Moon Chilled (4 page)

The back door closed and I shook my head, getting my mind out of the hunting space it had drifted into. I was not hunting. I was working with my hands, like a human. The reminder helped get my wolf under control as well. The thought of hunting had reminded her that there were horses nearby. They were trapped and fat from a heavy winter feeding. They'd make an easy meal, my wolf was trying to say as she sent me the suggestion to hunt them, even though it was a lazy thought that I doubted she really meant. Prey was still prey and the easier it was to bring down, the more my wolf was interested. Especially when she knew that these horses didn’t belong on her mountain. There were wild horses somewhere in Colorado but they weren’t here and these horses weren’t Mustangs. My wolf wanted them gone. I didn't bother trying to convince her otherwise. I simply ignored her. She knew my stance on eating horses when there was canned food available back at the cabin.

With him back in his house and surrounded by his family, I made my way into the barn. There was a metal gate that I had to go through since the barn didn't have an actual door. Before I got started, I took off my jacket. The lack of doors on either end of the barn created a tunnel for the wind to whip through and blast against me and the few horses that were brave enough to risk coming closer in order to find shelter under the edge of the roof off the barn. I breathed a sigh of relief as I took the jacket off and left it hanging on top of a saddle resting on a long wooden peg just inside the entrance of the barn.

I ignored the wind as it picked up outside, howling through the pine trees and young Aspens as I picked up the closest long board, lifted it easily, and began hammering it into the open space on the wall. It wasn't hard work at all, and I wondered why the man needed help as I moved onto the next board in the pile at my feet. Maybe the slight hitch my wolf had noticed in his step as he'd walked away had something to do with it. Either way, it wasn't my businesses why he needed someone to do this for him. I was simply grateful to be given the chance, and I was there strictly to work and get some money for rent. Stealing would have been preferred, but I couldn't exactly steal the cabin for the next month, and to do so would be far too risky. And in the quiet of this work, my wolf relaxed her restless pacing and settled into the back of my mind, seeming content with my usefulness—for a while, at least.

Chapter Three

Maiki

I woke up with sweat beaded on my forehead and the last tendrils of a nightmare snaking through my brain. I rolled over, wishing I was still asleep but knowing that if I closed my eyes again, the dream would be there waiting for me. Only it wasn't a dream. I'm a seer, and I know the difference between the nightmares of my past and the ones that have yet to come true. When I was a child, I'd wished to be able to see my own death, just so that I could know what age I would be when it happened. Then I could have looked forward to that year, counted down to it and celebrated its coming as a way to escape this madness. But my dreams didn't work like that, and I had someone else to live for now, to take care of. Someone that needed me just as much as I did him.

Deciding to get up, I pulled the thin crocheted blanket off me and rose to my feet at the side of the little twin bed I'd had since I was five. It hadn't been new then, and the years since hadn't been kind to it. But it served its purpose as well as anything else, I suppose. A picture caught my eye as I brushed my short blonde hair away from my face. Two little girls smiled back at me, both looking happy in that one perfect moment. Shae and another girl that looked like a younger, better version of me. But I hadn't been that other girl in over ten years.

I went out of my room and into the tiny bathroom across the hall to get ready. There wasn't much hot water left for a shower, but by now I was used to that. I got up later than everyone else, no matter how much I tried not to. I just wasn't a morning person, I guess.

A quick shower, a minute or two to brush my teeth, and I was back in my room to put something on. I had no idea what, though, and my lack of choices had nothing to do with the laundry not being done. I did it daily. No, my mediocre closest was a result of not being given a new outfit in more than three years. I pulled down a yellow dress and quickly slipped it on over my head. No one would care that I didn't have a bra on. It's not like I really have breasts anyway. The dress had been patched in a few places, but it fell past my knees and was one of the more modest things I owned.

