In a few minutes, Trace Blackwood in his wolf body climbed from the water onto the bank at the far end of the stream. He paused long enough to give a vigorous and mighty shake and fling the water from his deep, dark fur in a spray in all directions. Then, satisfied that he had rendered himself from drenched to just wet, he loped off with a snuffle and a pant into the tall grass of the slope leading up the hill towards the eastern mountain beyond it.
He passed from tall grass to forest underbrush, from hillside to the base of the mountain, and into the forest on the mountainside. He moved confidently, having passed this way many times before. He knew this forest as well as he knew the city in which he spent most of his time as a human. Presently, he came to a plateau where there was a clearing—and in the wide, grassy plateau stood a large and splendid lodge.
The lodge was the size of a mansion. Big enough to accommodate a dozen or more people in fine comfort. It was a place of sparkling glass set into logs stained a ruddy, golden brown, looking like an enchanted abode set into the wilderness. Trace sniffed at the air as he moved quickly from the edge of the forest to the front steps of the lodge. Most of the rest of the pack seemed to be elsewhere, probably out hunting beyond the lodge in the deep forest where the mountain continued its rise. Most of them—but not all.
Just one was in view, sitting at the top of the steps on the front landing. He was impossible to miss, a huge and imposing-looking wolf with fur the same color as Trace’s, but threaded with more strands of light grey and white, the signs of his age. Trace quickened the strides of his long wolf legs, closing the distance between himself and the elder wolf who sat watching him approach.
When Trace reached the foot of the stairs, the huge wolf stood up on all-fours and yawned widely, not from fatigue but to trigger his change. He morphed from four legs to two, and from wolf to man. The naked man standing where the older canine had been was a living prediction of the way Trace would look someday. The hair was shorter and greyer, the face more carved and chiseled, the body hair dusted with grey and white, but the body frame and muscles were still big and strong.
He was old, but he was not feeble. Keeping his eye on Trace, who sat at the foot of the stairs patiently and respectfully watching, the naked man stepped over to the railing on one side of him and picked up the dark robe he had draped there. He put on the robe and tied it fast, then walked to the other side of where he had been sitting and picked up a black leather gym bag from the porch. He tossed the bag down to where Trace sat, and now Trace began to morph, having respectfully waited for his father to change first.
Once Trace was human again and taking a towel from the gym bag to dry off his man-body, Roman Blackwood asked, “How was your swim?”
Running the towel along his arms and over his chest, Trace almost replied, Interesting. But he caught himself. If he said it was interesting, his father would want to know what it was that so interested him, and Trace was not sure he was ready yet to speak of what—or whom—he had seen down at the stream. There were too many other things to talk about right now. So, he only said, “It was good, Dad. Good swim.”
“Good,” Roman said back. “We’ve all still got a little bit of time, at least, to settle in here before the town meeting in the Hollow.”
By now, Trace had put the towel back in his gym bag and taken out his jeans, which he had rolled up inside the bag when he stripped for his journey down to the stream. Slipping into the jeans, not bothering with underwear and being careful not to catch the zipper on the part of his anatomy with which he had the most fun, Trace asked his father, “So, is the meeting all set?”
Roman replied, “They’ve got it scheduled for the day after tomorrow. They’re busy down there with fire relief still, going through the process of getting aid to rebuild things and help the displaced people. But I managed to encourage them to add it to their list of priorities.”
With a smile not unlike the way he had looked at the fleeing female werewolf, the still shirtless Trace said, “I’ll bet you did. Mentioning our name down there has a way of moving things along.”
“It could have been more complicated,” said Roman. “If the lightning had struck—or whatever it was that happened—on this side of the valley instead of that side, we might be the ones rebuilding now.”
“Except we’d have an easier time of it,” Trace added.
“Easier in some ways, yes. It still would have complicated things,” Roman said pensively. “We wouldn’t need any outside help—but it would have thrown things off.” And he looked meaningfully down at Trace, who looked slightly away, taking the meaning.
“Yeah,” said Trace. “It would have thrown off our plans for the season, that’s true. Tell you the truth, I wouldn’t have minded that.”
