A Wolf After My Own Heart by MaryJanice Davidson (good books for high schoolers .TXT) 📕

takes the average radius and ulna to knit back together.”

He was looking at her with not a little desperation. “What? What?”

She pushed up his unbuttoned sleeve, revealing a sooty—but unharmed—wrist. “Oooh, looky here. You’re all better. You went from make-shift cast to bandage to nothing in seventy-two hours.”

“Yes! Exactly! You know this.”

“Most people don’t heal up so quickly after getting hit by a decommissioned ambulance.”

“Right!” He sounded so relieved she’d finally put it out there, the Big Unspoken Thing, she (almost) felt bad. “So…”

She took a breath. “So I think there miiiiiiiiiight be something kinda weird going on with your family.” Beat. “Maybe.”

He let go of her shoulders and let out a tiny yelp of frustration. “That’s it? That’s all you’ve got to say?”

From her kitchen: “Take what you can get, Oz!”

Lila snickered. “Devoss has excellent advice for you, Ox.”

“Uh. It’s Oz.”

“Like the wizard?”

“Like the werewolf.” Pause. “On Buffy?”

She blinked. “Buffy wasn’t a werewolf.”

She almost whispered that, because he was leaning in again and she could not stop staring at his mouth. (In her defense, it was right there.) She felt momentary dizziness, then realized she was holding her breath. She wasn’t going to lean in, that wasn’t how she played this game, and besides, she didn’t have to; he was doing all the leaning. He just needed to lean faster. Much faster. Much, much faster.

“Lila, I know my timing sucks, but I haven’t been able to get you out of my mmmpphh.”

Much better. She ran her tongue across his lower lips and got a tender nip in response, and then she could feel herself stepping closer to him (not that there was much space left between them), could feel herself opening to him. His hand came up to cradle the back of her head and he tasted like salt and smoke and also cookies for some reason, and as far as first kisses went, it was devastating in all the best ways.

“What are you kids doing out here?”

They both jumped apart like guilty teenagers as Macropi came out and held the kitchen door for them. Lila took a second to remind herself that a) she was an adult, b) it was her yard, and c) Macropi was not the boss of her.

She followed Oz inside anyway, already wondering when they might kiss again, which should not be her priority right now, which nicely encapsulated the problem.

Never mind the fire and the wildlife. I might be in real trouble.

Chapter 19

“You want us to stay with you?”

“Sure.”

Maybe it was the (damp) nightgown and robe, her long feet all black with dirt, or the fact that her tight white curls were a disaster, but Macropi looked, for the first time, old and vulnerable. “Really?” she whispered.

“Sure.”

She and the kids had just finished drinking their Flanders’s cocoas, and Lila was glad to see it had perked them up a bit. The looks on their faces had been worth the effort of making hot chocolate from scratch during the wee hours.

“Wow,” Devoss had said when she’d handed him his mug, which had been topped with whipped cream, sprinkled with chocolate shavings, and for a finishing touch, Lila had wedged a vanilla wafer into the cream. “What even is this? It’s not a drink, it’s a dessert course.”

Thanks. The second Caro finished her note, she was again snout deep in her mug.

“It’s Flanders’s cocoa. You guys watch The Simpsons, right?”

“Only the first ten seasons,” Devoss replied. “The rest is dreck.”

“Yikes. Okay, there’s an episode where Ned Flanders makes Homer some hot chocolate, and he goes all out: whole milk, chopped chocolate—not powder—and the works, whipped cream and everything. So I call it Flanders’s cocoa.”

But now the drinks were done, and Dev in particular looked glassy-eyed. It had prompted Lila’s offer, which Macropi was still mulling.

“That would be… I’d—we’d like that. Yes. Thank you.” She let out a breath. “We would very much like to take you up on that, m’dear.”

“You’re considering this?” Annette asked, amazed.

“Considered,” Lila corrected. “Past tense. Decision’s been made, clearly. Try to keep up, Garsea.”

“It’s absurd!” she protested. “Mama, I’ll put all of you up in a hotel. I’d have you over in a nanosecond, but you know my place is still under renovation because, ah, things happened.”

Lila couldn’t imagine what that meant. “Things” like a bedbug infestation? Or a paranormal creature infestation? A house fire? Or a wrecking ball? A ravaging pack of fox cubs? Or Girl Scouts?

“Out of the question,” Garsea continued, because she had deluded herself into thinking it was her decision.

“Now don’t you go being stubborn on me, Annette. We’ll be fine here.”

“It’s ludicrous, Mama.”

“Jesus Christ,” Lila said irritably. “I’m not asking you to fill out a wedding registry. Just crash for a couple of nights until you figure out your next step.”

“I trust her,” Macropi replied at once. “She’s had loads of time to hurt us or worse.”

Lila coughed. “I’ve only had three days to hurt you.”

“I’m staying, too,” Oz declared. There was a short silence, broken by Caro’s scribbling. She held up a note, and whatever she’d written caused him to blush a little and shake his head. “Doesn’t matter. I’m staying.”

“And now that temporary housing arrangements have been settled…” Lila turned to Devoss. “Go down and tell Sally to just come upstairs already.”

“Uh. Okay.” The boy glanced at the others, who seemed as nonplussed as he was.

“Oh, please, you’ve been flaring your nostrils and inching toward the basement door for a couple of minutes now. You’ve clearly caught her scent.”

“Oh, yes,” Garsea said, giving her an odd look. “Clearly.”

“Not to mention, you guys would have been far more freaked if you hadn’t known Sally was lurking in my basement.”

“Mmmm,” Garsea mmmm’d.

When Devoss was basement-bound, Macropi tugged on Lila’s wrist. “I haven’t had a chance to thank you for what you did for us tonight.”

“This morning. And I didn’t do anything. You guys had it all under control. The only reason Devoss might’ve needed help—which he didn’t—was because he went back for his bear.”

Oz, who’d