WOLF CHILD: A PNR RH Romance (The Year of the Wolf Book 1)

by Serena Akeroyd

  He’d always disliked us, and we’d expected that hatred to pass onto his son. Hate begat hate, after all. But Eli had been the exact opposite. Supportive, helpful, encouraging.

  Always had been.

  Was the woman in my arms why?

  Had the Mother been waiting to tie us together all along?

  I didn’t usually believe in superstitions. Mostly because I was a living, walking one. The pack, on the whole, hated me and my brother because we were twins, so I knew most of the lore in our world was bullshit since I wasn’t evil. I wasn’t this obnoxious abnormality that should have been put down at birth because I’d dared to share a womb. So why would anything else be true? I’d never expected a mate of my own, nor for Ethan, and I’d never been granted one at our covenant just like Eli, but the mate bond was something I had faith in.

  How couldn’t I?

  A gift from the Mother wasn’t anything to sneer at on the regular, but a woman who got you? Who knew you bone deep?

  That was more than a fucking gift.

  I headed toward the fire, settling down on my knees as I lay her down on one of the many fur rugs on the floor. She sighed, instantly soothed by the heat, and when she rested her head on my lap, I was a fucking goner.

  I mean, man, she’d already had me twisted into knots, so much so that, last night, even after a long ass day, even after what had gone down with her at the carnival and the adrenaline of trying to stop chaos from falling on the pack before it was too late, I hadn’t been able to sleep.

  Not one wink.

  All night long, I’d been thinking about her. Her weirdness, who’d hurt her, why they had hurt her, her coloring…

  Now, here she was, fucking breaking my heart by doing shit like that.

  Sure, as wolves, we were tactile and affectionate by nature, but not to strangers. Not really.

  She released a chuffing sound, then almost dug her nose into my fucking crotch before settling down even more and sagging, as though any and all of her tension could dissolve from her being, now that she was here.

  Warm.

  Safe.

  I cut my brother a look when he slouched behind me, taking a seat on one of the armchairs in front of Eli’s desk. He’d twisted it around so he could watch over her, and when Eli took a seat on the side of the desk, perching his ass there to look us over as well, I just sighed and slumped a little.

  “This is gonna be messy,” I predicted.

  “All the good things in life are,” Eli muttered.

  And he wasn’t wrong.

  The next week was weird but good. Sabina didn’t shift, but she slept. A lot. We didn’t reveal her to the pack, mostly because we weren’t ready to announce how we’d come by her. Not without us implicating ourselves in something we hadn’t fucking done.

  The two-dozen-strong council, after hearing and experiencing the omega’s death, as well as the rest of the pack, were quiet, and though we felt the grief just as much, we were working too many hours to really mourn Merinda’s passing.

  The day after the attack, as predicted, the carnival had disappeared. There one moment, gone the next. Though we hadn’t scented anything that night, in the aftermath, it had been even harder because there were even more strange scents. The only thing we could say with any certainty was that we hadn’t scented a strange alpha. But they could have used something to mask their essences, and in all honesty, that wouldn’t be shocking, considering their intent.

  Ethan spent a couple of days in the next town to the west, and I went to the east, meeting with the alphas there to try and ascertain if they had a problem with us on the guise of business. Eli sent us with some trumped-up missive that gave us a reason to visit, but we found nothing in those packs, nothing that could help us, at any rate.

  And finding that I hated being away from Sabina wasn’t something I considered to be a lesson well learned.

  I spent those two days longing to get back to her, and from what Eli said, she’d pined for us as well. Yelping in her sleep more, being restless rather than rested as she slumbered.

  It wasn’t like we were letting the investigation die, but when the head of the council asked Eli if he could hold a meeting, I knew that meant our stay of peace had come to an end.

  The council wanted to get back to regular working hours, which meant that Eli would have to return too, and we’d be back doing our usual job.

  With no answers, I wasn’t even sure if Eli would claim he was behind Sabina’s transformation so as not to make waves. That was down to him, but I’d lie my ass off to the council.