Roman folded his arms and gave Trace a stern expression. “No, I don’t suppose you would have minded at all. If the season had been disturbed by rebuilding the lodge, everyone knows it would have meant postponing things. And you might have had another year to go on the way you’ve been instead of taking over.”
“Well,” Trace said, shrugging, “that would have meant you’d be Alpha for another year.”
“My being Alpha for another year isn’t in the best interest of the pack,” Roman reminded him. “The Alpha has to step down when his time comes for the good of everyone. Age must step down, and youth must step up. There’s no point going over and over what we all know.”
Trace frowned ruefully. “We all know you’re still perfectly strong and capable of leading us, Dad. It’s only some hidebound old tradition that says an Alpha has to step down at a certain age. You’re as good as you ever were.”
“I’m not as young as I ever was, Trace. And time isn’t going to stand still. Anyone would think you’d be grateful.”
“‘Grateful’,” said Trace, almost mockingly. “Yeah, remind me the next time I talk to my brother to tell him again how ‘grateful’ I am that he married into another pack and left me next in line to be Alpha.”
“Your brother,” said Roman, ever more sternly, “is still in line to be Alpha, just not our Alpha. In a few years, he’ll probably be leading the Cedar Pack, and before that, he’ll have given them his first pup. He’s taken responsibility there, just like you’ll soon have responsibility here.”
“If he’d brought his mate home instead of going to the Cedar Pack, he’d still have the same responsibility…”
“And you’d have none,” Roman said, cutting him off. “You’d still be able to go on just the way you’ve always done, never staying with one partner, never having one mate, never having a pup of your own. And never having to show any leadership.”
“I show plenty of leadership!” Trace protested. “I work in the family business the same as the rest of us. I make decisions, I manage things, I hire people, I fire people. Sometimes, I even pitch in with the actual work…”
“And you go from one female’s bed to another, our own kind, humans—whoever is pretty and interested and willing.”
“Is that really so bad?” Trace asked. “Have I been that much of a disappointment to you? Am I doing any differently than my brother used to do?”
“You said it yourself, Trace—the way your brother used to do. The way he did before he settled on one mate. I agree, I wish Dominic had brought Raven home and stayed in line to be our Alpha. But Raven wanted to stay with her own pack, and Dominic wanted to be with her. Should I have forbidden him to go? Raven might have left him. Should I have ordered him to stay and break his own heart? Would you have wanted that for him?”
Frustrated, Trace hung his head and scowled. “No, Dad, of course not. I want Dominic to be happy as much as you do. It’s just…”
“It’s just that becoming Alpha of our own pack means your days of rutting around are over. I understand that, son. But that doesn’t change the facts. The Blackwood Pack needs an Alpha. I can’t lead anymore; it’s time for me to join the elders. As my son, you’re next in line. You have to step up.”
Trace looked up impotently at his father—which was an ironic way for him to feel in light of what he would be called upon to do. Words failed him.
Roman came down the stairs and put his hands on his son’s bare shoulders. “Trace, I know you enjoy your life the way it’s been. I remember how much your brother enjoyed being an un-bonded wolf, free to do as he pleased with whatever female he pleased, whatever he wanted. Do you think I never felt that way myself? It’s fun to have many females in your den, or be in many females’ beds. But it can’t be your whole life. Sooner or later, you would have wanted something else, something more. Dominic did. I did. You would have wanted it too.”
“Not for a while,” said Trace with a half-smile, half-frown.
“But you would have. Son, you’re going to be the Alpha of this pack. And yes, you’ll have more responsibility. And yes, we’ll be looking to you to produce a pup. It’s been a long time since we’ve welcomed a pup. The rest of the pack is looking forward to it. It’s about the renewal of the pack, Trace. It’s about our continuation, our future. And you know, there are a lot of packs who don’t have the things we have. You won’t be rutting around anymore, but you know you’ll never want for anything else. And neither will your mate or your pups. We have a good life. We need you to carry it forward.”
Trace shrugged again. He almost slumped his shoulders, but he was careful not to do so in his father’s presence with his father’s hands on him. A slumped posture was a sign of submission, of subordination. It was a posture unbecoming an Alpha male—or someone who soon would be one.
“I get it, Dad,” Trace simply said.
