I froze mid keystroke. “What is it? Is there something wrong with the hunters?”
“No.” Teresa, looking like she was eighty instead of her young ten, puffed her cheeks out. “Young Jack and Forrest are arguing.”
I shut my laptop screen—I didn’t really want anyone to know I was thinking of attempting to leave Timber Ridge. “How can they be fighting? Don’t they have to work?”
“Young Jack has a part time job here, but he mostly works weekends.” Teresa jerked her thumb, pointing to the Howl-In café that most of the humans belonging to the Pack worked at. （The second store they mostly staffed was the Sweets Shoppe. The Pack couldn’t staff either store with wolves. Each location had failed health inspections twice due to wolf fur being found in kitchen areas—that stuff sticks to everything. After that, Greyson declared that the wolves weren’t even allowed to enter the building, and had to text orders to be delivered to them outside.） “Forrest is working at Timber Wolves Landscaping, but I think he’s on his lunch break,” Teresa concluded.
“How wonderful. I take it I’m the closest adult?” I asked.
“No,” Teresa said. “Amelia sent me to find you—she said it had to be you, because if the older wolves got involved it would make it more serious, and you’re impartial since you’re not human or wolf.”
In other words it’s because I’m an outsider that straddles both groups, accepted by neither but involved in both.
Teresa scooted over to my side of the table and tugged on the sleeve of my t-shirt. “Can you hurry? Things were getting really loud when I left.”
“I bet.” I slid my laptop into my backpack and zipped it up. “Young Jack has zero respect for werewolves, and since Forrest was just changed six months ago he’s still pretty touchy. Where are they?”
“In the park.” Teresa backed up as I stood and slipped my backpack over my shoulders. “What are you gonna make them do to settle it?”
“I’ll think of something.” I offered her a flash of a reassuring smile, and together we hurried down the sidewalk.
As with most families, there were clashes between the humans and the wolves of the Northern Lakes Pack. It got dangerous, however, as wolves traditionally settle arguments through physical fights—something any human would be severely disadvantaged in.
When I was a teenager I’d shot my mouth off more times than was good for my health—mainly at Rio, but occasionally at some of the other werewolves who called me a dog behind my back—and to seek revenge I’d come up with the idea of settling scores in other ways.
It started with mini golf. I’d practiced for a full year before I challenged Rio to a match and trashed him thoroughly—with his werewolf strength it was nearly impossible for him to do such a delicate sport.
After about three years the wolves had gotten remarkably good at mini golf—they used Chase as their representative whenever possible as he almost always got a perfect score after all that practice—and I was forced to switch to croquet, then pickleball, followed by volleyball, and most recently bowling.
Unfortunately the wolves were learning faster and faster how to control their strength with each new sport I introduced. （We did darts for a grand total of one week before the wolves figured out how to throw so they didn’t knock the target down.） Thankfully, most of the wolves had grown up and weren’t so hot tempered.
Actually, I hadn’t challenged Aeric or Wyatt to a match since before my adopted parents died.
Instead, it was only the younger members of the Pack who had been werewolves for less than three years or so who hadn’t perfected their reflexes and ability to hold back. Which worked well given that they were also the most likely to lose their tempers.
When we arrived at the park there was a cluster of Pack members, snarling at one another.
As expected, it was only the two youngest werewolves—Forrest, who was changed about ten months ago when he turned nineteen, and Remy, who was twenty but still should have known better since she was one of the few who had been born a werewolf—who were present and fighting. Judging by the way she looked at him, however, she was probably backing him up because they’d been dating for about three months now.
Young Jack and Amelia were shouting at the snapping werewolves, creating a confusing cloud of sound, though thankfully it didn’t look like they’d gotten physical yet.
Greyson is going to rip them a new one if he finds out they were fighting in front of humans.