by Shannan Rhys
“My daughter is here for the run,” said Teresa, straightening and crossing her long legs. “Although her moon widow is not here.”
“Neither is Judith’s,” said Alyssa. “Sorry, Evie, but it has to be said. When their husbands don’t come, it makes it harder on their families.”
All the moon widows nodded, and Ash just nodded along, even though he had no idea what any of those things meant. Tonya leaned toward him. “Judith and Courtney are both wolves who are mated to human men.”
“Like you,” Alyssa said, finishing a long drink of her red. “Only you have the sense to be here. Unlike Douche Van Smoot.”
There was a rumble of giggling, and Tonya said, “Judith’s husband. We don’t like him.”
“Got it.” Ash raised his glass. “Fuck Douche Van Smoot.”
Their laughter was loud and genuine and he covered up his smile with a sip of wine. He wasn’t much of a wine guy, but it seemed like that was the order of the night. There were probably five open bottles on the table. And a few more unopened. It was like he’d stumbled into girls’ night.
“I like you, Ash.” Alyssa raised her glass. “And he really is a douche.”
“Well, Judith likes him,” said Evie primly, putting down her goblet and crossing her hands in her lap.
“Judith just wanted to live in the Hamptons with Courtney. She doesn’t care how douchey her husband is. She married him for the money,” Alyssa snorted. “Pay attention, Ash. This is important.” She leaned in, pointing a finger at him with the hand that held her wine glass. “It’s all well and good for wolves to marry humans, but when a wolf is repressing her culture because her human mate doesn’t want to have to deal with all that wolf nonsense, that’s the day she should hit the door.”
Tonya reached over and put a hand on Ash’s arm, and he realized he’d been tensing. “She’s just blabbing, honey. Really. That’s a long-standing beef with Judith and her husband.”
“Douche Van Smoot?”
“Yeah.” Tonya squeezed his arm. “You’re not him.”
“No, you’re not.” Alyssa agreed, reaching over to clink her glass with his. She was a little unsteady in her seat, and he couldn’t help a little laugh. If nothing else, these women had managed to get him out of his head, though they were confusing him with all this talk of wolf culture.
“So, tell us all about you and your mate, Ash,” said Teresa, the hint of an upper-class accent in her voice. “Enough about our family drama.”
“He and Helena only met yesterday,” Tonya broke in, saving Ash from having to make the awkward one-night-stand-and-then-she-was-kissing-some-other-guy-by-noon conversation that he couldn’t get out of his head. He didn’t need to put all that on them.
“She’s from the El Paso pack?” asked Aunt Evie.
“Yeah,” Ash said, even though he honestly had no idea what pack she belonged to, how many packs there were, or any of that.
“She’s a Quade,” said Alyssa with a significant glance at the other women. Her tone implied there was something bad about that, and they all nodded, almost sadly. Uh-oh.
“Every pack is different, honey,” Tonya said. “We’re all VonBrandts here.”
“The Quades’ moon widows all stayed back in El Paso.” Alyssa drained the rest of her glass and set it down on the table, reaching for the chocolates.
“They don’t have any moon widows,” Tonya corrected, pushing the box of candy toward her.
“How can they not have moon widows?” said Alyssa.
“I don’t know. There aren’t many of them. I guess they all mated wolves.” The alpha’s wife selected a chocolate out of the box for herself and passed it to Ash.
He kept passing the box, as he hadn’t finished his wine and wanted to follow the rules of this new club. He didn’t finish the sentence that seemed to hang in the air…
All except Helena.
His phone buzzed in his pocket, and Ash put his glass down, excusing himself. When he pulled his phone out, he saw it was Tyson and rolled his eyes. Did he really want to deal with his friend right now?
But he walked into the foyer and did just that. “Where are you, man?” Ty’s said as soon as Ash accepted the call. There was noise in the background. They were probably at Joe’s Bar. Hopefully, not getting their asses kicked this time.
“I’m at a friend’s place.”