“And besides,” said Roman with a twinkle in his eye that belied his age, “it’s not necessarily such a bad thing to have just one mate for your life. It’s true, it’s always the same body, the same touches and licks and bites, and you’re only mounting one where you used to mount many. But the familiarity makes it more intimate. You feel a part of each other over time. It becomes just as good with one as it was when you were always on the hunt. Trust me. Your mother and I were never bored.”
Trace tilted his head at his father as if his head were still that of a wolf.
Roman lifted one hand from Trace’s shoulder and held up an index finger to emphasize his point: “Never. With the right mate, it only gets better.”
Trace picked up his gym bag, and father and son started up the stairs together. “ ‘The right mate…’ Everybody always assumes there is such a thing for everyone.”
“That’s because there is,” Roman assured him.
They reached the top of the steps and headed for the front door. “For you, there was. And Dominic.”
“And you,” Roman asserted.
“You’re sure about that?”
“I’m sure. And for the time being, I’m still Alpha, and what I say still goes. There is a right mate, Trace.”
“Yes, Sir,” Trace said as they entered the lodge.
_______________
In the wake of the fire, the town had started buzzing with rumors about the Blackwoods.
Everyone in Reynolds Hollow knew who they were, and some were personally acquainted with members of the family. Some knew them only as the Blackwood family and some, depending on who they were, knew them as the Blackwood Pack. Every community has it wealthy, prominent, and envied citizens, and for Reynolds Hollow, the Blackwoods were that family. They had lived in the valley longer ago than anyone alive could remember. They had not always been wealthy, but they built their initial grub stake with their skills at building homes.
There were houses in Reynolds Hollow that the Blackwoods had built more than a hundred years ago. After cementing their reputation in the valley, they had moved out into the world beyond Reynolds Hollow, taking their skills with them and growing more prosperous year by year, decade by decade, making a name for themselves in the construction of luxurious, high-end homes. Today, they were a multi-million-dollar empire many times over.
While the Blackwoods lived out in the world at large, they had not abandoned the valley. They had kept their roots there by building one of their luxury homes just for themselves, the family lodge on the eastern mountain. It was to the lodge that they returned every year during the good weather, the spring and the summer, and it was here they stayed into the fall until the snows came. They were known to travel back and forth between the lodge and the city, and at times to come down into the valley and visit Reynolds Hollow, dining at the restaurants and drinking in the taverns.
And on some nights beginning in April until about the waning days of October, the Blackwoods could be heard to howl from the forests and cliffs of their mountain dwelling. Sometimes the people of Reynolds Hollow would go out to the edge of the town that bordered the eastern mountain and listen to their howling and howl back. But only those who were truly kindred with the Blackwoods could sense and share what the howls really meant.
The rumors afoot were about what the Blackwoods might do to help the town recover from the fire. The relationship between the wealthy pack and the town in the valley below their lodge had always been basically friendly, though sometimes at a distance. They had donated money and services when Reynolds Hollow was troubled in the past, usually by flooding of the river and once by a tornado that had come through. So, when they returned for their residence in the wake of the fire, there was naturally a good amount of speculation about what they might do to help now. Fueling the speculation was the fact that a formal meeting in the town hall had been called, with the Mayor and the entire Town Council present and the public invited. But before that meeting, there was to be a preliminary meeting with the head of the family—the Alpha male of the pack—and his son, and certain important citizens.
The Mayor would be present, and a few of the Town Council members who had been there the longest, along with the head of the bank, the head physician of the local clinic, and the publisher and a reporter from the newspaper. The agenda of the meeting would be a discussion of the town’s most immediate and pressing needs in advance of the larger meeting to which everyone would be invited.
The chosen venue was the meeting room at Grady’s Tavern, which was generally used for private parties. Grady Shaw was keen to host the meeting because the Blackwoods always drank the best, and therefore most expensive, wine and liquor, and he was only sorry that the whole Blackwood pack was not coming. Still, he was more than happy to settle for the gold credit cards of the Alpha and his son. In addition to his two regular waitresses, he called in his daughter to work that night.