  Every. Fucking. Time.

  They were too up their own asses to really think much of it, except for the fact they’d be pissed at not being a part of the ceremony, especially when they learned she was the next omega and Eli’s mate.

  As well as ours.

  My lips curved as I patted her on the head, almost in the same position now as I had been a week ago the morning after her first shift.

  She hadn’t turned back into her human skin once, and I was getting used to seeing her this way. Enough that it made me want to be in the council room as a wolf too. Even though that was forbidden.

  No shifting in the alpha’s council chambers… Unless you were the alpha’s mate, of course.

  “You look tired.”

  Eli’s statement had my brows lifting slightly. “I am.”

  “You should go rest.”

  “I get more R and R here than I do back at home.” I popped my neck to the side. “Wish we knew who the fuck was behind her attack.”

  Eli winced and reached up and rubbed the back of his neck too—that was a bitch of a spot to get tension. “Yeah. Me as well. It doesn’t help that we’re running out of fucking time.”

  We were both well aware that tomorrow was the day of the first council meeting since his mom’s death, and I had no doubt he was dreading it. Not only because of the shit he was hiding from his people, but also, because the omega was an active part of the council.

  His mom had often kept Eli from getting riled up.

  And Eli got riled up a lot. Not only because his council was full of annoying motherfuckers, but because he was aggressive.

  I didn’t blame him.

  The best alphas were aggressive. You got nowhere as an alpha by handing out fucking candy and flowers to everyone, but Eli needed the calming presence of his omega more than ever, and she was still sleeping on the rug in front of the fire like a real wolf—no cares in the world.

  “Did she eat earlier?” I asked softly.

  Eli sighed. “No. She hasn’t eaten anything since we brought her here.” I heard him scrape his hand against his chin, the stubble rasping against his palm. “I’m glad she feasted that night.”

  “What did she eat?”

  “I caught her a stag.”

  “She ate all of it?” My eyes widened in surprise.

  “Yeah,” he confirmed. “Stunned the hell out of me too. At least she has something to keep her going. I’ve never seen anything like this before. Her waking up and dozing all the time. It’s different than usual. They’re passed out solid. Not wavering in and out like she is.”

  Before I could reply, the doors to the chamber opened and, spying my brother, I cocked a brow at the sight of him so excited.

  Of course he’d been more chipper since Sabina had come into our lives, even if she did little else than sleep all day and wake up for maybe twenty minutes total to communicate with us in that oddly-tuned radio way she had, but it made me feel brighter to see him happier.

  We didn’t always see eye to eye, but he was my brother, and I loved the asshole.

  “News?” I inquired softly, knowing my voice would carry to his ears without needing to raise it and potentially disturb Sabina.

  “Yeah. News on her.”

  That was something else Eli had set us on. Finding out who she was, if her papers were real or fake. Discovering if anyone might come looking for her.

  There was a disti
nct possibility that the reason she’d been targeted had nothing to do with us, Eli, or the pack.

  Of course, I doubted it, but we had to check every avenue. Even if it did take us away from her side more than I’d like. We all had jobs to do, and I envied Eli for getting to work in here and sit with her all the damn time, even while I was grateful that she was never alone.

  “Her papers are real?”

  “Yep, they’re not forgeries. Sabina Krasowski was born in Louisiana in 1990.”

  “It’s rude to disclose a woman’s age.”

  My eyes widened at her voice which, lo and behold, sounded a bit clearer. Probably because she was huffing at Ethan’s revelation.

  Women.

  Even as she-wolfs, they didn’t change all that much.

  “You could have just asked me for that information. You didn’t have to look into my past.”

  Eli shook his head as he scraped his chair back so he could get to his feet. When he walked over to her, she flopped off my lap just as she’d flopped onto it earlier and spread out between us, her head between her paws.

  “We meant no offense,” Eli told her gravely. “But it’s hard to hear you, and you rest so much. We didn’t want to disturb you.”

