Wolf Dreams

by Aimee Easterling

  I wanted to reach out and touch him. To make contact one last time before we were separated for good. But if Claw was hot now, he’d run cold five minutes later. In the interest of self-preservation, I nodded a curt farewell before turning toward home.

  I didn’t make it very far. One step later, his hand came down upon the shoulder Adena hadn’t claimed, making the raven caw her discontent. “Wait,” Claw said simply. And my wolf obeyed him, turning our body so our eyes could meet.

  “Claw, I don’t think I can do this....”

  He silenced me by placing a single finger atop my lips. The contact was as light as a butterfly kiss, but it nonetheless sent tremors racing all the way down my spine.

  I tensed, preparing to rip myself free out of his presence. I’d told him all of my secrets, and still he treated me like a toy to be played with then discarded.

  I’d actually taken another step away when he offered the only words that would have made me remain. “Please. I owe you an explanation.”

  Only he didn’t give me one. Instead, he strode a few paces further from the helicopter, far enough so the roar of the motor would muffle our voices from listening shifters. Once I followed, he led the conversation in a direction I wouldn’t have expected.

  “You know Harry is Changed like you.”

  Harry? I didn’t want to talk about the least pleasant of his pack mates. Still, at least Claw was sharing. So I played along.

  “Changed like the President too,” I confirmed. “Thus the temper tantrums.”

  Claw’s laughter brought a sparkle to his eyes that drew me in one step closer. Then, before I could do something rash—touch him, kiss him—he shook his head. “No. The temper tantrums are all Harry. But when he first shifted, he was moon blind for quite a while.”

  I wanted to ask questions, but my wolf, the huntress, stayed silent. And Claw accepted the opening we provided for him.

  “For Harry, being moon blind meant lust not anger,” he explained. “Theta was the first female wolf he met. He thought he was in love.”

  Although I really didn’t want to talk about Harry at this moment, I found myself rewinding the duo’s interactions during the few days I’d spent in their company. They’d hunted together, but they hadn’t seemed particularly amorous. “They’re a couple?” I asked at last.

  “Not now.” Claw hesitated, cocking his head and spearing me with eyes that begged for understanding. “Harry was moon blind,” he repeated. “Then two months later, he woke up and Theta was just one of the guys.”

  I COULD SEE WHERE THIS was going. “And you think I’m moon blind in the exact same way.”

  It hurt that Claw believed this overwhelming cascade of feelings roiling through my system was a fleeting crush rather than stemming from true, adult love. As if I was a teenager who didn’t know her own mind, being protected by a teacher waiting for his charge to grow out of her fickle fancy.

  “It was hard on both of them.” Claw’s non-answer was an answer. He reached out as if to touch me, then tucked the hand in question underneath the opposite arm.

  “So,” he continued after one long moment of silence. “I’m giving you the space to get over any moon blindness. If you still feel this way in a few months...we can cross that bridge when we come to it. In the meantime, Theta will check on you to make sure you’re bonding properly with your wolf.”

  He was all business and I was too furious to contradict him as he handed over my forgotten cell phone. “Here, Harry found it at the crash site. We’re all programmed in. If you need us, call us. We’ll be there. Any time. Any where.”

  Then he was gone. They were all gone. Claw and Val and Theta and Harry, the President and his entourage, plus the giant helicopter that seemed too surreal to be true. They flew off into the wild blue yonder, leaving me and Adena alone on familiar turf that suddenly appeared boring and mundane.

  “Grading,” I reminded the bird as my feet carried me home along a path I had no problem following even without my glasses. Adena must have caught my mood because she didn’t beg for dinner as I found my backup pair then settled into my office to work.

  Five hours later, the sun was sinking outside my window and I’d recorded every student’s grade. Joe, darn him, had wound up with an incomplete because he hadn’t yet turned in his paper. But, otherwise, my duties for the semester were finished.

  Well, most of my duties. I still had to get ready for Dick’s performance review.

  Rushing in and out of the shower, I donned business casual attire and double-timed it to campus. The sidewalks were empty this late in the semester, professors and students alike having started their winter break.

  No, that wasn’t completely true. The sidewalks were empty until I came within sight of the archaeology building. There, a cluster of two dozen students chattered to each other from the exterior steps.

  Was this some sort of protest? If so, the kids were going to be disappointed. I was pretty sure Dick and I were the only faculty members left around to be chanted at.

  I came up on them sideways, so nobody noticed as I slid past on my way to the door. Then—

  “Patricia?” I was surprised enough at the aspiring fiction writer’s presence to greet her by name. Her parents’ house was within easy driving distance. It made no sense for her to be hanging out on campus on the very last day before the dorms closed.

  “Dr. Oblivia,” she answered, eyebrows rising and mouth pursing into a barely suppressed grin. “We’re ready whenever you are. Let’s go in.”

  “EXCUSE ME?” I TOOK another look at the students, who were now turning to face me as a unit. Every single one of them had attended one of my classes. There was Carly, Noah, even Joe the slacker....

