Heart's Desire

Chapter 16 - Monty

After one last sweep of the ashy ruins, we return to Sasha's house.

From there, Dane, Julian, and Freya head into town to visit the Sheriff's office, while Kit and I remain behind to help Sasha look after the twins. Jake Nash departs, too, saying he's got work to do back at the ranger station, and Martin returns to his own home, after once again inviting us all for dinner.

He keeps casting apologetic glances at Freya as he does, but she refuses to look at him. If he were in Wolf form, some groveling would probably help, but as a man he's got to do better.

I hope they'll smooth things over soon; I hate it when my family fights, for whatever reason.

Once the others are gone, Kit and I help Sasha carry everyone's things up to the guest rooms on the second floor, leaving Luna and Luca safely asleep in their play pen—their 'cage,' as Julian half-jokingly calls it.

"Sorry you two have to share," she says, panting as she hauls Dane's enormous duffle bag up the stairs. "I gave my room to Juju and Big D, and Freya an' I are in the other spare. When I built this place, three bedrooms seemed so extravagant! Now I wish I'd put in more!"

I whisper a silent prayer of thanks that Freya isn't here to catch the nick-name Sasha has bestowed on Dane.

"Oh, no—that's okay. We're used to sharing," I say, reaching out a hand to steady Kit as he wavers beneath the weight of Luna and Luca's giant bag of baby things. He'd insisted on helping, and slung it over his shoulder with apparent ease, but it looks like it weighs about as much as he does. "What about Jake, though? You're not gonna make him sleep outside on our account, I hope."

"Nah. Jake's got his own place in town," she says over her shoulder.

She pushes open a bedroom door with her foot and then slings the heavy duffle onto a large, neatly made bed with a sturdy, solid pine frame. It's constructed of whole pieces of tree, with the headboard made of branches. It almost looks like it grew that way naturally. Instead, I know that Sasha made it herself. She's the artist in the family.

After art school, she got a job in Hollywood making set pieces for movies and TV, and for a few years was in such high demand she had her pick of the best jobs. Then something happened, and the work dried up. That's when she'd moved back here, to our parents' property, and built this house with the money she'd saved. Now she makes a modest but decent living selling her art and designs online. She seems happy, but with her bubbly, outgoing personality I sometimes wonder if she doesn't miss the fast-paced hustle of a place like LA.

At the moment, though, I'm preoccupied with what she just said.

"He does?" I ask, surprised. "But I thought..."

She helps Kit set the giant bag of baby supplies on the floor, and shrugs. "We are. We're just... taking things slow. Bustin' all the werewolf cliches. Not all of us want 'marriage at first sight,' you know."

She laughs, but it's true Wolves tend to move fast. We Mate for life, so once the Choice is made, there's little point in waiting.

"No, I gotcha. Jake just seems like the... decisive sort," I say, setting the rest of the luggage down at the foot of the bed. Julian does not pack light.

"Oh, he is," Sasha agrees, smiling. "It's just... Well, he moved here for the ranger job, you see. Course, being a Wolf, he came to greet the Pack and get permission to move in on our territory. That's when we met. I wasn't too sure about him at first, but he kept comin' round."

She smiles, her cheeks flushing a little at the memory.

"He was awful sweet—a real gentle-wolf." She laughs again. "But by the time I realized we might be Mates, he'd already bought a house in town. He likes being close to the station, and of course I'm not giving up this place. He spends most of his time here, anyway. We just haven't made it official, yet. Besides, I'm in no hurry. Much as I love 'em, I don't think I'm ready for..." She waves at the gigantic bag of baby things. "...a family, and all that."

"What about Jake?" I ask.

Sasha's gaze slides away from mine, and I get the feeling maybe the 'taking it slow' thing was Jake's idea.

"He's devoted to his job, and he's only just landed it. It's a dream come true for him. Did you know park rangers are twelve times more likely to be attacked on the job than FBI agents?" She shakes her head. "All he's doing is protecting land that's supposed to belong to everyone, but people don't realize how dangerous that can be."

I frown and rub the back of my head. "What about his Pack?" I ask. Usually, when Wolves mate, one will join the other's Pack, leaving their own behind. Traditionally, it's the less dominant of the pair. In this case, that would be Sasha.

"Oh, no." She shakes her head. "He wants to live here. He was ready to join us before we even Chose each other."

"He was?" I raise my brows again.

Except for those who leave to join a Mate, most Wolves never leave their birth Pack. There are the alpha-born, of course, who have no choice but to strike out on their own, and there are those like me, who join the Pack of a blood relative. Other than that, though, there are just Outcasts, and Rogues, and—very rarely—adoptions, where an unrelated Wolf is accepted by another Pack.

Both sides have to like each other—to trust each other as family—and it usually only happens after a close bond has formed.

Sasha nods, blushing afresh. "He's a charmer, my Jake. Mom and Dad took a liking to him right from the start—and vice versa, of course."

I want to give Jake the benefit of the doubt—being Sasha's Chosen, and all—but he hadn't struck me as all that charming. Dane certainly seemed to have found a kindred spirit, but Freya didn't like him, and I trusted my sister's judgement like I trusted the night to be dark.

I'm not sure what to think.

As we all turn to head back downstairs for my things, I try to come up with a non-invasive way to ask what I want to know, when a crash, followed by double high-pitched screams, puts all other thoughts to wild and immediate flight.

Breaking into an instinctive sprint, I race down the wide, stone-lined steps to the floor below, Sasha and Kit close at my back.

In the living room, I see the twins, shrieking to high heaven—or hell—with their little faces contorted into gargoyle screams.

That's not unusual.

I've seen that plenty of times before.

What's unusual is that Luna is hanging from the immobile ceiling fan, while Luca is stuck behind the fireplace grate, which is thankfully empty—it being a warm summer day.

Meanwhile, their playpen is overturned, as is a nearby chair, and the window above it is broken, glass littering the floor.

I rush to lift Luna down from the fan, while Sasha races to Luca and picks him up from behind the fireplace grate.

"Oh, my unheavenly gods!" she exclaims. "How on earth did they get out?"

I consider.

Babies escaping their cribs isn't unheard of; babies swinging from a ceiling fan and locking themselves behind a fire grate are less common occurrences.

First though, I make sure they're unhurt. I check Luna, then take Luca from Sasha and examine him, too.

Fortunately, there's no sign of injury, and soon their wild screams subside into quiet whimpers as they cling like little monkeys in my arms.

"They're alright," I say, my initial fears subsiding. "Just a little upset, I think."

Sasha examines the broken window and overturned chair. "Well, I'm beginning to see why Julian calls them 'monsters,' I think." She chuckles weakly, righting the chair and nudging at the shattered glass with her toe.

Distractedly, I agree, but my attention is on the broken window behind the crib, and on the pattern of the shattered glass.

Most of it is spread inward across the floor. The twins might be right little monsters, but they aren't the culprits in this case.

If they'd used inhuman abilities, Wolf or Fae, it wasn't to cause chaos; it was in instinctive self-defense.

Something else broke the window trying to get to them—from the outside.