Page 36 of The Sacred Wolf

“She’s a queen werewolf,” Evan corrected, and I wanted to slither into a crack in the pavement and come back as a weed. “She owns the Bronx. Sort of. Soon?”

“To be determined,” I muttered, suddenly feeling exposed on the street. “Let’s go inside. I don’t want to be seen.”

“Those pants say otherwise,” Jayla quipped, playfully checking out my ass as I hurried toward the front doors, struggling to pull the keys out of the too-tight pocket and proving her point.

“Mmmm, you should see our shiftskins,” Evan boasted, and from her shocked gasp, I knew that idiot had pulled up his shirt right there on the sidewalk.

“Inside, now!” I ordered, wrenching open the heavy door.

“That’s her Alpha voice,” Evan whispered behind his hand to Jayla. “She’s actually really bossy, it turns out.”

They sauntered past me, giggling, and it felt like someone had switched the pilot light in my heart back on. Warmth flooded my whole body, and I started to follow them inside, but a gentle breeze caught my hair and stopped me in my tracks. It was silly, it was spring in New York, and it was often breezy, but… I held the door open a moment longer and whispered, “After you, Charlie.”

Once the guards from the front of the car were posted up at the doors, Jayla stood by and silently judged me while I raided the fully stocked concession stand while Evan made his way upstairs to use his tech genius to set up the projector to play whatever DVD Jayla had smuggled in her pouch like a kangaroo. By the time I had prepped the popcorn, Eva had figured out, and he slung his arms around both our shoulders and guided us into the theater.

“You know, I was thinking upstairs,” Evan said, “And we actually kind of can see things with our noses. Not like visions, more like… help me out here, Elyse?”

“Reading people?” I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess so. We can know stuff that isn’t visually obvious, like a rough idea of how someone’s feeling or—”

“Whether or not they’ve mated.” Evan beamed. This was clearly what he’d been waiting for. “And get this? Elyse’s boyfriend—”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I growled as I slid into a row of seats a little more than halfway to the screen.

“Mmmm, he kind of is,” Evan said. “Anyways, he’s a virgin!”

Gods, he was putting on a show for Jayla tonight. I dropped into a seat and shoved the first fistful of popcorn into my smiling face. He would get a pass this time, just to smooth the gap between old times and new.

“No way!” Jayla gaped at me. “That guy? How?”

“He’s very old-fashioned,” I mumbled.

“So, you gonna de-flower him?” Jayla sank into the seat next to me.

“No. We’re over.” I bit my buttery lip. “I don’t think I’m going back.”

“Whoa! What?!” Evan leaned over Jayla’s lap to search my face. “What the hell are you talking about? Where would we go? The Bronx?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe out west? I just can’t anymore.”

“Pshhh!” Evan made a face. “If this is about him being jealous of me, you don’t need to worry about it. I can handle him. I would love to handle him.” Evan stopped, mid-lascivious grin. “Hang on a second. Elyse… do you think… Okay, hear me out, but do you think Sebastian is smelling what he does to me. Sorry, I’m only human, well, no, I’m not, and neither is he, so…”

“He smells you being horny and thinks it’s over me.” I stared at him, going back over all the times Sebastian had behaved the worst in the last month. Always when Evan was around. I thought he was just being a gross Alpha male, but the real him was so damn earnest…

“Could that really be it?” Evan said, his mouth quirking up. “Maybe he’s never sensed another male reacting, ah, positively, to his physical gifts? Though I find that a little hard to believe. My gaydar is popping up in there.”

The conversation came to an abrupt end as the screech of an old modem hooking up to the internet filled the theater, followed by Harry Nilsson’s “The Puppy Song” taking us on a digital tour of New York City. The whole thing felt wholly appropriate.

Kind of sacred, actually.

“You guys…” My eyes filled with tears.

“It seemed right,” Jayla said, her eyes shining too. “To honor her.”

I nodded, unable to speak. You’ve Got Mail wasn’t just Charlie’s favorite. It was the reason she’d moved to New York. Evan reached an arm around both of us, squeezing us as tight as the armrests of our seats would allow.We were sitting all out of order from how we used to, but that was alright. Charlie didn’t need us to save her a seat. She was everywhere now. In everything I would ever see.

I settled in to watch, sharing popcorn and Twizzlers with Evan over Jayla’s lap. I waggled one of the red strings at Jayla, who was eating the blanched almonds she’d brought with a look of undying patience plastered on her face. I teased her loudly—for Charlie—that it was illegal to bring outside food to my theater, which resulted in her throwing an almond directly into my mouth. I coughed and spit it out. Blasphemy!

As I dissolved into the familiarity of the story, of internet-crossed lovers who could only be themselves behind the screen, it started to feel like Charlie was really there, lecturing me about my currently unhealthy yet potentially epic romance.

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