of them. Turning someone is a tricky business, and she didn’t have the heart to do that to him.”
“So her son did.”
Blake laughed. “Exactly. He said he was rescuing his mom from the cage, and he was angry the sheepherder had shot his mother.”
“They must have had more kids, or you would be the offspring of the she-wolf’s pups.”
“They did. They had three more kids, two boys and a girl. They all got along as kids do—fighting, playing, being a family of lupus garous. My great-grandfather had thought he would be all alone in the world if he didn’t convince the girl in the mercantile to marry him. Instead, he brought his mate and a passel of kids in to the mercantile once a month, surprising everyone in town. He even took my great-grandmother to dances, but only when a new moon was out.”
“What a lovely story.”
“I won’t lie to you and say everything worked out. There were times when my grandfather was ashamed of not being a royal wolf like the older half siblings. It had a big impact on them. They vowed to find royals to mate. It was easiest for their sister since there was a shortage of female wolves. She found a mate right away. But my grandfather and great-uncle were turned down a number of times after they’d fallen in love with the she-wolves they’d wanted to mate.”
“And?”
“My great-uncle found the she-wolf he couldn’t live without who was similar in wolf roots’ lineage to his own. He didn’t care. He loved her. My grandfather lucked out and also found a mate whom he truly loved, and she loved him back. Her parents didn’t want her to mate him because she was a royal and he wasn’t, but she broke from convention and mated him anyway, though they moved out of state. That’s how we ended up in Vermont.”
“Wow. I have to admit my parents want my brother and me to mate wolves we love, but no turning anyone, and if we have a choice, mate a royal. Of course as kids, we’re agreeable. But when you’re in the real world, you realize that what makes your heartbeat quicken has nothing to do with whether the wolf you’re dating is a royal or not.”
“So there’s hope for me yet?”
She chuckled. “Are you kidding? There’s a lot more to any of this than that. Chemistry, which apparently your great-grandfather and the she-wolf had. It just goes so much deeper than the need to provide royal offspring. I can see where your grandfather was coming from, observing his half siblings who were able to run as wolves during the new moon. Maybe wanting to go somewhere around humans on a full moon night but unable to. Feeling different from humans when they were trying to sort out their differences with their wolf half siblings. I imagine when they were younger, it would have been difficult to understand the differences.”
“It was. They were fortunate the half siblings didn’t tease them about it. It was something their mother and my great-grandfather were strict about. They’d have enough ridicule from other royal wolves when they grew older, not to have to suffer it from their own stepsiblings.”
“That’s good parenting. So where does that leave us?” she asked, pulling him in for a kiss.
In heaven. He began kissing her again, her lips tenderly pressing against his, and then the pressure intensifying, growing more passionate, more like a courtship than just a sweet friendship between wolves. He nuzzled her cheek, her skin soft and warm. He moved his lips against her mouth again. He hoped she was being perfectly honest with him because he really, really wanted to take this a whole lot further with her.
She dragged her mouth away from Blake’s and ran her hands through his hair. “I need to check with Roxie and see that everything is okay, and you need to tell Kayla and Landon they can come home to run as wolves with us. Then I need to return to my room so poor Roxie can come home.”
“Yeah, you’re right.” He knew his siblings would do anything to allow them as much time as they needed, but Nicole was right.
“Hey, how are you doing, Roxie?” Nicole asked on her cell phone.
“Everything’s quiet.”
“Okay, we’re going for a run and then I’ll call and you can return home.”
“Okay, no rush,” Roxie said. “Talk later.”
Blake got up to clean the dishes and texted Kayla and Landon to tell them to come home.
Landon texted: We’re on our way back.
It wasn’t long before Landon and Kayla arrived at the house. Nicole was helping Blake with cleanup, and then they stripped and shifted. As wolves, they ran out the wolf door and chased each other across the fields of snow, through the woods, woofing and having a blast, the waning moon shining on the night. The chilly air made their wolf breaths turn into frozen mists.
Blake wished Roxie had been able to join them and hoped that they would be able to take her on a run with them soon. He thought Nicole was having lots of fun, and she proved she was when she stopped and howled at the moon. They heard a howl off in the distance—Jake Silver, a wolf’s greeting and connection—and that set off the Wolff siblings, each of them howling to let the others know that they were with Nicole and she was one of them. Though with the ski resort being open, they had a lot of out-of-area wolf visitors, so the pack didn’t necessarily think a wolf howling meant trouble.
