“I’m sure. I imagine I can speak for both Mary and myself when I say that we take no offense.”
“Well, good. I wanted to invite you to dinner tonight, too, so you can eat off your donated plates.”
Maggie sat on the sliver of unoccupied sofa cushion in front of him and put a hand to his forehead. “You feeling up to it, wolf man?”
“No.” He let out a long, ragged breath that sounded like exhaling hurt him, and it probably did. His body was still adapting to the wolf magic. Some days were easy. Most were filled with joint, muscle, or other kinds of pain.
Mary had opted to not go immediately to work at Sheldon’s office. She and Andreas needed time to adapt to Norseton, and to each other.
“But I’ll endure,” he told Maggie.
“That’s the spirit. This might make you feel better, though. I think Adam and his missus’ll be around.”
“That does make me feel better. At least we know if my tethers come loose and the wolf spills out of me, there’ll be people there who can save me from my shame.”
Muriel waved a dismissive hand at him. “You’ll get better at it.”
He scoffed and sat up, cringing.
“You all right?” Mary whispered.
He nodded slowly. His blood pressure had been incredibly low since they’d moved to Norseton. Sudden movements often made him faint. Adam said his systems would adjust in time.
He swallowed. “This isn’t normal.”
“Not supposed to be,” Maggie said. “You’re not like the other wolves. I mean, you’re made of the same stuff, probably, but their magic has been more or less consistent since their lines originated. They were born with theirs already waiting to be switched on. Yours was way more dormant.”
“I know you’re just trying to make me feel better.”
He smirked charmingly and she wondered how it was he’d managed to be on his own for so long. Some woman should have tried to tie him down.
“Because that’s what you do here, right? Keep people from going off the deep end?”
“I swear, I don’t know how I ever got such a reputation for bloodlust.” She shook her head and clucked her tongue. “Anyhow, don’t be ashamed of what you can’t do yet. Tess is still in the learning curve, too, as are her chieftains. We’re all still figuring out what we can do. Some of us are just more surprised than others. You’re in the right place.”
Mary sat next on the sofa arm and squeezed his hand. “I think so, too.”
“No more guilt about selling your father’s house?”
“Not guilt. Not regret. Just…a bit of melancholy. But, he’s not there. The house is just a house, and I have everything of his that’s important.”
He leaned in and brushed the side of her face with his lips, ever so gently. Not beastly at all.
Muriel clasped her hands in front of her and smiled. “Aw. I love a happy ending.”
“No,” Mary whispered and gave Andreas’s cold hands a squeeze. “A happy beginning.”
Part VII
Dragon Untamed
Tessa Rowan
Chapter 1
My suitcase wobbled for a moment before thumping haphazardly against the floor as I dropped it next to my overflowing duffel bag, and let out a long breath. Half relieved, half exhausted from the long Trans-Atlantic flight, I was now standing in the middle of my temporary home for the next month. And it was every bit as far away from the loud in-your-face everything about the city as you could get.
And of course I mean The City. New York. Believe me, when you’re a born New Yorker, that’s all it ever is to you. People talk about any other city and you sit there silently judging them with an air of disapproval because you know there’s only one The City.