Gabby (Safe Haven Wolves Book 1)

by Sherry Foster

  “Ok, I think I have everything. Let’s get this over with.” I regretted the words as soon as they left my mouth. I was right, she was excited to be going shopping and now she looked someone kicked her puppy. I saw what looked like a tear forming in her eye. Thinking quick I asked, “Do you know how to bake cookies?” I was nervous about what I was about to do, but she was the one who offered friendship. “I want to come back and bake some cookies. My nanny taught me to bake cookies when I was younger, but I haven’t felt like baking cookies much these last few years. I was hoping, if you want, maybe we could bake cookies later.” My gut clenched as I waited for her answer.

  I did not realize until this moment how much I wanted a friend, and how much I wanted that friend to be Stormie. When she smiled it was like the sun coming out from behind some clouds. “Oh my gosh cookies. You know how to bake cookies? Can you bake chocolate chip cookies? I love chocolate chip cookies. Do you think you could teach me? I swear I will pay attention. Oh David will be so surprised when I cook him some cookies. He loves cookies. At least, I think he loves cookies, I mean he must love cookies, everyone loves cookies. He eats the cookies I buy from the store just fine. I never had anyone teach me to bake cookies. I just buy the pre-made cookies, you know in the refrigerator section, or the frozen ones. Those are the only ones I know how to bake. Oh, wait, you did mean bake cookies from scratch right? Cause David will not be very impressed if I just come home and bake him frozen cookies. He will eat them, he always eats everything I cook, but, somethings are not great. I tell him he doesn’t have to eat it if he doesn’t like it but he always eats what I cook.”

  Stormie finally stopped talking for a moment, I thought it was to allow me to say something but I was wrong, before I could open my mouth she was off again. This time barely more than a whisper, “Do you know how to cook real food? Cause sometimes I don’t much like what I cook either. David’s mother always cooked for him, even after he moved into his own place she was always dropping food off. But she died 6 years ago and he is not a very good cook either.” She finally fell silent.

  I looked at her, she looked sad again. It hurt to see her sad but I was not brave enough to do much more than pat her awkwardly on the shoulder. I was not sure what to say but I was surprised to find myself offering the information, “My nanny taught me and my sister to cook. Of course I will teach you how to cook. But we will not be able to cook anything if we don’t get off the porch and into the car.” I was sniffing the fresh air smell around the cabin. It still seemed to have the smell of the ones chasing me but for some reason it did not cause me panic as it had in the past. It was almost like there was some extra smell in the air that I could not place. A smell that made me feel safe. Which was really weird when I thought about it. But I guess it was no more weird than a certain smell making me afraid.

  I would love to put the smells behind me and just enjoy the day, but I can’t. What I can do is try to make today the best day I possibly can. With that goal in mind we get in the car and I turn the car around in the yard. When I get to the end of the drive I stop and wait. I look over at Stormie but before I can say anything she asked, “Are we going or sitting here? Cause I gotta tell you this is a beautiful place but it does not have a grocery store.”

  I laughed, “Pick a direction, any direction, preferably one with a grocery store.”

  She blushed when she realized I was waiting on her to tell me which way to go. “Oh, turn right and then when you get to the purple fencepost you need to go right again and then you are going to take a left at the small white house with the picket fence then another right when you get to the stop sign and then,”

  I quickly interrupted her “I can’t remember all that, why don’t we take it one turn at a time. So I take a right at the small white house with the picket fence? How far is that from here?”

  Stormie laughed, “No silly, you take a left at the white house. You can’t take a left from here, you have to take a right. Let me start over, when you get to the purple fence post, just a little ways past Sam’s house you will take a right. What can you teach me to cook? Can you teach me to cook today? I mean a meal not just cookies. Maybe we can get something simple and you can teach me to cook.”

  Now it was my turn to laugh. “What can you cook now? Maybe if you tell me what you can cook that will help.”

  “Well, I don’t always burn the mac and cheese anymore. And I sometimes don’t burn the bread when I toast it. I can cook a roast, but, not one anyone would want to eat. I can cook pizza. But we are kind of tired of pizza. I tried to fry fish once, but, now David doesn’t let me fry anything anymore. Not after he had to replace the kitchen from the fire damage. I almost managed to bake hamburgers once. But they just fell apart, really, I can’t cook much.”

  “You caught your kitchen on fire cooking fish? How did you do that?”

  “I don’t know. I put the fish and the french fries in the grease and then they exploded and the kitchen was on fire. That was the third, or was it the fourth time David had to replace the kitchen?” Stormie looked deep in thought for a minute. “Now David doesn’t really like me to cook on top of the stove, just bake things mostly. Except if I cook it in water like mac and cheese and spaghetti. Oh oh I can cook spaghetti! I cook the noodles and David opens the sauce and I pour it on the noodles. But it is was very runny the first time, then we figured out to take the noodles out of the water. Much better when you take the noodles out of the water. But if you take them out too soon they are still kind of chewy. If you leave them in too long they are really nasty.” She shuddered as she related her cooking horror stories to me. I wanted to shudder too.

