Page 31 of Pack Scratch Fever
“It doesn’t matter. He likes her, I can tell.”
Avery makes a face. “I’m not sure about that.”
“He does. She wouldn’t affect him like that if he didn’t. When’s the last time he’s had anyone match his energy?” I chuckle.
That’s the other thing I immediately liked about Piper.
She’s shy at first, but her passion ignites when something sets her off.
At the rescue, it was her eyes lighting up when she saw the Siamese kitten we brought.
At our house, it was Poe annoying her and getting under her skin.
It’s wonderful.
“It’s late,” Avery says, yawning. “I should go to sleep, but I also want to stay up and see if the traps work.”
I smirk. “You just want a reason to contact her,” I say, and he chuckles.
“Kind of. It’ll also be kind of fun to learn how to do all the trapping,” he admits. “I like the idea that we’re helping them, too.”
Avery won’t admit it, but he’s secretly been wanting to get a cat for the last few years.
But he’s always been pretty shy about asking for what he wants, despite my and Poe’s attempts to help him find his voice.
“We’ll just bring them all inside to piss off Poe. We can place the traps on his bed and get sardine juice all over them.”
Avery laughs, his eyes softening.
“Yeah,” he murmurs. “I just think…” he swallows and clears his throat. “I have a feeling about her, you know? That she’s the one.”
I nod. “You don’t have to explain it to me. I’m there with you. We just have to find a way to win her over.”
Something about Piper is different.
This primal, needy urge to claim her runs through my veins, and my mouth waters every time I recall her scent.
If Poe doesn’t see it, I’ll make him see it.
She’s the one for us.
7
PIPER
Blair and Maritake care of the cat traps that we set at the packhouse.
I don’t go back.
“They say hi, by the way,” Blair says, two days after we made the emergency visit to the packhouse.
After Poe called the catspests.
I grunt in reply, brushing Alma, a cream and orange female cat that we took in two months ago. She purrs and slow blinks at me from her perch on the cat tower, and I give her a smile in reply.
Pests! Howdarehe?
“Maddox and Avery are sweet,” Blair says conversationally, clipping an angry Mister Whisker’s nails. She wears thick gloves to avoid any scratches, and despite the feline’s foul temper, Blair remains relatively unscathed. “They seem genuinely interested in learning to trap for us.”
