Most Eligible Wolf, Julie Steimle [important of reading books .TXT] 📗

all it effects, as well as an overwhelming sense of belonging which he yearned for even now. Rick confessed. “I stumbled across Wolverton pack the summer after my high school graduation. I was supposed to intern at the factory nearby. But to make a long story short, I ended up spending the three days of the full moon in their town—and… I messed up.”

Randon stared. He listened.

Rick clenched his teeth. “Do you remember Malik and Lukas, those two wolves from Canada?”

“The ones who kidnapped you?” Randon stared, recalling exactly what had happened then. A pair of Canadian werewolves had intended to bring Rick back to their pack in Canada to ‘improve the gene pool’. Rick had barely gotten away, and in the end the SRA had shot and killed the two wolves, attempting to get Rick also.

“These guys are like them,” Rick anxiously explained. “Every pack wants new blood. The only thing is that Wolverton was sneakier about it.”

Randon gasped, adding it up.

Rick closed his eyes again in pain. “I got Daisy pregnant—which was their whole plan.”

“You have a kid?” Randon drew in a breath.

Rick shook his head. “No. Daisy miscarried four months later. The thing is… I’m kind of…” His teeth clenched. “I’m kind of addicted to her.”

“Addicted to…?” Randon shook his head, not quite getting that part.

Nodding, Rick reassured what he was meaning. “To Daisy. Her scent. Her skin. Her… everything. But I… but I can’t….”

“Do you love her?” Randon asked, leaning back with open curiosity as Rick generally didn’t date much. “I mean I pretty much overheard that your dad is against it. But—she’s a wolf.”

“I know,” Rick muttered as if that exasperated him more. “But, I actually hardly know her. It was all physical.”

Exhaling, Randon leaned back farther, nodding. “I see. So, you were seduced.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” Rick moaned. He slumped against the wall.  

“No. I’m not making fun of you,” Randon protested, hands raised. “Have you forgotten my mom and sister are both witches? I know a thing or two about female seduction. And I think that Daisy is a master.”

Sighing with relief—a heap of relief actually—Rick dug into his wallet. He was glad that the whole summer shenanigan had not been entirely his fault. Randon had confirmed it. He extracted a ragged paper from his wallet, the creases where it was folded were nearly holey. He started to read from it.

“What’s that?” Randon peered over his shoulder.

Rick showed him, handing him the paper. “Pastor Cartwright had me make this list a while ago to read whenever I feel overly tempted to run back to Daisy.”

Randon read the first line out loud: “What I Want in a Wife/What Attracts Me to Daisy…” It was a compare and contrast list. A very useful tool in keeping his thoughts clear and real. He looked to Rick, skimming down the details about Daisy. Then he handed it back to. “She’s not exactly what you want in a wife, is she?”

Rick shook his head, gazing on the list himself. “No. She isn’t.” He sighed closing his eyes. “The problem is, I might be stuck with her.”

This time Randon stared with skepticism.  

Rick could see it. “I’ve been among a number of packs now, and there are some accepted, universal truths about wolves like me, and what happened in Wolverton between Daisy and myself. I wasn’t just seduced. I…”

“Slow down,” Randon said. He got closer, lowering his voice. “Can I just say the way you were acting with her was like you were under a spell?”

 Rick quickly lifted his eyes to Randon’s face. “You think so?”

Randon shrugged. “It’s possible.”

“Could it be lifted?” Rick desperately asked. He didn’t want to be captive by some kind of hormonal tether to a girl he didn’t actively choose as a future partner. He wanted genuine love. He wanted a real, mutual relationship. Daisy was sumptuous and great in bed—but it still drove him crazy how little he really knew her and, honestly, had so little in common with her. He didn’t want a relationship based entirely on sex. It was wrong.

“Explain what happened to me, and don’t leave anything out,” Randon said, leaning back. He folded his arms.  

Nodding, Rick thought over the events that led to him making his big mistake with Daisy. “I was sort of chased by a pack of she-wolves in heat—”

Randon snorted, squelching a louder laugh.

“Randon!” Rick growled, glancing to passersby. “It wasn’t funny. I would like to see how you like it.”

“Sorry,” Randon muttered apologetically, trying to look repentant. Trying. But clearly he thought it was funny a pack of gals were chasing after his friend. “I won’t interrupt again.”

“Anyway, I don’t know what their entire plan had been, only that I found out Daisy had researched me and had chosen a spot I might come to. She acted as if she didn’t want to be involved in their pack elders’ plan to get one of them pregnant, and I have to admit I naïvely trusted her. She got me lunch—”

“Like killed a—”

“Sandwich,” Rick retorted. “From a kitchen.”

“Oh.”

“And she gave me some insect repellant, because I had all these ant bites.” Rick shook his head. “And I later had an allergic reaction to the insect repellant, which nearly made me pass out.”

“Nearly passed out?” Randon stared. “You?”

Rick shrugged. “I have a super sensitive nose—even for a wolf. I thought you knew this.”

“Oh.”

“Anyway, I felt myself naturally become attracted to Daisy. It was innocent enough at the beginning. We held hands. We took walks around town. We talked.” Rick shook his head. “It just felt so normal. I swear, at the time I didn’t feel like I was being seduced. She wasn’t trying to look sexy. She was just acting as a friend. And… I mean, I did kiss her once before we…” Rick shook his head, coloring. He was getting hot just thinking about it. “I was just thinking that we would have a normal summer romance. You know, go swimming together. Maybe make out a bit if it turned out we liked each other. But, she convinced me to join them in their full moon rites—and I think that is where things went out of my control.”