After finishing homework and dinner, Crystal stepped out of the house under a sky turned to deep blue by dusk, and in the retreating light of the day, she looked up at the part of the roof covered by the plastic and the tarps, and smiled at the thought of how much her father would like to receive a part of whatever monies the Blackwoods would be donating to the town. Grady would doubtless prefer to pay the roofing contractors with that rather than make an insurance claim, and it would spare her college fund. Yes, it was a good thing after all to have potential wealthy benefactors living in a lodge on the mountainside.
Walking along the street from home to Ryan Avenue, Crystal moved with purpose so as not to be late, but couldn’t help reflecting on the guests she would be helping to serve tonight. Many times, while out on a run, she had gone past the intersection letting out onto the private road that wound its way up the eastern mountain to the Blackwood lodge.
While online, she had occasionally gone to the Blackwood Contracting website where pictures of the lodge were posted. Though she had never been up to see it in person—it was very private property, after all—she had looked over the photos of the place, which surely looked like every cent of the millions that the Blackwoods owned.
Outside, it was a huge log structure that would have looked rustic and back-woodsy if not for the large, tall panes of glass that were used in its construction. In fact, it reminded Crystal a bit of some of the buildings pictured on college websites and college catalogs she had seen.
Inside, the place was one broad, open, airy room after another, with spectacular views of the mountain below, the valley, the river, and the other mountain facing it; though now some of those views of the other mountain must be marred by the blackening and denuding of the fire. All the furnishings and fixtures were exquisite, brand-new and ultra-modern; the whole dwelling looked like something out of an issue of Architectural Digest, and Crystal was surprised that it had never been so featured.
Then again, the Blackwoods probably wouldn’t want magazine and media people nosing about their property and possibly finding clues to the nature of the owners. Werewolves by necessity were deeply private people, except with other werewolves and the most trusted humans. Wealthy werewolves were naturally even more private and could well afford to be.
When Crystal arrived at the tavern, she found the regular crowd already in place at the bar and tables and other familiar faces from around the town populating the booths. Both waitresses were in circulation with trays of drinks and food. Alana, the curly-haired waitress whom Grady had hired partly for her especially broad smile, was the first to spot Crystal. She stopped en route to her customers just long enough for a greeting.
“Hi, Alana,” said Crystal. Then, lowering her voice a bit, “So, are they here?”
Alana cocked her head a bit to Crystal’s right, where the door to the meeting room was. “Yep, they’re all in there with Roman Blackwood and his son. Your Dad just took them some drinks.”
“Okay,” said Crystal. “Well, I’m ready to work.”
Alana went on her way, and Crystal went behind the bar to the little room off the kitchen where staff took their breaks and put on their aprons. Crystal took her apron from one of the little lockers on one wall of the room and quickly fastened it on. “Well, here we go,” she whispered to herself.
Her father entered, grinning. “Hi, Sweetheart.” Grady was a middle-aged man of average height, with slightly thinning hair, a short beard, strongly muscled and hairy arms, and a stomach rounded and softened by his years. Perhaps it was only a daughter’s natural bias, but Crystal had always found her father in his other body a most handsome wolf.
“Hi, Daddy,” she said. “Alana told me they’re here.”
“They’re here, all right,” said Grady. “And they’re thirsty,” he added, rubbing his hands together in that way that he did in his happiest moments, which Crystal was always glad to see.
“Are they all set for now?” Crystal asked.
“They’re good for right now,” Grady replied. “You can take their order when they’re ready for their next round. Meanwhile, just help out Alana and Suzanne.”
“Okay, Daddy,” she said, and they stepped together back out into the tavern.
About twenty minutes later, just as Crystal had served glasses to a young couple, her father came up to her, looking ready to rub his hands together again. “I just looked in on them,” he said. “They’re ready for another round.”
“All right,” said Crystal, “I’ve got ‘em.” And with her order pad and pen tucked into her apron and her tray tucked under one arm, she made her way across the main room to the door to the meeting room. Emulating Alana and putting on her best smile, she swung the door wide and stepped through it.
