4. Labrador Retriever

Felix

Mia had been in the pack house for three days now. The last few days Lucien was also here, the two of them planning away in our office while the rest of the wolves were out training, but he had left this morning. Now it was just her.

With Lucien here is was quite easy to communicate, but without his presence, the atmosphere was quite tense and awkward. The only one who seemed mildly comfortable about this oddly was Creed. Creed was more than ecstatic, some weird obsession with strength she had.

I sat in my office staring at the papers in front of them, barely recognising a word on them when I noticed something flicked outside. I looked up out the window and saw her running laps of the oval. ‘Zach, she’s outside, keep an eye on her would you,’ I mind linked Zach. As much as she came with Lucien, it was hard for us to trust someone we didn’t know, let alone a guard.

Many of the stories about them implied that they were merciless killers, that didn’t differentiate between prey and witness. Mia herself was the star of a few of the stories, Lucien’s ruthless guard was a legend in her own right.

I kept an eye on her as I sensed Zach go out to the grass area and I swear I could see her roll her eyes before she looked directly at me and raised an eyebrow. I shook my head and looked down at my paperwork, taking glances every now and then to watch her.

Mia

“I see he sent me a baby sitter,” I snarked as I saw The Beta, Zach, approach me. He seemed nice enough, with bright baby blue eyes framed with thick lashes, and wavy blonde hair that flopped over his eyes. He was the human equivalent of a Labrador retriever. He grinned and shrugged, coming closer. “He doesn’t trust the wicked.”

I raised an eyebrow and stared into the office where I knew Felix was, knowing that I was meeting his gaze. He wasn’t very subtle about the way he continued to watch me. “You’re Alpha needs to find a new hobby if I am all that he is interested in.” Zach snorted and I laughed. “Wanna train with me?” I suggested.

I could see him clocking this idea over in his head. Was I serious? Was I a danger? Would I hurt him? But he also seemed overly excited, I could almost see his wolf panting in his head. “Sure why not?” I grinned and cocked my head towards the forest, “let’s run then”

I loved running, it was a huge release for me and my wolf, and being out in the forest felt even better. I was impressed at Zach’s ability to keep up. As a guard I had always trained thinking about stamina, whereas pack wolves generally learnt to fight with strength on their mind, running wasn’t a huge hobby in the pack wolf world. As we continued to run I could tell that he was distracted with mind linking. ‘Maybe he is telling the pack to stay out of our way,’ my wolf Fallon huffed and I couldn’t help but roll my eyes.

Neither of us were the biggest fan of the active avoidance of guards that pack wolves had. Most treated us as if we were monsters, many too scared to even look at as. Even with our presence locked down they knew. They couldn’t sense our wolf, yet they knew we were werewolves, so they were unsure. We were too foreign, too different to be trusted. It made our jobs harder when we needed to integrate into packs, as if we almost needed to throw our wolves at them in short bursts, just to reassure them.

Form a young age we were trained to be able to control our powers, to express them when we needed to scare and intimidate, and to suppress them when we were hiding. By the time that we were old enough to fight, our default tended to be suppression. We would tuck our whole wolf very neatly in our hearts, deep enough to hide their scent, but concentrated enough that our connection with them was clearer than ever. It was hard to separate from that, to spread the wolf throughout our whole body. Even though they were still here, it felt as if they were spread out so thinly that half of them was missing.

Thinking about this, I absently kindly started to play around with my expression and suppression of Fallon, getting lost in my own head. Trying to spread her as thinly as I could to my fingertips until she would bounce back like an elastic band.

Without warning, I was suddenly running into a brick wall. Shaking myself out of my daze, I gazed up to find Zach glaring at me. “What the fuck were you doing?” He snarls. I look at him and blink, taking a while to realise what had happened. “Why the fuck are you trying to make me submit?”

The gears start running in my head and I swear I heard Fallon chuckle as I realise what I had done. “Sorry I got caught up in my own head, mucking around with how I can suppress and express my wolf. I wasn’t even thinking about what affect that could have.” I apologise and Zach clocked his head to the side, thinking. Fucking Labrador.

I sighed and looked at him, “I usually suppress my wolf, unless I need my presence to be felt, she stays right here,” I explained pointing to my heart. “I was trying to stretch her presence out in my body, it’s an exercise I do to make sure I don’t lose control. I forgot you were here.”

He looked at me and nodded, “don’t do it again, my wolf wants to tear you apart right now,” he chuckled back. I was forgiven already. I smiled at him mulling a few ideas over in my head.

“You know I can teach you to leave the trance.”