Julia's Pack.

Chapter 7 - Bush critters

“Yeah.” Evie rested her head against his chest, Angelica leaning against his side. “I'm okay. We saw the snake too late.”

“Everyone did. I think we'll talk about what you can and can't pet when everyone's relaxed.” Julia squeezed Lia and Davie. “There are some things you can't pet. They don't like it.”

Julia watched the door anxiously, as the kids relaxed and settled in for a movie, Beth distracting them with some food and soft drink. Normally the four year olds would have had a nap by now, but she didn't disturb them, both of them now falling asleep on Oliver's leg and on the edge of the couch, clearly already heading in that direction on their own. Oliver was falling asleep too, to her amusement, barely able to keep his eyes open. He always looked so tired lately. She wondered if he was pushing his training too hard.

Levi texted her, which was kind of funny when he was just five minutes away, and she read it. Julia relaxed. He was going to be okay. The otter skin was thick and the snake had only scraped him, it was his panic that had made his heart sound funny, so it was going to be painful but not deadly. Julia breathed out slowly, shutting her eyes, relived. Snakes scared her a bit now. She had to find out what kinds were here.

Was it crazy to want to hunt them all down? Probably. They were just trying to live like she was. Trying to survive. Julia just had to learn to respect them. Teach the kids to be careful.

Levi came in later and hugged her anyway, hard, nuzzling against her neck as Julia leaned against him.

“What kind of snake was it?”

“A young copperhead snake. Not even an adult.” Levi said softly, stroking her back, his scent washing over her and taking away the last of the anxiety that clung to her. “He said it'll taste delicious. He'll cook it tonight.”

Julia tried to smile as Levi grinned weakly at her. “Otters eat meat?”

“Mmhmm. Otters are predators too, remember?” He gazed over her shoulder at the couch and Julia turned to look. Oliver and the 'four angels' were asleep, some pink sunburn on all five of them, Levi looking amused, his chin resting on her shoulder as he leaned against her back. “Our poor family. Never a dull moment.”

Beth rolled her eyes and gestured for them to follow her outside. She slid the door shut gently. “Let's just let them sleep. Oliver looks like he's been awake for days. You want some help to cook dinner?”

How did she know? Besides, of course, all of Julia's terrible attempts at cooking dinner for the women's night out thing they usually did weekly. She'd been unable to do it this week. Julia nodded, Levi laughed softly, and the three of them headed for Julia's house.

Sunday, compared to Saturday's snake drama, was peaceful. The kids didn't fight as much, to Julia's shock, and she sat with them as they went over different animals and insects that 'didn't like being petted'. Levi had researched all night and found several species of snake and spider that might be on the island.

The scary one was the copperheads. They were aggressive and didn't like to be played with. But they had little teeth and apparently the teeth didn't go through boots or thick socks. The other two, the tiger snake and the white lipped snake, was also deadly, but both species were shy. That was nice to know. So if the kids just didn't come across a sleepy snake and pick it up... it'd probably run from them. That was probably why Julia hadn't really seen much of snakes over the years she'd been here. They probably stayed deep in the bush and avoided the noisy wolves and humans.

Then there were the insects. Apparently there was an ant that actually jumped and had a nasty bite, called a Jack Jumper, bees and wasps that the kids already knew to avoid, a couple of spiders including a 'cave spider', and a red back spider. It freaked Julia out a little but Levi was so calm, so relaxed, that her panic faded pretty fast. Apparently people rarely got bitten, even less likely to die from the bites, so even though they were technically deadly, it just took some brains in the bush to avoid getting in trouble.