  My eyes narrowed as the perfectionist in question dipped down behind his compatriots to avoid my gaze. I’d deal with him shortly.

  “I’m afraid we must have gotten our wires crossed somehow,” I apologized to the students who had apparently cut their vacation short for some unexplained reason that was going to have to wait. “I have a meeting....”

  “And we’re coming along.” Patricia eyed me for a moment, then prodded. “Unlock the door or we’ll all be late.”

  She was, unfortunately, right about the time crunch. Shaking my head at the students—who would have to fend for themselves while I talked to Dick—I let us all into the building, turning left toward the office of the department head.

  There was a note on his door requesting that I meet him in the conference room. I’d only been there once, during my job interview. There’d been leather chairs, lace doilies, and fancy carpeting. As I recalled, we’d drunk imported teas out of tiny porcelain cups.

  So Dick wanted to intimidate me. Didn’t he realize I’d been raised in a similarly rarified environment?

  Sighing, I swung around to wiggle back through the students so I could travel in the opposite direction. The young adults behind me were eerily silent while my wolf was wide awake behind my eyes. No wonder I heard the low murmur of voices before I opened the door and realized Dick had no intention of berating me in private.

  Inside, ten faces turned to meet mine, Suzy the only one who offered a smile.

  This wasn’t a performance review. This was an ambush.

  Chapter 31

  “You’re late,” Dick gloated. Then he took in the sea of students behind me and his glee faded into his usual annoyance with the younger generation. “We’re preparing for a professional meeting, children. Kindly run along.”

  “Dick, really.” The second-most-senior staff member sounded mildly appalled by her colleague’s patronizing language. Still, she nodded toward the door as she threw the students a bone. “Is there something we can help you with before you go?”

  In immediate answer, Patricia stepped forward until she stood shoulder-to-shoulder beside me. Her eyes scanned over the assembled faculty members and settled on the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, who just so happened to be the one ultimately responsible for a
ll issues of hiring or firing.

  Someone had done her homework.

  “Dr. Lewis,” Patricia started, speaking so clearly and firmly that I knew her statesman father would have been proud, regardless of her career aspirations. “There’s some information we’d like to share with you—”

  “We really don’t have time for this drivel.” Dick had the full weight of authority in his voice when he interrupted.

  “I have to agree,” one of his colleagues grumbled. “I have a flight to catch in under an hour.”

  “Which is why I suggested putting this meeting off until the beginning of next term,” said another.

  Up until this point, Dr. Lewis—the dean—had remained silent. But now, she speared the array of faculty with a look so pointed it managed to shut even Dick’s open mouth. “In case you’ve lost track of our purpose here, a university’s goal is to educate students. Those same students are looking forward to next semester. They have a right to know who will be teaching their classes.”

  Who will be teaching their classes...? I swallowed as my uncertain status here was spoken aloud.

  “Dr. Lewis, I’d like to assure you...” I started.

  But the older woman shook her head to silence me before turning back to Patricia. “Please, allow the students to speak.”

  And they did speak, some more tremulous than others as they filled up the empty corners of the wood-paneled conference room. “Dr. Hart is the only professor who ever took me seriously,” Patricia told the assemblage. “She helped me realize that my weaknesses were also my strengths.”

  “Dr. Hart had faith in me when I didn’t have faith in myself,” Joe told the faculty. But I was more glad of the thumb drive he slipped into my hand when he brushed past—his not-quite-perfect, but I suspected A-quality term paper.

  “Dr. Hart found me an internship that I didn’t know existed...”

  “Dr. Hart got me excited about a subject I’d thought was just a distribution requirement...”

  “Dr. Hart let us pet her raven...”

  “And that’s another thing!” Dick interjected, unable to bear the cascade of young voices one moment longer. “That beast is a pest and a menace. I demand....”

  “I don’t think,” Dr. Lewis said, her voice quiet but nonetheless squelching Dick quite admirably, “that you are in the position to demand anything at all.”

  TO THE STUDENTS’ DELIGHT and my surprise, Dr. Lewis lit into Dick with all the passion of a frustrated educator. She reamed him up one side then down the other, and by the time she’d finished he was as good as cowering at her feet.

  “The way I see it, Dick,” she finished, “you have two choices. Clean up your act and do your job or accept early retirement. Dr. Sanora will take over your duties as department chair to give you the leeway you obviously need to pay attention to your students. And I will keep a close eye on your progress throughout the next term.”

  Then she turned her attention to me, and for a moment I thought the older woman was a closet werewolf. Because my shoulders bowed beneath the pressure, my eyes dropping to the floor. “Dr. Hart,” she started, and I barely heard the susurration of students fidgeting behind me over the blood rushing in my ears.

  I swallowed, preparing for the worst. Instead, her ensuing words warmed me. “Keep up the good work.”

  So I was still a professor, Adena remained our mascot, and Dick was demoted. The decision seemed almost too good to be true.

  But the students had no problem believing it. They carried me out of the building on a sea of exultant laughter, then Suzy led us around the block to the Chinese restaurant. Based on the banter, it soon became apparent that she’d been the one to alert the student body about my predicament. Life lesson: Never mess with the department secretary.

