A whimpering basket of goodies. A baby under a blanket.
I shouldn’t stare, but I stare.
First off, the woman is incredibly pretty, and the baby is loud; her shrill cries pierce the mostly deserted street. In addition, the woman stinks.
I don’t mean like she’s been chewing straight onions; I mean she reeks of fear. Even the baby smells like fear.
Wolf noses know.
Hell, even the oblivious trio at the market would catch on if they looked. She’s shaking as she opens the rear of her little hatchback sedan and tucks the blanket on a big case of diapers. Her head doesn’t stop swiveling. Her cooing words are spoken with shallow puffs of air, soothing words that have no true comfort. The baby knows it, howling louder.
“Um. Excuse me?”
The lady lets out a shriek, and the baby shrieks in chorus.
“Oh, God! I’m so sorry! I... Are you okay?” I stand back, hands raised, palms out in the universal “I’m harmless” gesture.
“I... Yes, I’m okay. We’re okay.”
“All right. Well. Happy Halloween.” I back away, but stop after only a few steps.
Something is happening inside of me.
Werewolves like me don’t necessarily have some destined mates like those from old packs who were always werewolves from the dawn of time have. My family is wolfy on my dad’s side, but that’s only because my grandad got bitten on a camping trip in West Virginia. It passes down, so I have a wolf, but not all the fancy lore that goes with it.
Still, my instincts are screaming at me.
Pack! Protect this tiny pack! Lone wolf with a pup.
I sniff, and the instincts practically throttle me.
Injured wolf. Lone wolf.
No, the woman isn’t a wolf, but something in me has started thinking of her as a she-wolf.
Thinking of her as my mate.
Which she so clearly is not. There’s a wedding ring on her hand, and her baby is only a few months old.
Anger boils and fades.Where is the man who’s supposed to be protecting his little family?
Wait, maybe that’s why she’s scared. Is her man missing?
I sound like some chauvinist, but my brain doesn’t want to have a discussion about women and their abilities to be equal to men. I know that. Some of the strongest wolves I’ve ever met are women.
But you should always protect your mate and your pups.
“I promise I’m not trying to bug you, but you look—lost. Need any help? I know Pine Ridge really well. Born and raised here,” I offer, hoping I sound suave, yet sincere.
To my surprise, the woman stops, holding her squirming baby on the box of diapers and the blanket pad with one hand while she expertly whips out a diaper from a big sage-green bag. “What’s your name?” she asks.
“Jasper—”
“Wainwright. You did the traffic report tonight.”
“That’s right. Always do the commuter spotlight. Sorry, I thought you were from out of town. It’s a small town, and I know a lot of people. Do a lot of community events,” I conclude with a shrug. Inwardly, I’m perplexed. I feel like I would have remembered a beauty like this, yet I know she has to be from nearby, or she’d never have heard my report. Maybe she’s just passing through for the day. “Visiting?”
“Uh. You could say that.” She ducks her head and attends to changing the baby.
