Jaguar (The Madison Wolves Book 12)

by Robin Roseau

  “We do, but I don’t have time today.”

  “Do I need to make other arrangements, Elisabeth?”

  “No.” She held out her hand. We clasped for a moment. I was tempted to use it as an opportunity to flirt, but I didn’t think she would be ready for that.

  But then I couldn’t help it. While I did release her hand, I gave her a good look up and down. “I have to admit. With you naked, I enjoyed being on top of you.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” she said. “A little furry action. I don’t think so.”

  “Wait,” I said. “So wolves don’t-“

  “No.”

  “Seriously? Because let me tell you...”

  Her eyes widened. “You’re not serious.”

  “Well, I haven’t done girl on girl action that way,” I said. “But a few times...”

  “You’re teasing again.”

  “Totally serious.” I smiled. “Cats can get damned randy.”

  She laughed. “I still think you’re kidding.”

  “Elisabeth, I’m willing to tease, but when called on it, I don’t lie. I’m entirely serious.”

  “Well, I can’t tell you the guys wouldn’t be interested, but don’t get any ideas with me.”

  “You shouldn’t knock it until you try it,” I said. “And I’ve seen Lara and Michaela flirting in fur.”

  “I’m pretty sure that only goes so far,” Elisabeth assured me.

  “Only pretty sure?”

  “It’s not like Lara and I would talk about it,” she said quickly.

  “You should ask her.”

  “I’m not asking my sister if she’s had furry sex.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not.”

  “Then ask Michaela.”

  “I am definitely not asking my sister-in-law if she’s had furry sex with my sister.”

  “You’re a prude.”

  “I am definitely not a prude,” she said, beginning to sound defensive. “Hey!”

  I laughed. “Prude.”

  “Funny.”

  “Repressed.”

  “Yeah, no.”

  “Right. When’s the last time, Elisabeth?”

  “I’m not answering that.”

  “Prude.”

  “Hedonist.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with that,” I replied. “Maybe you should try it.”

  * * * *

  My relationship with Elisabeth rewarmed after that, although not entirely. I flirted with her, but far more lightly than I had. But for that matter, I flirted with almost all the women.

  I thought Francesca was amused by that.

  Elisabeth told me Zoe’s story. I wasn’t that surprised at how the pack had responded to discovery by a human, but I pointed out if it ever happened again, they could ask Carissa to help. Elisabeth nodded to that but made no commitment.

  We spent a portion of the summer in Bayfield and a portion at the compound outside Madison. During the second trip to Bayfield, there was an incident with the kids that stands out, and while it’s not necessarily pertinent to my story, the telling offers insight in how the pack leadership dealt with their youth.

  * * * *

  Like we had for the first trip, we assembled Friday morning after breakfast. We were down one teenage boy, and the parents along to chaperone were different, but otherwise everything ran much as it had for the first trip.

  Both Elisabeth and Michaela shuffled things around. There was something to be said for partnering with the same people, but I supposed it was important for the kids to rotate through. I found myself driving car number five this time, one vehicle from the end. With me were Scarlett and Angel, Scarlett in the passenger seat and Angel in the far back, tasked with watching behind us. I was glad to be driving instead.

  We had four students with us, all girls. Parker seemed pleased to see me; she was partnered with Evangeline. Evangeline was one of the enforcer program students, similar to Monique. She seemed very earnest. The other pair was Cassie partnered with an older girl named Alexia. Like all werewolves, Alexia was tall, but for a werewolf, even a 17-year-old female, she wasn’t as broad through the shoulders, and she had curves to make a human model jealous. She wore her black hair long and straight, and she did something else I didn’t typically see amongst werewolves. She wore makeup and nail polish, and they were very artfully applied.

  If I were into cradle-robbing, I’d have found her beautiful. But with one look at her, I wondered if she were trouble.

  We weren’t even in the car before she offered her first complaint. “Why can’t we pick our own partners?” She gestured. “He’s pretty cute. I wouldn’t mind being partnered with him.”