  “This wouldn’t have tasted nearly as good if Dr. Lewis had ruled against us,” I noted an hour later after the last student had drifted off, leaving the pair of us alone at what looked like the site of a massacre. I’d stuffed myself to the limit, but I was still having a hard time preventing my wolf from chewing on the bones of the Peking duck.

  “Not a chance,” Suzy told me. “You’re the best professor the department has seen in a decade. But this”—she tapped my sling gently but adamantly—“was unexpected. What in the world did you do to yourself?”

  I wanted to tell her about the plane crash, the President, the wolf hiding inside me. But those secrets weren’t mine to tell.

  As had happened repeatedly during our short acquaintance, my hesitation turned a potential bonding moment into awkwardness.

  “Well,” Suzy started, removing the napkin from her lap and returning it to the table. “I should be getting back....”

  “No, wait.” I placed my good hand on her nearest arm the same way Claw had stopped me when I tried to walk away from him. I couldn’t tell her about my crazy week in the wilderness. But as my wolf might say, I could throw her a bone. “You told me you don’t have kids or a husband?”

  “Ye-es?”

  “How would you like to have Christmas dinner at my house? I promise not to let Adena in the kitchen while I cook.”

  It wasn’t much...but it was enough for Suzy. “I prefer cranberry sauce, not jelly or relish,” she warned.

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Epilogue

  Winter break was lonely without students to teach and Dick to fight with. Perhaps that’s why I found myself missing the pack so much.

  My wolf wasn’t thrilled by our isolation either, but she eventually settled into our new routine. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays we were human, planning the next semester’s lessons and poring over archaeological literature. The other four days, she ruled the roost.

  On wolf mornings, my animal half sometimes let me maintain control long enough to drive our tiny pack somewhere wild before we shifted. More often, she used the dog flap to hunt neighborhood vermin for Adena, spoiling the raven so badly that the latter now refused grocery-store eggs.

  We had the schedule down, so I expected no problems when school came back into session. After all, this was a Monday. I’d planned our fur schedule for precisely this reason—so my wolf wouldn’t balk when I returned to my job.

  She balked anyway. The only thing predictable about wolves, after all, was their unpredictability. Rational human thought had no place in the furry lupine head.

  So we stood on four feet atop cold kitchen tiles, watching the clock on the stove click over from 7:59 to 8 o’clock. Sunlight pressed through the windows as Adena cawed annoyance from her perch by the window. Our pet raven hadn’t enjoyed any breakfast at all.

  “We need to shift,” I demanded, but the urgency in my inner voice just made the wolf plant her feet harder. For a long moment, we struggled. Then she turned our head to face the dog flap...and, unexpectedly, a nose pushed its way in.

  I’d been afraid of this. Ever since realizing that any passing werewolf could enter through the dog door as easily as we used it for an exit, I’d woken in cold sweats imagining paranormal home invasions. But Theta had assured me that the local alpha was watching out for me from a distance. He’d felt guilty about misunderstanding the situation and covering up Blackburn’s bloody shift months earlier, provoking the long string of events that led up to Air Force One’s crash.

  So I was safe here...supposedly.

  I didn’t feel particularly safe, though, when the amber eyes of a wolf joined the intruding nostrils. Eyes, ears, a furry ruff, wide shoulders....

  The scent of moss and butterscotch twined around me like an incorporeal hug.

  Claw shook himself once and stood statue-still while my wolf danced around in welcome. It had been almost a month since we’d last seen him, and he smelled even better than we recalled.

  For what felt like an eternity, we basked in his presence. Then he barked once...and my body morphed. Hairs receded, hind legs lengthened, tail disappeared into my spine.

  I stood there, naked and unsteady, waiting for Claw t
o join me. But instead, he nodded once then left the same way he’d come in.

  I tensed, waiting for my wolf to fight for a chance to follow him four-legged. But she was strangely quiescent within my belly.

  I was the one left staring at the door he’d disappeared through. I was the one biting my lip against words that couldn’t be said:

  “I’m not moon blind. Come back. I need you.”

  But my students were waiting. A whole new batch, whose photos I’d memorized and whose social-media presences I’d stalked in preparation for our introduction. I was already guessing their strengths and weaknesses. Was already pondering methods to mold them into a cohesive pack.

  “You look out for you,” my father had told me. If I didn’t take what I wanted, who would fulfill my needs?

  My pack, that’s who. Everyone I helped would return the favor. And, when he was ready, Claw and I would finally talk.

  Pulling on clothes then grabbing a granola bar apiece for me and Adena, I gathered up the raven. Then, together, we headed out the front door.

  CAN OLIVIA AND HER wolf learn to coexist in the human world? Find out in Moon Dancer.

  Or why not take a quick side trip? See through Claw’s eyes when he first meets Olivia and learn more about cave paintings in the Moon Blind bonus pack, free to newsletter subscribers. To sweeten the pot, I’ll throw in two additional werewolf novels so you don’t have to come up for air for days.

  Thanks for reading! You are why I write.