Page 4 of Werewolves Don't Howl
I blinked at him, my mouth opening and closing while I struggled to know exactly what to say in return to his blunt honesty. Why would he want me to know why he was rude to me? Did he actually think that would influence my career? “And yet, it’s none of your business what I do with my life, or what kind of news I write.”
His lips curled with the slightest sneer. “What do you write? It’s not news.”
If I hadn’t grown up with an elf, I wouldn’t find his expression so insulting. If he kept this up, I really would kick him in the shins. “It’s called good news. Maybe you’ve heard of it. Politics and most other things are bad news. Why not focus on the good?”
“It’s the gnome in you. Must be, because it’s not the elf. If you don’t look at the evil, it will spread unchecked.”
I answered sweetly, “And if you don’t focus on the good, there may as well not be any. You can go out and fight your battles while I stay home and protect what’s good by appreciating it. When you’re broken from your battle against an unconquerable foe, there’s something to come home to.”
He stared at me, almost shocked. “You wish to make a home for a warrior?”
I blinked up at him, for a moment side-tracked. I didn’t date, not when intimacy would reveal all my secrets. I certainly didn’t see marriage in my future. Talking about romance with the senator was surreal. Elves wouldn’t talk about marriage or intimacy until after dating for decades. I hurriedly backpedaled. “Is that what it sounded like? I’m a respectable society journalist. I like what I write, and I like the people I work for. I have a small life, that’s true, but it’s what I want. Just because I don’t want to go out and keep evil from spreading unchecked doesn’t mean my life goals are less valid than yours, Mr. Youngest-Senator-from-Texas-who-probably-knew-what-he-wanted-by-age-five. Live a little.” I tugged on his tie, making it slightly askew. Yes, it was offensive to invade an elf’s space, but he clearly had no problem with offensiveness.
“Live a little?” he asked, tilting his head, bemused, leaving his tie crooked.
“Yes. Live more and judge less. If you’re not happy with the way I work, then be the journalist you think I should be. I have no interest in following anyone else’s dictates, particularly a complete stranger I only just met and hope to never see again.” I winced once the unforgivably rude words were out of my mouth, but he only nodded once.
“You’re happy then? Not simply avoiding unpleasantness because of lingering fear?” His eyes were intense for a moment before he glanced around as we walked through the maze.
“I’m not avoiding negativity, I’m focusing on positivity. Haven’t you ever met a gnome before?”
“But you aren’t just a gnome.”
How offensive. There was nothing ‘just,’ about being a gnome. “No, I’m not just anything. Like elves aren’t just placid rocks in the stream of life, letting everything flow over them. You change currents, but you’re just an elf. Or are you?” It was so rude to suggest that he was part something less respectable, but I couldn’t seem to help myself.
He smiled slightly. “You can see my nature even though you refuse to do an exposé on me. Your talents are wasted.”
That was practically a confession! But he was right. I wasn’t going to expose the senator, not when I understood exactly what it was like to hide who I was beneath a sweet and docile exterior. I pointed at him. “Nothing is ever wasted when there is good intention. You think that if something isn’t big and loud, it isn’t valuable? That’s myopic. You can’t see the trees for the forest.”
He leaned closer, the scent of him rushing over me like a storm. “And you can see anything if you care to look, but have no interest in it.” He bowed low, and I realized we’d reached the two warring lions without me realizing that we were walking so quickly.
He said, “It has been a pleasure, Miss Era. Forgive me for my unpleasant company. I am pleased with your life choices if you are pleased with them. Would you like me to escort you back to the party? I’m afraid I have some paperwork I need to take care of and would rather leave by a side exit if you don’t require my company.”
I squinted at him while I studied his strangely relaxed shoulders. That’s where he kept his stress, and now he was much less stressed than at the beginning of the party. What was he really doing here? Not that I cared. I made a point not to get involved with messes. He’d come to find me in the maze. That meant that he was trying to get me involved with the messes I liked to avoid. Was he just perverse like that? He needed to find the one reporter in the world who didn’t want to dig into his psyche and expose him to the world?
I spoke slowly. “You specifically tried to rile me up. Are you looking for a writer to add to your crew? That’s the only thing that explains it. You do everything with intention.” And he’d intended to insult me and offend me from the very first moment we’d been introduced. Being part ogre didn’t explain it, not when he’d made a point to keep his dark side covered, particularly in front of the media.
His smile seemed genuine, violet eyes twinkling. “I’ll find my own way out then. It’s been a pleasure.” He bowed even lower and strode off, leaving me with the lions and the maze behind me.
ChapterTwo
“Can you cover the game for me?” Bertram the Bashful asked on a Friday afternoon a week after the garden party. It was an ironic nickname. There wasn’t anything shy about the sports reporter.
He was leaning on my desk, which was positioned near the water dispenser, the restrooms in the middle of the large office full of busy reporters, and Clara, who was calling up advertisers.
Loren frowned at Bert and shook her head. “Send her downtown and she’s likely to get mugged again.”
I smiled back at the reporter who covered crime and conspiracies. She’d love to get mugged. She’d get a story and throw down the mugger to add to her reputation as serious girl-boss. Woman-boss. There was nothing girly about the human with elf blood who worked out at the gym while Bert played sports.
I said, “I gave Bingo cookies. That wasn’t a mugging. And Bert, we’re talking baseball, yes?”
He nodded and ran a hand through his ashy hair. “Melinda needs me to take the twins to gymnastics because…”
“Tax season,” I answered for him. His wife was an accountant. Every April was the same story, which was unfortunate timing. At least I liked baseball, and most of the team members liked giving interviews to me as much as to Bert. The werewolves were particularly flirty, but none of them had pushed anything, thanks to Max, the alpha of Singsong City, who kept all but the youngest wolves from losing control.
I was technically a werewolf, but it wasn’t common knowledge. Thank heavens that werewolves kept things quiet. I’d lose my job if Nanette, the editor-in-chief, knew that I’d been infected, but that wasn’t what kept me quiet about it. No, it was my parents and what their reaction would be.
Gnomes weren’t supposed to be able to turn. If they got infected, they died. I’d been ‘lucky,’ transitioning after two months of the most miserable anguish imaginable. Not that I bothered to imagine anguish. Most werewolves transitioned in less than two days. I was so special to have survived. For the next two years, I’d stalked a vile wolf that I suspected of turning me. I ripped him and his pack apart, picking them off one by one, then let the police find me with the other girls he’d caged, trying to turn them into werewolves so he could mate them to his pack and raise an army.
