Kathy Love - My Sister Is A Werewolf

“So this is the long-lost sister, eh?”

Elizabeth glanced toward the gravelly voice that sounded behind Christian. Even though she’d only been to Christian’s-or rather his mate, Jolee’s-bar once or twice since moving here, she recognized the speaker. An old, thin man with a bushy beard and watchful eyes. On the same bar stool where she’d seen him last with a mug of beer in front of him and a cigarette hanging from his lips.

“ Elizabeth, you remember-” Christian started, but the old man cut him off.

“Just call me Trader Vic.”

Elizabeth frowned at the amused look on the old man’s wizened face, then realized the joke. So this old coot knew the truth about her. Given that, she supposed it was hard to pass up a good Warren Zevon joke. “Werewolves of London ” was like a national anthem for her kind.

She expected to be irritated that this stranger, this mortal, knew what she was, but something in the old man’s eyes reassured her that her secret was safe with him.

“Hey, Vic. So I guess you know that I’m not Little Red Riding Hood?”

The older man chuckled, then reached for his beer.

Christian cast a puzzled look between the two, then shook his head. “Okay. Introductions have been made-I think. Take a seat here,” he gestured to the stool beside the old man’s, “and let me get you a drink.”

Elizabeth nodded, placing her helmet on the floor next to her seat. Damn, she needed a drink. She started to ask Christian for a whiskey, straight up, then stopped.

What would her brother think of that? The baby sister who’d never had more than a few sips of watered-down punch, asking for a shot of hard liquor.

“I’ll, um, take a light beer-whatever kind you have.” That was an acceptable compromise, wasn’t it?

“Sure.” Christian seemed fine with it as he reached for a mug.

Vic leaned toward her, his wise eyes twinkling. “That wasn’t what you wanted, was it?”

Elizabeth shook her head and smiled slightly, already feeling camaraderie with the old man.

“Elizabeth,” called Jolee as she came down from the back of the bar. The sound of her full name on someone’s lips other than her brother’s gave Elizabeth pause.

She was used to thinking of herself as Elizabeth-somehow she’d always managed that. And Christian calling her Elizabeth was just natural. But everyone else, for years and years, had called her Lizzie. Somehow that nickname had been easier, as if Elizabeth had died with her family and Lizzie had been born. But now, people wanted Elizabeth back. She was just afraid that person was gone.

She cast her thoughts aside and forced a smile at the tall, beautiful redhead. This woman was now her family, too. Another wave of guilt and anxiety coursed through her, making her shift on her bar stool. Jolee probably knew all about her. Or rather all about the “other” Elizabeth. Another person who expected her to be someone she no longer was.

“How are you?” Jolee asked, her slow, drawling accent and her wide, warm smile making it impossible to believe she was a vampire.

Elizabeth supposed a vampire with warm southern charm was as appropriate as one with aristocratic, European charm, making her brother and Jolee a well-suited match. Charm being the operative word to describe most vampires. Charm wasn’t a word applied to werewolves. At least, not the ones she knew.

She refocused on her sister-in-law’s question. “I’m fine,” Elizabeth said automatically.

She was so far from fine, but that would require her to reveal just how far away she was from the Elizabeth of the past.

“Is the house working out?”

Elizabeth nodded, a small but real smile touching her lips. “Yes, I love it there.” She really did, even if she had been edgy and tense since moving there. “West Virginia is beautiful.”

Jolee grinned back, and again the room seemed to fill with warmth. It was little wonder why Christian served beer in this backwater bar. Elizabeth suspected he’d do anything Jolee wanted-just for that smile alone.

“If Jolee had her way, she’d get our whole family moved to this godforsaken place,” Christian said, joining them and placing the pale beer in front of Elizabeth. Then he squeezed Jolee affectionately to temper his words. She elbowed him, but grinned at his teasing.

“Can you picture Sebastian ever leaving the city?” Jolee laughed. “That brother of y’all’s is far too in love with the perks of urban living to come here. But Rhys… ” She cocked an eyebrow like the idea of getting Rhys and his wife, Jane, to West Virginia might hold merit.

“You can work on them, then maybe Sebastian and Mina will follow.” Christian leaned in to kiss his mate’s cheek, more respect and love in his ribbing than teasing.

Elizabeth watched them, a pang of envy flitting through her. What was it like to have a relationship like that? But the notion was almost instantly ripped from her mind, replaced by an overwhelming swell of pure need. Sharp and breath-stealing. Just like the one she’d experienced in her barn earlier. What on earth was happening to her?

She pulled in a breath slowly through her nose, focusing on the bottles lining the wall behind the bar. Clear bottles, green bottles, brown bottles, a few blue, too. She tried to focus on anything but the attraction between her brother and his mate. And this raging need whirling through her.

“So is your research going well?” Christian asked, not seeming to notice her agitation. That had to be good, right? She wasn’t totally out of control.

Christian frowned, however, when she didn’t answer. “Elizabeth? Your research?”

She pulled in one more calming breath. “Umm, yeah, it’s going fine.” Everything was fine. Keep saying that and maybe it would be so.

“Are you any closer, do you think?”

Elizabeth nodded again, then took a long swallow of her beer to hide her frustration with this uncontrollable agitation inside her. The golden liquid tasted bitter, but didn’t have the bite she was craving.

Her family, her research, even her drink-nothing seemed to be satisfying as it should. Nothing reduced the feelings inside her. The strange restlessness that kept battering at her, wearing her down.

“Oh,” Jolee said, glancing back to the booth where all her sound equipment was arranged. “This song is nearly done. Please excuse me.”

She rushed back down the bar toward the karaoke system and the small stage where a woman stood at a microphone. The woman’s eyes were moving from left to right as she followed words on a large teleprompter-half-reading, half-singing them-off-key and a little behind the music.

Elizabeth twisted on her seat, surprised that she hadn’t even registered the singer. Now that the singing had penetrated her stressed brain, it was pretty darned hard to miss.

“And that was ‘Love Is Like a Butterfly,’” Jolee announced in an impressed voice, as if she’d found the off-key rendition very enjoyable. Further proof that her sister-in-law really was a kind, kind vampire.

“Now, here is,” Jolee glanced at the square of paper she held, “Jill Lewis-”

A cry of embarrassment came from a table near the stage. Elizabeth spotted the indignant woman seated with a man, who she glared at, and another couple. She continued to frown at the man as she waved her hands adamantly in the universal sign of “no.” But the signal didn’t work-the others at the table cajoled her to take the stage.

“Here we go again,” Christian said, drawing Elizabeth’s attention to him for just a moment. But before she could ask what he meant, she found herself turning back to watch the escapade.

For a second, she felt sympathy for the poor woman, who still adamantly declined to take the stage. She obviously didn’t want to sing. But then the woman stood. Maybe she would get up there after all.