“Full moon rites?” Randon echoed. “That sounds like witchcraft.”

Rick nodded. “I know. I should have realized something like that might be happening. It was just… Randon, some packs have their own religion. They worship either a goddess of the moon or the moon itself. I knew one pack that was really orthodox about it, and they called people like me and my dad heretics for not believing any of that stuff. In fact they were offended if we ever mentioned the true origins of werewolf to them. They think the whole witch curse thing is an insult and a lie. Thing is, I have never been with a pack during a full moon until then.”

“So you attended one of these rites,” Randon said, urging it along as if they were finally getting to the source of the problem.

Rick nodded. “I did. At the time, I just thought it was some hokey start to their pack hunt—which honestly was amazing. The hunt, I mean.”

Randon blinked it him, much like a cat.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Rick said, paling. “As a human, the idea makes me sick. But Randon, as a wolf, the hunt with all the other wolves, working as a team… it was something I was craving for a long time.”

“I see,” Randon murmured. His eyes inspected Rick carefully. He was quite pensive.

“It’s a wolf thing, you have to understand,” Rick said.

Nodding, Randon urged him on. “Ok. Continue. What about the ritual? What did they do in it?”

Thinking, Rick recalled, “They built a big bonfire. They had priests and priestesses leading the ritual. The young single men and women were to participate in that ritual. We undressed in separate—”

“Undressed?” Randon gaped at him.

“It was done in the nude,” Rick explained, not quite meeting his gaze. “Wolves don’t hunt with clothes on.”

“You did,” Randon shot back. “You always wore shorts.”

“Did, yeah,” Rick said, nodding with a reminiscent sigh.

“You still do, right?” Randon asked, closing one eye.

Rick shrugged, still not meeting his gaze.

“You still do, right?” Randon asked more pointedly.

Sighing, Rick replied, “It depends on the circumstances. If I am in the city, yes. But when out in nature, no. Not anymore. I mean, no wolf wears pants.”

Randon moaned.

Rick shoved him in the shoulder. “Like you can talk. As a cat you are always in the buff. It is unfair that your clothes transform with you.”

Deciding to leave that subject, Randon changed it. “Ok. Ok. Get on with the ritual. What happened?”

“As I said, we undressed in separate areas. Then there was a parade—a procession where we marched down the road to the bonfire. Men stood on one side and the women on the other.”

“My gosh…” Randon uttered, unable to hold it in.

“And the priest said something with the priestess. I don’t remember what.” Rick strained to recall, thinking hard. It was a bit of blur in his mind. By then Daisy’s scent had overwhelmed him and she seemed to be what was buzzing in his mind—even before they had… He shook that thought off. “Then they called us to look at the moon, and that’s where I was unable to control it, and I went all wolf.”

 Sighing, Rick shook his head.

“And that’s it?” Randon looked let down. He had seen Rick go wolf a number of times. This was nothing new.

“No.” Rick sighed more, cringing on the thought. “No. At that point of the ritual, whoever changed first leads the hunt. I changed first, so I led the hunt.”

“And…?” Though it was an interesting detail, it wasn’t enough to prove a spell had been enacted.

Blushing, Rick cringed. “You know, I really don’t like talking about the hunt. I mean, as a wolf, it was mind blowing. But as a human, now… the blood.”

“I got it,” Randon said. “Moving on.”

“Right, moving on.” Rick shook his head to shake off the icky feeling that was crawling along his skin. He lowered his voice to barely above a breath. “Um, the thing is after the kill, normally I got back human and clean up. But with the wolves, for the first time I just stayed wolf. It was… so… mind blowing. I had never really embraced the wolf before.”

“But you told Chen back when the New Year’s demon came around—” Randon interjected.

Nodding, Rick said, “I know. But what I was telling Chen was that I had accepted that I was a wolf. I still wasn’t happy about it, though. I mean, it made my mom divorce my dad. And it made people try to kill me every month. It was a curse, you know.”

Randon stared. “And it isn’t now?”

Sighing, Rick closed his eyes. “I’m sort of split now. At Wolverton I embraced the wolf for the first time. They showed me it didn’t have to be a curse. And on that full moon, I was fully wolf… and it was the most beautiful thing ever.”

Randon wordlessly stared.

“I belonged to something completely for the first time,” Rick said. “It was the first time ever that I had been unreservedly accepted. Do you know how mindlessly intoxicating that is?”

Randon shook his head. “Are you kidding? I’m a witch’s familiar. I’ve never belonged.”

With a heavy nod, Rick cringed. “Yeah. I know. I’m sorry. It was just… back then, I was accepted. I was one of the pack.”

“And that’s why…?” Randon rolled his hand leading onto what happened next.

Rick closed his eyes. “No. That was more or less the mindset I was in when it happened. The wolves started playing games after we had eaten our fill. It was… wow, you know. I… I could be all of me and enjoy being a wolf. And Daisy was, of course, among them. It started out as a wolf game, but then one thing led to another. And the next thing I knew, I was waking up, it was morning