“Ooooh. The dick chick?”
Ash squeezed his free hand into a fist, wishing Tyson was in front of him so he could take out some of this pent-up frustration. It would be good to fight. He didn’t know what he wanted to fight about, but there was so much tension inside him that needed a release.
“You’re a dickhead,” he finally said.
“We’re taking off in the morning.”
“Sounds good.”
“You wanna meet us at Meg’s Bakery for the sendoff?”
Ash let out a long breath. Tonya VonBrandt had followed him into the foyer and was looking at him with open concern. All he could do was shrug. He was sick of making excuses for Tyson.
“I gotta go, man. Just, don’t drink and drive, okay?” He hung up before Tyson could say anything else hurtful about Helena.
Maybe he and Helena weren’t mates in the truest sense of the word—not like those moon widows and their partners—but he was sick of Tyson taking shots at her.
“Sorry about that,” he said to Tonya, shoving the phone back into his pocket.
“You okay, honey?” Tonya put a hand on his shoulder. “You haven’t relaxed since you showed up.”
“I don’t even know why I’m here.”
“I do,” she said with a sad smile. “You want to be with your mate, and she’s out in the woods somewhere.”
He stopped to think about that. Was that really what he wanted? To be with Helena? It felt like he’d come out here to yell at her. Or confront her. Or find her. Or pour his heart out to the alpha’s wife and get some advice. But then all the women waiting for their mates had derailed him, and all he could think about was how his life would change if this became his world.
What would it be like to let Helena shift and run without him? What it would be like to sit with the moon widows every month? There was a part of him that wanted it, but Helena didn’t. She’d run out of his house, she’d kissed another man, and then she’d bonded Ash and trapped him here. None of it made any sense.
“I guess I’m just confused,” he finally said. “There are so many things we didn’t talk about before we did this.”
“There always are.” Her solidarity didn’t do much to alleviate the tension in his chest, but it did help to talk to someone who knew more about this world than he did.
“I feel like I’m tethered to a woman who doesn’t want me.” Saying the words aloud had almost cracked him open, but now his feelings were out there, acknowledged for God and everyone.
She tipped her head to one side and pulled him into a hug. “You’re going to be okay, Ash. I promise. These first days of the bond are disconcerting. That’s why I’m so glad you came back. You need to be with us. With other people who know what this is like.”
He nodded, pulling away, trying to get his shit together. He didn’t need to fall apart like this with a stranger. What he really wanted was to talk to Helena, but that wasn’t in the cards. Not tonight, anyway.
“It will be better when she comes back.”
“I’m not sure it will,” he said, sadly.
“It will.” She took his hand, pulling him back toward the moon widow gathering. “Stay with us. Talk with us. Like I said, you can sleep in one of the bedrooms upstairs. You can be here when Helena comes back in the morning. You two need to sit down together and have a real talk.”
Ash let her lead him back into the living room, even though every instinct in him urged to go find Helena. He couldn’t talk to her, as a wolf. It wouldn’t be fair for him to hunt her down and throw accusations at her when she couldn’t talk back.
He’d wait for her.
Chapter Twenty-One
Helena trotted through the woods, staying ahead of the other groups and being careful to avoid her own pack. Ash’s emotions rolled her like she’d been strapped to a roller coaster. Confusion. Longing. Anger. Betrayal. Desire. He’d run the gambit tonight several times over already. Not that it should surprise her—she’d caused it.
A branch snapped behind her and she started, dashing down a deer path away from the unwanted company. She recognized Kate’s bark, but she didn’t want to be near anyone right now, her cousin included. She didn’t want to hunt. She didn’t want to pretend everything was fine. That her world hadn’t just come apart at the seams. That her grandfather wouldn’t completely lose his shit on her.
She nosed through some low brush and came out on a low bluff, overlooking the river valley. So beautiful. And still so green.
