Page 27 of It All Started with a Bite

“Wards?” I raised an eyebrow. “Like magic?”

“Yes. The local coven maintains them for us.”

I recalled Mrs. Chen’s words about the Hawthornes owning half of Amberford.

“Do witches usually help werewolves?” I asked in a casual voice.

The way he glanced at me indicated he’d not missed my wary undertone.

“They do when it’s mutually beneficial.” His expression grew thoughtful, suggesting there was more to that story.

We drove in silence for a while, the lights of the city giving way to darker roads that wound upward into the forested mountains around Amberford. I became more and more aware of Samuel as his car ate away the miles.

Every breath he took. Every slight movement of his hands on the wheel. Every rustle of his slacks over his muscular thighs as he worked the gas and brake.

My nails sank into my palms.

I had never been so conscious of any human being in my entire life.

Of course, Samuel wasn’t a human being.

I rolled down the window to cool my flushed face, convinced the mate bond was going to drive me crazy before the first full moon.

“You hot?” Samuel asked with a faint frown.

“Kinda.”

His frown deepened. “It’s probably to do with you having just turned.”

I decided not to deny his assumption.

“So what exactly are those pack protocols we need to learn?”

“They are rules that keep order in the family,” Samuel replied. “And ways of behaving that maintain hierarchy.”

“Like rolling over and showing your belly?” Bo asked suspiciously.

“Among other things.”

“I knew it!” Bo’s tail thumped an annoyed beat against the leather seat. “This is totally going to involve tricks.”

“It’s not tricks,” Samuel said with a sigh. “It’s survival. A pack without order is dangerous to itself and others.”

Something in his voice made me stare at him. “You sound like you’re speaking from experience.”

His jaw tightened. “Let’s just say I learned the hard way what happens when wolves don’t respect the hierarchy.”

The Bentley turned onto a dirt road that led deep into the woods. I picked out details in the darkness I wouldn’t have before, including eyes gleaming in the shadows. I suppressed a shiver.

“The wards start here,” Samuel said. “You’ll learn to feel them eventually.”

He was right. Something buzzed against my skin for a moment, like static electricity but warmer.

“That feels tingly,” Bo said. “Like that time I stuck my nose in an electric socket.”

I twisted to stare at him. “Wait. Was that when our TV went out and blew all the fuses in the building?!”

“I was young and curious,” Bo admitted without an iota of shame.

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