Cody
When Quinn and I stepped out of the trees and into view, the guys playing football paused long enough to cheer. I lifted our intertwined hands in the air and shot Quinn a quick grin. She rolled her eyes in response, but her cheeks flushed and she couldn’t hide her smile.
I pulled her toward the group, and they paused their game long enough for an introduction.
“Hey guys, this is Quinn.” I lifted our linked hands again. There were about twenty five teenage boys playing, and they all wanted to introduce themselves. With ages ranging from 12-22, they hadn’t had much exposure to female humans turned shifter other than Hallie.
They all took a second to tell Quinn their names, and by the end, she had an apologetic smile on her face.
“I’m sorry, but it’s going to take me a while to remember all of that.”
“They understand.” I leaned over and pressed a kiss to her cheek, figuring that I might as well enjoy my time with her until she went back to trying to convince me to leave her.
“Tanner and Hallie are inside with Emma and Logan.” One of the older guys told me, as they all resumed positions in their football game.
“Where are all the girls?” Quinn looked around like maybe they were all in a different group somewhere.
“There aren’t any.” I led her toward the house. “There haven’t been any female shifters born in almost twenty years. Emma is one of the youngest ones.”
“What the crap? Why?”
“We figure it’s to force the humans to accept us into society. It’s harder for humans to disown their daughters than their sons when they become shifters.” I explained our theory. There was no way to prove it right or wrong, considering that the Creator was the only one with the answers, but it was our best guess.
Quinn rolled her eyes.
“Please. It’s more likely that women are more able to adapt to a life change as big as becoming a shifter.”
We entered Emma’s and Logan’s house then, ending the conversation.
“Hey, guys.” Emma waved from the kitchen, where she was sitting on the counter while Hallie added flour to the stand-mixer next to Emma.
Hallie saw us and hurried over to give Quinn a quick hug.
“Me and Emma have a box of clothes over there.” Hallie gestured toward the door. “There should be something that fits you.” She smiled before going back to her cookie dough.
“Thanks.” Quinn returned her smile and headed over to the box, and then Hallie pointed her in the direction of the bathroom. Though I liked the way she looked in that t-shirt, everyone else would be more comfortable with her fully-dressed.
“Logan and Tanner are playing some shooting game.” Emma gestured to the living room. I could hear the noise coming from the TV so she didn’t have to tell me that, but I figured it was a courtesy thing so I’d feel more welcome in her house. With the history between our soulmates, things had been a little shaky between us.
“Thanks.” I nodded and started toward the living room, and Emma slipped off the counter in time to follow me.
She glanced toward the bathroom, where my soulmate would be changing. I couldn’t hear Quinn thanks to the stand-mixer and the TV, so I figured she couldn’t hear us either.
“Are we good, Cody?” Emma checked.
“Why wouldn’t we be good?”
She rolled her eyes.
“Let’s not pretend there wasn’t a few minutes where we wanted to kill each other’s soulmates.”
“I never wanted to kill you.” I offered. When she smiled, I grinned. “We’re good, Em. I’m over it.”
“Me too.” She wrapped her arms around me. “I’m happy for you.”
“Thanks.”
I let go of her and headed into the living room, where Tanner and Logan were hyper-focused on the game on the TV. I grabbed an extra controller and took a seat on the couch neither of them were occupying, then waited for the match to be over.
The door to the bathroom opened while I was waiting, and I eavesdropped on Quinn’s conversation with my sisters.
“Dang, girl. Those are some nice legs.” Emma whistled. She was right, my soulmate had fantastic legs.
“Oh, I was a gymnast.” Quinn brushed it off. She didn’t sound as defensive about it as I assumed she’d be, since we’d never talked about it. “What are you making?”
“Snickerdoodles. It’s Ty’s birthday tomorrow, and Emma says they’re his favorite. I figure we can always use another baked peace offering.”
Crap, I’d forgotten it was my dad’s birthday. I’d have to run over to his house and give him a hug or something. What was I supposed to do for the dad whose pack and family Tanner and I had ripped in half?
“Oh, cool. Do you guys usually make a big deal out of birthdays?” Quinn asked.
“Not really.” Emma spoke up. “Usually mom just makes our favorite food for dinner and we eat cake. We never did birthday presents until after the walls went down, because there were no presents to give.”
“What? That’s insane!” Quinn protested.
“I had no idea.” Hallie put in. “Should we go and get him something?”
“Nah. I’m sure the only thing he wants for his birthday is for our packs to become one again.”
I looked at Tanner, my eyes widening, and saw the way he was grimacing. He felt like the pack split was his fault.
“Why not?” Quinn wondered.
I grimaced too.