Helena didn’t want to be a wolf right now. She pointed her face to the moon and growled. It had been wrong for her to run from Ash without trying to explain. But she couldn’t do anything about it now. She had to ride out the wolf moon and feel Ash’s pain and confusion until the moon released her from its curse for the month.
But one thing had become clear to her in her run tonight. She would make it right with him. She had to. He was her mate. Human or not. Fate had decided they were the best match for each other, and if Helena believed in anything at all, it was that Fate played an important role in wolves’ lives. Her whole life she’d been waiting for Fate to show her the path to the one person meant to love her. The one her soul would be joined to.
And it was Ash. She’d been drunk and completely out of touch with herself that night at the bar, but she’d still felt that draw…and he’d shown her what it felt like to be loved. The words hadn’t been said, but she’d felt his love. Felt herself love him back.
Whatever punishment her alpha had in store for her, Ash was worth it. That was why Aaron had forced the bond—he’d seen what she’d been too blind to see. Tonya had tried to give them time to talk, but Helena had been a coward. She’d turned tail and run.
Now she only hoped Ash would forgive her.
The moon widows had polished off another bottle of wine by the time Ash got back to the room, and Alyssa held up a glass in his direction.
“We’ve decided what your nickname will be, if you want to know it.”
Ash stopped in his tracks, standing a few feet away from the back of the couch. “I’m afraid to ask.”
“Ash is a nickname,” argued Penny, pushing on Alyssa’s arm. It was clear that they’d gotten tipsier since he’d left the room.
“Actually, Ash isn’t a nickname,” he said, walking to the back of the couch. “It’s my full name.”
“You’re not Asher or Ashley? You sure?” Alyssa arched an expressive brow.
“Just Ash.”
“Well, now you really need a nickname. We can’t just call you Ash.” The doorbell sounded and Alyssa stood, about to take a step over Penny’s legs, around the coffee table.
“I’ll get it.” Ash turned to walk back out into the foyer, but he heard the door open and close, followed by two voices engaged in quiet conversation.
“It’s just the rest of the girls,” Tonya explained. “Emma always rings the doorbell, and Kara always walks in.”
“What about Hash, then?” Alyssa said, calling after him. “Helena-slash-Ash equals Hash.”
He quirked up a brow. “Like Bennifer or Brangelina?”
“Exactly.” The dark-haired woman beamed at him, pretty proud of herself. He was really starting to like these women. A little crazy, but his kind of crazy.
Two pretty blondes walked through the door from the foyer with three pizza boxes, between them. They both stopped in front of Ash, glancing at him like there was something wrong.
“Um,” said the one with the ponytail, “Tee, you in here?”
“Come in, honey. That’s just Ash,” came Tonya’s voice from behind him. “He’s with the Quades.”
“Hash,” Alyssa said with a snort.
The blonde with loose hair pulled the boxes away and smiled at him as she passed. “We got a veggie blend this time. I hope that’s okay.”
“I hope you got meat, too,” Alyssa’s voice rang loud and Ash turned to find her still standing up, if swaying just a little. “I need meat tonight. And cheese. And carbs.”
“Hence the pizza, Aunt Lys,” said Ponytail. She extended her hand to Ash. “I’m Kara. And that’s Emma. You’re here for the run?”
“His mate is out in the woods,” Tonya called, and Ash held up his wrists.
Kara held hers up too. She had similar tattoos with a slightly different pattern. “That’s like our greeting now. Whose tattoos do you have?”
“I belong to Noah,” Emma said from behind him. “VonBrandt. He’s one of the twins.”
“And I belong to the other one. Luke.” Kara threaded her arm through Ash’s and dragged him to the back of the couch. “Who do you belong to?”
The question stopped him, because he knew the answer, but he was afraid to say the words out loud, in case Helena really intended to leave him in the morning. He didn’t want to embarrass her with questions from a bunch of people.
“Helena Quade,” Tonya said.
“Where’s my meat pizza?” Alyssa’s question cut off any further discussion, thankfully.
Kara handed two of the boxes over and then pulled on Ash’s arm. “Hey, why don’t you come watch Jurassic World with us?”
