Summer's Gone

by Jen Talty

  “Be careful.”

  “Yes, dear,” he said, glancing over his broad, wolf shoulder. “God, that sounded just like my father.”

  Titus. Coral remembered the first time she’d met Drew’s father. Talk about an intimidating wolf. But it was Ellen, Drew’s mother, that made Coral stand up a little straighter. A beautiful human with a captivating soul. Ellen had a distinct hardness about her, but it wasn’t directed at herself or anyone else for that matter. No. It was more of a perfect combination of humility and confidence that most humans never found.

  Humans tended to boast and puff out their chests worse than wolf packs marking their territory, but it was usually false bravado.

  Ellen possessed none of that.

  “Your father is a good man. You’re lucky to have him.”

  Drew lowered his head before turning and heading across the open field.

  Seconds later, a cement wall dropped between her and her fated, shaking the ground below her feet.

  “Drew!” she screamed as she raced toward the wall, pounding her fists against the hard surface that stretched past the clouds in the sky. “Drew.” She dropped her forehead on the cold concrete.

  “He’s fine.”

  She stiffened at the sound of a woman’s voice. The same woman she’d heard telling her to make the right choice. Slowly, she turned, searching for the source, but all she saw were the sparkling snowflakes falling from the sky.

  “Hello?” Coral called.

  “Hello back,” the woman’s voice said, giggling. “It’s so good to see you again.”

  “Again?” Coral turned in a circle, covering her eyes as the bright flickering of the snow blinded her. “I never saw you before. But are you the same woman who asked me to make the right choice?”

  “Yes. But we have meet before. It’s been many, many moons, but I knew your mother.”

  “Knew?” Coral asked. “And what did you mean about making the right choice?”

  A light flashed as a tall woman floated from the sky, her blond hair flowing over her shoulders like an angel. She wore all white, and little hummingbirds buzzed about her head.

  “You could reject your fate, reject your mate, and be the happy little creature with no future. Or, you can unravel the puzzle.”

  Coral let out a long breath. She had already accepted Drew in her mind. Now her heart just needed to follow suit. “How do I know you?”

  “In this world, I am Hera. In your world, my name was Iris.”

  “Was?” Coral clutched her tight chest. Fear continued to run through her mind without Drew at her side.

  “Wow. Your pull to the wolf is stronger than I anticipated,” Hera said as she floated closer.

  Coral took a step back.

  “I’m not here to hurt you. Or your wolf. But I am here to warn you.”

  “Of what?” Coral blinked her eyes as the snowflakes turned to raindrops.

  “Of this.” Hera waved her hand, and an opening in the wall appeared and images of the farm filled the darkness like a hologram. Wolves howled. Fairies screamed. Creatures scattered everywhere as arrows from the sky sought out flesh. “It’s not just the destruction of the Wolfairies that is at stake. Your mate’s pack, the largest and strongest wolf pack in all the world, will be wiped out and not because they are the fated protectors, but there is a secret that the visionary didn’t tell King Lear when he cast the Royals to human form. It’s not just the unions of the fated that is necessary, but the reunion and rebirth of where it all began.”

  “I don’t understand,” Coral said, her heart hammering in her chest. “What are you telling me?” The rain turned to a waterfall, and Coral found herself under it, the woman on the other side. She could barely see Hera. “What am I supposed to do?”

  “That I can’t tell you.”

  “Why not?”

  Hera reached her hand through the water, and it opened up, letting the sunrays beam through. “Because I don’t know.”

  Hera disappeared, as did the waterfall. The sky grew dark, and in the distance, she could see the woods. She took off running. “Drew,” she called, but he didn’t answer. A flash of lightning filled the sky.

  Then everything went black.

  Chapter 8

  “Coral!” Drew howled as he took off in a full run toward the wall but skidded to a stop when it turned into a castle and the dark wolf jumped in front of him.

