Page 79 of The Wild Wolf's Rejected Mate

A strange feeling untangles in my chest. Guilt that it’s been so long. Gratitude that I had reason to speak her name on such a beautiful day with the sky so blue. Grief. Love. Regret.

“She was the best cook,” I say.

The females hum and murmur, a kind of affirmation. Or maybe an amen. I blink, and maybe for the first time, I really see the people around me.

The tremor in Mabli’s hand. Her swollen knuckles, her red chafed skin.

The steel in Elspeth’s spine, how she won’t let herself relax against the back of her chair, and how her eyes are always darting when she hears a shriek from the sycamore, a clang from across the clearing, or the caw of a crow flying overhead.

The dirt under Griff’s fingernails as he crouches by the fire, pokes it with his stick, and pretends he isn’t listening to our conversation.

This is all so strange, but is it that different, really, from home? Mabli’s hands could easily belong to Old Noreen. Griff lingers just like Fallon used to do when he’d drop by for the video games we’d buy for him in Chapel Bell, like he craved the warmth of our company but some grown male voice in his head wouldn’t let him show it.

And isn’t my gaze darting, too, like Elspeth’s, at each shriek, clang, and caw?

“Remember when Justus and Khalil went after that bog worm up by Salt Mountain?” Lelia changes the subject back to Justus’s exploits. This time, everyone chuckles a little more gustily. I guess this one’s even better than the skunk story.

“They really thought they could catch him with a net.” Diantha snorts.

“They did catch his head,” Elspeth says.

“More like they harnessed him.” Diantha’s furry, pointed ears twitch with humor.

“It was a lucky throw, though. I’m sure I couldn’t tell a bog worm’s head from its ass.”

“That beast dragged the both of them around the whole lake at least a dozen times.”

“You couldn’t tell them apart afterward; they were both so covered in muck.”

“And the smell!”

“Oh, Fate, thesmell!”

“It was like they’d rolled in something dead.”

“Like they’d rolled in shit andthenin something that died.”

“They had to scrape themselves clean with a putty knife.”

“If I close my eyes, I can still smell it.”

“I smell it in my nightmares.”

“And that bog worm got away clean in the end, didn’t he?”

“He’s up there laughing still, mark my words, telling his little bog worm babies about the time he took two idiot shifters for a tour of the bottom of the lake.”

They’re all nearly falling out of their seats, cackling, their noses scrunched, tears gathering in their eyes. Griff has given up acting like he’s not listening. He’s cracking up, too.

Is this bog worm the same one that Darragh killed a little while back? I heard it was a monster. Should I mention it?

Join in?

Reach out?

I listen for the voice to tell me why I shouldn’t, but she’s silent.

I listen for my wolf.

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