  “Well,” she said with an inner sniff as well as outer huff, “I can tell you that someone does want me dead, but no one would want me to come back as a wolf. In my family’s culture, cats and dogs are impure.”

  Ethan cleared his throat. “Her father is Draga Krasowski.”

  I hitched my shoulder. “So? Who’s he?”

  “He’s a Roma king,” Ethan replied, rolling his eyes at me.

  I narrowed mine at him. I hated it when he made me feel like I was a moron for not knowing some random motherfucker’s name.

  “What the fuck is a Roma king?”

  Sabina’s eyes cut to me, and she gave me a nudge with her nose. “He’s famous for all the wrong reasons.”

  “I’ve never heard of him,” Eli stated, making me sneer at Ethan.

  “Not everyone knows random people,” I sneered at him mentally.

  Some of us had lives and didn’t just absorb nonfiction books like they were going extinct before the end of the year.

  “Roma, like Romany? Gypsies?” Eli blurted out, before he muttered, “Sorry, Sabina.”

  She sighed. “Not my culture anymore.”

  Was it just me or was her voice clearer than ever today?

  “Anymore?”

  “I was born into it,” she muttered, shuffling around, and it didn’t escape my attention that she moved so her nose was still touching my leg and her butt was pressed into Eli’s side.

  The way she needed to connect warmed me, because it told me I wasn’t alone in this. We weren’t out in the cold—we were in this together.

  “I was born into the life, but I escaped when I was eighteen.”

  My eyes flared wide. “That’s a strong word. Did you run away?”

  A whine escaped her, and she tucked her face into my side, no longer just touching her nose to me. She was hiding. Outright.

  Ethan released a soft breath. “I found out after I scoured the papers online for news on her.”

  “What happened?”

  Eli’s query had Ethan moving over to sit down on one of the armchairs beside the fire again. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he let his hands dangle between them.

  “Drago’s an important man in the Roma community down in Louisiana. Arranged marriages are common there. As are honor killings.” He cleared his throat when we all tensed. “They’re rare, but not in Drago’s community.”

  “What happened?” Eli demanded, his voice turning low.

  Deadly.

  “By the sounds of it, at least from what I can make out, Sabina was his eldest daughter and was promised to a family rival.” He shrugged. “Sounds crazy to me, but they had some kind of turf war going down. Kept stealing shit from one another. She was supposed to broker peace between the two families.”

  “Only, I’m not a commodity,” she rasped, her head still turned away.

  “No. You aren’t.” I rubbed between her ears, trying to soothe her with my touch.

  I wanted this conversation, so badly, to be with the woman, but that wasn’t about to happen. I had to figure that the Mother would decide when she’d shift back into her human skin, so for the interim, we had to deal with this level of communication.

  It didn’t outright suck, but not being able to hear this from her lips, to see the nuances in her face, hear them in her voice? It made this a thousand times harder.

  “She fell for a boy in her school.”

  “Daddy was mad because he didn’t want me to graduate, but Momma insisted. We’d had CPS sniffing around that year because of kids being truant. The families said they were homeschooling the girls, but they weren’t.” Her voice wavered. “I met him there.”

  “Quarterback of the football team,” Ethan said softly. “High school sweethearts.”

  “I got pregnant. On purpose,” she admitted. “We agreed that was the only way Daddy would ever let us be together.” She shuddered.

  “Police are still investigating Kian’s death and Sabina’s disappearance,” Ethan finished, but I knew there were plenty of holes in the story. Holes he didn’t want to pick apart when she was within hearing range.

  Had she carried the baby to term? Or lost it?

  The question was on the tip of my tongue but, though my brother thought I was a moron, I really wasn’t.

  Instead, I whispered, “Would your father still want your blood?”

  It wasn’t the most diplomatic of questions, but it was prudent, considering the current situation we were in.

  “Yes. That’s why I’ve been in the carnival ever since. I was new to Ollywood’s, but I’ve been with four the past twelve years. It takes me around the country. Out of his way.

