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By the time he was back indoors, the house was empty, Victoria having slipped out the garage door before he’d entered the front door. He could hear the motor running, the door lowering, and the sound of her engine accelerating as she pulled away a moment later.Good. Locating the juice at last, he chugged half the carton, ensuring it was put back with less than a full glass remaining. He had the house at his disposal without their glares, at least for a short while, before she returned home with little Jack.
Staggering into the laundry room sideways, he dropped his overloaded basket on top of the dryer with a grunt. Jackson’s home did not boast the same level of amenities as Gray’s — there was no laundry service, no thrice-weekly turn-down service, and the housekeeper who came to Jackson’s house twice a week seemed to have been instructed to leave the guest suite off her list. His fists bunched in frustration when he saw the full washer, a detergent pod and fabric softener bead already placed within. Loaded, but not on.
His sister-in-law had complained about his middle-of-the-night hours after the first few weeks. He couldn’t help it, he’d argued with his brother — he was set to a completely different internal clock than the rest of them.
“Then reset it. We both have work in the morning, and Jack has to be up for school. I can’t have you prowling around all over the house at night, keeping everyone awake. And what did you put in the dryer the other night, five pairs of workboots? Let’s put laundry in the daytime activity column.”
They didn’t want him doing laundry at night, but he and Victoria had no qualms about keeping the clothes dryer full the other twenty hours a day. They didn’t want himprowling aroundthe house at night, an unflattering descriptor he didn’t appreciate, but they didn’t want him prowling around in the daytime either, it seemed. Lowell closed his eyes, sucking in a deep breath, holding it for as long as he was able, letting it out on a slow, controlled exhale, pretending he was back in that one temple in Hokkaido, the crisp smell of mint and lemongrass incense nearly tickling at his nose. Opening his eyes, he was disappointed to still find himself in Jackson’s home.
This was fine, he reminded himself. It was fine. He appreciated Jackson giving him a place to stay, deciding to pretend the offer had been made from a place of altruism and not solely based on the desire to make Grayson angry and gain a live-in babysitter in one fell swoop. It was fine. His mother was always happy to see him, Lowell reminded himself, and he could employ the time-honored tradition of doing laundry at his parents’ house.Someone might even make me a sandwich and let me sit in the room with them.
Or an even better idea — pack his stuff up right now, put the key to Grayson’s house to use, and soak in the cool, dark atmosphere of his choice of oversized bedrooms. He could have his laundry done by Grayson’s service, avail himself of something delicious from the always-stocked refrigerator, and masturbate until he was unconscious.You might wake up actually able to think.It was a no-brainer, he decided.
He turned to pack, pausing to spin the washer’s dial to the hottest settings, hoping they wouldn’t notice before they punched the start button, too confident in the knowledge that they’d already loaded it up to check.
* * *
Chapter 2
Moriah
“Okay, so tell me againhow this worked. You sign up and get the shots, and it realigns your cycle. And then at the full moon, you go back to the clinic and you just . . . Do it? With a random stranger? On like, a gurney?”
“No!” Drea squealed, hiding her face in her hands as she shook with laughter. “Sweet Mother, why do you have to make it sound like that! I already told you, it’s not a stranger!Youare the one choosing them. You can take the time to interview them after your selection process, before your first cycle!”
“First heat, you mean, right?”
Drea blew out an aggrieved breath.
“It’s like you’re going out of your way to make everything sound as salacious as possible.”
Moriah grinned cheekily. She wasn’t sure how she was meant to be responding to her friend’s disclosures. Drea had left the fertility clinic in Bridgeton, too much money wasted, she had said, and Moriah nodded her agreement. She and Sorben had run through a good chunk of their savings on the ineffective treatments, a contributing factor in their marriage’s demise, one for which she assumed the sole blame. It was impossible to say no. It was impossible to look hope in the eye and say ‘not today.’ Not when the people at the clinic were so encouraging, so optimistic that the next round would be the one that worked, seeing a dollar sign over her head every time she came back, month after month, unable to go in and quit.
Drea and Elijah had the same issue, but Drea had found out about this other clinic. A fraction of the cost, she had told Moriah. Unprecedented success rates. All she had to do was sign up, get a monthly shot, and have sex with a werewolf.
“Elijah was just okay with it?”
At that, Drea sipped her lemonade thoughtfully.
“No, he wasn’t. Not at first. I mean, can you imagine? Who would be? You have to tell your husband that in order for you both to achieve the one thing you want together, you have to bring in the help of a different man who can get the job done where your husband can’t. I can’t imagine how demoralizing it was for him after the first conversation. He was upset. He didn’t want to think about it, didn’t even want to consider it. I didn’t push. We’re either in this together, or we’re not in it at all.”
She paused, sipping her drink again. The Black Sheep Beanery was bustling as it always was, and she waited until a noisy group of teenaged trolls and goblins passed their table before she resumed speaking.
“He said yes about two weeks later. Just out of the blue. ‘Yes, let’s do it. If it’s going to work, let’s do it.’ He just needed time to come to terms with it. We’re never going to conceive on our own; we both knew it. We toured the facility together, and I think the sterility of everything really solidified his decision. We made sure to interview our donor together. He seemed like a good, stand-up guy. I’m not going to pretend it wasn’t awkward as hell the first session and only marginally better the second month. But then the third month took. And now here we are.”
