“I swear you’re more invested in Alpha Greyson’s love life than he is,” Shania said. “But Aeric and Wyatt are just as bad as you, if not worse.”
“The Pack is justifiably concerned about it, because Greyson’s missing mate means he’s in pain—to a certain extent.”
“Maybe.” Shania dug her keys out of her pockets and jangled them. “I’m going for real, now. I’m supposed to meet Aeric, and I’m late now. Oh, but I have to say I admire how you handle Greyson’s dating candidates. I’d never be able to lecture a werewolf about staying clothed, knowing they could just reach across the desk and throttle me.”
“It’s all in the firmness,” I said. “They can smell it when you’re scared—your sweat glands give it away. But if you act like you don’t care and can keep your cool, you can pull them into your space, and they’ll listen.”
“I think it’s just because it’s you,” Shania said.
“Not hardly,” I snorted. “Though I will admit my puppy pheromones help. I know as long as I mind my manners, they won’t swat me.”
Shania started walking backward to the door. “See, it’s your can-do attitude like that, that got you stuck working the welcome center where they need someone to mind visiting werewolves when you could be doing so much more!”
My smile turned a little wooden, but I forced a laugh as Shania reached the door. “Yeah, maybe. Have a nice lunch with Aeric!”
I waited until Shania left before dropping my smile.
She couldn’t have known the emotional bomb she’d almost stepped on.
What was I doing here?
Given that I lived in that uncomfortable not-Pack-but-not-human state, there was nothing keeping me in Timber Ridge since Mama Dulce and Papa Santos had passed away.
I could go anywhere.
I should go anywhere but here. Then I’d maybe have a chance to get a life.
Most annoyingly, I’d tried.
I’d left Timber Ridge first for college, but I transferred to online classes and came back after one semester because I’d been absolutely miserable away from Timber Ridge. I didn’t regret coming back, it was a short time later that Mama Dulce and Papa Santos died, so those last few seasons we had together were that much sweeter since I was home with them.
But I’d tried twice since then to leave Timber Ridge.
Both times I’d been so homesick it hurt to breathe, and I’d come back within a week.
It has to be that I hang out with wolves all the time. They’re such homebodies, they’re wearing off on me.
I sighed and slipped out from behind my desk, heading to the gift shop.
I needed to buy some of the special bath products the wolves sold in the shop.
The Pack didn’t outright demand I use their products, but they were so sensitive to scents and would endlessly nip at me if I used something that upset their noses. It was just easier to buy the shampoo and conditioner two particularly enterprising packmates made.
（When my hair started going prematurely white—a genetic consolation gift from my dad since I apparently didn’t inherit any magic from his family line—I initially dyed it brown. I never made that mistake again as the entire Pack complained for a solid month about the stench of my hair every time I saw them. That was why I was rocking white hair at the tender age of twenty-three.）
I poked my head into the gift shop, trying to spy out the shelf we had dedicated to bath products, when the door jangled open.
“Pip!” Shania called.
I swung around with concern. “You’re back already? Is everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine,” Aeric said. He crowded the doorway behind his girlfriend. “But the hunters just got here! You should come check it out!”
“The ones to investigate the Low Marsh wolf’s death?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Shania confirmed. “Don’t you want to see them?”
I hesitated. “We can’t leave the place unstaffed.”
“You can stand outside the door and see the hunters from the front stoop. They parked out on the street. Come on!” Shania darted back through the door, Aeric disappearing with her.
I glanced back at my desk before following after her, squinting when I stepped into the blinding sunlight and the hot, muggy air.
I had to wait for my eyes to adjust to the sudden brightness and shield my eyes before I could see the line of hunter cars—sufficiently cliché black SUVs, four of them.
The hunters, dressed in muted browns and grays with empty holsters strapped to their chests and thighs, piled out of the SUVs. It looked like there were thirteen or fourteen hunters, and they all were of varying age and size, though I was pretty sure they had to be from the same family, because there were similarities in the nuanced way they moved, and their expressions.