“Valerie, is there a human cub hiding in
this office?” Morgan Rosemont growled, standing in the doorway and glaring at
his secretary. There was a dusting of snow on his thick, dark hair and on the
broad shoulders of his wool overcoat.
A chill wind whipped past him. He stepped
inside, followed by his construction foreman and packmate, Arthur Handley, and
slammed the door shut with a bang.
Valerie looked up from her desk and batted
big, innocent eyes at her boss. The cold had made her thick, round glasses fog,
which ruined the effect a bit. “Whatever do you mean, Mr. Rosemont?”
He looked around impatiently. “You heard
me. A human cub. Somebody distracting you from working.”
She pulled her black sweater tighter
around her generous figure and maintained her wide-eyed expression of denial. “First
of all, I am not working right now because my lunch hour just started.
Secondly, we humans refer to cubs as ‘children’. And why would there be a child
in your office? I don’t have any children. Or any life whatsoever, but that’s a
different story,” Valerie said. “Anyway, you got some messages while you were
out, and I put them on your desk. Some of them look rather urgent. You should
go check.”
“Where is it?” Morgan demanded, stamping
the snow off his feet.
She met his gaze unblinkingly. “Where is
what?”
Morgan let out an angry, frustrated breath
and walked over to Valerie’s desk. He stared down at her, all six foot three
inches of him. “You know how I know you’re lying to me, Valerie?”
“You’re psychic?” Valerie suggested. She
knew he wasn’t, of course.
There were some strains of shifter that
were psychic. Thank God Morgan wasn’t one of them, because if he could read his
human secretary’s thoughts, she’d have been bounced out of the office on her
very well-padded rear long ago.
“I know because, number one, you’re
answering my questions with questions, and number two, I’m a wolf shifter. I
have an amazing sense of smell. You smell it, don’t you, Arthur?”
Arthur maintained an expression of polite
interest. “If you say so, sir.”
“Get that child-cub thing and remove it at
once,” Morgan said to Valerie. “This is an office, not a daycare.”
The coat closet door banged open, and a
small, dirty-faced child dashed out, ran over, and bit Morgan on the ankle.
“Valerie! What the hell?” Morgan yelled,
shaking his leg in an attempt to dislodge the child.
“Morgan! Watch your language! Don’t hurt
her!” Valerie ran over and knelt down next to them. “Teddy, come on.”
“Me
don’t hurt her? She’s the one who’s
biting me!”
“Oh, don’t be such a baby.” She pulled
Teddy off him and set her on her feet.
Teddy was eight, but small for her age,
and for a human she was awfully feral in her behavior – like her tendency to
bite when she was annoyed. She had long, uncombed, dirty-blonde hair, her face
was always grubby, and her clothes were faded and two sizes too big for her.
The hem of her moth-eaten wool overcoat brushed the floor.
She glared up at Morgan ferociously
through a curtain of filthy hair that covered her face.
“You’re a bad wolf,” she informed him.
“Valerie?” Morgan raised an eyebrow at
her, his ice-blue wolf’s eyes glimmering with annoyance.
“Her mother is at the mineral springs
today and she doesn’t have anyone to watch her,” Valerie said to Morgan.
The mineral springs had amazing healing
properties for humans with dementia and a number of other ailments. Before an
earthquake created the springs, the shifter town of Silver Peak, and the nearby
human town of Juniper, had been dwindling in population, with shuttered
businesses and empty stores. But since word about the springs had gotten out,
both towns were bursting at the seams with people desperate for their curative powers.
“And this is my problem why? I have a
business to run.”
“Fine,” she muttered. “You weren’t even
supposed to be here today. I thought you’d be on site until this evening.”
Morgan’s company, Rosemont Resorts, was
expanding its newly built resort hotel and spa, and also building luxury
condominiums, due to overwhelming demand. Morgan was planning on working right
up through Christmas Eve. Just bubbling over with Christmas spirit, he was.
Before Morgan could answer, the front door
banged open again, letting in more wind and snow. She breathed a sigh of relief
as two of her friends barreled in and quickly shut the door behind them. They’d
help her with Teddy.
“Hey, Valerie! Who’s your little friend?”
It was Eileen, a wolf shifter friend of Valerie’s. She was accompanied by their
friend Erika, who belonged to the same pack as Eileen.
The little girl looked at the women, then
looked at Morgan with a scowl. “I’m Teddy, and he’s the Big Bad Wolf,” she said
of Morgan.
“And don’t you forget it,” Morgan said,
returning the scowl with one of his own.
The girl walked over to Eileen and Erika
and looked up at them. “You’re a wolf, and you’re a wolf.” She jabbed a dirty
little finger at both of them. “And I’m a human. Are you in a pack? Did you
know that some wolves can’t turn into people? Where do those wolves live? Where
do you live?” The fact that she was firing off a volley of questions at them
meant she liked them. It was preferable to her alternative mode of
communication – ankle-biting.
“Erika, I need a favor,” Valerie said. “Can
you take Teddy here back to Juniper? She’s staying in the shanty town at 372
Winthrop Drive. Her mother is at the mineral springs, and she’ll be back around
five. There should be some church volunteers at the rec center there today who
can watch her until her mother gets home. If not…” Valerie’s face puckered in
concern, and she glanced at Morgan, who shook his head decisively.
“Motherffff…” Erika glared after Morgan,
then glanced at Teddy and stopped herself. “Mother of pearl is my favorite
jewelry,” she finished. “I got this,” she said to Valerie. “Hey, Teddy, want to
go to the town square, make a snow-fort and throw snowballs at people?”
“Erika!” Valerie protested, scandalized.
“What?” Erika flashed a wicked grin. “Basic
self-defense skills should be learned at a young age. We can also practice
making swords out of icicles.”
“No swords!” Valerie said.
“Okay, icicle spears. We’ll go to the
coffee shop and get some hot chocolate first,” Erika said to Teddy. “We need
fuel if we’re going to go start a frozen-water war.” Erika was a tomboy and an
infamous mischief-maker. Great. So Valerie’s choices were leaving the child by
herself, sending her off to stab someone, or…well, those were her choices
today.
Erika led the happy child out, and Eileen
sat on Valerie’s desk. “Other than the fact that your boss is an ass-face, isn’t
it a beautiful day?” she said, gesturing at the window, which faced Main
Street.
It was December 10th, and the village of
Silver Peak, Montana, was a winter wonderland.
Freshly fallen snow blanketed the streets
and parked cars and fire hydrants in sparkling white. Christmas garlands twined
around the lamp posts, and every store window was framed with twinkling red-and-green
lights. A pack of Christmas carolers was strolling through the streets,
singing. They were led by their parents. Several of them were in cub form,
trotting through the snow wagging their tails and wearing wreaths as collars.
They howled in tune to the singing.
“Breathtaking,” Valerie said.
“Stunning.” Eileen nodded contentedly.
“I really hate Christmas,” Morgan growled.
He looked at the carolers. “It’s one p.m.
Don’t they have somewhere to be? Why are they walking around singing like that?”
Eileen and Valerie exchanged amused looks
with each other, and Eileen stifled a snicker behind her hand.
“What?” Morgan snapped.
“I, for one, am shocked,” Eileen said. “I
mean you could knock me over with a feather. A season that’s all about
togetherness and happiness and love, and you hate it?”
Morgan stared at her. “You don’t work here
anymore. And yet you’re here.” He glanced over at Arthur. “She’s still here.”
“Yep, she is.” Arthur, a tall, lean wolf
shifter in his fifties, nodded placidly. His method of getting along with
Morgan was to agree with whatever Morgan said without really paying much
attention to it.
