Chapter Eighteen
Glenn
Glenn padded alongside the tiny wolf. He could walk now without limping and tried to wrestle with his brother and sister, though they both refused as if they knew he wasn't well enough yet. Glenn trotted on his four legs, testing the runt's gait. He kept up with Glenn for a while before falling back. As a shifter wolf, he was bigger and stronger than a natural wolf, but the runt still would have been able to keep up for a little longer if he had been completely healed.
Glenn shifted into his human form and popped his head in through the kitchen window.
"Hey."
Brady jumped, he'd been sitting in the dining room chair reading a chart in front of him. He still hadn't gotten a drop-in client from anyone in town, but the park rangers must not have gotten the memo because they'd shown up a few days before with a box of animal research that they needed Brady to take a look at. That was good in Glenn's book since Brady was sexy when he was working.
"Sorry for startling you," Glenn said making clear he wasn't sorry in the slightest.
"It's fine, how is the--are you naked?"
Glenn grinned. Brady could just see him from the shoulders up, anyone behind him would be able to see him in his full birthday suit. "Your clothes don't just magically appear when you shift," he explained.
"I understand that, but...oh never mind. Anyone sees you, it will be a treat for them." Brady got up and walked over to the window. He pretended like he was trying to stretch tall enough that he could see over the windowsill. "How is the wolf?"
"Better, but not quite all the way. I don't think I can convince him to stay another night though." It wasn't like Glenn was able to communicate with the wolf in the same way that he was speaking with Brady at that moment, but they could communicate on an animal level. Glenn was sensing that the wolf was restless, too restless to spend any more time in the barn. He'd already been more patient with that jerk goose than any normal animal would be. If he'd been a regular wolf, that goose would have been dead by now. But the runt and his siblings were an odd breed.
"That should be okay. We will just have to trust that they'll come back if he goes downhill. Can you ask Parker to come in here? I wanted to explain some of these charts to him. He was supposed to be my apprentice after all."
Glenn frowned. "I thought Parker was in there with you?" At least, he had been when Glenn had come outside hours ago to work with the wolf.
"No, he said he was going to go outside and help you a long time ago." Brady's eyes were wide with sudden worry.
"I'm sure he's fine. I'll trot around the area and look for him," Glenn said, reaching through the window to pat Brady on the hand. "Everything is probably fine."
Glenn fell from the window then as he morphed seamlessly into his wolf form. He walked around to the front of the house. That was the only door he could have come out of that Glenn wouldn't have seen right away. With his nose to the ground, Glenn searched for his scent. He found it immediately but needed to suss out the most recent trail. A recent one led out to the barn, but they had all gone out there that morning to tend to the animals. He kept sniffing and located a trail that seemed to lead around the house to the forest line.
The hair down Glenn's spine stuck up. What if he'd gotten into trouble? A trap, or worse, something that Foster had planted? Shifter coyotes were small, closer in size to their animal counterparts than wolf shifters were to theirs. Glenn began to run as fast as he could without compromising the trail. All the while, his mind spun, conjuring up a million different scenarios, a million different ways his love was in mortal peril.
He thought maybe it was because he was so in tune with Parker and everything about him that he could hear his voice from a distance that was much further than anyone should be able to hear. He slowed down, suddenly thankful that he wasn't downwind.
"I've been busy," Parker said with an irritated edge.
"Been busy or lazy?" a hard voice asked.
Glenn stopped in his tracks. It sounded like Parker knew the voice, judging from the annoyed sigh Glenn heard next. If Glenn had thought the other voice was there to hurt Parker he would have ran right in to save him. He didn't though, and Glenn did the unforgivable, choosing to eavesdrop instead of making his presence known. Parker had so many secrets, so many times he'd spoken a half-truth. This was Glenn's shameful chance to find out why.
"This wasn't an easy mission. You all knew that going in. You also knew I'm not the type to act without thinking first. That's why my uncle chose me."
"Ya, well your uncle is going to die before you act."
"He still can't shift?"
"Of course he can't. Hardly none of us can now. We need space, fresh air and water, something you were supposed to secure for us. Instead you're rolling around with some human and...is that a wolf I smell?"
Glenn flattened his body to the ground before realizing the other voice meant the smell on Parker.
"Don't worry about what I smell like," Parker snapped. "That's what I wanted to talk to you about. The vet's land won't work. But there is a suitable replacement. Some local guy in town. Word is he has a lot of land and not a lot of smarts, Robert Foster--"
"Robert Foster? No. No way. He is the one person in Riverside who needs to be untouched in our takeover. God, don't you know anything?"
Glenn knew why people said not eavesdrop. You often didn't like what you heard.
"What? Why? That guy is an asshole, why is he getting protection from the pack?" Glenn didn't need to be a shifter to hear Parker at that point, he was yelling.
"We've had a contract with him since you were a pup. Christ, I would think someone like you, poised to be a leader would know something like that. He delivers gifts once a month and in exchange, we give him protection in town and when he goes on runs."
"Goes on...you mean booze?"
"I think they call it moonshine up here."
"I don't care what they call it. You're telling me he is safe because he is the one to deliver poison to the pack on a monthly basis?"
"Get off your fucking high horse, Parker. The pack is sick, most of us can't shift, you want to take away the one thing that gives us pleasure?"
Glenn remembered back when Parker was talking about his childhood and mentioned his father, about how his mother died and his biggest fear was turning out like his dad. His dad who was now in prison. He'd lied during that conversation, Glenn had tasted it. Glenn would have never guessed this was why.
"I have to get back. You were so fucking late they're probably wondering where I am," Parker said.
"They're?" the voice responded. A light breeze blew down towards Glenn giving him his first good smell of Parker's conversation partner. Glenn inhaled and felt like he was going to be sick. He knew that smell. He'd fought that smell. The man Parker spoke with was definitely one of the coyotes Glenn had fought the night they saved the wolf. He might have even been the one who'd managed to hurt him. Despite it all, Glenn was first and foremost worried that Parker was so close to such a dangerous person. He wanted to scream.
"The vet's land won't work," Parker said, ignoring the guy's question. He spoke clearly, enunciating every syllable. "It's got...rats," he said.
The other coyote laughed. "You are a horrible liar, Parker. You're gonna have to work on that if your uncle dies. An alpha has to be able to lie and be believed."
"Fuck off. Don't do anything until I tell you to." Parker walked away then. He must have shifted because Glenn heard him approaching on four feet. He had enough time to wonder why Parker's shifting abilities hadn't been effected before the coyote was trotting past him, clearly not searching the area for predators. Glenn didn't recall telling his body to shift, but he did, from four to two legs. As he grew in height, his head brushed against a branch. It made enough noise that Parker turned around with a snarl. Upon seeing Glenn standing there naked in the middle of the forest, he went silent.
In the time it took Glenn to blink, Parker shifted into a human. He opened his mouth and Glenn ran forward punching him squarely in the face.
Parker's body crumpled and if Glenn hadn't been worried that the other coyote would hear and bring friends, he would have wailed out is pain. Hurting Parker had been like hurting himself, but ten thousand times over. He couldn't risk that Parker wouldn't yell out and alert the coyote though. He heaved the man over his shoulder, careful not to bump his head on anything. He resisted the urge to cradle him to his chest. Despite everything he had just heard, Glenn's inner wolf wanted to be near Parker, to care for him. He bit back an annoyed growl and began the trek back to the clinic.