Thomas watched Asia as she made her way about the room as people gathered for their meeting. This was a tradition of having a gathering before and after a run like this. Humans would have barbecues and wolves had nighttime runs. Of course, there would be food and drink afterward. But right now it was seeing who was there and catching up on resent events. Who’d mated and was planning a ceremony? New pups and pregnancies. Job changes and all the other things life threw at people. Not that this pack wasn’t close and most already knew about these events. No, this was a chance for gossip and politics to play a part within the community and families of the pack. Old habits died hard. These gatherings were created because once upon a time the pack lived separately and could only find the time to come together a few times in a month. Now, for safety, they lived more closely together. Times change, but traditions were enduring. Thomas was about to stand up and tell t

Emily was getting large now. She couldn’t believe it, this she’d lost hope of ever experiencing. Sometimes she’d wake up and think it was all a lie. Now she could assure herself that it wasn’t. Someone was moving inside her. It was frightening and thrilling. Going in for a checkup was still, and she secretly feared bad news at any moment. But there’d been none, just morning sickness, swollen ankles, weight gain, among other surprising things. James was a madman trying to get everything just right for their pups. Emily missed being able to shift and go for a run. It made her moody and frustrated more often than not. Now with the pups due any day, she stood in the nursery and realized, things must happen faster. James was right to panic. What would they do if there were no cribs after the pups arrived?James kept telling her that everything would work out. But she’d kept so many worries to herself that she wasn’t sure any longer what was a real problem and what wasn’t.

“Well, that talk went badly.” Haden entered the bedroom and put his phone to charge. His features reflected his stormy mood. “What? What? What? Sorry, I was trying to work on these numbers. Who were you talking to, and how did it go badly?” Janine lay on the sofa with her feet up and a laptop on her lap. She was frowning at the screen when Haden stomped in and made his announcement. “I did as you asked me to do. I called my daughter again and told her what was going to happen after I called my Beta to set up going there to hand the pack off to Micheal is it my fault? She didn’t mate with him, but with a human? She’s not stupid. She knows a human can’t run a pack. That’s like asking a house cat to lead a pack of wild dogs. It just wouldn’t work.” Haden came to stand near Janine’s shoulders and frowned at the screen as if his expression would intimidate the numbers into righting themselves. “Check the fourth column again. I think you’ll find the error there. I

Eva couldn’t believe she was preparing for the night they’d mate. It was all going to be permanent, forever, until death. Penny was at a pup event for the night. She’d have fun and not miss them because there’d be so many others there. She was too young for the finer details of what was about to happen. They would make love and in the heat of their passion, as its pinnacle, they would bite each other. Forming the permanent bond. It was a marvel how their pheromones worked. The fae added them to ensure their army would always have fresh troops. The bite was part of the wild nature and ferociousness the fae wanted in their foot soldiers. If she’d been taught the truth, the fae used wolf shifters as little more than those who would be the incidental deaths of war. They were the troops to sacrifice for the sake of fighting for an imaginary slight to their ever shifting and complicated honour system. The fae didn’t die like a human or wolf shifter. They didn’t feel like t

“You seriously want all this pomp and spectacle for two ceremonies? And what’s this about a gathering to get to know one another? How much is the travel alone going to cost? Asia, had you really thought about this? How is the pack going to afford this? Thomas’ pack isn’t rolling in money, and you know it.” April dropped several binders and a tablet on the desk before Asia. It took her a better part of the morning to get her leader alone so she could confront her without an audience. “It’s okay April. I spoke with Thomas on this, and he agrees that two ceremonies would be better, and for the gathering after each ceremony. Well, if you look, you’ll see that we have different people meeting for the first time. These are the members of the two packs that will work together and make everything run smoothly. They deserve to get to know each other before we throw them into the deep end of the pool. Who knows? Maybe there will be more pairings coming from this?” “As