  I stood back and let Scarlett handle it. She pursed her lips and then said, “That type of suggestion has been made before. Michaela goes through a lot of work to make sure everyone gets to know everyone else. Those efforts would be stymied if everyone picked whom she partnered with.”

  “Except this time Michaela didn’t go through any work at all. Iris and Lindsey did it. Why did they get to pick, but none of us do?”

  “Because Michaela goes through a lot of work to make sure everyone gets to know everyone else,” Scarlett repeated. “And I know she spent a couple of hours with Iris and Lindsey, explaining her system and then checking the decisions they made.”

  “But why them?”

  “Because they’re Michaela’s assistants this summer,” Scarlett said. “Maybe after you’ve been in the program for more than a few weeks, you’ll find opportunities for more responsibility. But before you can come in and tell us how we’re doing everything wrong, you need to learn what we’re doing and see the results. Michaela has reasons for everything she does.”

  “I was only asking,” Alexia whined. Great. I felt bad for Cassie right then and there.

  I said nothing.

  “Well, I’m happy with my partner,” Parker said, holding up Evangeline’s hand. “And we’re in an all girl’s car. Even better!”

  Alexia shot her a look but didn’t otherwise respond.

  “Do we have a game picked?” Cassie asked. “I like when we play games during the drive.”

  Alexia turned her annoyed gaze to Cassie, who seemed to not even notice. Good for her.

  A minute later, we got everyone settled. Michaela and Elisabeth did one final round of checks, and then even one more before the convoy turned for the road leading from the compound.

  Three of the girls talked quietly as we drove to the highway. Alexia stared out the window and looked unhappy to be here. She was such a remarkable difference from Parker. I didn’t fully understand it. If she didn’t want to be here, why was she here?

  I realized that wasn’t my problem.

  As soon as we were on the highway, Cassie called out, “Scarlett, are we playing a game?”

  “I think we might have a game or two ready,” Scarlett said. “What do the rest of you think?”

  “Games sound like fun,” Parker said. “Last time, Kimber told me about some of the games you play. I don’t think I’d be very good at any of them.”

  “Why is that?” Evangeline asked.

  “She said they’re like science quizzes and stuff.”

  “Oh, those are fun,” Cassie said. “But we mostly only play those when it’s all kids from the science program. Even if all we asked were stuff we’ve learned this summer, it still wouldn’t be fair. But we play other games.”

  Scarlett proposed a story-telling game. It worked in a round robin, everyone telling a few sentences before going to the next person. You lost points if you made a mistake, like using the wrong name for a character someone else proposed. You won a point each time it was your turn and up to two more if you successfully included past details, which was risky, while also advancing the story.

  “Anna, did you want to play?” she asked.

  “Yes, but as I’m driving, I don’t expect to do very well. But it sounds like fun.”

  “I’m sure the k
ids won’t mind beating the big jaguar at something,” Scarlett said, and when I glanced at her, she was smiling. “All right. Parker, I have paper and pen. I want you to keep score.” She handed those over. “Write down all our names across the top in whatever order you want, and then I’ll pick the person to start. After that, I’ll tell you who got points and you’ll announce the next person to go. But you should change the order each round, so you might go after me the first round but it might be Cassie the second round. Just make sure we get equal turns.”

  “Got it,” Parker said. A moment later she said, “Evangeline, how do you spell your name?”

  “Just put down Line,” she said, pronouncing it like lean. “L-I-N-E.”

  “Got it,” Parker replied. “Ready!”

  “Line, you’re first,” Scarlett said. And Evangeline began the story.

  As predicted, I could only pay partial attention to the game, and I thought Angel was more focused on her job as well. We each made a few mistakes and scored near the back.

  What surprised me, but shouldn’t, was that Alexia clearly didn’t care, either, and while Angel and I scored poorly, at least our scores were positive. I thought Alexia was intentionally making mistakes.

