The Wolf's Joy

by Holley Trent

  “I take it that’s someplace you ladies avoid?”

  “Indubitably,” Clarissa said. “There’s no way of knowing who’s there. Even if our physical forms are here, we could still be psychically harmed by interactions there. We try to stay away.”

  Alex accepted a mug of tea from Tamatsu and bent over the table for the sugar bowl. “So, you’re having a lock-in of sorts.”

  “I think that’s a good way of putting it.”

  Jenny sighed. “We’ll probably end up sleeping all day tomorrow and getting absolutely nothing done.”

  “But you’ll miss the parade,” Alex said with a pout.

  Jenny made some indecipherable grumble that had Scott rubbing her shoulder and murmuring, “There, there.”

  Asshole.

  “We’ll go to the parade, if only to terrorize Wilbur Marzano.”

  Alex’s brow furrowed. “The chamber head? Why?”

  “Because he’s a prolapsed anus,” Tamatsu said.

  “Oh.” Alex shrugged in her go-with-the-flow kind of way and took the seat Tamatsu pulled out for her. Her ability to roll with the punches made her such an appealing mate, but her tolerance didn’t extend completely to Ben. Just to everyone else.

  Ben growled quietly, gathering up a few cookies from the tray on the counter, and headed for the stairs. He wasn’t going to stand in the kitchen sweating and growling when he could be horizontal in a bed with nice-smelling sheets.

  Beds didn’t yell at him. Beds didn’t take him into their warmth only to capsize and knock him down on his ass. Beds didn’t care if he couldn’t be everywhere at once.

  They embraced without judgment.

  Tossing his coat onto the chair, he fell face first into the guest bed and wished for sleep to come quickly.

  The wolf inside him was clawing to get out—to clean up the mess Ben had apparently made—but it was no use. There was no point even trying. The unfortunate truth was that he couldn’t have everything. Come what may, he’d made the best choice he could.

  He’d never find another job where he’d be given as much respect. A Wolf had to grab dignity and hold on tight.

  It wasn’t so easy to come by.

  Chapter Nine

  When Ben left the room and didn’t return, Alex had been tempted to follow. She hadn’t gotten enough of her anger out of her system. She felt like she hadn’t explained well enough why she was so mad at him, but also wondered why she should have.

  Nothing made sense.

  He claimed she was his mate, and yet he didn’t seem to instinctually know that one’s mate would want him near.

  Delivering his coat was simply an excuse to have the argument, but the truth was, she didn’t really want to argue. The idea of spending another night at home alone had sent her careening toward depression. She needed people, and for a few hours, she’d thought she’d found a person.

  “Did you drive over?” Clarissa’s question roused Alex from her mental wanderings.

  Alex stared down into the steaming hot amber liquid in her mug and shook her head. “Walked. Afraid to drive anywhere. Ben said my truck is a ticking time bomb.”

  “He’d know,” Scott said.

  “I was really hoping he was overstating the severity of the issue.”

  “Nah. Not that kind of mechanic. Besides, why would he lie to you? You’re not paying him to fix anything.”

  “Because that’s what men do when they want to punish women for making decisions by themselves. They make them believe that if only they consulted with them in the first place, they wouldn’t have the problems.”

  “We don’t do that.”

  Clarissa snorted.

  “What?” Scott wore ignorant-blank-face better than anyone Alex had ever met.

  “As fond as I am of you,” she said, “you’re not exempt from being called out on chauvinistic behaviors. Perhaps you’re not as overt as some of the Wolves in your pack, but you certainly give opinions even when they aren’t requested.”

  “I just like to be helpful.” Scott looked to Alex. “You’re not gonna be able to get that smell off you, by the way.”

  Alex pinched up the front of her coat and sniffed. “What smell? Diner smell? Desert smell?”

  “Oh, you didn’t know?”

  “What’d I just tell you?” Clarissa asked him pointedly.

  “What’d I do?”

  “What smell?” Alex demanded.