The meeting room had a pool table and a large, round table with chairs. A group of people, including the lady doctor and the lady reporter, were all seated at the table, drinking and talking away. She scanned the group and recognized most of the faces present. There were only two, both males, that she had not previously seen. One was a dark and powerfully built older gentleman who wore authority as well as he wore his natty casual clothing. The other, also dressed in what was obviously pricey designer sportswear, was…
All of a sudden, Crystal felt exactly as she had felt at the stream. She went rigid and numb from head to foot, as if struck and charged with some outside power. She felt as if her hair must be standing on end. Her eyes bulged. Her mouth dropped open, but the only sound that escaped was something completely incoherent. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
It was him! Absolutely, positively him! There was no question and no mistake about it. Fully clothed and sitting there in human form—it was that man, the late-twentyish to early-thirtyish man from the stream. Crystal had seen all of him that was possible to see, and there was no way she could ever forget him. A girl could never forget such a sight. She was suddenly face to face with that man again.
All eyes at the table turned in her direction; all eyes, including his. Crystal felt fit to dig a hole and jump into it. He was looking right at her again, after she had seen him that way. It was all she could do to stop her knees buckling.
The one who was obviously Roman Blackwood said, “Hello. Are you all right?”
Crystal somehow forced herself to talk. “Me…? Am I…?”
“You look a bit startled,” said Roman. “Are you okay?”
Her voice wavering, Crystal replied, “Oh…oh, yes…yes, I’m fine, Sir. Um…you…you must be…”
“Roman Blackwood,” he finished for her. And gesturing to the dark wonder at his left, “And this is my son, Trace.”
“Trace…,” was all Crystal could say. Now she had a name to hang on all that perfection.
Smiling, Trace said, “Mr. Shaw said his daughter would be helping tonight. Is that you? Crystal, right?”
And now she had a voice to go with that name and that face and the body that lurked under those clothes. Gulping, she nodded, “Um…yes, I’m Crystal.”
“Nice to meet you, Crystal,” said Trace. And he was about to say something else when Crystal suddenly spoke up, stopping him.
Half-stammering, Crystal said, “Um…you know what? I forgot something in the other…,” and she pointed in the direction of the outer tavern, “…out there. There’s something I… Can you excuse me just a minute? I’m sorry, can you just…? Excuse me…” And as calmly as she knew how to move without breaking into a run, Crystal made for the door and exited the meeting room. Once on the other side of the door, she made a beeline for the break room without looking in any other direction.
In the break room, she found herself gratifyingly alone. Good; that way no one could see her shaking. Crystal set her tray down on one of the two small tables in the break room and then leaned on the table, taking deep breaths. In her mind’s eye, she played back that encounter with the phenomenally naked Trace Blackwood. Now she knew him in all of his forms—man, half-wolf, and all wolf. Well, she did not actually know him, but she had seen him in every way.
She had, so to speak, taken the measure of him, and each of his measurements including that one down there was nothing short of impressive. Trace was a man among men and a wolf among wolves. She knew she must have aroused his curiosity with the way she reacted to him. Oh, did she have to use the word aroused? Of all the words she could have used, that was one of the ones she wanted the least. Was he even now sitting in that meeting room, guessing that Crystal recognized him?
And if he was figuring out that she recognized him, it would not take much effort for him to guess how—and as soon as he guessed, he would connect the flustered girl in the meeting room with the startled young she-wolf who had spied him at the stream.
Calming herself, Crystal was now embarrassed both by her reaction to Trace and by her embarrassment. She mentally scolded herself, You idiot, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about! You saw him naked. You’re acting like such a human; stop it, already. Why are you acting like this?
Why was she reacting this way? There was absolutely no legitimate excuse for it; she truly was acting human, and she knew better. Was it only that she was not prepared to see Trace now in her father’s tavern, just as she was not prepared to see him naked at the stream? Was it only that he was the most incredibly beautiful, indescribably gorgeous thing she had ever set eyes on in her life? Why should she feel that was on seeing him, whether that time or this? He was a man, that’s all; a werewolf in his human skin, nothing more.
Nothing, except for the aforementioned incredible beauty and indescribable gorgeousness. It was as if nature itself had set Trace Blackwood down in front of her and said to her, Here he is, Crystal. Here is my very best work. This is perfection.