  I thought now would be the perfect time to change the subject. She seemed sad again and for some reason it really bothered me to see her sad. For so many years I had no one to care about it seemed strange to care about someone again. I mean, I cared about my sister, nanny and Josh, but they were not around for me to experience their happiness or pain. For some reason Stormie felt important to me even though we just met yesterday.

  As I made the first turn and tried to think of something to talk about Stormie surprised me by bouncing in her seat. I guess she never stayed down for long.

  “What can you teach me to cook? Can you teach me something simple I can surprise David with tonight? Oh he will never believe I am learning to cook. Mom tried to teach me a few times but she has no patience with teaching me. She said they should have taught me to cook at school. Oh was she mad when she found out the school does not teach the girls to cook. I only caught her and dad’s kitchen on fire one time and after that she said no more. She told me I just better pick up food at the diner everyday to feed David.” When she finished I glanced over at her to see a tear trickle down her cheek. I had never seen anyone quite like her before. One minute she was bouncing all over the place, the next she had tears in her eyes.

  I was starting to panic. I had no idea how to handle these sudden mood swings. I wonder if she is expecting a baby. I read once women get really emotional when they are expecting.

  Trying to find a way to comfort her, without taking my eyes off the road, I offer the suggestion, “We can start small and build up to bigger more elaborate meals. And I will watch you carefully to make sure you do not catch my kitchen on fire. If it makes you feel better we can pick up a fire extinguisher. But really, I will teach you right so we will never even need one. Although, my nanny said you should always have a fire extinguisher in the kitchen just in case. Now let me see, what can I teach you to cook in just a few hours?” I started thinking hard so I was really surprised when she let out a little shriek.

  “You missed the turn. Back up, no no don’t back up, turn around there, see the little drive. Turn around. I am sorry, I forgot to give you the next turn.”

  When I pulled in the little road to turn around I stopped and looked over at Stormie. She looked both excited and apprehensive. Before I backed up to turn around I told her, “I think we are going to be good friends. I wil
l teach you to cook and you will invite me over to eat. I am so happy I found this place. I feel like I belong here. And even better, I know just what I am going to teach you to cook.” I giggled when I saw her face light up again.

  “Really? You will teach me to cook something today. For real? Something good?”

  I laughed again, “Yes, really. I will teach you to cook one meal today. A meal I love, and I am sure your David will love it too.”

  I checked to make sure the way was clear and then backed out onto the road to get back to the turn I missed. I could see Stormie bouncing in the seat again. I want to ask her if she is pregnant, but if she isn’t she could get offended. I waited to see what she was going to say next and I did not have to wait long.

  “What are you going to teach me to cook?”

  “I am going to teach you to boil chicken.”

  “Um, Gabby, boiled chicken doesn’t sound very much like a meal. I mean, if that is what you are going to teach me I will learn, but I don’t think David will be impressed.”

  “Well, I have been thinking about what I could teach you. You said you can cook spaghetti right?” I look over in time to see her nod her head and open her mouth but before she could speak I continued with what I had to say. “I am going to teach you to make creamy chicken spaghetti. It is such a simple meal but only if you can first boil chicken and tell when it is ready. The rest of making the meal is really just adding things into the pot.”

  “If it involves me adding things together I will mess it up. I always mess things up if I have to add them together.”

  “That is the wonderful thing about this meal, once you know how to boil the chicken everything else is so easy. You just take the chicken out of the water you cook it in, it will be chicken broth at that point, we add a can of condensed chicken soup, a can of condensed broccoli soup and then Velveeta cheese. Cook it on low until the cheese is melted, cut the chicken up and add it back in. Then you can cook the noodles, you did say you can cook noodles. I promise you, once you learn to cook chicken everything else is easy.”

  “Can we buy cooked chicken and maybe I won’t have to cook it today? Do they sell cooked chicken?”

  This time I did shudder before I could stop myself. But, I have eaten worse while on the run. I just could not imagine choosing to eat chicken from a can.

  “They do sell already cooked chicken in a can. They also sell chicken broth. If we get the ingredients while we are at the store we can get a container to put the sauce in and you can make it at my house and take it home. You can cook the noodles at your house and, after you drain all the water from the noodles you can put the noodles on the plates and ladle some sauce over the noodles. You can freeze the sauce in serving size portions for later if you want.”

  I glance over at her to see her bouncing in the seat and crying at the same time. The stop sign was coming up so I was hoping she would stop crying long enough to tell me which was I was suppose to go. I am almost certain she said to turn right. Stopping at the stop sign I see what looks like a few buildings to my right, sure enough Stormie points in that direction. I hope she stops crying before we see anyone she knows. I would hate for people to think I made her cry.