  “Wolf funk.” He leaned his seat back onto the rear legs and grinned as he folded his arms over his chest. “How ’bout that? Didn’t expect you to be a sticky one.”

  “Are you saying I . . . smell like him?” Apparently, they were going to have a conversation out in the open about what she and Ben had done behind closed doors, but even the threat of imminent shame didn’t deter her from following up with, “I’m going to permanently carry around the smell of a guy who can only commit to being a drive-through companion?”

  “What on earth gave you that idea?” Clarissa asked, sounding genuinely appalled.

  Alex was glad she wasn’t the only one in that state. “He did. Implied that you needed him too much.” Groaning, Alex closed her eyes and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “No offense meant. I don’t mean to be snarling at you. I’m so frustrated. It seems that whenever I fall for someone, something happens soon after to punish me for making a bad choice. And I tried to resist him.”

  She really had, but it was impossible not to want him, whether for a day or longer. For forever.

  “I understand why he’d think that,” Clarissa demurred softly. “I’m perhaps overly cautious in who I have working around me and my family. I don’t adjust well to strangers, and Ben and Scott have been ambassadors, of sorts, for me.” She pushed her chair back from the table and stood with her mug. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

  “Hold on,” Scott said, setting his chair back to rights. “You’re not gonna fire him or nothing like that, are you?”

  “Of course not.”

  When the elf queen was out of earshot, Scott said, “I just got him fired, didn’t I?”

  Noelle rolled her eyes.

  “That a yes or a no?”

  ___

  “If you’re really asleep, I’ll go away, but I suspect that you aren’t.”

  Ben rolled over and squinted at Clarissa standing in the light of the hallway. “You need my help with something?”

  “Actually, yes.” She stepped into the room, sipping deeply from her mug, and sat on the bed’s edge. “You know I balked at first when Noelle and Jenny insisted that I start being more proactive with my security. I’d been doing fine for decades without any. Now, you could argue that we have different opinions of what ‘fine’ means, but we’ll save that for another day.” She raised her shoulders, then let them fall.

  She was right. He could have argued, but he opted to keep his mouth shut.

  “I try to mind my own business as far as mating concerns go, but the changes in Wolf personalities are particularly notable when you go too long ignoring the mate pull.”

  “I’m sorry if I’ve been snippy.”

  She set her mug down on the nightstand. “I’m not concerned with you being less good-humored. I’m concerned with you being agitated and miserable when you don’t have to be.”

  “I can see where this is going.” Ben sat up and put his back against the headboard.

  “Can you?”

  “Yep. You’re going to fire me.”

  “For goodness’ sake, why is that the first assumption people come to?”

  “Because the assumption makes sense.”

  “Maybe to people who are thinking too rigidly. In my old job, I didn’t have a choice but to be flexible and to seek unorthodox solutions to problems. I had to create fixes that didn’t exist. Although I’m no longer queen of anything, that way of thinking doesn’t automatically turn off. Let me ask you this. Alex is your mate? Does the wolf part of you think she is?”

  “Yes.” His mate. His soothing infl
uence. His kooky green thumb. “Didn’t expect that to happen. Wasn’t even looking for that.”

  “People rarely anticipate when they’ll find the person they’re meant to connect to. If they did, they’d find that person sooner.” Her brow creased as she twined her fingers over her belly. “So, you like her?”

  Like seemed to be such a weak word for what he felt. Alex was infatuating, and the familiar kind of hot mess prevalent in Wolf packs. He may not have known her long, but he’d thought he was learning her fast.

  “Feel like I’ve known her forever,” he said finally. He tapped his fingertips together contemplatively. “Feel like I should be taking care of her. Haven’t felt that way about anyone before.”

  “Can you make it work?”

  “The wolf in me says yes, and I believe the wolf, but she doesn’t want to do long distance.” The wolf in him didn’t either. Shifters didn’t distance themselves from their mates unless they had to, but long distance was better than nothing. Seeing her sometimes would keep him on two legs and sane. He’d be lonely, but at least he could anticipate seeing her. Getting back to her.

