The Moon sisters came out of the house together. One look at Elise’s face told me they’d been up to no good. She was way too happy for our dire circumstances.

She bounced up to me, threw herself into my arms, and gave me a kiss.

“What was that for?” I asked as I held her close, still savoring the feel of her soft lips on mine. “Not that I’m complaining or anything.”

“Can I not want to kiss a handsome man when I see him?”

“Sure you can,” I said, then returned the kiss. Soft, sweet, wonderful. “Why so bubbly all of a sudden, though?”

“I think,” she said, pausing to look around, “I have a plan.”

My heart sank a little, like there was a well in my chest and it was floating to the bottom. “Elise, I’ve been thinking. I don’t know about this. These all seem like nice people. Crazy, but nice. I don’t think I can rob them, or hurt anyone. It’s just—it’s not in me.”

Elise pulled back a little. “Don’t worry, we’re not going to steal anything. We’re going to get them to give it to us.”

“Wait, what?” I asked in confusion, looking to Eve.

Elise’s sister shrugged. “I dunno, either, so don’t ask me. She keeps saying you’re our secret weapon.”

I sucked in a breath and gave Elise the eye. “You didn’t tell her, did you?” I asked quietly.

“No, of course I didn’t say anything. I’m not going to do that.”

“Thank God.”

“You get to.”

“Dammit, Elise!”

“Tell me what?”

I sighed. “Not here. We have to go somewhere private where no one will see or hear us.”

“Besides,” Elise added, “you won’t believe either of us unless you see it for yourself. It’s too amazing for just words.”

Eve gave us both a look like she’d smelled some beef that had gone off. “You two are serious, aren’t you? What do you have to show me?”

“Don’t worry,” I grumbled. “You’ll see.”

Not ten minutes later, we were back in the storage unit we’d been in earlier. This time, the door was barred from the inside so no one would walk in, and I was ducked behind a well-packed shelf that obscured the sisters’ views as they stood in the middle of the room.

“What’s he doing back there?” Eve asked, shuffling her feet a little like she was impatient.

“Getting ready to show you something.”

“Ew. But he’s dating you.”

“Shut up, Eve! Get your mind out of the gutter.”

Eve would’ve screamed as soon as I padded around the corner on all four paws, but she was too breathless to muster much of one. Instead, she just grabbed Elise’s hand and gripped it tightly. “Oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God!”

“See?” Elise said to her. “This is how we’re going to just ask for it.”

“My God, they’re real. They’re really real?”

“Shifters,” Elise said, putting an arm around her sister’s shoulders. “He’s called a shifter.”

Eve looked back and forth between me and Elise, wide-eyed. “Shifters? More like spirits! Reverend Fenris has talked about them! About how they’re emissaries from the Great Alpha! I thought it was all bullshit, b-b-but you’re fucking dating one!”

I looked back and forth between them, my ears perked up, my mouth hanging open.

“Can I rub his tummy?” Eve asked, half afraid and half amazed.

Not again. I sighed a wolfish sigh and turned back around, returning to my spot behind the shelf to slowly change back.

There was a loud thud like a sack of potatoes dropping as Eve sat on the floor. “Oh. My. God. I can’t believe this shit.”

“Eve, get up. He’s a special guy and all, and he can turn into a wolf, but he’s still practically human. He’s not an angel or some mystical being.”

“If he’s not some kind of spiritual being, like Coyote for the Navajo, why can he change like that?”

“Have to ask him,” Elise replied. “I just found out about this last night.”

“And you haven’t told anyone?”

“What? No, of course not. They’d think I was fucking crazy. Crazy and, you know, they’d bug him. If anyone finds out about this, they’d try and put him in a government facility or something, Eve. You can’t whisper a word of this to anyone, I’m serious.”

“But, Elise, I mean…”

“No. No, Eve. This has to stay secret.”

Still behind the shelf, I cleared my throat as I stood and began to pull my clothes back on. “Now that my little circus monkey trick is finished, what do you think?”

“What do I think?” she asked. “I think it’s amazing!”

“That’s not what he meant, Sis,” Elise said as I, still buttoning my flannel back up, went around the corner and rejoined them. “He means, do you think they’ll give the offering to him?”

She shrugged. “I don’t see why not. I mean, what Lupo Congregation member wouldn’t? They’d probably want you to stick around and get worshipped or something.”

“Yeah, that ain’t gonna happen. I’m not much for being the center of attention.”

Eve looked up at me, her eyes sparkling with delight and wonder. It was like she was seeing Johnny Depp or Beyoncé on the street.

I fought the urge to snap my fingers in front of her face, just to try and bring her back to reality. “What?”

“You’re really, really real. And my sister is totally dating you. You know how cool that is?”

“Sort of? I know how cool it is that I’m dating your sister. That count?”

She broke into a grin as Elise helped her up from the floor. “Now,” she said, clapping her hands together, “this is how things are going to work. The meeting starts up in just a few hours, and that means we’ve got to get you a robe, Elise.”

“What? Why the hell do I have to get a robe?”

“Because they won’t let you come to the ceremony without one.”