Chapter 2: Wolves Are Pack Animals

I think Greg hasn’t smiled much in the past few months. He looks like it’s an unfamiliar expression that keeps crossing his face when he looks at me. But it runs away from him as someone else comes up to the table. I can feel whoever it is, and know it’s another wolf.

Greg shifts in his chair like he’s trying to decide if he wants to run away or attack the newcomer. It’s a strong enough reaction that I turn to look at who it is, half expecting a giant angry biker type.

Instead, I see someone who either was in the military or always wanted to be. He has short cropped black hair with the lines of scarring through it, a way of holding himself that tells me he is confident with violence, and the posture of someone who has been trained to move a certain way. He’s clean-shaven, holding a bottle of Guinness, and his eyes are a startling green.

His eyes shift to me, and his entire posture changes. He seems to settle a little, and as he does, so does Greg. He gives me a look that’s full of hunger but tinged with a desperate need that makes me want to pat him on the head and tell him everything will be okay. And maybe that he’s a good boy.

“I’m Fred. Freddy, if you like,” he says, smiling at me.

“Emily,” I say. Then I gesture at Greg. “Greg. You want to join us, Freddy?”

He sits down as if I ordered him to, giving me an embarrassed smile as he does so. “This whole thing is so strange,” he says. “I mean, it doesn’t feel possible.”

I nod. “Been going through that a lot the last few months. It’s hard to believe that all those things we thought were myths are, well, not.”

“I thought I’d seen everything,” Freddy says.

“Afghanistan or Iraq?” Greg asks. He then gives a shy smile. “There is a scar in your hair that suggests shrapnel, and I know that didn’t come after your change. You shifted around the table so that your back wouldn’t be to the rest of the bar, and your eyes dart around with the signs of combat-induced PTSD.”

“Afghanistan,” Freddy says, a flash of a smile crossing his face to cover his discomfort. “Good eye on the scar. IUD shrapnel during my second tour.”

“Is that why you left the military?” Greg asks. “Were you discharged for injury?”

Freddy shakes his head. “I got lucky; shrapnel wounds were all superficial.” As he says it, he rubs his right thigh, making me think there was another, more severe, injury. “I served my commitment and then went to college. That was the plan, anyway.”

Becoming a werewolf changes things, disrupts plans. I think we all know that too well.

“Hey, are you guys here for the whole meeting thing?” a female voice asks. I turn to look at her. She’s a short and curvy Latina woman, looks to be around Freddy’s age, maybe ten years younger than me. Maybe less, hard to say. “You know, the, um,” her voice drops to a whisper like she’s saying a bad word, “werewolf thing?”

I gesture to the fourth chair at the table. “We are,” I say. “Join us. Tell us about yourself.”

She smiles and sits down, a whiskey on the rocks sitting in front of her. “I’m Helliot,” she says. “I’m super excited by this whole thing. Scared too, but you know. My life used to be so boring, you know?”

“So how is this going to work?” Greg asks, giving Helliot a polite smile. “Once we join a pack, I mean. Do we have to relocate?”

“I think that’s the idea,” I say. “Hopefully they’ll help you find a job if they expect you to move across town or even to a different state.”

“Wouldn’t matter to me,” Helliot says. “I’m just a temp. I can do that anywhere.”

“I’m not sure how I feel about moving in with people I don’t even know,” Greg says.

Freddy shrugs. “You get used to it,” he says. “So long as people don’t fight, should be fine.”

I take a breath. I’m kind of overwhelmed by the three of them, and I don’t understand why. As I look over each of them, I notice things that seem particularly odd.

The way that Freddy’s shirt hangs off his shoulder, the curve of his jawline, and the fullness of his lips that make me think how it would feel to kiss him.

Then there’s Greg and the sharp blue of his eyes, the taught frame of his body against his clothes, and the dexterity of his hands that make me wonder about the things his fingers could do inside me.

And Helliot, with the soft curves of her breasts, the cleft between them, the little upward curve of her lips that make it look like she’s got a secret; something about her makes me want to know what she looks like when she has an orgasm.

I haven’t been this horny since–I can’t remember if I’ve ever been this horny. Or this attracted to a stranger. Let alone three strangers. At the same time. I feel like I’m in the opening of a porno movie, and we’re about to retire to a giant rotating bed and screw one another’s brains out for the next few hours.

“I’m not sure how I feel about this,” Greg says. “I just want my old life back.”

Freddy shakes his head. “Not me. I love what I am. What we are. More control might be nice, but it’s a small price to pay. I don’t even need my glasses anymore.”

“I never wore glasses,” Helliot says. “But I definitely like the raw feeling of power. I just wish I didn’t have the weird reactions to other people. Other wolves, I mean.”

I actually know what that is. “Your inner wolf is reacting to the wolves of other people,” I say. “That’s where the alpha thing comes in.”