  “I wouldn’t either. If she wants you, too, there’s no reason you can’t stay here. You owe me nothing.”

  Before Ben could open his mouth to tell Clarissa that it was about more than owing to him, but about pride, she pressed her hand over his lips.

  “Obviously, I can’t make decisions for you. But as an outsider looking in on your situation, and knowing what I know about shifter mating, the logical course of action is for you to stay in Maria. I know moving would be a tremendous disruption in your life, but—”

  Gently, he peeled her hand away from his mouth and said, “I’m not worried about all that. I can find work anywhere. I always find work, even if I have to make the work myself. I just don’t want to quit the only thing I had in my life up until now that set me apart from all the other Wolves back home. Working for you, I was somebody. I am somebody. Not just some guy hustling for scraps anymore. I earned this.”

  “Oh. I see.”

  “Do you?”

  “I think so.” She sat beside him and stacked her hands on top of each other on her lap. “I seem to have a knack for hiring people who refuse to leave me even after I’ve ordered them to. First Noelle and Jenny. Now you.”

  “You’re not going to order me, are you?”

  “No. I see no reason to do that. As I said, I’m not afraid to think creatively. You may be able to get everything you want, and more.”

  “How?” Ben squinted at her, trying to make sense of what she was proposing. There was no way in hell Clarissa was relocating. She had a home—a farm—and a huge family back in North Carolina. Even if she didn’t have the crown to show for it, she was needed there the same way she’d been needed in the elf realm long ago.

  “You weren’t here for the discussion earlier, but I told the girls that I intend to be here to visit with Noelle and Jenny much more going forward,” Clarissa said. “The only deterrents I have are distance and time. Time, I can’t do much about, but distance is made somewhat easier to overcome by having so many associates with teleportation abilities.” She chuckled. “I much prefer planes, but I’ll admit being flung across the globe in a matter of seconds is an efficient way to move around.”

  “Wait,” Ben said, putting up his hands. He needed her to tell him in explicit terms what she was proposing, but it sounded a lot like business as usual. “Explain to me what’s gonna happen.”

  He didn’t want to get his hopes up for what amounted to a consolation prize.

  “What’s going to happen is you’ll move here, and when I’m in Maria, you’ll be on duty. I anticipate you’ll be doing the same number of hours, only you’ll be working them all here instead of split between Maria and back east.”

  She sounded too reasonable.

  What she was proposing sounded like a trap.

  She reached over and gave his hand a firm squeeze. “I wouldn’t dare keep you from your mate, Ben. In fact, I’d fire you if I thought doing so would steer you closer to her. You’re at a stage in your life where you need to think more about doing what’s best for you long term. I’m not going to let you do to yourself what Calvin and Sweetie did.”

  “Wolves already have a reputation for doing too much in the way of self-preservation, and to the detriment of the folks around them. I’m trying not to be like them. I’m trying to be an example for them.”

  “I happen to think you’re doing fine at it.” She gave his hand another reassuring squeeze and then padded to the door, picking up her mug up from the nightstand as she went. “And you’ll be even better at it once you’ve got your mate squared away. Wolves your age aren’t supposed to be solo. Remember that.”

  “I will.”

  Clarissa was saving him from himself. He was ashamed that she even had to, but he wasn’t going to sit around fretting about it.

  Making solutions. That queenly way of thinking.

  He’d upset Alex, and he couldn’t let that stand. Now that he knew that a happy ending was achievable for a Wolf like him, he was going to seize it by the throat. But somehow, romantically.

  “Maybe I should get her some flowers or somethin’.”

  They’d be even better if they’d already gone to seed.

  Chapter Ten

  Alex gave her eyes a brisk rub and shook herself, trying to wake up a bit. Even the sounds of the high school marching band blasting their hip-hop rendition of “What Child Is This?” couldn’t keep the sleep monster away. At twenty-three, she pondered if she’d already become too old for all-nighters. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone with so little sleep.