And this made her feel truly self-conscious. She was eighteen, after all, and he was late-twentyish or early-thirtyish. By her reckoning, Trace was a perfect older man, but from his perspective, Crystal was jailbait. True, she was of the age of consent, but she was young, really young. She felt as though she had no business thinking the kinds of things about Trace Blackwood that were now sniffing at the corners of her thoughts.
And yet…why not? Hadn’t she looked at gorgeous older men on television and in the movies and admired how beautiful they were, and even fantasized about them asking her out? Hadn’t she dated them in her daydreams? Hadn’t she lain awake in bed in the dark at night, thinking of the scenes of them that she had watched when they stripped out of their clothes and draped themselves across a bed with some actress? And hadn’t she imagined herself in the place of the actresses, rolling around with those men, having them kiss her and feel her all over, pretending for the camera to make love to her? Why was her response to Trace Blackwood any different from her response to any of those men?
Because all those men were on TV and movie screens, that was why; not standing breathtakingly naked in streams, right in front of her in the living flesh. And because none of them were now sitting in the meeting room of her father’s tavern, waiting for her to take their order and serve them. This was reality. Dark, hairy, muscular, handsome, and impressively hung reality. And it was now just a couple of rooms away.
Her father’s voice coming up behind her nearly made Crystal leap out of her human skin. She gasped, whirled around, and put a hand to her chest at the sound of him saying, “Pumpkin, are you all right?”
Catching her breath, Crystal answered, “Oh…Daddy. I’m fine.”
“Are you sure?” Grady asked. “I just went by the meeting room, and Mr. Blackwood poked his head out and was looking for you. He said you’d run out of there like you were upset about something. Did something happen?”
“No, Daddy, nothing happened,” she answered, shaking her head. “Really, it’s fine; I thought I’d forgotten something, but I didn’t. I just got a little mixed up. I hope I didn’t upset them. It’s okay with them, right?”
“Yes, honey, they’re fine. It’s just Mr. Blackwood said you had a look as if you’d seen something that upset you, and they didn’t understand what it could have been.”
“Oh…,” said Crystal, trailing off now and taking her eyes away from her father, distracting herself with straightening her apron and flipping through her order pad—meaningless “busy” actions that were a “tell” of something amiss that she did not want to talk about.
Her father was not fooled. “Crystal, when you don’t want to look at me when we’re talking, I know there’s something going on. Is there something about the people in that room that upset you?” He put a hand under her chin and moved her face to meet his, making her look at him. “You can tell me.”
“Daddy, it’s fine,” she said. “It’s just a stupid, ridiculous thing, and I shouldn’t even have reacted the way I did. It’s nothing.”
“If you reacted,” he said, taking her hand away now he was sure he had her attention, “it must have been something. Are you sure they didn’t say anything or do anything…?”
“They didn’t say anything, Daddy!” she almost shouted. Then, more calmly: “And they didn’t do anything. They only saw me for a second. It’s just…?”
“What?” Grady pressed.
Lowering her voice more, Crystal finally said, “It’s just…I saw him.”
“You saw who? Mr. Blackwood? You mean you’ve seen him somewhere before?”
“No, not Mr. Blackwood!” Crystal said nervously. “Not that Mr. Blackwood.” She darted her eyes about as if to make sure no one else was there or coming in before she said further, “The other Mr. Blackwood.”
“The other one? You mean his son? Trace?”
Crystal, still nervous, did not answer in words. She only nodded yes.
A little concerned now, Grady asked, “You saw Trace? Where?”
“At the stream,” said Crystal.
“The stream? You were at the stream, and he was there?”
“Yes, Daddy.”
“What were you doing there?”
“I just went out for a run,” Crystal answered. “I went to wolf and took a run down by the stream, and I saw him there. He was in the water. He was wolfen too, at first. Then he stood up and…and…”
Even more concerned now, Grady put a hand on her shoulder. “And what?”
A fearful note crept into her voice. “And…he changed.”
There was a leaden hush between them as Grady took that in, and took the meaning of it. Then, gravely, he asked, “He…changed? You mean he changed in front of you?”
Crystal put a hand to her mouth and nodded her head yes again.
“And there was no one there but you and him?”
Another nod of her head.
