Next, there’s the Alpha house—the hell I’m meant to lead from. Built in a tree and sitting thirty feet off the ground, the house is old, steeped in tradition, and built by the pack’s own hands. In some of those rooms, tradition isn’t the only thing it’s steeped in. My blood has painted many of its walls and floors.
Callie’s soft body wraps around my right arm, her cool hand brushing against mine that’s still locked around the steering wheel. Noticing how tight my grip is, I let go and lace my fingers with hers. I press my face to the top of her head, my lips brushing her hair, and take a slow, deep breath, letting Callie’s even intoxicating scent fill and relax me. Since the night of the Halloween party, her scent has changed. Now it’s more than pomegranates, white orchids, and storms on the horizon. There are hints of fresh turned earth, campfires, cool water, and something I have no words for. It’s a scent with no name, but evokes a feeling of home. A real one that brings peace to the soul.
Sam clears her throat again before hoping out of the back of the car. She slings her backpack over her shoulder. “I’m... going to go check on things. Make sure everything is set up for the ceremony and celebration.” She hesitates, her gaze taking in Callie leaning against me. “Take your time,” she finishes, before shutting the door behind her and trekking her way up to the house.
“Ceremony and celebration?” Callie questions, her thumb running along mine. She sighs and twists so her face is pressed more against my shoulder. “That’s why you invited me today…and I’m thinking it isn’t for moral support, is it?”
“No,” I murmur, closing my eyes so I can block out everything that isn’t the sensation of Callie next to me.
“Does it have anything to do with the Call?” she inquires, her words slightly muffled as they’re spoken against my flannel shirt.
I smile against her hair. “Yes and no.”
She releases a frustrated huff and pinches the inside of my bicep. It doesn’t hurt, which seems to frustrate her more. “Please tell me what’s going on. Why did you want me here?”
“I need you,” I whisper, my chest tight when I feel her body freeze beside me.
The words are truer in more ways than I want to admit, but I never really meant to tell her… at least not now and not like this. My wolf, forever simple in his wants and needs, whines in my head. He accepted our need for her from the very beginning.
Callie is silent for several seconds, her grip tightening on my hand and around my arm. Finally, so quietly that it’s a strain for even me to hear, she murmurs, “What do you need me for?”
My heartbeat pounds loudly, its pulse felt in surges throughout my body. I don’t know how she interpreted my words, and I don’t want to elaborate. I don’t want to scare her. Instead, I answer with the tangible, “Pack needs to pledge to a witch. You.”
“Is that why you refused Neva? You wanted me?” she presses, her tone not giving away how she feels.
I can’t take not knowing what she’s thinking so I reach for her, awkwardly gathering her in my arms, and tip her face up to me with one hand. My thumb brushes along her jaw as my gaze traces over her features, drinking in every part of her.
She bites her lip and uncertainty clouds her storm filled eyes as my silence drags on. My wolf is restless, pressing underneath my skin. He’s annoyed that I won’t just fess up to everything and is ready to show her how we feel himself. He doesn’t appreciate that people tend to freak out when someone they’ve known a little over a month confesses they’re that someone’s everything.
She calls me hers, but does she mean it like I do? Would it terrify her to know how deep it goes? That I don’t know where the Call ends and I begin? How I don’t care that I can’t tell? It doesn’t matter as long as I’m by her side.
My thumb reaches for her lip, gently tugging it free from her teeth, and I answer honestly, “What’s mine is yours. My pack will be your pack.”
Her eyes blink rapidly and her small smile wobbles at the corners. “You want me as part of your pack?”
I want you to be ruler of my pack. Mi reina. My queen,I think, but I offer a small smile of my own and nod.
“Well, all right then,” Callie replies with a sniff. Pulling away with her hand resting on the door handle, she adds, “As a member of the pack, I won’t tolerate anyone treating you badly. Anyone that tries to hurt you will have to go through me first.”
Before I can explain that the whole point of this is to protect her, not me, she’s already hopped out of the Tahoe with her backpack. I swallow my sigh over yet another thing she won’t let me help her with, while pushing down the fear that I’m already too much for her and this is her subtle way of trying to make space between us. In a life where I’ve spent most of my time trying not to feel anything at all, I don’t know what to do with these intense, all-consuming emotions. Protect. I understand that, so that’s where I’ll focus and hope she’ll still want me.
When I get out of the car, I can’t help but laugh. Callie stands on the sidewalk giggling, as she’s surrounded by a bunch of wolf pups, sniffing and licking her, while a few whine to be pet or picked up. Recognizing their coloring, I notice that not all of them are from natural born parents. Too young to know prejudices, they followed their friends to investigate the new person with the confusing scent.
One of the pups shifts into a girl no more than a few years old. Naked, with her hands raised in the air, she shouts, “Up! Up!”
Callie blinks with surprise, it’s the first time she’s witnessed a full shift, and she picks up the toddler, balancing the girl on her hip.
The girl looks down at herself, and realizing what she did, squeals in delight. “I did it! I shifted all by myself! On purpose!” Her bright blue eyes land on me, and her grin grows, filled with tiny pointed teeth. “Alpha! Alpha, I did it!”
The pups move as I approach, crowding each other behind Callie. Smiling, I run my hand along the girl’s feather soft hair and murmur, “I see. You did great.”
In a move that, had I not seen her shift, would’ve made me think she was some type of unknown monkey shifter, the girl leaps from Callie, grabs on my shirt, and clings to me with more shouts of, “Up! Up!”
Quickly, I rest my forearm under her butt and lift, cradling her back with my other hand. Her tiny fingers, sharp with baby claws, dig into my shoulder as she squeals again with joy.
Callie’s expression is soft as she watches me with the girl, her arms full with another pup that’s trying to lick her face. She giggles when the pup lands a good lick on her nose, but soon after, her brows pucker, and she puts the pup down, muttering, “People, Callie. They’re people. Last thing you need is a kid with a crush because you can’t stop petting strange wolves.”
I have to hold the toddler in my arms tighter against my chest to keep from dropping her as my whole body shakes with suppressed laughter. The pups, unsure what I find so funny but knowing that their Alpha is laughing, start yipping and barking along with me.
