Alison Paige - Little Red and the Wolf

“Bah! Never mind that. Fieldtrip. The hospital has the best pound cake on Thursday nights.”

“Gran-”

“How’d it happen? Why? Did he explain everything? The book says the first time’s the hardest.” Her eyes wide, back straight, Granny was the most lucid Maizie had seen her in years, and she didn’t have a clue what she was talking about. “It’ll hurt, y’know, the first time.”

“What will hurt? Explain about what?”

“About… Maizie, dear, where is he?”

“Who?”

“Gray Lupo, of course. You don’t know any other werewolves, do you?” Her tone made it clear she was joking, but when Maizie didn’t answer, Granny drew her own conclusions.

Voices in the hall pulled Maizie’s attention. Geez, why were they talking so loud? She could hear the nurse talking to Mr. Peterman in the hallway like they were both in the room. And who was pounding on the piano? Had they put a microphone inside the baby grand? Of course they’d need a microphone on the piano to be heard over the pots and pans being slammed around in the kitchen. God, why was it so noisy at Green Acres today? How could anyone think-

“So you’ve met the whole family then,” Granny said, adjusting the flowered quilt covering her from the waist down.

“What?” Maizie snapped her attention back to her grandmother.

“Gray’s family,” she said. “Joy’s a nice-enough lady and the twins are polite, but I can’t say I like that Lynn too much. Always trying to get into Gray’s drawers. He’s a widower, for heaven’s sake, and her brother-in-law.”

“You knew? About all of them? All this time?” Someone flushed a toilet, the sound of swishing water echoed through Maizie’s head.

“Why, yes, dear. So did you. I’ve told you about my beautiful silver wolf hundreds of times.” Her brow wrinkled, her voice taking on that careful tone people use with small children and the mentally unstable. “How did you think he got the violets in the vase and cleaned out the gutters?”

Someone yelled “bingo” and Maizie glanced around the room for the speaker. There was no one, though several people voiced their congratulations to Millie, whoever that was. “I…I thought you were…”

“One brick shy of a full load?”

“Yeah.” Although now she was wondering the same thing about herself. “I mean, I thought it was one of your spells.”

Maizie collapsed into the bedside chair, resisting the urge to cup her hands over her ears. What was happening? Pain twisted her stomach, made her cross her arms over her belly instead, holding tight. It was the first cramp since her shower, but it seemed to hurt twice as bad. She grimaced, rode the pain, waiting for it to subside.

“It’s starting already,” Granny said with a nod to Maizie’s belly.

“What?” Maizie squirmed in her seat. The pain dulled but still hadn’t completely gone.

“The change. The change is starting. Good gravy, he really didn’t explain anything?”

“Gran-”

“Well, dear, I’m sorry. But you shouldn’t have let him turn you without asking a few questions. You wouldn’t hop into bed without discovering the important things about a man first, would you?”

Important things like he blamed her for his wife’s death and that he was the very thing she’d spent her life despising? Apparently, I would .

“How did you know I’d been bitten?” A sly subject change. Maizie hoped Granny wouldn’t push her to admit all the careless things she’d done last night.

“I can see it in your eyes.” Granny leaned toward Maizie, staring at her eyes but not into them. “They have that wild look. Quick, larger pupils, like you see everything.”

Maizie wasn’t sure about that. At the moment she was too busy noticing how the dull pain in her stomach had spread to her legs and arms. Her muscles ached as though they’d been sorely overworked. And the racket of the nursing home was becoming damn near deafening.

“You smell like him too.”

“What?”

“You must have noticed it. It’s such a wonderful smell, like earth and trees and wind. I can smell that on you now. But that’s normal for werewolves.”

“Werewolves…” Maizie still couldn’t fully wrap her brain around it. “Gran, how do you know about all this?”

Granny opened the drawer of her nightstand and pulled out an old leather-backed book. She handed it to Maizie. “Gray gave it to me years ago when your grand-dad passed. He offered to take me into his pack. Tells you everything. I can’t believe he didn’t at least warn you about the first change.”

“It wasn’t Gray.”

“What? Then who? What happened?” Granny’s face paled.

“Don’t worry. I’m sure Gray took care of it. He took care of me. But then we got distracted.” He was too busy fucking her blind to tell her she’d been turned into a werewolf. “And then I just…I didn’t stick around.”

“Well, I can’t imagine what could possibly distract him from something so important. What…” Her cheeks flushed. “Oh. Yes, well… A highly amorous nature is normal too.”

“It tells you that in here?” Maizie read the cover. “ The Wolf Curse by Gervase of Tilbury, in the year of our Lord twelve-hundred and fourteen.”

“Some of it’s bullshit, of course.”

“Gran.” The woman hardly ever swore which made the rare occasions all the more surprising.

“They were afraid of their own shadows back then. And it’s not a curse. It’s a virus. You come down with the full-blown disease first, like chickenpox, before your body creates antibodies to control it. After that you can change back and forth at will. The rest of the book is fairly accurate, I’m told. Pack law, instinct, tradition. You should read it before things progress too far.”

“Great.” She felt like crap, achy, sick to her stomach, overwhelmed by all manner of noises, and now she had homework. Maizie shivered, her skin tingling. She checked her arm to make sure it only felt like ants crawling all over her. “I have to get home.”

“Yes, dear. I heartily agree. Read the book or find Gray. Your choice, Little Red.”

Something told her the time for choices had just run out.

Her body was trying to turn itself inside out…through her bellybutton.

Maizie snuggled tighter into a ball on the couch, tugging the blanket under her chin. The cottage was full of shadows, the sun nearly set. The temperature on the hummingbird thermometer suctioned to the window read eighty-two degrees, but Maizie was shivering so hard her teeth chattered.

This was worse than the time she’d caught the flu and had to be hospitalized for a day and a half while the worst of it passed. They’d been afraid she might die. What did that say about her chances now?

Another shard of pain tore through her abdomen, like a chainsaw slicing her from navel to neck. She screamed, but the sound was hoarse, the last half hour had ruined her voice. She should’ve called Gray. But what could he have done except watch? She’d already thrown up until there was nothing left inside her. No one needed to see that.

Her body convulsed, every muscle pulled tight then stretched apart. The blanket flew across the living room, falling behind the chair in the corner. Dear God, she was freezing, even as sweat dripped from her chin and nose. She couldn’t stop shivering and when another wave of pain raked through her body she found herself writhing on the floor.

Her hair was sopping wet, long strands clinging to her face, stuck to her neck and dripping little puddles on the floor. She pushed up, locked her elbows then rested there for a second trying to find a moment’s peace. Her body wouldn’t have it.