Grady made a noise that sounded like a wolf’s growl while still in his human body. He turned sharply and started to exit the break room. Wolf fur began to break out on his forearms, his neck, and his forehead. Crystal grabbed him by the sleeve and made him look back at her. “Daddy, what are you going to do?” she asked.
“What do you think?” her father half-growled in answer. “I’m going to ask him what he meant by that.”
“Daddy, don’t! Maybe he didn’t mean anything!”
“The hell he didn’t! Changing in front of an eighteen-year-old girl with no one else around; don’t tell me that didn’t mean anything…”
“Daddy,” Crystal said, “he didn’t do anything but stand there. He didn’t come near me; he just changed. You know, it’s not like we’re human. I don’t think he meant to scare me or try anything with me. I ran away, and he didn’t come after me; he just stayed there. I overreacted, that’s all.”
“He just stood there and showed himself to you?” Grady asked, fuming.
“Really, he just stood there.”
“Like that.”
“Yes, like that. Daddy, if we were humans, you’d be right to think he was some kind of pervert or molester or worse. But he didn’t do anything but show himself. You know he must show himself to females all the time…”
“To ‘females,’ yes,” said Grady. “But not to my eighteen-year-old daughter.”
“Daddy, don’t make a scene, please,” said Crystal. “Nothing happened. I ran away. I didn’t know who he was, and I never thought I’d see him again. So, when I walked into the meeting room now and he was there, I was surprised and embarrassed. Daddy, he didn’t see me in my human body, and he didn’t catch my human scent. He doesn’t even know I’m the one he saw. He was just doing what he does with females all the time; that must be all it is.”
Grady fumbled, mortified, at the rolled-up sleeves of his shirt. Inside, he seethed with a father’s protectiveness of his virginal daughter and an Alpha wolf’s protectiveness of pack and territory. The fur that had started to break out on him began to recede a bit. “I don’t care what he does with ‘females,’ and I don’t care if he’s the son of the Alpha of the richest pack in the state. You are my daughter…”
“And he doesn’t know he saw me,” Crystal repeated as soothingly as she could.
Grady looked at Crystal and put a hand that had come close to becoming a paw on her cheek. Moments like this were among the most sensitive and difficult moments in werewolf life, when the line between their human selves and their wolf selves blurred and grew indistinct, and their feelings became like a tumble of flesh and fur and teeth and fangs. At moments like this, they almost did not know what they were, whether they were one thing or the other or both things at once. Crystal touched her father’s hand and felt his love and was grateful for it.
“You don’t have to see them again if you don’t want to,” said Grady. “I can make Alana or Suzanne responsible for the meeting room and leave you out of it.”
Crystal shook her head. “You don’t have to do that, Daddy. I’m not upset anymore, and there’s nothing to be scared of. They’re two of the most important, rich lycans in the state, just like you said, and this is important to you and the town. We need everything to go well tonight and make the best impression on them, don’t we?”
Grady sighed. “That we do.” He smiled, his fur disappearing with her calming words, and took her face in both hands now. “You know, if Trace Blackwood had seen you as your human self—and thank the woods he didn’t! But if he had, he would have seen just what I’m seeing right now.”
“What’s that?” she smiled back at him.
“He would have seen what used to be a little girl running around with legs a little too long, who’s somehow turned into a very smart, very beautiful young woman when I wasn’t looking. When did that happen?”
“Oh, Daddy…,” Crystal said, her voice cracking.
“It’s your last year of high school, you’re ready for college, and for some reason I don’t quite have a little girl anymore. What am I supposed to do about that?”
Crystal almost had tears in her eyes. “You’re still my Daddy,” she said. “You’ll always be my Daddy.”
Grady chuckled, “I think that’s supposed to be my line, and I'm supposed to say you’ll always be my little girl. Except you won’t, will you?”
Spontaneously, they melted into a hug.
Father and daughter composed themselves. Crystal dried her eyes and straightened her apron, this time for real, and Grady watched the young woman who used to be his little girl take herself from the break room back to the meeting room, tray and order pad at the ready.
