Killian joins the males, and their conversation resumes. I ignore it for a while, but eventually, as a steady breeze filters out the pheromones, my brain starts lazily paying attention.
They’re arguing about Cadoc Collins, the Moon Lake heir. He’s coming to train with Quarry Pack. That’s not unusual. The high-ranking wolves from North Border and Salt Mountain also send their oldest to train with us. We’re the best fighters. It’s unquestioned.
With Moon Lake, though, things are always complicated. They’re our closest pack in terms of physical distance, but the peace between us has always been tentative. They have ambitions for the five packs, and we have no interest in a united shifter nation where we’re all under Madog Collins.
Life sucks now—it would be worse if we had to work in the human world and hand most of our profits over to whoever ranks higher. We live pretty basic here compared to the mansions at Moon Lake, but we provide for all. No one’s scraping by for food because they rank low.
I’m bored, so I stare out the window and eavesdrop. It’s basically come down to Ivo versus Eamon.
“All I’m saying, Alpha, is look down the road ten years. Cadoc Collins is our biggest threat. Would you hand a loaded gun to your enemy?” Eamon asks. Finn and Alfie murmur that no, they wouldn’t. “We can show him the basics. Tell him he’s a natural. He’ll go home singing our praises.”
“He’ll go home and tell his father that Quarry Pack is weak. He’s young, not stupid. If we hold back, best case scenario, he thinks we’ve lost our edge.” Ivo stands and paces. Killian sits in an armchair across the room, facing me. He looks at his lieutenants when they speak, and then his gaze skips back to me.
Every time, I flush hot. Not heat hot, but—toasty.
“So what? Let them come at us, and we’ll show them different,” Finn says.
Ivo sighs, exasperated. “Because we’re not going to be fighting Moon Lake in a gulch somewhere under the light of a full moon. They’ll buy the properties surrounding our territory. Squeeze us out. Lure our females to their big ass fuckin’ lakefront houses. Something like that.”
Eamon waves a hand. “If our females can be lured, good riddance.”
“We have so many, then, that we can spare them?” Ivo turns to Killian. “It’s your call. We can argue for another hour, but it comes down to whether it’s more dangerous long term to train our enemy so that he respects our strength or convince him we’re chickenshit. You know where I stand.”
“What’s Cadoc Collins really gonna do if we teach him to fight?” Ivo adds. “He can’t take us all.”
“But he can teach his males. And I’m not convinced that this doesn’t end with claws and fangs in a gulch somewhere in the pale moonlight.” Tye leans back in his seat. He’s on Eamon’s side. I didn’t see that coming.
All the males grow quiet and look to Killian.
He’s wearing his usual expression, lips a severe line, dusty blue eyes unreadable. He’s very still. He’s gazing in my direction, but I don’t get the sense that he’s looking at me. He’s lost in his head.
I’ve never seen him like this. Killian Kelly makes snap decisions, curt and unapologetic. He doesn’t tolerate argument. He certainly doesn’t sit and patiently listen to them.
Finally, he lets out a long sigh, and says, “Mutual assured destruction.”
Ivo instantly relaxes.
Eamon scowls. “What does that mean?”
“Didn’t you pay attention in history class?” Killian raises an eyebrow.
Eamon sniffs. In his day, males only went to school until they could read and do long division. He never shuts up about the cost of gas to bus the pups to Moon Lake past elementary school. Says it’s a waste.
“If Cadoc Collins goes back and trains all his packmates to fight like Quarry Pack—and that’s a big if, he’d have to pry them out of their human office buildings first—the worst-case scenario is that he has a pack full of males with a deep respect for what we can do. And no incentive to test us.”
Eamon Byrne shakes his head. “It’s a mistake.”
Killian levels his gaze at the male with the bushy gray muttonchops. Eamon’s lips peel back from his yellowed teeth, and for a second, it seems like he might let his fangs drop. But then, he tosses a stooped shoulder and bends his neck.
“Besides, where’s the fun in going easy on the pup?” Killian flashes a smile that barely shows his teeth. The other males relax. There are a couple chuckles. The tension dissipates, and the air thins.
My wolf shakes herself and plops down to lie on her side. I hadn’t been aware, but she’d been on alert. She didn’t like the vibe—males arguing, her mate the focus of the attention. She was ready to leap into the middle of something.
That would’ve been a debacle.
Not our mate, I tell her.
She yawns and rests her muzzle on her paws.
“All right.” Tye claps. “Next order of business.”
Oh. That’s not it?
It is not.
It keeps going. There’s a piece of gym equipment that needs to be replaced, but Alfie and Tye disagree on the vendor. There’s an issue with the budget. Dermot and Ivo cover the coffee table in spreadsheets, and at one point, Ivo gets so pissed over an equation, he sprouts fur.
But it’s mostly boring as hell.
I stare out the window for a while, but there’s not much to see. Folks are getting ready for dinner. Old Noreen has put the roasts in the oven. The scent is winding up from the lodge. I lick my lips. I’m hungry.
A silence falls. I look up, and everyone’s staring at me. Especially Killian. His eyes burn gold, and he’s focused on my mouth. Without thinking, I gnaw my bottom lip nervously. His wolf growls. It rattles the windows in their frames.
As one, the males’ heads drop. Then Killian clears his throat and asks Ivo to repeat himself.
I finger my phone. I tucked it into the hoodie pocket on my way out of my cabin. I have unread messages.
Dermot launches into a story about a time when Killian’s father bought a cut of some kind of fight club up in North Border. It’s supposed to back up his point about the spreadsheet, but it meanders. And meanders.
Has ShroomForager3000 trashed me on the locavore message board already? It’s not like it matters. I don’t know these people in real life. And the shroom business is dead in the water.
Did he tell everyone I’m a shifter? I guess people on the internet must love drama as much as a shifter pack because even on the Loca-voracious server, I’ve read posts putting people and restaurants on blast. Am I on blast?
Is he telling everyone that my boyfriend assaulted him, and I’m a sad, pathetic female shifter who isn’t even allowed to sell the mushrooms she collected herself?
Aren’t I a sad female shifter who isn’t allowed to sell her own mushrooms?
Stuck in the naughty chair. Ignored. Because I’m a dependent, not a person. No value except my biology. I don’t like thinking this way, but this chair is uncomfortable, and I’m hangry, and there’s something weird going on in my body.
So I focus on being mad at Killian.
Yeah, my braid is fascinating now. Only a couple of days ago, I was buck naked in front of him, and he had his buddy put me out back with the trash.