  Chapter Six

  Trey

  I have no idea why Stormie is crying, but since I can see she is also bouncing up and down in the seat of Gabriella’s car I know whatever the reason she is excited. So the tears must be happy tears, which will not keep David from panicking when he hears his mate came into town in the little unicorn’s car crying. I watch Stormie pointing out the direction from where I am sitting. Hiding might be a better word for what I am doing. After talking with David last night, and dad, and of course mom had to weigh in on the subject they all said I needed to get close enough to Gabriella to smell her. So for today, and only today, I was going to be my sister’s pet wolf. I threatened to beat her to within an inch of her life is she told the little unicorn that where anyone else could hear.

  I had a meeting last night with some of the older wolves in the pack. They all agreed with me something was fishy about the situation. No female unmated wolf should be roaming around like this one was. The general consensus was, she must be on the run. The big question is, what is she running from? A mating she doesn’t want, a heritage she refuses to have, no one can even guess. When she sees me, in my wolf form, we think she will bolt. But with Stormie in the car with her, she will have time to get her calmed down.

  As they park in front of the small grocery store, the only one in our small pack run town, I trot up to the car and wait. I see Gabriella’s eyes go wide but I am not prepared for what I hear through the window. “Oh look Stormie, have you ever seen a dog so huge in your life?”

  I mentally groan. She will make no friends in this town calling us dogs. A dog looks nothing like a wolf.

  I see my sister wipe her eyes and look around for the dog. When she doesn’t see a dog she looked back at the little unicorn, and I heard her say, “Where?”

  I watch Gabriella look at her in disbelief then look out the window at me. Pointing at me I hear her say, “Beside your door. That huge black dog beside your door. Do you know who it belongs to?”

  When I see Stormie turn to look at me I am no prepared for what she has to say. She does not follow the plan at all. If I was in human form I would face palm when I hear her “Are you crazy. That is not a dog, that is a wolf. How can you, of all people, not know what a wolf looks like?”

  “What do you mean? I know what a wolf looks like. I have seen nature shows. They are gray. That is black so therefore it can not be a wolf, although, they do have white ones in the snow.”

  It would appear that my little unicorn had some things to learn about wolves. She also did not seem to notice what Stormie said about how she should be able to recognize a wolf. I looked at Stormie though the window, again thankful I could talk to any member of my pack no matter what form we were in, I need her out of the car sis. Get her out of the car or just open the door and let me get my head in. I can not smell her through the car.

  When Stormie opened the door we both got a surprise. Gabriella shrieked and reached over Stormie to slam the door closed almost catching me in the door.

  I did not get a chance to get my nose in the car but my wolf is tearing at my insides now. He does not at all like having the door closed on him when he is so close to his mate. At least now I do not have to question if we are mates or not. My wolf has never acted like this in my entire life. If I can’t get him calmed down I have no idea how I am going to last until Christmas when my mate turns twenty-one. The elders I have talked to did not ever mention having problems in the past when the females were plentiful.

  I can hear Stormie and Gabriella arguing through the door. Stormie is trying to convince Gabriella how harmless I am but apparently she is not buying the story. I start to whine and I hear my sister say “See, look, you are making him cry.”

  Gabriella has apparently concluded my sister is crazy, at least her expression indicates she believes Stormie is crazy. Her words back up my suspicions. “Are you crazy? That is not a pet. That is a killer. Do you see how big he is? We are not getting out of the car until he goes away. I do not want to get eaten today. Look at him. He looks hungry. He is probably whining because we look like food.”

  I wish I could see Stormie’s face. I am glad now I asked mother to come to town today. I see her approaching the car. Gabriella has not seen her yet since she is coming from the driver’s side and my little mate has not taken her eyes off me since Stormie opened the door. When mother came around the front of the car and reached for me I nuzzled her hand. I hear Gabriella squeak in terror. I can not believe the effort I am having to go through just to get her out of the car. My family may never let me live this down.

  Mother taps on the window of the car and I hear Stormie asked Gabriella if she can roll the window down.

  “Mom is going to want to know why I am sitting in the car. We can get out you know. See, the
wolf is not eating my mom so I am sure he will not eat us.”

  Mother is laughing at me through the pack bond. I have never seen your wolf whine like that son, I am guessing this little unicorn is indeed your mate?

  As embarrassed as I am over these events I can not keep the pride from my spilling through when I tell her yes, if I had any doubts at all they have been laid to rest. Now I just have to figure out how to get her out of the car.

  Finally Stormie’s door opens and Gabriella only makes a tiny, almost inaudible squeak when she steps out. After watching Stormie pet me she decides maybe she will be safe outside of the car also. Never taking her eyes off me she slowly climbs out of the car. I want to trot around the car to her side, but I fear I will frighten her so I let her make the first move.