Suddenly, Nicole nipped at Blake’s ear. He pinned her to the snow. Maybe he should have gone easier on her, but his brother tackled him and so did Kayla. They were play-protecting Nicole, bringing her full force into the family.
Blake loved them for it. And the way Nicole was aiding them and cheerfully barking, he suspected she did too. They played in the snow for about an hour, running, chasing, biting, and then they finally headed home. He and the others had so much fun playing with the new she-wolf that he hoped they could do this nightly before they all turned in.
They ran inside the house where Rosco greeted each of them in turn, as if making sure his whole wolf pack had come home, though Roxie was missing. Then they shifted and dressed.
“We’ve got to do this every night,” Landon said.
Kayla agreed. “Except we need Roxie to join us.”
“I agree,” Nicole said.
Blake smiled. “Let me take you home and Roxie can come home.”
“Would you like to have breakfast with us in the morning?” Kayla asked.
“That sounds good.” Nicole bundled up. “Night, Kayla, Landon.”
They both said good night to her and headed upstairs to bed.
Blake and Nicole pulled on their jackets and gloves. Then he escorted Nicole back to the lodge. Nicole was texting Roxie to let her know they were almost to the room.
Roxie texted her back, and Nicole showed the text to Blake.
“They’re still watching TV,” Blake said. “It’s midnight.”
“Yeah.”
They reached the door and unlocked it. As soon as they walked inside, Roxie smiled at them. “Hmm, you guys smell like the fresh outdoors. I’ll give you a moment. I’ll be downstairs, Blake.”
Blake nodded. “See you in a minute.”
Roxie left, and Blake pulled Nicole into his arms. “You let me know if I need to stay with you at any time.”
She kissed him, and he loved this with her. “I will,” she said.
“I’ll see you in the morning. You let me know anytime if you are having trouble before then.”
“I will. Thanks, Blake. I loved having dinner with you, the movie was so much fun, and the wolf run… That was great. I think everyone really enjoyed themselves.”
“We did. Roxie will enjoy it with us tomorrow night too.” Though he could envision Roxie aiding Nicole and Landon while tackling him to protect Nicole. He didn’t mind
as long as it was all in good fun. “Good night, Nicole.” He kissed her again, not wanting to let go, but it was late and Roxie had to be tired too. Then he left Nicole, even though he wanted to stay the night with her in the worst way. He told himself it was just to protect her, but he knew it was a lot more than that.
* * *
Nicole started stripping off her clothes, but she didn’t want to shower tonight, wanting to keep Blake’s scent wrapped around her all night long. She knew she was falling for the wolf when she had no intention of doing so. She had a mission, and he was helping her with it. That was all.
So why didn’t she just wash him right out of her hair?
Chapter 9
The next morning, Nicole listened to what was going on in the cousins’ room but didn’t hear anyone stirring yet. It was seven, and she’d overslept herself. Her suspects must have watched TV until two in the morning, which they’d done the night before, and then slept in late.
She hurried to take a shower, then dressed warmly, wanting to catch up to Blake while he was walking Rosco. When she reached the first floor of the lodge, she saw Blake smiling at her and Rosco on his leash. Rosco was wagging his whole body and trying to greet her. That was the nicest morning greeting she’d ever had.
“I wasn’t about to run off until I learned if you wanted to go with us. I would have texted you, but I was afraid you might be sleeping. Rosco is getting used to you coming with me on our walk.”
She smiled and gave Rosco a hug. “I was hoping I wouldn’t miss you, but I didn’t expect a welcoming committee.”
“A good-morning kiss.” Blake pulled her into his arms and gave her a hug and a kiss.
She hugged him back and kissed him. “You sure do a great job on your role as my boyfriend.”
“Yeah, but I’m doing something wrong. You hugged Rosco first.”
She chuckled. “True. He was wagging his tail so hard, I couldn’t ignore him. But I didn’t kiss him.”
Blake smiled and kissed her forehead. “I have to admit Rosco was a bit confused when I walked him to the lodge instead of out into the woods or field first thing. He thought he was going to miss his morning walk.”