  Tamatsu, discreetly propping up Noelle at the curb, was no worse for wear. Angels didn’t have to sleep. Noelle was listing somewhat and jolted erect when the cymbalist clashed the bronze discs together a few feet away from her.

  “Ooh, that’ll wake a lady up,” Jenny grumbled. She was sitting on the curb, head low, pale blonde hair hanging in uncombed clumps around her face.

  “At least the snow melted,” Alex offered, warming her hands around her paper coffee cup.

  “Elves aren’t bothered much by snow, dear,” Clarissa said through a yawn.

  She must have been truly exhausted. The woman rarely used the e word out in public. Admittedly, there was a paranormal buffer around them, which probably lowered her inhibitions somewhat, but even with two angels, assorted Cougars, and a few witches flanking them on the sidewalk, she wasn’t the kind of lady who’d talk about such things around noninsiders.

  Apparently, Alex had become an insider.

  She liked that.

  But even her glee at finally being nudged into the niche her friends were already in was tempered by the low simmer of annoyance she’d had since delivering Ben his coat. She didn’t know what she’d expected to happen. Things always unfolded so beautifully in movies, but the man had all but vanished. She hadn’t seen him all morning.

  Scott was there, though, standing behind Jenny and occasionally bending to pat down her flyaway hair.

  It’d be easier if I could just stop caring the way some people do.

  She sighed and took a deep sip of coffee. She couldn’t stop caring, though. Her tolerance of the man had quickly bloomed into a frustrating obsession.

  He’d picked a damn lock for her and hadn’t made her feel like an asshole for needing him to.

  “Hope that’s enough.”

  She realized after a few seconds that the voice behind her had come from her missing man—the one she’d been mentally excoriating all morning.

  His breath tickled the hairs on the back of her neck, and she felt the safety of his larger-than-life presence then.

  Maybe that’s what the shifters feel, that energy.

  Afraid to turn around, she rubbed her hand down her neck. She didn’t know what Clarissa had told him. Clarissa hadn’t said anything when she’d returned to the kitchen, so Alex had assumed nothing had com
e of it.

  “I didn’t know if the wet ones would be any good,” he said. A swarthy hand gripping a paper bag appeared over her shoulder. He shook it. It sounded full. Heavy. “I picked them up anyway. Everything out there was wet.”

  “What in the world is that?” Curious, she folded her fingers over the folded bag top.

  “More of the same stuff from yesterday and a few other things, too. I didn’t know what they were. I figured you’d know or would know how to find out.”

  Brow furrowing, she turned to him. Coatless. Messy hair falling into his eyes. Unshaven.

  He looked like a wild man—feral and unbothered by the world.

  She knew she wasn’t fit to be seen in public in her tousled, wrinkled state, but he looked absolutely perfect.

  “You went out to the open space?” she asked. She couldn’t look in the bag and hold her coffee at the same time, but it didn’t really matter what was inside. She hadn’t expected anything, so even one viable seed would be a victory come springtime. Little victories meant the world to her.

  “Yep. Almost had it out with your botanist friend.”

  Her heart damn near stopped. “What happened?”

  “All right, so, I’m out there, minding my own business, looking for them plants, and he comes rampaging up the trail like a got-damn bat out of hell. Scowling like an asshole, glasses all fogged up. No idea how he could even see. Mind you, this was five in the morning and the sun hadn’t even come up yet.”

  “His rage was probably guiding him. Like radar.”

  “Hey. Sounds as good a reason as any to me.” Ben slung an arm around her shoulder, and she melted under the gentle pressure as though she were just a gooey, Alex-shaped thing held together by yesterday’s clothes. Something about his proximity made her pleasantly warm from the inside out. She could get used to that feeling.

  But wouldn’t. It was short-lived, just like harvest season.

  “He come right up to me and says, ‘What the heck are you doing?’ I asked him what it looked like I was doing, and he started hemming and hawing like he thought I was gonna lie. Why lie?” Without looking, Ben snatched a baggie of parade candy from the air before it could bonk him on the side of his head. He stuffed it into the back pocket of her jeans, stealing a grope while he was there.