  “But he wouldn’t tear out my throat. We’re Roma, not shapeshifters. And even though I’m impure to him now, even though I betrayed our family, he wouldn’t use a dog to change me.”

  “It wasn’t a dog, Sabina,” Eli corrected her softly. “It was a wolf. A shifter. You don’t have rabies.”

  She sniffed. “No. I guess I don’t. Maybe that’s something to be grateful for.”

  I thought about that pathetic little trailer she’d lived in. How small it had been, how clean and neat, even if it had been a sign of her poverty, and I thought about her being in that type of place for years. Years and years. Hiding away. Leaving everything she knew behind because her family wasn’t a safe place, it was something she knew to fear.

  I gnawed on my bottom lip as I also thought about her childhood sweetheart.

  Did she still love him?

  Mother, how wrong was it, and how stupid, to be jealous of a dead boy.

  I ground my teeth down, shame flooding me at the uncharitable thoughts. I couldn’t begin to imagine the horror she’d been through, and my feelings were a moot point.

  “You’re still looking for the people who bit me?” she asked, breaking into my thoughts, making me grateful she didn’t know where my mind was at.

  Ethan winced at that phrasing—two people.

  She was adamant. Of all the things she’d said this week, most of it drowsy and some of it incoherent, she insisted on repeating that.

  Two people.

  Two had done this to her.

  I scrubbed my hand across my jaw as I admitted, “We don’t have a clue.”

  She sighed. “I suppose it doesn’t matter.”

  “You’re wrong,” Eli seethed. “I want to know who dared hurt you.”

  “I’ve been hurting for a long time. I haven’t slept this much in years.”

  Because she felt safe?

  “I’ve never been so rested,” she continued.

  Something in her voice had Ethan tilting his head to the side. I wasn’t sure what he’d picked up on, but Ethan could be great at reading between the lines. “Sabi
na?”

  She didn’t look at him, just barked slightly in response, as if to say, “Whuttt?”

  I didn’t blame her. Sometimes I felt like I was dealing with a prickly teacher too. The teacher in high school that everyone hated and always gave the majority of his class a barely passing grade, except for his teacher’s pet.

  Ethan had been the original teacher’s pet and had morphed into Mrs. fucking O’Grady.

  “Have you been staying in this form on purpose?”

  I frowned at him. “Don’t be a dumbass.”

  Ethan grunted. “Shut up, Austin.”

  “Boys,” Eli intoned, and though I winced at being called that in front of her, I shut up. “Sabina, is he right?”

  She huffed, sucked in a breath, and then shifted.

  Not only did my brain ache from the fact that she’d purposely stayed a wolf for the past seven days, but my eyes nearly crossed when I found her naked and sprawled at my side.

  I mean, I should have known to expect her nude form to appear beside me, but seeing was really fucking believing, and my mate?

  She had the hugest tits I’d ever seen.

  They were massive. And her nipples? Fuck me. I wanted them in my mouth.

  Stat.

  “You’re drooling,” Ethan noted wryly, even as he grabbed a throw from the back of the nearest sofa and headed over to shield her nudity from us.

  She shot him a shy glance, even as she huddled within the thick throw, not stopping until her knees were tucked against her chest, crossed slightly at the ankle in a way that, I knew, if I angled my head just right, I’d see her pussy.

  So, I was a pervert now.

  Great.

  She needed a shower like a week ago, but the basic essence of her? Fuck, it was like nothing I’d ever known before.

  Addictive.

  She hadn’t smelled like that back at the carnival. Even over the undertones of blood and carnage, of the mass humanity and the various scents that polluted the fairground, I’d have tasted this on the air.

  And I hadn’t.

  My cock was pounding, and not just from the sight of her luscious tits. Just from the sight of her. Her face tipped down, her eyes cast away. She somehow was both elegant and demure, and her skin was a rich brown hue I hadn’t noticed back at the carnival. It was like she had a tan, a deep rich one that made her half gold.