“Because Tanner and Cody both have too much dominance. If our packs merged, Dad would be third, and that would probably only last until Artie’s old enough to control his dominance. My dad doesn’t know how not to be the Alpha.” Emma explained.
Tanner ran a hand through his hair as the match ended, and Logan looked between us with an apologetic expression. The merge had been hard on everyone, but especially on Tanner and me since we’d gained so many more responsibilities.
Our pack’s third was in Wisconsin with his soulmate and had been since just after the merge, so Tanner and I were the only ones there to keep the peace. You’d be surprised by just how many fights break out in a group of a hundred guys from 12-25 years old.
“I’m sure he could learn. Hallie learned how to be a shifter, Leah’s not trying to save the world anymore, and you became an actress.” Quinn reminded Emma. “Cody’s learning not to lose control of his wolf every time I do something to piss him off.”
I watched a grin take over both of the other guys’ faces when she added the last part.
“I’ve had to learn how to be something besides a gymnast. I thought it would kill me when I couldn’t compete anymore, but look at me. I’m not thriving, but I am surviving. Change is part of life, and if I can survive breaking my back and losing the future I had planned, I think Ty can handle not being Alpha. Heck, it might even be a relief for him.”
The girls in the kitchen—and us guys in the living room—sat in stunned silence for a few seconds before my soulmate spoke up again.
“Plus, the prejudiced people in the other pack haven’t tried to wreck my house or kill me since I told them off the other day. If they were going to do something, they would’ve done it already.”
“Maybe you should add lawyer to your resume.” Emma remarked.
I bit back a groan, and Logan met my gaze. That was a touchy subject for my soulmate, one that we should’ve avoided at all costs since she wasn’t trying to get rid of me at that moment.
“That’s not an option.” Quinn’s voice went flat, and I heard her footsteps.
Figuring she was storming out the front door, I dropped the remote on the couch and stood to follow her.
My eyebrows raised when she walked into the room.
“Going somewhere?” She asked dryly.
“Just stretching.” I lied, pulling my arm across my chest in a quick stretch. “That was a good run earlier, I’m a little sore.”
Tanner choked back a laugh, and I didn’t have to look to know that Logan was grinning.
“Oh please. If that run made you sore you’re more marshmallow than mountain or man.”
“I’m pretty confident we’ve already established how man I am.” I met her smirk with one of my own, and my brother coughed back another laugh.
“Have we? Because I remember establishing that you weren’t man enough to take me to bed when I asked you to on multiple occasions, James.”
She strolled through the doorway on her right and went through the back door, leaving me both shocked and even more attracted to her than I’d been when we’d made out in the forest.
Tanner and Logan busted up as soon as Quinn was gone, and Hallie and Emma were laughing so hard they were crying when they came into the room.
“I love your soulmate.” Emma collapsed on the couch next to Logan, wiping away tears as her laughter died down. “That girl isn’t afraid of anything.”
“Except her parents, who are lawyers, Em.” I rolled my eyes, though I was grinning too.
“I can’t believe she said that out loud.” Hallie sat on the arm of the couch next to Tanner.
“I can’t believe you turned your soulmate down when she propositioned you.” Tanner’s body was still shaking with laughter.
“I wasn’t going to sleep with her as part of her plan to get rid of me.” I stood up, following Quinn in my mind. If she stuck around with the pack too long, there was a good chance she’d jump one of the other guys like she had Sebastian.
“I can’t believe you just said ‘propositioned’,” Emma rolled her eyes at Tanner. “But I’m sure that’s not the only reason she wanted to sleep with you.”
“Yeah, well you guys can keep talking about our sex life while I go and stop her from trying the same thing with some other guy just to piss me off.” I called out, strolling out through the door and into the shocked crowd of boys.
I expected to have to peel my soulmate off one of my lucky, unsuspecting pack mates. Instead, I found them all gathered around Quinn, who was on her back on the grass. I would’ve heard her swearing like a sailor if not for all the guys talking around her.
My heart raced and my stomach dropped when I realized that she must’ve gotten hurt. Shoving my way through the crowd, I dropped to my knees beside her. There were tears pooling in her eyes, but the expression on her face was one of fierce anger.
“Are you okay?” I put my hands on her face, then her shoulders and arms and legs, checking for injuries.
“Just back off.” She snarled, shoving me away and getting up only to rush into the forest. I gave her a second before following after her, turning to the guys next to me.
“What happened?” I growled.
“She ran into me and fell.” One of the twelve-year-olds looked at me, petrified. “When she didn’t roll over or get up, I tried to help her and she started swearing. Landen rolled her over and she looked like she was in pain but just kept swearing at us.”
I ran a hand over my face.
“I’m sorry, Zak.” I barely took the time to apologize for her before taking off into the forest after my soulmate, who was still moving but hadn’t shifted.