I could smell the snow outside, the fresh blanket calling me to come out and play, but if I did, the dress wouldn't be any good for staying warm. But I was to stay inside most of the time and knew I wouldn't be let out unless the situation called for it. Which it rarely did. I brushed my hair quickly and hoped I looked like I'd gotten more sleep than I actually had. After that I left my room and walking down a few doors in the farmhouse's upstairs hallway with its peeling paint and creaking floors. It was larger than most like it, I supposed, since it had nearly five bedrooms, all of which were filled by my alpha and his favorite men. That I'd been good enough to deserve my own room had been a surprise. I figured that I owed that special treatment to the little boy who lay sleeping behind the door I knocked on.

I could hear his snores and let myself in, eager to see him and get him ready for the day. People were downstairs and knew I'd be needed soon.
Just a few more minutes
, I silently asked whoever might be listening. A little more time to start my day, to pretend things were good, that we were a normal little family. Instead of whatever it was that we'd become.

Gavin was stretched out on his own little twin bed. He'd been graduated to it only the month before, and compared to the toddler bed he'd been sleeping in this one looked as if it nearly swallowed him whole. I knelt on the bed beside him, his face only inches from mine. He was my perfect little boy, the son I hadn't expected to ever want. I didn't let that stray thought stay in my head long, as I knew of the kind of heartbreak it could bring to me if I let it fester. Instead I kissed his cheek, waking him up, and brushed his pale blond hair away from his head.

"Hey, sleepy," I said to him as soon as his eyes were open.

"Not yet, Mommy," he grumbled, trying to turn away from me. I wished that I could let him sleep, that he could have a few minutes simply just to enjoy himself. But that wasn't to be. We had things to do, he and I, and staying in bed wasn't one of them. And so I scooped him up, despite his protests, and set him down on his feet on the floor in front of me.

"C'mon." I took his hand and took him into the bathroom. His routine was easy, but getting him to brush his teeth wasn't a chore either of us enjoyed. Still, we managed to get it done without having the toothpaste squirt over either one of us in the struggle, and so I counted that as a win.

I took him downstairs and did my best to avoid being stepped on or run over by the much bigger men that were already filling the small kitchen. There wasn't a chair left for Gavin, so I lifted him onto the countertop, the design of which reminded me of the fifties, but not in a good way. It had none of the retro charm I saw in the magazines I snuck sometimes from other members of the pack. It just looked old and really worn down. I pulled a juice box out of the fridge for Gavin before getting started on the breakfast orders for the people I was responsible for feeding.

It wasn't everyone, I wasn't running a cafeteria, after all, but there were plenty of people to feed anyway. Soon I had a handful of skillets out, each on a burner as I scrambled eggs and cooked up bacon. I never really noticed it as a child, but now that I was cooking for them, I had to say that werewolves ate far more than their bodies should have been able to. I didn't know where all that food went; I just went with it, pulling out another dozen eggs when the first were gone. I just cooked for them, didn't ask questions, and was glad someone had remembered to go get the eggs from the chickens in the side yard this morning. That was not one of my jobs, even though it could have been and was in the past. Taking care of Gavin had replaced many of my responsibilities in the pack. I guess I was lucky to have given birth to a son.

The first row of plates was placed on the table, and I waited for the next batch of food to cook. Gavin was done with his juice box so I gave him a bag of peeled oranges I'd tried to get him to eat yesterday. He would have rather had the cookies I made last night, but that wasn't going to happen until after lunch at the earliest. He had a sweet tooth as bad as mine.

I heard voices coming through the back door as men entered the house. I didn't need to look up at them to know who they were. My nose told me all of that. I dropped my gaze and stepped back, allowing my alpha and his closest men through. They came into the kitchen, and I backed into the nearest corner, staying out of their way but close enough if needed. My alpha was with them, and I ducked my head, averting my eyes for him most of all.

They smelled of the wind and mountain snow, and something else, something I dared not put a name to so early in the day. I avoided them and tried not to let their casual brushes against what little exposed skin I had bother me. They were in charge and could do as they wished, with or without my consent.

"Hello, boy," my alpha said, going to my son and patting him on his shoulder. He wasn't affectionate with him, not as I thought a father should be. But then again, he'd never actually wanted a child, and if Gavin had been born female, I didn't know ... That was not a thought for today, and I quickly put it away in favor of something lighter, something much more fitting for this chilly morning. The sun was out, and its glare against the bright white snow made me blink before I turned away from the window where the curtains had been pulled back to allow in the light. The mountain was beautiful, the snow a welcome reminder of the season. And I had my son. That there was a space missing in my heart didn't matter. Nothing could fill that hole, but thinking about it did no one any good, especially when her name wasn't to be mentioned in this pack.

