Half an hour later Vicki, now dressed again, stared at the paper he’d written both his guesses and her actualmeasurements on. “I don’t understand how you did that. They’re all exactly right.”
“Mmm, not exactly. I got your inseam off by a centimeter, and that threw the hip to ankle off by…” Zane grinned at her expression. “It’s my job. I could have guesstimated most of those fairly accuratelybeforeI got my hands all over you, and once I did…” He shrugged.
“You’re right,” she said, still staring. “That’s sort of uncomfortable. Do you do that to all women?”
“Um. Will it help if I say I also do it to all men?”
Vicki glanced up, startled, and laughed. “Yeah, it sort of does. It’s kind of a hell of a party trick, I guess. So all of this…” She gestured at the studio, which they’d put back together into some kind of order. “Does this mean you’re staying in Virtue?”
“It does. At least for a while.”
“Why? I thought you hated it here.”
Zane lifted his eyebrows. “Because you’re here, obviously. I can’t date you, fake or otherwise, from California.”
“Boy, if that was fake dating, I can’t wait to get to the real thing.” Vicki grinned and stepped up against him, her warmth and scent a vivid reminder of how close they’d been. Her blouse was unbuttoned farther now, and she’d found, but not re-inserted, the nipple shields that kept her tiny little quarter-cup bra school-safe. Zane, gaze arrested by the sharpness of her nipples against the white blouse, was torn between delight at being the only one who knew how provocative her underthings were, and greedily wanting to see her visibly wearing that kind of thing in public all the time.
He tried to drag his mind back to the topic, which was…California. Dating. Being with Vicki. Important. More important than sex, although with her lithe body warm against his, it was very hard to remember that.
It was very hard, anyway. He muttered, “Down, boy,” to himself. His wolf gave a sense of vague offense that made Zane laugh, and Vicki, glancing down, smiled too.
“Not that I have any objections, but can we order Chinese in or something, because I’m also starving.”
“Yeah, but before we do that—Vicki, there really is something I need to talk to you about. It doesn’t—I hope it doesn’t—change anything, but you need to know that I’m?—”
A wolf shifter. It should be reasonably easy to say. Just four syllables, none of which were difficult ones.
No, the difficult part was that true humans didn’t generally know about shifters, so the whole thing required a total realignment of their way of thinking. And that, somehow, was even more difficult than bringing up the idea of dating, which Zane had already completely blown.
“If you say secretly married,” Vicki said in a very steady calm tone, “I’m going to actually kill you.”
“Oh my God, no! No, I’m a wolf shifter.”
Well, on one hand, that hadn’t been so hard after all. On the other, Vicki was blinking at him slowly in complete bewilderment. After a long, uncertain moment, she said, “Is that…some kind of furry? Do you have a…fursona?” carefully, as if she wasn’t absolutely certain of her terms.
“No! Oh, Christ, I’m doing this really badly. No, look, I…no, look. That’s easier. That’s better. Sorry. I should have started here.” Zane backed up several feet and held his hands up. “Please don’t scream.”
Amusement creased Vicki’s beautiful eyes. “I promise not to scream any louder than I did earlier, how’s that.”
“That’s not really screaming, though, is it? It’s getting really loud, but it’s—” Zane swallowed. “Never mind. We’ll come back to that. Just…don’t scream.”
With that, he turned into a wolf.
To his surprise, Vickididn’tscream, ore even shriek. She clapped both hands over her mouth, but the sound she caught behind them was a laugh.
Laughing, Zane thought, wasprobablybetter than screeching, but somehow it didn’t make him any less nervous. He sat down, then lay down on his belly, watching her hopefully. The end of his tail even thumped, which was moderately embarrassing, but
Vicki stood there, hands over her mouth and her eyes enormous above them, for several seconds. Zane sat very still, although his heart was beating wildly. Eventually Vicki dropped to her hands and knees and crawled toward him, almost as if she was afraid of frighteninghim, as if he really was a wild animal. Although he hoped she’d be smart enough to not crawl right up to a wild wolf, or to stare at it, wide-eyed, from only a few inches away. She tilted left and right, gazing at him in astonishment that seemed lace with bright-eyed delight, and finally whispered, “That is aheckof a fursona.”
Zane barked—actually barked—laughter, and shifted back to human, still lying on his belly. “I honestly never thought of it like that, but I guess it sort of is. I have no idea if there’s a large shifter population in the furry community…”
“I mean, on one hand I’d be really tempted, and on the other, why would I wear a giant extremely hot wolf costume when I could actually turn into one?” Vicki’s voice quavered between laughter and awe. “Zane, you turned into awolf. Is that co?—”
She sat up abruptly, expression purely at war with itself, as if laughter and indignation were vying to have first say. Laughter won, because she blurted, "Wait, oh mygod, you're atailorwho turns into awolf, Zane, you're awear wolf!" through giggles.
He groaned. "No, honestly, we're not bound to the phases of the moon or anything, we just shift int?—"
"Nooo!" she howled with delight. "Aw-e-a-rwolf!"