  Besides the wolf being fucking huge, Drew didn’t know what kind of creature it was since it didn’t smell like a wolf, a dog, a human, a fairy, or anything in between. It actually had a non-scent. Like stepping outside into a day that didn’t feel like it was part of a season. A day that was neither cool, nor warm. Cold nor hot. Not a scent of fresh flowers, humid air. No cool breeze bringing in a change.

  Almost like the creature didn’t exist.

  Drew took a step to the side as he let a low growl hum from his throat, showing his teeth.

  The dark wolf moved with him, not making a single sound.

  “Move,” Drew said.

  The wolf sat, cocking his head as if he wasn’t quite sure what Drew had said.

  “I’m going in that castle, and you’re not stopping me.”

  “No. You’re not,” a man’s voice said from somewhere in the distance. “You can’t.”

  Drew exhaled out of his nostrils, lowering his head in aggression. “Resorting to parlor tricks by casting your voice elsewhere?”

  “He can’t communicate. Not yet anyway.” A man appeared next to the wolf. He was an older gentleman, maybe close to Drew’s father’s age. He had grey hair, and he barely stood as tall as the wolf. He rested his hand on the wolf’s head and scratched.

  “Who are you?” Drew sniffed the air, catching a very slight coconut scent mixed with pine.

  A werewolf.

  And a fairy?

  “I’m the keeper of the Royal Castle, and you are not to go in.”

  “Why not?” Over the years, Drew had seen drawings of the Royal Fairy Castle, and this came pretty damn close with tall towers and a wall that snaked on for miles. Thick vegetation of beautiful flowers lined the walls.

  “I do not know. I was just told to make sure you did not cross the bridge.” The man pointed behind him and to the north. “Not yet anyway.”

  Drew nearly laughed out loud. The drawbridge had been pulled up, and rumor had it that the waters below were filled with monsters able to tear through any creature in seconds.

  But that wasn’t what he found funny.

  He shouldn’t be able to communicate like this with anyone but his pack, his mate, and maybe a few Royals.

  “Who told you that?”

  “The visionary.” The man raised his hands to his mouth as if he were about to whisper into someone’s ear. “He has lied to King Lear and he’s using a medium to help the new visionary, the one that will not only be able to see the future, but the past, see what must be done when she has not yet come into her powers.” The man waggled an eyebrow. “Nor taken care of her brother.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?” Drew had quickly grown tired of this fairy’s games. And Drew believed this man to be of the trickery variety of fairies he’d read about in the old books his sister had found. Drew wondered what kind of game the wolf had been playing since Drew knew the mixture of scents had to be these two keeping him from finding Coral and protecting her.

  “You, my dear lad, know more than you think.” The man tapped his temple. “You might be young and oh so innocent, but you are a smart one. It will all come together. You and Coral must trust each other. You must get others to believe what you know because they won’t want to believe it.” The man waved his hand in the air, and the large wolf ran back off into the woods. The castle crumbled as if it had been demolished by a controlled explosion. The man floated into the air, fading into the blue sky.

  Drew raced through the tall wildflowers. The intoxicating scent of fresh cut lilies bottled with an ocean breeze tickled his nostrils.
r />   “Coral,” he called. He sensed her close. Smelled her. “Coral!”

  Panic gripped his heart, squeezing the life out of him. All he could think was that somehow the castle had gobbled her up, taking her with it to whatever land it had sprung from.

  It was then he saw Coral, lying in a clearing.

  His pulse pounded in his head. The roar of his blood rushed through his veins, thundering in his head like lava irrupting from a volcano. If anything had happened to her, there would be hell to pay, and he’d be just the wolf to deliver it.

  Five feet from where her body stretched out, he slowed his pace. Her chest rose up slowly as fairy dust trickled from her lips.

  Her life breath.

  Thank God.

  Nudging his nose against her neck, he licked gently. She tasted like a little piece of heaven wrapped in chocolate and sprinkled with caramel. He curled up next to her as he turned from wolf to man. Resting his arm over her body, he closed his eyes. “I will never let anyone hurt you. Ever. I promise to be by your side forever.”