Back in the meeting room, she found the group still seated around the table, and all attention went to her. Crystal put her pad on her tray, whipped out her pen, and glanced about, noting that they all had fresh drinks. “I see someone else came and took your empties away and got you your next round,” she said. “I apologize for that. My name’s Crystal; Mr. Shaw is my father. I’ll be taking care of you the rest of the evening.”
Roman paraphrased his earlier question. “Everything is fine then?”
“Yes,” Crystal smiled. “It was so silly. I just had one of those moments when you think you’ve got something mixed up. I must have heard something that made me think of school and thought I’d forgotten something from earlier today. I’ll be graduating soon, half a dozen different things on my mind.”
“I’m glad that’s all it is,” Trace spoke up.
And now Crystal met Trace’s human eyes with her human eyes for the first time. There was a sharp and distinct pause now as the two of them looked directly at each other, and Crystal reminded herself that Trace Blackwood did not know her the way she was now and had no way of knowing that she was the one he saw then. In fact, now that she seriously thought of it, she was the one with the advantage over him in a way.
“Yes, that’s all,” she said. “I’ll be back in a bit to see if you need anything else. Um…welcome to the Shaw Tavern, I guess.” And she smiled at the group.
Trace, however, flashed a smile that was meant very specifically for her. “Thank you,” he said. “It’s a nice place you have here.”
“Thank you, Mr. Shaw,” Crystal replied.
“Please,” he said, “you can call me Trace.”
“Oh, I don’t think so,” she almost blushed.
“Yes, you can,” he said. “I insist.” And he held out his hand across the table.
Crystal took a deep but quiet breath and reminded herself again that Trace had no way of knowing to whom he was holding out his hand. As far as he was concerned, she was only the daughter of the owner of the place where he was spending his evening. She stepped forward, reached for his extended hand, and took it, feeling the smooth, firm maleness of his skin and the strength of his sinews as he shook hands with her.
For just an instant, it felt as if he were grasping her hand a little more tightly before she pulled it away. She met his eyes again. They were a smoky hazel color now, where they had been an amber color before, but now as then there was an almost electric sparkle in them. She felt another little spark of self-consciousness from remembering where and how she had seen those eyes before, and pulled back her hand, wondering if Trace could sense the familiarity.
Stepping back from the table, Crystal cordially said—to the entire group, not just Trace—“I’ll see you all in a little bit, then.”
“We’ll look forward to it,” Trace said and watched her turn and leave.
The conversation about events in Reynolds Hollow and what the town and the Blackwood Pack could do for each other picked up again, but Trace now paid only half attention. He kept glancing back at the door to the meeting room, waiting for her to reappear. He could swear there was something about that girl. He did not know quite what it was, but there was a feeling about her.
Trace never ignored the feelings that he picked up from females because certain feelings of mind and senses and instinct had a way of leading to certain other feelings, very pleasurable feelings of body that were Trace’s favorite things to feel. How old was Crystal? If she were about to graduate high school, she must be just about eighteen.
He smiled subtly, remembering that he had not mounted a girl that age since he was a boy that age. Of course, he was even younger than that his very first time. Still, he had taken a few females through their own first times. It had been quite a long time now, but the sight of Crystal Shaw took him right back there.
It further occurred to him that the little female wolf that he had seen at the stream, to whom he had displayed himself, who had scampered off when he did, was of an age that would translate to just about eighteen in her human form. Could it just be…?
That would certainly explain why she would be so flustered just walking into a room where he was present. The only reason for her to react in such a human way, in such inexplicable dismay, was that she was still a virgin, and he had caught her by surprise. He smiled a little wider at the idea.
Then again, the whole thing could be just a coincidence, and she could really have suddenly flashed on something that she had forgotten about school, some detail that had slipped her mind until some offhanded remark made her remember. Still, he had to wonder what it was that she could have heard in a roomful of adults that would make her think of some detail about school.
Coincidence? Perhaps. But Crystal Shaw’s behavior was a little too inexplicable and a little too human for him to dismiss so casually. If his innocent suspicions were true, it would mean that Crystal had seen something for which she was not quite prepared. And he began to envy the young wolfling for whom she would be prepared. No doubt it would be a very sweet thing for some lucky teenage werewolf to relieve so beautiful a she-wolf as Crystal of her virginity. Very sweet and very lucky indeed…