Silent Night: The Shaping (Silent Night #1)
Chapter 1
Willow shut off her SUV before she fucking turned her phone off, too. She’d needed the GPS to find the cabin, but now she was officially in healing mode. No contact with the outside world. With her mother. Her sister. Her damned ex.
And maybe calling him damned wasn’t fair, but she was in a mood.
The nearly straight-up-the-mountain driveway to the cabin had forked toward another cabin half a mile back — and she’d checked satellite images before booking the cabin to make double-damned sure she wouldn’t have close neighbors.
She took a few minutes to look at the gorgeous house perched on the apex of the mountain, more glass walls than solid, and she couldn’t wait to see the view from the top deck.
After the worst Halloween ever, she was going to enjoy her solitude up here with no phone, no social media, no nothing.
She’d loaded up her e-reader, had her hiking boots, and hell, she might even decide to spend a day or two as her hawk, though she’d need to scout the area and observe the local wildlife before making that decision.
With the audiobook no longer keeping her mind off her shit-show of a relationship blow-up, the silence dragged her back to the big proposal she’d had no idea was coming.
James had gone all out, flying them on his private jet to Sleepy Hollow in New York.
James loves holidays, so she hadn’t suspected a thing.
He’d had a special eighteenth-century floor-length silk gown made for her — swishable flowing fabric over a floofy crinoline, bodice that flattered her every curve.
He was in a sharp period suit complete with the fancy vest, and they’d been masked and gloved, ferried around in a horse-drawn carriage through the costumed crowd, the music and drumming in the air, fire dancers painting sparks into the night.
His security had led them to a cordoned-off balcony above the square as the parade slowed below. The headless horseman stopped his mount, tilted his pumpkin head up toward them in theatrical salute… and James dropped to one knee.
Her pulse had pounded in her ears, her throat closed, and she had to work harder than ever to keep her inner hawk from bursting out of her soul and taking flight when she realized what he was doing.
She liked James. She enjoyed spending time with him. She wanted to love him, but in that moment, Willow knew she couldn’t spend another day with him, much less marry him. He was as vanilla as they come, and she’d desperately tried to make it work, but feel-good sex was never going to be enough.
The collar and rituals she craved weren’t in him. He’d never spank her. Never whip her. Never order her to her knees for a merciless throat fucking.
He had his schedule, and he’d expected her to follow it: to have a drink waiting for him at a certain time, to arrive for lunch when his assistant told her to, to be his socially acceptable arm candy at social events — and to wear the jewelry he draped over her.
His choice, not hers. She’d thought that would be enough.
She’d desperately tried to make it be enough.
But it was vanilla control, and not the specific brand of power exchange she so desperately craved.
She wanted someone to control her every minute, with consequences for not following orders.
James had controlled her daytime schedule, and she’d loved it, but without consequences when she wasn’t where she was supposed to be, it would never be enough.
She hadn’t wanted to humiliate him in front of the crowd, so rather than shaking her head, she’d hiked her dress and ran while escape plans formed, wondering if she could get a flight back home that night, and how she’d get to the airport when the streets in the area were closed.
She ran in heels through the brisk October air the two blocks to the gorgeous eighteenth-century inn, and was wearing jeans by the time he arrived.
“You don’t mean this,” he’d said, voice calm but carrying the weight he’d built his empire with. The perfect Dom voice. “You’re overwhelmed. I came at it wrong. I won’t apologize, but we’ll do this your way. Tell me the kind of wedding you want.”
He hadn’t become a billionaire by accepting no for an answer. He knew how to get his way, but this time, Willow had maintained her position and walked out. When he’d grabbed her wrist to stop her from leaving, her clit had come to life, but she knew he didn’t mean it the way her body took it.
He’d let go when she told him he was hurting her, and she’d walked out.
Now, back on the mountaintop, Willow opened the SUV’s door and cut the memory off mid-loop. Enough.
