Lori Handeland - Marked by the Moon

Julian frowned. Alana had needed help to adjust; she hadn’t quite fit in. They’d fallen in love while Julian instructed the shy, sweet young woman in the ways of the werewolf world.

He pulled his attention from the past into the present where his people stood naked in the dawn’s hazy light. No one cared. They were pack. They had nothing whatsoever to hide.

“I told you to shift,” he murmured. “If you’d have listened, you could have grabbed some clothes before I called them.”

“I’ll shift when I want to,” she said. “Or when I have to. Not when you tell me to.”

He’d been right about her defying him. And about his enjoying it.

“Besides,” she continued. “They don’t have clothes; you don’t have clothes. Why should I have clothes?”

“Frostbite?”

“I’ll heal frostbite easier than I healed—” She glanced at her ribs. The bruises and the scratches were gone. She met his eyes and shrugged.

His people began to shuffle impatiently. The initial change left them warm enough to withstand the extreme cold. But the longer they were human, the more human they were, and while frostbite could be healed, it would have to wait until the moon rose to do so completely. A day of frostbite on tender extremities would not be a day full of sunshine.

“Everyone welcome Alexandra Trevalyn,” he said. “Alex. She is one of us.”

He felt her swift glance. Had she thought he would reveal her past? If his pack knew she was the hunter who had killed his wife, they would kill her.

If he’d wanted her dead, he would have ended her himself. Before he’d made her a werewolf.

Everyone moved closer, welcoming her. Pack members were touchy-feely, and that made Alex uncomfortable. Julian crossed his arms over his chest and watched as she tried not to squirm.

A sudden insight stunned him. He had not planned to bring her here. Therefore, he had not brought along the serum that would allow her to touch anyone but him in human form. Which meant she should now be writhing on the ground in agony along with everyone who had touched her.

“Enough,” he barked.

His people turned to him in surprise. Welcoming a new pack member meant getting to know their scent, their touch, and letting the new member get to know yours. They believed Alex had taken her medicine, as they all had. So why was he stopping them?

Since he couldn’t tell them that something very strange was going on, he chose to tell them nothing.

“Ella.” Julian addressed the oldest female in the pack —a dark, thin Frenchwoman who appeared the same age as Alex but in truth had narrowly escaped the guillotine during la révolution . “See that she gets settled.”

Ella moved forward, hand outstretched. Alex frowned, staring at Ella’s palm as if she had no idea what the woman wanted. She wasn’t afraid; she must have come to the conclusion that since she could touch Julian, she could touch everyone.

Alex backed up a few steps. “I’ll—uh—be right back.” She moved out of the crowd and came to Julian. “Where will I stay?”

“With Ella.”

“But I—” She broke off, biting her lip. “I just met her.”

“You just met everyone.”

“Not you.”

Julian blinked. “You want to stay with me?”

“I don’t want to,” she said at the same time he said, “That wouldn’t be smart.”

“Because of yesterday?” she asked.

The instant the words left her mouth, Julian remembered the taste of that mouth, the feel of it on his body, the scent of her all around him, and his penis leaped.

“Faen,” he muttered. Shit! He was naked. If he got a hard-on now—

He didn’t want to think about that. In fact, he’d better not think about it or he’d definitely get one.

Her eyebrows lifted, and her lips twitched as if she knew his every thought. “What if I promise not to jump you?”

“You’re admitting that you did jump me?”

“No.”

Her defiance caused amusement to flicker, quickly followed by annoyance at both his reaction and the sight of her face. How could he be both attracted and repelled by her every minute of every day? He wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her, at the same time he wanted to throw her down on the ground and take her.

“Ella,” Julian snapped, and strode away without bothering to reiterate his orders. It was a sign of weakness to repeat himself, and Julian could not afford to be weak.

Just because he was their leader, and had been for close to a century, did not mean a wolf wouldn’t challenge him if given the opportunity. Julian had managed to keep the peace because he was the strongest, the biggest, the baddest when he chose to be. No one dared question him.

Except Alex.

He sighed, wondering if he might have to kill her after all.

Following a long, hot shower where Julian both warmed his chilled skin and jacked off to ascertain he would not have any surprise erections later that day, Julian dressed, then checked his messages.

Between traveling, locating Alex, following her, and setting up his plan, he’d been away over a week. He had a lot to deal with. Julian was not only the mayor of what had come to be known as Barlowsville—a joke at first, but the name stuck—he was also the chief of police, the judge, and, when necessary, the executioner.

The latter was rare. For the most part they lived in harmony. But when dealing with nearly two hundred werewolves…well, shit happened.

Thankfully none of the messages awaiting him spoke of misbehavior so severe that capital punishment would be necessary. Just the usual minutiae of village life— boundary disputes, nonpayment for services or goods —and the minutiae of werewolf existence—the snatching of a rabbit from someone’s very jaws, the taking of more than one’s share of a larger kill—elk, deer, moose.

He put aside his duties until later. He had one duty he must attend to first.

His house, a two-story log cabin at the farthest edge of the village, backed a squat, white edifice that blended into the landscape during the majority of the year when snow covered the land.

Presently the snow reached Julian’s knees, but the distance between the rear of Julian’s house and the rear of the building was only a few hundred feet and wasn’t that difficult to traverse, especially for someone with the strength of ten.

Inside, the air was cool—though not unpleasantly so. Silence reigned, broken every so often by the click of electricity or the whisper of the wind through the eaves.

“Cade?” Julian called, but no one answered.

Typical. His brother often became engrossed in his work to the detriment of all else. If it weren’t for the full moon that forced the issue, Julian thought Cade might forget to shape-shift altogether.

Julian walked through the silent halls, ducked his head into Cade’s empty living quarters, then followed his nose to the laboratory where he found his brother boiling what smelled like death over a tiny blue flame. For a few minutes Julian just watched him.

As a Viking, Cade had been a bust. Without Julian to protect him, he would have died long before that fateful day in Scotland.

Cade was a gentle soul, a healer by trade. He’d been indispensable when they’d gone a Viking, his knowledge of the human body and the herbs and potions necessary to mend it vast.

Whenever they’d invaded a new country, Cade spent his time talking to the local healers, gathering knowledge from every corner of the earth. He fought, but not eagerly or well, which meant Julian always fought at his side.

Except for that one time.

“Hey,” Julian murmured, and Cade looked up, blue eyes widening when he discovered his brother in the room.