“I can’t believe my little girl is going to a human college!” Mama says with tears shining in her eyes. She’s got my face between her hands, looking at me and nearly refusing to let go. “And so far away!” I can’t help but try to comfort her, even though we’ve talked about this ad nauseum. “Mama, I’m only three hours away. I can be home whenever and you can visit,” I remind her. “Once a month,” Ba adds putting his arm around Mama’s shoulder, helping to extricate my face from her hands. Papá moves up beside me and pulls me into a hug. “Mi hija, (My daughter),” he says into my ear. “Entiendo por qué tienes que dejarnos. Lamento que tenga que suceder. (I understand why you have to leave us. I am just sorry that it has to happen.)” I have to bite my lip and squeeze my eyes tight against the tears that come unbidden to my eyes. He’s talking about Caleb. The last week has been awful. Our friends don’t know how to deal with i
Fati left with her parents to head to college today. I haven’t seen her in week. Hadn’t talked to her for weeks before that. It’s been less than a month, but it feels like forever. And now she’s gone. There’s nothing that I can do about it. I’m sitting in my apartment, mindlessly flipping through the channels on the TV that I rarely use. I rarely have the time to watch TV, but now I can’t seem to muster enough energy to do anything else. Suddenly, there’s a knock at the door and I can scent my two best friends. “Go away!” I call out from the couch, knowing that they’ll be able to hear me. “No chance!” Ethan calls back. “You’re not wallowing tonight. We’re going out!” “Fuck that shit!” I call back, but I still push myself up and off the couch. I walk over to the door and unlock it, not even bothering to open the door before I turn back to the couch. They both walk in, Finnegan huffing out a lau
Come on, Fati! We can’t be late for the first day of classes,” Ollie calls to me from the foot of the stairs. I have my door open and thank the Goddess Above that everyone was already up and down at breakfast this morning for the first day of classes frenzy. Angela had told me that as the days wore on and people got more settled in, that wouldn’t be the case anymore. But for now, the school year was new, there were new wolves in the packhouse, and life was bright and shiny. Our wolves wanted to make a good first impression.“Give me five minutes!” I call down to Ollie as I loop a hair tie around my long French braid. I never wear my hair down, usually pulling it into a long ponytail. But, again, since today is the first day of school, I wanted to put in an extra effort. I had done two long French braids down either side of my head and wanted to curl the front pieces that I had pulled out to frame my face. Problem was, I have an impatient wolf at the foot of the stai
“I need a fish special, 86 the pine nuts for allergies!” I call out. “Yes, chef!” is called out by the men on the line. “Go ahead and start course two on table five. Jorge, I need a well done filet. Give me a two minute count to start the rest,” I yell again, turning sticking my hand out to grab the ticket from the waiter that has just walked into the kitchen. “Yes, chef!” echoes through the room as I read through the ticket. “We’ve got a VIP four top walking in on table two. I need an off menu amuse. Two vegans, one nut allergy. VIP prefers earthy, savory foods,” I alert the kitchen. “Yes, chef!” “Hands!” I call, summoning two different servers to take food into the dining room. “Walking tables ten, three, and fifteen.” “Chef, two minute count,” I hear from Jorge. “Heard, Chef. Fire the rest of table 12. And where is my fish for table six? Everything else is dying in the pass,” I a
“It’s been a week, Fati. Are you just going to stare at him or are you going to make a move? He’s your mate. You’ve got to make a move. He’ll want you, it’s just the way that mates work,” Ollie says as she sees me staring at my mate during the break for our class. He laid his head down on his arms about five minutes before the professor called a break for our three hour class and he hasn’t moved since. It doesn’t take werewolf senses to know that he’s sleeping. It also doesn’t take werewolf senses to detect the slight limp in his step or see the bruises on his face. Or the wince when he takes too deep a breath. He’s hurt. I don’t know how he got hurt or who did it. What I do know is that my wolf is rising inside of me, begging to know who hurt my mate so that I can end their miserable life. “I find out his name. Did I tell you that?” I murmur to Ollie. “No,” they say, turning fully to face me. Their eyes
I stand in the clearing in front of an altar to Hecate that we have set up in our backyard. We share part of our land with my parents, meaning that it backs up to the woods and is near a stream, making it peaceful and close to nature. Behind us, the backyard is packed. My parents and three siblings, his parents and three siblings. And that’s just our families. There’s many of the other trios with their families. The Elite. Members of my coven. Selene and Thor. Hecate of course and her group of men. It’s fucking insane just for a pregnancy blessing. But even though it’s been a year after the show down in the Underworld, we all are finding everything that we can do to celebrate. It just brought home the fact that you never know what day is going to be your last. Spend it how you want to gain happiness and love. So that’s what we’re doing, getting a blessing for Nathan and my baby. The baby that we were specifically brought toget
Two days later… I stand in line with the other graduates from the college of Health and Human Development at Arcadia University. My gown feels like a furnace trapping the heat inside and I almost wish that I had taken Finnegan and Ethan’s dare to just go buck ass naked underneath. I could change into my wolf and run home to change before my father would ever see me. Of course, he’d still know. He always knows somehow. I think it has to do with some of the gifts that he gleaned from his mating with my mother and from being an oracle himself. Mom…I wish she was here. Sometimes I can see her when I astral project onto Hecate’s plane, but I wish that she could see me graduate from the career that she encouraged me to do. Her death during the fight with Fenrir outside the gates of Valhalla nearly destroyed our father. When a wolf loses his mate, a piece of his soul dies. Some less powerful wolves will die with their mates, t
The day is spent hanging out with Caleb’s family and mine, along with about 50 other graduates and their families at a huge barbecue. It’s a day full of fun, food, and family and I love it. But I have been waiting for tonight.I’m so proud of Caleb. For finding something that he wanted to do. A way to help people, like he’s always wanted to do.It’s more than I’ve been able to figure out.As a luna in this huge, country-wide pack, it’s my responsibility to find my niche. The thing that I can do to help keep the pack going. Papá became the head of the college. Ba researches all of…well everything for the pack from fighting styles to vacation spots. And Mom is the main Oracle of the pack. They had it all figured out within a year of getting their gifts and I still haven’t even gotten my gift, let alone figured out what I’m going to do with the rest of my life.But I need to put that out of my mind. Because tonight is all about Caleb and the new set of lingerie that