  Exhaustion swept his body like the ocean taking the sand during low tide. A rainbow of colors filled his mind as he drifted off…

  “What the fuck are they doing?”

  The laughter of both of Drew’s brothers jolted him awake. He blinked his eyes, rubbing them as he sat, realizing he and Coral had been curled up on his kitchen floor.

  And his clothes had been torn from his body as he must have shifted for real in whatever that vision had been. His cheeks flushed as he glanced at Coral, who had started to stir.

  “Well I’ll be damned. They mated,” Nico said, his voice waffling between humor and tension.

  “Shit,” Drew muttered. “Will you please toss me that blanket?” He pointed to the fleece on the sofa. Chaz tossed it at him. “I’m not sure I want to know what happened here.”

  “I’m not sure I want to tell you.” Drew wrapped himself in the blanket before shaking Coral’s shoulder. “We’ve got company.”

  “Huh?” she mumbled.

  He pulled her to a sitting position. “You okay?”

  She blinked her eyes open, coating his face with fairy dust. “Are you?”

  Narrowing his eyes while his brothers laughed their asses off, he pushed aside the fairy dust. “I’m fine. What did you see in the Royal Castle?”

  “She was in what?” Chaz asked, turning serious as he stepped forward.

  “I wasn’t in it. I was behind a wall and spoke to a fairy named Hera, but she said her name in my world was Iris.” She faced Drew, looking him up and down with wide eyes.

  He clutched the blanket tighter. He’d had a couple of girlfriends, but he’d never been intimate with them, a fact his brothers knew well.

  And here he stood, covered in nothing but a blanket, after being found on the floor with her in his arms.

  Thank God she was completely clothed.

  He swallowed, picturing what she looked like under her cute, little shorts and tank top, which left very little to the imagination.

  He choked on his breath. “I shifted while in the vision.”

  “You were in the vision?”

  “I think I was part of it,” Drew said. “Let me get some clothes on, and we can sit down and talk this out.” Drew turned on his heels and made a beeline for his bedroom. Once inside, he fell against the door. His lungs burned as gasped for air. He meant what he’d said to her in the field.

  But he also knew neither one of them were ready to be tossed full force into this union. The pull grew stronger every day, and he knew without a doubt, he wanted to be with only Coral for the rest of his life.

  He also knew they had just mated, and he worried what that meant to Norse, and the future of the Wolfairies.

  Chapter 9

  Coral clenched her fists together. How could Drew just run off like a coward and leave her there with his two brothers smirking at her?

  And why the hell had his clothes been ripped to shreds and he was only in a blanket?

  “Why don’t you go sit down?” Chaz waved his hand toward the sofa.

  She wanted to respond with, why don’t you just leave, but refrained. “I’ll be right back.” Coral couldn’t remember a time when she’d been angry. She could barely think of a time she hadn’t been happy, and she had to wonder how much Norse had protected her from the hell her poor sister had to endure. She’d literally lived her life with blinders on and now that she had been released into this world, emotions had started to come flying at her like the raindrops that had fallen from the sky in her vision.

  If she didn’t get this rage from her system, she knew it would fester and that couldn’t be good for Norse.

  Or the Wolfairies.

  She shoved open the door, letting it hit the back wall. She opened her mouth, ready to give Drew a piece of her mind, but instead, she gasped, staring at his bare backside. She’d never seen a man’s ass before and didn’t think she wanted to.

  But she’d look at Drew’s again, no question.

  He jumped, hiking up his jeans before turning to face her. “What’s wrong?” he asked, fastening the fly. His tanned, muscled stomach twitched.

  She covered her mouth, hoping it didn’t look like her eyes bugged right out of her head. “You shouldn’t have left me out there,” she said without the venom she’d felt minutes before. “I was totally mortified.”

  He arched a brow. “How do you think I felt? I was the one laying naked on the floor when my brothers woke us up.”

