Chapter Four

 

Foxfire

 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

This is a dream. A really bad dream, like the time Sunny left her mushrooms out and I ate them and thought the walls were melting.

The clarity of the moonlight, the scents that surrounded me, they were beautiful, but it’s way worse than a bad trip.

“Here.” Tank sits down next to me, holding out a power bar.

“No more jerky?” I ask hopefully.

“Carnivore?”

“I tried to be vegetarian like so many times. I would have these cravings where I almost ate raw meat.”

“She wouldn’t let you.”

“Who?”

“Your fox. She’s pretty, by the way.”

“My…”

“Your fox. That’s who came out to play just now. She’s gorgeous.”

I stare at him, remembering the harmony in my limbs, when I didn’t think about it, the freedom, the whole new world of scents, beautiful and profane.

“What am I?”

“You really don’t know?”

“Um, no. One minute I’m… on two legs and then, the next I’m…” My breath gets stuck in my throat. “I’m—”

“Okay, okay, relax.” He rubs my back. “Just breathe. It’ll be okay. You’re a shifter, like me. Most of us have the benefit of growing up in a house surrounded by shifters. My dad coached me through my first change. I was early. Some kids don’t shift until their teens, and then wake in bed all furry. It usually happens in adolescence, if not before.”

“It’s never happened to me.”

“Yes, well, if I had to guess, I’d say your fox is shy. And she’s on her own, without family or protection.”

I lean into him. My heart isn’t pounding as hard, but Tank is the only one keeping me on Earth.

Foxes. I’m a fox.

“You’re a shifter,” I state.

“Yeah, baby. I’m a wolf.”

I let out a noise, half laugh, half gurgle. “I noticed.”

He rubs my back some more.

“So that’s why Garrett sent you. You’re not part of a gang called the Werewolves. You are a werewolf.”

“A pack.” He says after a long silence. “I’m part of a pack.”

“With Garrett?”

“Yeah.”

No wonder they’re secretive. I’d be less surprised if I found the path to another world in my closet, but it actually reassures me. At least Garrett and Tank’s behavior makes more sense now.

I open my hands, close them. Hands, not paws. No claws. Not right now.

“Are there others, like me?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Oh.” Again, the world tilts under my feet.

“Foxfire… is there anyone… Do you know anyone in your family who might… have a secret?”

“What, like my great aunt Agatha’s chili recipe? Oh, and she turns into a Saint Bernard during the full moon?”

Tank just looks at me, forehead wrinkled. He must think I’m really losing it.

“No.” My breath shudders out of me. “Nothing like that. I don’t really have a family—only my mom. And I don’t think she’d hide something like this from me.” I rub my hands. Hands. Not paws. No fur. “I’m cold.”

He grabs the blanket and tucks it tight around me, wrapping an arm around my shoulders and giving me a side hug. “It’s the shift. It takes energy. And you’re skin and bones.”

“I am not.” I frown at him.

“You are, baby.” He squeezes me tight, pulling me closer. “Petite.”

“Yes, well, I was born this way. Not all of us can be freakishly tall and built like a truck.”

“A tank.”

“Yeah.” Something he said unravels. “Wait, so you think someone else in my family is a shifter?”

“Shifters breed shifters. It’s genetic.”

“So my mom or dad…”

“One of them carries the gene. Most likely they can shift. It’d be almost impossible for two non-shifters with the dormant gene to bear one who can shift.”

“My mom.” I shake my head. “I don’t think she’s a shifter. I lived with her. I’ve known her all my life.”

“She never snuck off into the wilderness for hours at a time?”

“No. She does a lot of pot, but that’s about it.”

Another long silence. “What about your dad?”

“I don’t know him.”

Tank nods.

I swallow. I never met my dad. Around first grade, I decided I wanted to, but that was only because we were doing a class project on our parents. Mom helped me do half the project on her, and half on the host of my favorite show, Reading Rainbow. My entire class ending up thinking I was LeVar Burton’s daughter. My popularity went way up, and I haven’t given a thought to my mystery sperm donor since.

Except, now. Because of him, I turn into a fox. The thing that will most impact my life, given by a man I’ve never met.

I sigh.

“It’s okay, Foxfire,” Tank says again, and squeezes me tight. He may be a giant grouchy lump most of the time, but he’s pretty good at reassuring me. I feel a lot better in his arms, anyway. If he wasn’t here, I’d be a complete mess. Probably ready to commit myself to the loony bin. “It’s going to be all right.”

“How is it all right? I turn into an animal during the full moon.”

“Not just then. With practice, you’ll be able to shift at will.”

“Oh, goody. I can wow them at dinner parties.”

A sound rumbles in his chest—a half growl. “No. No dinner parties. You have to keep this a secret.”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

He catches my chin lightly. “Okay, baby. First rule of any pack. You give animals bigger and deadlier than you your respect. I’m telling you now so you don’t get it beaten into you by someone less sympathetic than I am.”

I try to think of something snarky as his dominant gaze bores into me. “Fine,” I mumble, dropping my eyes.

“Good girl.” He tucks me closer. I’m practically on his lap. He nuzzles my hair. He’s sniffing me again. This time, I don’t mind. Must be a wolf thing.

“So, does this mean I’m one of your pack?”

“No,” he says quickly.

I hide my flinch. This creature, this animal inside me, she wants her kind.

“Most shifters keep to their own. But I’ve never heard of a pack of fox shifters. You’re the first one I’ve seen.”

Great. I’m still a freak, no matter what species. Whatever.

I sit up and scoot away from him to shake out my hair. It’s a mess, full of sticks and grass. I comb my fingers through it.

“Let me,” Tank murmurs, and picks out the rest. When he’s done, he keeps his arm around me.

“Thanks.” Slowly, I let myself relax. “What now?”

“Now, we wait. You need rest. In the morning, I feed you.”

“You’re staying?”

“You’re still my prisoner. And we both know I can catch you, no matter how far you run.”

I nod. I’m too tired to argue. He’s been here only a few hours, and he’s already a fixture in my life. But I’m glad. I feel safer with him, somehow.

I’m a fox. Fuck. I tuck my face into his shoulder. He’s so big and so strong. And when I… my fox came out, he knew just what to do. I’m too tired to think about what that means, but maybe, for just tonight, I don’t have to.

“I always knew I was different,” I mumble.

“What’s that, baby?”

“My mom. She’s weird. And she raised me.”

“Did she ever leave for periods of time, or act strange around the full moon?”

“She’s my mom. She was always strange.” I remember kids pointing at us. Laughing. My name, my petite body, my hippie mom, smelling of patchouli oil and dressing us in clothes from Goodwill. Weird.

I realize I said all this out loud when Tank tightens his hold on me.

“It’s going to be okay.”

I wrap my arms around him and bury my face in his chest. He cups the back of my head as he murmurs, “We’ll figure it out, together.”