Abraham stepped up to the beefy-looking werewolves first. “Huxley, Mathias, Calvin, Clyde,” he said as he pointed to each man. “This here is Wyatt and Wes. They’re the newest members of our pack.”
They all extended their hands one by one for us to shake. Their expressions were a little wary, but that was to be expected. Their job was to protect this pack and they weren’t sure they could trust us yet. I knew we’d eventually prove they could.
“These two are hoping to become enforcers as well. They’ll be evaluated by Bea sometime this week.”
Huxley snorted as he looked down at the cards in his hand. “Good luck with that. She’s vicious.”
Mathias chuckled and shook his head.
“She can’t be that bad,” Wes spoke up from beside me.
Huxley looked up at him. “You have no idea.”
My idiot brother, instead of being properly cowed, stood a little taller. I knew he was itching for the challenge, and I could only hope that Beatrice knocked him on his ass. He could use being taken down a peg or two.
Abraham turned around to scan the rest of the kitchen before his eyes widened slightly. “Can’t believe Callie’s out of her bat cave,” he murmured before gesturing toward the woman sitting at a table all alone. “Come meet one of my sisters,” he said to us.
“How many do you have?” Wes said as we followed Abraham across the room.
He chuckled. “Too many. There are five of us.”
My eyes widened as we followed Abraham. Werewolves were always born as twins or even triplets, but five at once? Damn.
We reached the curly-haired woman, but she ignored us. How she could be oblivious to three giant werewolves surrounding her was a mystery, but she was somehow doing it.
Abraham leaned over and tapped her on the shoulder. She jerked in response before glancing up at him and I got my first good look at her.
Her pale skin was flawless in a way that almost looked unnatural. The only thing marring her face was a small birthmark to the right of her pink lips. Her eyes were a pale blue and I could see the resemblance to Abraham and Beatrice in them.
“Sorry to interrupt, but I wanted to introduce you to our new packmates.” He turned to us. “Wyatt, Wes, this is my sister, Callista.”
Even though my eyes hadn’t left her once, when her pale blue gaze met mine, I was completely unprepared.
Everything came to a screeching halt as the whole damn world stopped spinning.
My heart thumped irregularly in my chest and my sweaty hands clenched into fists as her eyes widened slightly. In that instant, I knew she was feeling the same thing I was. That something was happening between us. We were on the cusp of something critical and life altering, and just when I thought my heart was going to beat through my rib cage, she broke eye contact.
I took a deep breath like I’d spent hours oxygen deprived. Keeping my panting as discreet as I could, I raked my eyes over every available inch of her. It felt like I could stand there and watch her for hours.
When she finally spoke, it was like another shock to my system.
“Nice to meet you both.”
Her voice was soft and quiet, but strong enough to cross the distance between us. It was like cotton candy wrapped around steel. Light and fluffy on the outside, but with a strength and resilience underneath.
“You too,” Wes said from beside me.
When I was still silent a minute later, my brother elbowed me in the ribs, and I staggered forward. “Right. Nice to meet you too,” I choked out.
I didn’t know what the hell was going on, but I knew it all stemmed from the woman sitting in front of me. The one who was still staring at the table before her like it was the most interesting thing in the room.
Thankfully, it seemed Abraham hadn’t noticed anything because he clapped a hand on my shoulder and spun me around. “Now, let’s go take a look at the rest of the pack lands. I can show you where your house is and then let you get back to your mom so you can all prepare to move in tomorrow.”
I smiled at him, but I could feel how brittle it was. “Sounds good.”
As he led us through the kitchen, I couldn’t help but toss a glance over my shoulder at Callista. She was still staring at the table, and if I wasn’t mistaken, it looked like she was shaking her head softly too.
I didn’t know what just happened or who that woman really was, but I knew I needed to find out.
Callie
“Hoo wee, did you see the hot new guys?”
I ignored the annoying voice and continued to read the text in front of me. My organization was about to start working on legislation having to do with fracking and I needed to be as knowledgeable as possible.
“Callie. Did you hear me?”
I looked up to find Aubrey perched on the table beside me. When had she even gotten there?
“What’s going on?”
Aubrey rolled her eyes. “The new guys. Did you see them? They’re delicious-looking.”
I frowned at her choice of words and shook my head. Since when were men described the same way as you would a cake? “Um. No. I didn’t.”
Aubrey huffed out an irritated breath. “That’s probably because you’ve got your nose so far inside that book I’m surprised you don’t have ink on the end of it.”
I self-consciously reached up to rub the tip of my nose. “I’m studying, Aubrey. We have a huge case coming up and I need to–”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, cutting me off. “Anyway, I’m just letting you know I call dibs on both of them.”
Now it was my turn to roll my eyes. “What are you, five? You can’t call dibs on a person. Let alone two people.”
Aubrey shrugged and hopped off the table. “Well, I just did.” With that, she sauntered off.
I watched her for a moment longer before I shook my head and returned to my textbook. She was ridiculous and I didn’t have time for her nonsense. Truthfully, I should have been up in my room studying, but the walls had felt like they were closing in on me and I thought a change of scenery was in order.
My environmental organization was slowly picking up speed and I needed to be ahead of my game now more than ever. So far it was just me and Katie doing what we could when we could, but I had plans to change all that. Within the next year, I wanted to hire another scientist and possibly acquire a lab of our own. That would take money though, and that wasn’t something we had at the moment.
In the meantime, I needed to finish this text and fill my already overflowing brain with everything I could learn about fracking and its potential effect on the air, water, and soil before we went out in the field ourselves.
I don’t know how much time I lost in that textbook before I was tapped on the shoulder. When I looked up, I found my brother, Abey, with a smile on his face.
“Sorry to interrupt, but I wanted to introduce you to our new packmates.”
This must have been what Aubrey was jabbering on about. It was no surprise really. She’d already made her way around most of the men in the pack. Eventually she’d need some fresh meat, or she’d starve.
“Wyatt, Wes, this is my sister, Callista.”
Ugh. I really didn’t like when he called me Callista. It reminded me of our parents, and those were usually sad thoughts I tried to steer clear of.