  I wasn’t impressed by her attitude. I shouldn’t have been surprised by that, either, as she was acting pretty much how I would expect a teenage werewolf to act. Heck, she was acting like a lot of teenage humans act. But I’d gotten so used to the attitudes of most of these kids, so when encountering a more typical kid, it was shocking.

  I wondered again what she was doing here.

  In all, we told three stories by the first stop. It was actually quite fun. But I most enjoyed was how different they each were. The first turned into a romance story, but it was about two girls. That was initially Angel’s contribution, but it became firmly entrenched when both Parker and I added to it. The second one was an adventure story that began, “Not everyone knows this, but when Lara bought the property near Bayfield, there was a huge police investigation.”

  That came from Evangeline, and she scored very well during the second story.

  The third story was quite silly. Scarlett tried to make it serious, but I sabotaged her. I used my turn to insert a few puns, and the girls picked up on what I was doing rather than Scarlett’s intention. Twice she tried to get the story back on track, but by then, the rest of us were in the spirit, and soon we had even her laughing.

  Alexia tried to act too cool to laugh. She didn’t always succeed.

  And then it was time for our first stop. We climbed from the cars, and I asked Scarlett and Angel if I could pull Cassie aside for a moment. I received a puzzled look but permission. I slipped my arm over her shoulders and tugged her to the side while Scarlett kept Alexia with her.

  “We don’t know each other very well,” I said, “and I might be putting my whiskers where they aren’t wanted.” Cassie didn’t respond. “I’m going to be blunt. Don’t let Alexia steer you astray.”

  “She’s okay,” Cassie said.

  “Do you understand what I’m saying, Cassie?”

  She looked down for a moment, not meeting my gaze, and shifted on her feet a couple of times. But then she nodded. “But she’s okay,” she added.

  “Well, I’m going to say this anyway. When I was about your age, I had a friend.”

  “Another... um.” She looked around nervously.

  “Yes,” I said. “I wouldn’t say we were best friends, but we were friends. But then she made a new friend, and things changed. Her new friend was okay, just like Alexia is okay, but negativity is catchy. Do you know what I mean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “My friend’s grades began to slide. She became too cool for a lot of things, things like homework and listening to the teachers. Maybe everyone here will be a good influence on Alexia. But the danger is that she’ll be a bad influence on everyone else.”

  “She won’t,” Cassie said.

  “Promise.”

  “I promise.”

  “Okay then,” I said. I gestured with my head, and we rejoined our group.

  But five minutes later I managed to leave the girls with Angel and Scarlett, and I stepped up to Michaela’s side. “A moment of your time, Alpha.”

  “Of course,” she said. She gestured, and we moved away from everyone else, coming to a rest against one of the SUVs, her enforcers taking new positions to protect the little fox.

  “What is Alexia doing here?”

  “Ah. You weren’t involved in those conversations.”

  “I’ve seen her attitude before.”

  “What we’re doing is an experiment,” Michaela said. “This is the first summer we’ve opened my program to kids who aren’t students of our school. You’ve met Parker.”

  “She’s sweet.”

  “She is. I wouldn’t say every teenager in the pack applied for the summer program. Some have jobs, after all. Some probably felt they wouldn’t be accepted. And of course, some just weren’t interested, but not many.” I nodded understanding. “I wanted to take all of them. I was unanimously outvoted by literally everyone with a say in the matter: Lara, Francesca, all the enforcers, the pack council, and even a few students I talked to. Every single one told me, in one way or another, that would be a horrible mistake.”

  “I suspect they’re right.”

  “I have competing responsibilities,” Michaela said. “As a teacher at Wolf Run, I have responsibilities to my current students. But as the pack alpha, I have responsibilities to the entire pack as well as the individual members. I think I feel the latter responsibilities more heavily than most of the others involved in our decisions. There are members of the council who especially feel the responsibilities flow only one direction.”