"Sir?" I spoke up, knowing that I needed to tell my alpha about my dreams as soon as I saw him in the mornings, no matter what else he was doing. That was his rule. And I might not get another chance to do so. He often went hunting in the afternoons or was otherwise engaged. I didn't look up, but I didn't have to in order to know he was against the back wall. Years of living with them had given me decent spatial recognition as a matter of survival. I had to get his attention, but he wasn't looking at me. He was talking with one of his men in front of the fridge. I knew him, knew his smell and too much else about him as well. I did not go toward him. But I needed my alpha to notice me. I touched his elbow, the barest touch possible, before pulling back.

"Yes?" he demanded, his voice stern, bringing the noise in the kitchen to a halt around us. No one moved when he spoke. But it wasn't out of respect. The people in my pack feared him, and I knew first-hand that it was with good reason. While women and children were far more often the focus of his attention, men hardly went without a scratch in our little pack.

With his attention turned to me, I went to my knees in the kitchen. Not because he'd demanded it or because he'd even said anything to me that would suggest it. Not yet, anyway. But because the strength of my alpha's attention on me made it impossible for me to do anything else.

I pulled my shoulders down and in and hugged my arms against my stomach. Talking to him always made me feel a bit queasy. "I had a dream last night," I said, trying to get my voice to be louder, but it didn't work.

He made an irritated noise in his throat. "A what?"

I curled my hands against the edge of the counter, needing its strength to keep my balance, even on my knees. "A dream." My free hand went to my knee, and my fingers disappeared under the hem of the dress I wore. "I had a dream last night." I whispered the words, half-afraid to voice them. More than half, if I were being honest with myself. Which, I realized with no small amount of disgust, I hadn't been all that much lately. Some things were simply too hard to do and I, the weakest member of our pack, knew that better than most.

"Tell me about this dream you had, seer," he said, his voice soft, coaxing me into a deceptive calm. I knew better than to believe him, but I knew even more that fighting him would end up being worse for me. And though I wasn't sure how much Gavin knew, I was sure he'd never seen what our alpha was capable of. Not first-hand, at the very least. I was sure of that.

I didn't want to tell him, and I lowered my head even further toward the cracked and peeling linoleum floor to get away from the whispered command in his seemingly innocent words. I knew not telling him would make him mad, but the dream would upset him more. I didn't know what to do. Shae would have, had she been here, but I wasn't Shae and I didn't have the answers. My hair, short and blonde, fell into my eyes to brush against the floor. I was momentarily distracted by how brittle it was, how frail the dull yellow strands were, before I felt the floor below my fingertips vibrate as he stepped forward, his heavy boots carrying him toward me. I held still, knowing that if I shrank away when he was this close and could see me doing so that it would mean trouble for me. And my back had only just finished healing from my last punishment when I'd washed a dry clean-only dress belonging to one of the girls in the pack.

But I also didn't just want to sit there, to welcome his touch even while I secretly reviled it. But inaction was the same as allowing it. Or so I'd always thought. I didn't want him that close to me, and the thought of being touched by him made me want to spill what little breakfast I'd been able to manage up until then onto the floor. It was hard enough being in the same room, the same house, as him, and having him this close was nearly unbearable.

His smell, his touch; they brought back memories that I didn't want to remember. Things I'd been trying to block away since I was a child. But they were too many to count, and his proximity made them come close to the surface, back to where they could be seen again, to be relived in a way I never wanted to again. I'd barely survived them once—I couldn't do it again. I didn't have the strength to weather them a second time around. There was a distant rumble in the back of my mind, something wanting to be remembered but too long ignored and forgotten to bring back so easily. My nightmare memories took energy and time I didn't have to spare, and so I fought them even as I saw him reach toward me, his old, withered fingertips like claws coming at me.