“Yeah,” Emma said, turning with a pizza box in her hand. “Hang with the cool kids.”
Ash nodded, thankful for the invitation. The moon widows were definitely a lot to take. All the inside jokes and name-trading. Crazy-cool. But a smaller group would be easier.
“We’ll be over in the den,” Kara announced to the other women. Then she and Emma ushered him away from all the wine and estrogen, leading him through several more rooms before they hit what felt like the back of the house.
The room they ended up in had wood floors; thick, comfortable rugs; and orange Swedish-looking reclining couches with cup holders between them. This was clearly the movie-watching area of the house. The TV screen hanging on the wall looked to be at least sixty inches.
Emma set the pizza on a big table along the side of the room and spread out some paper plates. “I hope you’re okay if we took the veggie. Although you’re more than welcome to go back in with the moon widows and get some meat-lovers.”
“I’m good with whatever’s here,” he said, grabbing a plate and sliding a thick slice of pizza out of the box. “Melted cheese on bread. Everything else is gravy.”
“So this is your first run?” Kara sat on the far side of the three-person couch.
“Yeah.”
“I haven’t been doing it a year yet, and I don’t like it either,” Emma said, sitting on the near side. Ash had no choice but to sit in the middle. It felt like they were ganging up on him. But he had fresh meat plastered on his forehead, so perhaps it was to be expected.
“I was with Emma on her first run.” Kara took a big bite of pizza and pulled her lips to one side as she chewed.
“I couldn’t handle all of the moon widows on my first run.” Emma bit into her own piece of pizza and pointed the remote at the TV. It came to life quickly.
“It’s a lot easier to watch movies and eat pizza, your first time,” Kara said.
Ash took in a deep breath. First time, like there would be a thousand of them. But he still wasn’t sure about that. Helena had freaked out so completely, and she was still jumping from emotion to emotion, even as she roamed the forest. Apparently, being a wolf didn’t prevent her from having human emotions. Although, like Tonya said, the bond was definitely less intense and insistent than when she was a human.
“I’m good for pizza and movies,” he finally said. “Although… Jurassic World? I mean, I’m all for sequels, but this is just getting ridic
ulous.”
“You’re stuck. It’s the only DVD we rented. We just need some beer,” Kara said, and Emma jumped up with a promise she would be right back.
Kara settled her plate on her lap and stared at Ash. It was sort of unnerving, how she was studying him.
Like she was looking for something.
“How long have you been mated?” she asked, quietly.
Ash glanced at his watch, calculating the hours. “Less than a day,” he said. He wasn’t sure whether she was asking if he’d had sex with Helena—which had apparently activated something, in Fate’s eyes—or if the question was about the tattoos. This seemed like a good compromise.
“Yikes.” She touched his arm. “So you’re new to all this, then?”
He nodded. “I still don’t know any of the lingo, and I have no clue what’s happening. Like at all. Except the pizza. I get pizza and beer.”
“Good.” Kara patted him and then picked up her pizza again. “It’s easier to focus on what you can control. The shift is not one of those things.”
“Or the way I can feel her.”
“Or that.” There was a somber note in her voice. “That’s never easy. In fact, sometimes, you’ll know what she feels before she does, because they’re coming at you from the outside. That’ll unnerve her. Or, it unnerves Luke. He can’t hide anything from me anymore.” Her lips curled into a secret smile. “But he’s learning to love that, too.”
“And can she feel me, the same way I can feel her?”
“Oh yeah.” Kara took a big bite. “Although because of their alpha bond, they’re probably more used to the intrusion of magick in their lives.”
Yes. Those were the words he’d been looking for. Intrusion of magick. He’d never considered that he’d allow someone else to enforce their will on him again…and yet magick had made him its bitch. Because it had brought him closer to Helena, he couldn’t resent it. But the fact remained that he hadn’t planned for this. She hadn’t either, but apparently their plans weren’t the ones that mattered.
