“Are you the father?” Skylar asks, but her tone is clinical rather than judgmental.
“Genetics pending,” I say. “But my wolf says yes.” I glance down at the baby, trying to see myself in her, but all I see is a tiny, beautiful, but furious pup.
Fern gently swabs the baby’s cheek when she takes a break from the bottle, seals it, and sets it aside. “We’ll run a panel,” she says, “but if your wolf knows, that’s usually enough.”
I feed the baby and try not to think about the future, but Fern is already way ahead of me.
“So, what’s the plan?” she asks, soft enough that I could ignore the question if I wanted to.
I don’t have a plan. I don’t have anything. Except for a whole lot of regret and shame that I’ll never let anyone see.
Chapter 2 - Dina
Some mornings, I wonder if I’m living or just acting out the mechanics of survival in a story written about someone else. The clock on the microwave reads 9:42, and I’ve already swept the floor, wiped the kitchen counters twice, and made my bed so tight you could bounce a coin off it.
I sit on the edge of the mattress and stare at the blank wall across from me. The apartment is almost too clean now. There’s a particular silence to living alone in a town of strangers, and it feels strangely loud.
Dad used to tell me, “Order your world, Dina. A clean room is a clear mind.” He was the sort of man who believed in shoe polish and discipline, who thought folding laundry was a spiritual exercise. I think about him every time I fold a towel, which is a lot, because I don’t have much else to do these days.
I open the fridge and close it again. I’m not hungry, but the motion feels necessary, a small ritual to shake off the inertia. My wolf is restless, pacing at the edges of my skin, but I’m not ready to let her out yet. If I shifted now, I’d probably run until my legs buckled, then keep running on sheer willpower and the memories that chase me.
I turn back to the small kitchen table and set out a coffee mug. There’s a note from Bryan still stuck to the side of one of the boxes of unused mugs that linger at the back of the cupboard. He dropped them off with his mate after I moved in. I’m not sure how he thought I’d use so many when I have no friends. I don’t even know him very well, but he’s the only one here who knew my father and trained with him. He’s the only one who would recognize the way I line up my shoes because that’s how he was trained, too. He’s been kind, and his mateseems lovely, but I’m wary. Maybe just tired of feeling on edge all the time.
Bryan thinks I should put in for Security. He said it the first week I arrived, in that careful, roundabout way he does when he’s trying to be both supportive and nonthreatening. “You’ve got the training,” he said. “Hell, you could probably teach the whole squad.” I heard what he didn’t say to me: that he knows I probably need a reason to keep moving, and he’s scared of what happens if I sit still too long. People with our training don’t do well with nothing to do.
But I haven’t shown up at a single training session. I’m not sure I ever will. The idea of standing in a gym with all those strangers, pretending it’s just another Tuesday, makes my skin crawl. It’s not that I’m afraid. It’s that I don’t know how to be around people whom I’m not one hundred percent sure I can trust anymore. I’ve lost everyone, and with that, my ability to tell who is a threat and who isn’t. I don’t know how to start from zero, build a new self out of nothing but polite conversation and the hope that nobody looks too closely.
I’m doing it again. Sitting here, replaying my father’s voice in my head, like I can scrub the memory of everything that went wrong, of everything I’ve lost, if I just overanalyze it enough. I know I should stop. I know the only way to get through is to be here, right now, breathing this air and drinking this cheap coffee and not letting the past control my present.
I force myself up, grab my coat, and lock the door behind me. The air outside is sharp and clean, the kind of cold that wakes you up with a slap and an apology. I breathe it in and let it scrape the inside of my lungs, then start walking. The pack hall is at the far end of Main, past the bakery and the squat little gym that reeks of pack pheromones. I tell myself I’m going to check the job board, even though I know it’s a waste of time;everything worth doing is snatched up by people with deeper roots and better connections. Still, routine is its own comfort, and I need the walk.
