Page 33 of The Coyote's Veterinarian Omega

Cam glanced at me, then glared at his relatives. “They can wait,” he said gruffly.

I sighed and pushed the plate away. “I can’t eat with all of you watching me like that.” I flushed; it sounded far more petulant than I meant it.

“Oh,” Caroline said, putting a hand to her mouth, like she hadn’t even thought it might be awkward to have an audience.

Karla had no such compunctions. She dropped an arm on the table, leaning forward, staring at me intently. “Tell us—how’d you meet your fated mate?”

Cam

Igroaned and clapped my hands to my face. “karla,” i protested, even as wyatt sat straight up and stared at her. i was glad he’d put his fork down; otherwise, it would have fallen out of his hand and clanged on the plate. instead, he just stared at my aunt, who grinned.

“Fated … mate?” Wyatt asked finally, tilting his head to the side.

“Karla,” Caroline said, and Karla jumped, which probably meant Caroline had kicked her under the table.

“What?”

“Cal said the boy just learned about shiftersyesterday, and that’s how you want to start this conversation?” Caroline gave her wife a reproving look.

“Well,” Karla said, “how else would you start it?”

Caroline sighed, then looked at Wyatt. “Ignore her,” shecommanded. “Tell us how you and Cam met.”

Wyatt blinked, then pointed between the two of us. “You think we’re … fated …”

“I got shot,” I blurted, hoping to forestall more questions about this whole fated mate thing. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I bought it—even though it made perfect sense.

“Got shot!” Karla echoed, her attention shifting to me.

“And what were you doing to get shot?” Caroline asked, lifting a brow. Somewhere in the background, Cal sighed.

“I smelled blood, so I went up to Bobby Lam’s to check on the sheep.”

“In your fur, I assume,” Caroline said.

“In my fur,” I conceded.

“He’d been bothering the sheep up there for a couple of weeks,” Cal added. “Council fined him a couple of times.”

Wyatt cleared his throat. “Vern and I were there—there was blood because one of the ewes was lambing.”

“Oh,” Karla said.

“Bobby took a shotgun to me. Got me in the shoulder.”

“Well,” Caroline said, “serves you right for nosing about and bothering the sheep.”

Wyatt cleared his throat again. “I saw him run off and figured he was going to die a horrible death—I … I didn’t know he was a shifter. I thought he was just a regular old coyote.”

Caroline and Karla shared a look. Caroline turned back to Wyatt. “And?”

“I got back to Vern’s, and in the morning, I got my own car and drove back to Lam’s place. Then I followed the blood, which led right to the back door here.”

Caroline sighed and looked at me. I shrugged; I knew I’d been careless, in a lot of ways.

Cal chuckled. “Can you imagine? Cam gets himself shot, and first thing the next morning, there’s this fellow at my doortelling me there might be a wounded coyote running around the property.”

Wyatt’s brow crunched, as though he was thinking about something. He looked at me. “You were there for that conversation,” he said finally, voice accusing.