  “Oh,” she said softly. She hadn’t considered it would have bothered him, but that didn’t change the fact that he’d left his mate…mate? Oh shit. “You mated with me?”

  “Yeah. Not sure how that happened, but full disclosure, every wolf in my pack will know just by looking at us.”

  “Freaking wonderful.”

  “It’s not like it would come as a surprise to any of them.” He held his hand out. “Come here.” His tone turned deep and sultry.

  It made her insides turn into melting marshmallows floating in a steaming cup of cocoa. “That’s not the point.”

  He placed her hands in his, and he raised them to his shoulders.

  “They’ll look at me differently,” she said.

  “They already do,” he whispered. His hot lips sizzled and popped against her cheek, sending little sparks into the air. “That was different. I hope that didn’t happen when you kissed those other guys.”

  “I think it’s a fairy thing and back then I thought I was a witch, and that reminds me. We need to look at—”

  He hushed her by pressing his finger on her lips. “In a minute. I need to tell you something.” His dark eyes turned into a mix of almond and bourbon colors. They swirled together in a perfect blend of everything she wanted. Kind. Tender. Sweet. Even a dab of vulnerability. “I’ve never been with a woman,” he said.

  “What?” she exclaimed, blinking wildly, trying to control the yellow and gold dust that flashed about the room. “As in, you’ve never had sex before?” He wasn’t that much older, but he was a wolf, and a sexy one, and she suspected women had been dropping at his feet for years. How could he have gone the few short years of his adult life without having done the deed?

  He closed his eyes, and his cheeks turned a light-red color. “I know. A twenty-three-year-old wolf virgin. But I didn’t want to do it with just anyone and I was always so busy with either school or work and then last year Chaz brought Daphne home and the farm was turned upside down with fairies. When Nico found Isadore, I knew there was someone out there for me, and I decided I wanted my first to be only, and that only is you.”

  She gripped his biceps as a wave of dizziness threatened to knock her off balance. If she wanted to tear her gaze away, she wouldn’t be able to, but she hadn’t expected she’d be raising herself up on tiptoe and pressing her body against his as she kissed him with wild abandon. His tongue met hers with a fury that was as terrifying as it was exhilarating.

  A low hum filled her
throat as he wrapped his arms around her waist. His fingers dug into her back, sending shock waves through her system. She never wanted to know what it might be like to be in another man’s arms. She knew nothing about love, but every instinct she had told her that Drew would be the only man who could make her dreams come true, and she his. Together, they could conquer any problem.

  Alone, their existence would mean nothing.

  He slipped his hands under her shirt, and she thought her body might catch fire, and not in a bad way. He ran his fingers up and down her spine. Their lips locked as if he were the ocean and she were the sand. Nothing could separate them.

  “Excuse me.”

  Except maybe one of his brothers.

  She dropped her forehead to Drew’s chest.

  “Don’t mean to interrupt but we still have a spirit to deal with and a vision to decipher, so perhaps sucking face could be put on hold for a bit,” Nico said. His voice was laced with a playful tone.

  “Get the fuck out of my room. We’ll be there in a minute.” Drew cupped her cheeks, tilting her head.

  “Sure thing,” Nico said.

  “Shut the door on the way out,” Drew said.

  “No fucking way.”

  She heard Nico’s feet scuff across the floor.

  “He’s got really shitty timing,” she said, smiling.

  “Yeah, he does.” Drew kissed her forehead. “I know we’re fated, and I know we’re going to feel even closer when Norse isn’t sitting in your mind, but that doesn’t change that we’re both young and new at all of this.”

  She patted his chest, feeling empowered. “Kissing is good. We can do a lot of kissing.”

  “Works for me.” He brushed his hand over the curve of her ass.

  “That’s not kissing.”

  He laughed. “Can’t blame a guy for trying to cop a feel.” He took her by the hand and led her into the family room where his brothers had made themselves at home.