  “Ah,” I said. I’d ever been in a position like hers, and I’d never really thought about it. “And?”

  “And... We implemented a grueling application process. In a way, it was more grueling than admittance to my regular program, but we had fewer actual criteria. Academic achievement wasn’t in the list. We wanted to know if the kids could get along with us for one summer.”

  “And that brings me back to Alexia.”

  “Yes, well. Some of the kids made it through the process in spite of predictions by everyone, including myself, they wouldn’t. And of course, we had some I was sure would do well who weeded themselves out in one fashion or another.”

  “And Alexia?”

  “She hasn’t done one single thing wrong,” Michaela said. “She doesn’t mouth off. She doesn’t take advantage of opportunities to misbehave, and trust me. We made sure they had opportunity.”

  “She has a bad attitude.”

  “She’s a teenager,” Michaela countered.

  “None of your students have bad attitudes,” I pointed out. “They’re all so...”

  “Perfect,” Michaela said. “I know. Trust me, I know. You’re worried she’ll rub off.”

  “Yes.”

  “I hope for the opposite. She’s a smart kid and could have a bright future. I’m only looking for that spark.”

  And so, I nodded.

  * * * *

  For most of the next week, nothing came of the Alexia issue. I kept an eye on her and Cassie. And while it didn’t look like Cassie was rubbing off onto Alexia, I was relieved to find Alexia didn’t seem to be rubbing off on anyone, either.

  But things change.

  This change arrived Thursday evening, an hour after dusk. The pups were in bed. The teenagers were, theoretically, in the bunkhouses. Other than the enforcers currently assigned to the lodge, watching over Michaela, Deirdre, and the pups, Elisabeth had all the other enforcers and enforcer students out for “night training”. I didn’t ask what that meant.

  In deference to the reduced enforcement, many of the rest of us were clustered together. Lara, Michaela, Deirdre, Zoe, and I were engaged in a heated conversation. I suppose I should really say that Michaela and Zoe were so engaged, and the rest of us we
re leaning back, watching. I’d actually long lost track of the original point but was having more fun watching the difference in styles. Michaela remained cool and calm; Zoe was far more passionate. And I thought perhaps Michaela was getting her worked up a little intentionally, but I wouldn’t have accused her of it.

  We were interrupted when the lodge front door opened, and two of the teenage girls stepped in: Cassie and Parker. They both carried stern expressions, but they approached our group slowly, Parker needing a little encouragement from Cassie.

  “This can’t be good,” Lara muttered. “Michaela.” She gestured with her head.

  Zoe broke off whatever point she was making, and five pairs of adult eyes turned to the two clearly nervous teenagers. They came to a stop about five feet away.

  “Problem?” Michaela asked. Slowly, Cassie nodded. Michaela gestured, and they moved closer. “Is anyone hurt or dead?”

  “No,” Parker said.

  “Not that we know,” Cassie clarified.

  “Is anything on fire?”

  “No,” Parker said.

  “Is someone doing something they wouldn’t do if they knew I was watching?”

  Cassie and Parker turned to each other, and that was all the answer we needed.

  “Who?”

  “We’re not sure,” Parker said. “Some of the kids were talking.”

  “Talking. We encourage talking.”

  “About going into town.”

  Michaela sighed. “How long have they been gone?”

  “We’re not sure,” Cassie said. “Alpha, I-“

  “Cassie,” Michaela said, interrupting. “You are not responsible if your partner breaks the rules.”

  “But I lost track of her.”

  “We’ll talk about that later,” Michaela said. “But unless you encouraged her to break the rules or intentionally looked the other way, you’re not in trouble. I know you wouldn’t have encouraged her, and the fact you’re here suggests you didn’t look the other way, either.”

  “I didn’t come the minute I knew she was gone.”

  “All right. We’ll address that. How long do you think they’ve been gone?”

  “They might not have left right away,” Cassie said. “I was studying. I don’t know.”

  “An hour?”