Page 151 of The Good Boys Club

At this, the marquee broke into applause. Not just polite clapping, but cheering and whooping and feet stomping. Sports-arena-level cacophony. Mash looked at me and his smile grew wider. His cheeks flushed pink. He was too fucking adorable.

“’Bout bloody time!” someone yelled from one of the long tables when the cheers ebbed.

Mash pointed at them and shot them a wink. He addressed the marquee again. “Secondly, I am also going to exchange mate bites with Cian during the same full moon.”

Applause broke out a second time, though not as enthusiastic. In fact, I spotted several teenage to twenty-something women and a few men decidedly not cheering. Yeah, been there. Knew how they felt.

“But,” Mash said, cutting off the noise once again. “We have more news to share. Cian is . . .” He hesitated, looked at me.

I mustered every ounce of confidence I could find or fake. Imagined I was Mash giving a lecture about lichens or bark and projected my voice.

“I’m a not a werewolf. I’m a shifter.” I scratched the side of my nose. “Uh . . . yeah, sorry about that.” I lost my nerve near the end.

I expected gasps, maybe even a few boos. Instead someone shouted, “Knew it!”

Whispers broke out. I caught a few.

“Told you he was too short.”

“Ever seen a young were with glasses? Nah, mate.”

“If Mash’s happy, and Rita doesn’t care, what difference does it make?”

“Yes! You owe me twenty silvers.”

More than a few bank notes passed between hands. Wait—people were betting on my inauthenticity as a werewolf? I wasn’t sure whether to feel offended by that.

I’d spent a long bloody time with my ears and tail out for nothing, it seemed.

“So if anyone has a problem with that, well . . . you know what you can do,” Mash said.

Rita got to her feet, shaking her head and tutting to herself. She walked over to us on shaky legs, and for the first time since I arrived, she looked every bit her eighty-seven years. Silence fell. The kind of silence only reverence could command.

She frowned up at me and Mash in turn, her eye contact lingering on her grandson’s. After a few moments a soft smile ticked the corner of her mouth. She nodded to Clem and Kimmy, who both nodded back, and then she turned to the other wolves in the marquee.

“If anyone has a problem with my successor’s choice of mate,” she said, her voice surprisingly loud and commanding for someone of her stature. “Quite simply, you can go fuck yourself.”

The applause that erupted this time was thunderous—explosive, deafening, raise-the-roof kind of cheering. I heard her words repeated around the vast space in awe, like an echo, as people began instantly regaling them to their party.

She turned to me, offered me her hand to shake. “Welcome, officially, to the Cassidy pack, Beta.”

I was crying. I knew I was crying, but I didn’t bother to wipe my tears away. “None of that hoity-toity handshaking here,” I said. Instead, I pulled her into a hug.

A Furry-Tail Ending

Twenty-Seven Days Later

Cian

By the time the Hunter’s Moon had arrived, word had spread about the wolf shifter who’d been accepted into the Cassidy pack, and the marquee was heaving. At least double the number of wolves were here than at the last full moon.

Mash looked around the tent at all the people. Occasionally he waved, occasionally he gave a cute little frown and a shrug when he didn’t recognise someone.

“It’s busy for a few reasons,” he told me. “One, the Hunter’s Moon is the most important of the three Harvest Fest moons and always draws in a bigger crowd. Also, wolves have arrived specifically to watch me accept the call. There’s gonna be like a ceremony . . . sort of. I dunno what happens, I never really remember them. Andalsoalso, they all heard you’re a shifter and want to see your foreskin.”

“Fuck off,” I said, slapping his bicep with the back of my fist. But just in case Mash hadn’t been joking, I kept my boxers on until the last minute, until almost all the wolves had shifted and Mash was shoving his big wolf head between my legs.

I ran a hand through his fur—softer than air—stashed my pants, and shifted too.

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