Silvercreek’s downtown is a single street lined with tidy businesses, every one of them in better repair than anyplace I’ve ever seen. People really care here. The hardware store is opening up for the day, an old guy with a beard down to his chest shoveling the last of the overnight dusting off the stoop. He gives me a nod, and I try to nod back, but I trip over the rhythm and end up looking uncoordinated, so I keep moving.
The bakery windows are already fogged, and the smell of cinnamon rolls and fresh dough leaks out onto the sidewalk. My stomach lurches, then complains, but I ignore it. I can feel eyes on me: the woman behind the counter, the old man with the crossword, the bored teenager refilling the sugar dispensers. I’m a curiosity here. The wolf who doesn’t belong. They know my name, my story, but they don’t really know me, and I plan to keep it that way.
I make it another block before I spot the bookstore, early sun pouring gold through the glass. Bookshops are thin on the ground in a town this small, but Ruby’s is an institution here; she calls it “The Den,” which might sound too hipster anywhere else, but somehow it fits just right here with her running it. I feel a pull, a magnetic drag, and let myself drift off my route.
Inside, it’s warm and comforting, the air thick with the perfume of old pages and loose-leaf tea. Ruby is perched on a rolling ladder, re-shelving hardcovers with the single-minded focus of someone who genuinely loves what she does, and it shows. She doesn’t look up when I walk in, but I know she’s clocked me. I head for the back, past the “staff picks” and the lurid romance covers, and lose myself in nonfiction. The shelves groan with stories of war and survival, and I run my finger alongthe spines, pretending I’m looking for something new when really I just want to touch something that feels real.
Ruby descends the ladder and lands with a soft thump. “Morning, Dina.” Her voice is low but as warm and welcoming as her store. “Got something for you, it’s only 50 cents, and I know you’ll give it a good home, if you want it.” She ducks behind the counter and reemerges with a battered paperback from the second-hand section. I recognize it instantly: a copy ofMan’s Search for Meaning.I spent ages looking at a new copy of it last week, but never had the guts to buy it because I’m on such a tight budget. I can’t tell if she’s making a point or just being nice.
I take the book and flip it over, hiding my face by staring down at the cover. “Thanks,” I say, trying not to sound like I mean it too much. Gratitude is dangerous. People expect things in return.
Ruby leans her elbows on the counter, pushing a mug of tea in my direction from the stand she keeps on the wall behind. “You know, we have a book club,” she says, soft and sly, like she knows I’ll say no but wants to test the waters anyway. “It’s not fancy. We just meet up, talk some shit, and drink wine. Sometimes we even talk about books.”
My first instinct is to recoil, but the way she says it makes it sound so harmless, almost fun, and for a moment, I imagine myself sitting at her table, laughing at something stupid, letting the noise of other people fill me up instead of the endless echo in my chest. “Maybe,” I say, which is further than I thought I’d get.
Ruby grins. “I’ll save you a seat.” She pours herself a refill and sips, her eyes never leaving mine. “You settling in okay?” She asks it like she already knows the answer, but wants to give me the chance to lie.
I nod, because it’s easier, and because I want to believe it’s true.
Before I can change my mind, the bell over the door jingles, and Luna walks in. Even in casual clothes, she looks impressive; she’s all beauty and intent, her presence crackling with the kind of quiet energy that makes you want to stand up straighter. She’s got a box in her arms, the top layer packed with children’s books and battered picture books. Her eyes scan the shop, and when she spots me, she tilts her head in that way she has, like she’s reading a second script beneath what’s actually happening.
“Dina,” she says, by way of greeting, then turns to Ruby. “Donations for the literacy drive.”
“Leave them by the register. I’ll sort them after I finish up here,” Ruby says, then to me, “Luna’s got the best taste in romance books, I’m sure they’re buried at the bottom beneath those children's books, so I’ll save them for the moms.”
Luna sets the box on the counter, laughing but not denying it, then gives me a measured look. “How are you finding things?”
