Charmed Wolf by Aimee Easterling (best ereader for pdf TXT) 📕

member of our clan should leap over the fire at least once. If anyone doesn’t, tell me.”

I itched to take her hand and drag her with me as I turned toward the fire. But I was Alpha—above and apart.

So I ran alone. Leapt alone. Alone felt the flames lick my calves, not quite hot enough to burn. Alone, howled joy at the jump.

Then, turning, to face my pack, I spurred them onward. “Who’s next?”

If the Alpha leapt, everyone wanted to leap. Some jumped lupine, some human. Those waiting formed a ring around the fire, curling in and out among the vials of glitter like a dragon slithering through its hoard.

This would cleanse my pack and the glitter. I could feel the force fire’s power. I smiled.

Then my old nurse was in front of me, gnarled but not so much that she couldn’t bear her chosen burden. Natalie’s baby was nearly invisible inside copious swaddling, but I knew exactly what was being held out to me when the old woman demanded: “Time for you to take Hazel across.”

SHE WAS RIGHT—THE BABY needed to cross the flames for her own safety. I wasn’t about to be the one to carry her, however.

I gulped. “Kale...”

“...Is dancing with his age mates. If I’m not much mistaken, Tiffany has a tiny crush.”

Turning to follow my nurse’s finger, I saw that she was right. Kale no longer lingered at the periphery. Instead, the leaning lesson must have worked because he was surrounded by a flock of tweens. It wasn’t fair to force him to be a big brother now.

And while I considered Kale, my nurse struck. The baby landed in my arms with a thud. I had to grab the child or she would have fallen. No wonder she immediately started to cry.

“What are you...?”

The nurse didn’t answer because she was no longer human. Her robe fell off easily as she shifted, then she was loping toward the bonfire. In lupine form, she’d have no trouble making the leap.

Unfortunately, in lupine form she couldn’t jiggle the baby back to silence. In fact, after touching back down, she joined the line of shifters dancing amid the glitter rather than turning back to collect her charge. I pinged her, requesting assistance, but my pleas were resoundingly ignored.

I could have commanded the old woman to return and deal with the baby, but that would have squashed the celebratory atmosphere. Instead—“It’s going to be okay, kid,” I told my unwanted burden.

Natalie’s youngest was having none of it. Her face was red from wailing. If I didn’t find a way to quiet her, she was going to make herself sick.

I spun in a circle, seeking assistance. But my pack mates were laughing. They thought it was a joke—their Alpha unable to please a tiny baby.

It wasn’t that I couldn’t. I just lacked practice. I was probably holding the infant wrong. Or perhaps she had a wet diaper. Why couldn’t she be a wolf pup? They were easy to tease back to grins.

Then Rune was there beside me. “Trouble?”

“Please hold it. Her. Please hold her.”

His brows lowered as if he was seeing me for the first time. “You don’t like babies. Then why do you need a Consort?”

I could barely hear myself speak over the baby’s screaming. “It’s complicated.”

“Will you tell me?”

“If you take this baby across the fire and return her to her nurse, I will tell you.”

His hands slid beneath mine. The instant he touched the child, she quieted. The instant his persimmon surrounded me, my chest loosened. I was finally able to breathe.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Rune murmured, baby on his shoulder and lips almost smiling.

Then he was running along the same path my old nurse had followed. Was leaping above the bonfire, pure elegance beyond what any of my wolves possessed.

And I saw, beneath his legs, someone enter the circle of firelight. Someone I was usually very glad to catch sight of, although not at this exact moment.

Natalie must have returned early, gone looking for her kids at pack central, then traveled to the obvious gathering spot when she found our home empty. The spot where she and her family had spent several holidays with the pack, enfolded by our acceptance despite being unable to shift to lupine form.

Now, though, she didn’t look ready to celebrate. Instead, her eyes grew so wide I thought they might bug out of their sockets. She was running by the time Rune touched down.

“Give me,” Natalie yelled across the thirty feet that separated them, “my baby!”

Chapter 23

“Mom?”

I hadn’t noticed Kale at my shoulder, but now I was absurdly grateful for his presence. Because my pack couldn’t see me browbeaten and there would definitely be browbeating involved once Natalie wrenched her baby away from Rune.

Especially after I told my friend the Kale-kidnapping truth.

Plus, I needed to be certain Natalie wasn’t fae-affected before I gave her back possession of her children. Time to implement my secret weapon.

“Kale,” I whispered, knowing every shifter within twenty feet would still hear me. “I have fifty bucks with your name on it if you can get your mother to jump across that fire then head for her car.”

“She’s not going to leave without Hazel.”

“Butch and I will be going in the same direction.”

“And if I get her moving, you won’t send me away the next time there’s danger? You’ll treat me like a man?”

The kid drove a hard bargain, but I nodded. “I swear to treat you like a man.”

I held my breath, wishing we had come up with some sort of secret handshake to prove my earnestness. Kale wasn’t a pack mate. I couldn’t order his obedience.

Still, our moment seemed to have cleared the air between us. Kale took off at child speed—which is to say far faster than an adult’s walk—and managed to grab Natalie’s hand before she immolated. “Mom! This is important!”

“What is?” Her gaze didn’t leave Rune, who was already circling around the bonfire to meet me.