She grabbed her duffel, her backpack, and her purse, and then had to turn her phone back on to get the code when she reached the door.
And turned it right the fuck back off as soon as she was inside and the code was committed to memory.
Her sister and mother were pissed at her for breaking up with James. Like she was some old maid who needed to just take whatever came along.
Though her mother was seeing all those dollar signs, but Willow had been attracted to his power, not his money.
But throwing that power around meant nothing without the kinds of consequences Willow wanted.
And if she was honest, she was going to miss his parrot more than she’d miss him.
The view from the top deck was everything she’d hoped it would be. Mountains rolling as far as she could see, and the little town of Gatlinburg below, the cars crawling around like ants.
She made another trip to her car to bring the groceries in and put them away. Tonight would be two medium-rare ribeyes, baked potatoes, apple pie, and vanilla motherfucking ice cream.
She’d come off a weeklong work stint in Atlanta three days before Halloween, and she wasn’t due to work again until Thanksgiving week.
As a traveling nurse, she’d make mega-bucks working the holiday.
She’d turned down work during Christmas so she could go with James to…
fuck, she wouldn’t be going anymore. He’d booked a week in Lapland, a glass-roofed igloo suite in a private chalet with its own sauna.
Reindeer-drawn sleigh rides through a snow-dark forest, a husky run at noon-blue twilight, a helicopter hop to watch the aurora, and a complex chef’s tasting menu and fireside champagne.
One night in an ice hotel, but the rest in the glass-roofed igloo so the sky could pour the northern lights right over the bed. Assuming they appeared.
She shook her head. Yeah, she’d been looking forward to the trip, but not enough to marry him.
She explored the space on her way up to the impressive bedroom, stripped down to nothing, and went out onto the deck with her e-reader in a waterproof case.
Her Tbr list for the weekend was all lined up — a just-released murder mystery from one of her favorite authors, a recently-released sexy vampire romance from a fantastic series, and then an old favorite, because she was going to start the sexy theme with all the kinky goodness of Safeword: Arabesque.
Wouldn’t that be the dream, living with three kinky men?
* * * *
Kenny heard the vehicle coming up the mountain, and he waited long enough for their new neighbor, or neighbors, to get inside before he stalked through the woods to see who’d arrived.
And was gifted with a view of a naked, gorgeous woman on the top deck, taking in the mountaintop view, stretching her body in the cool evening air, perfect tits on display, and then she turned toward the hot tub, an ass with curves to die for, begging to be striped with a belt.
When she slid into the hot tub and the show ended, Kenny edged closer to the tree line, sniffed, and caught the scent of a hawk shifter. Nothing else recent. She was here alone.
Hawk vision is made for picking out breaks in patterns, and a human-shaped wolf skulking around would show up like a flame in the woods if she bothered to look.
But her face was buried in a screen now. Still, he was more careful about moving, in case she looked up. He moved deeper into the woods while he maneuvered so he could see the back of her SUV, and was a little surprised to see a Hamilton County tag.
He didn’t see a city sticker, so she probably lived in the county around Chattanooga. Not that it mattered, since the cabins were far enough apart it wasn’t likely their paths would cross.
Wolves need to know who is around them, and now that he knew, he should return to their cabin. She wasn’t likely to stand up and stretch again, so there was no reason to stay and watch.
And yet, he did, but just for another couple of minutes.
Silas had the fire going when he returned, while Boone was chilling in a recliner with a beer bottle.
This weekend had been Kenny’s idea, and so far it seemed to be heading in the right direction.
He’d been interim Alpha of the Chattanooga Pack since shortly after the Big Battle Between Good and Evil, but he’d recently grabbed the title officially.
Everyone missed Randall, the old Alpha, but life has to go on.
Kenny had assumed he’d be a part of the Homewood Pack when it’d formed, but when Cora had asked him to try Alpha on for size, he hadn’t been able to refuse her.
She’d gone through so much, taken on so much, anything he could do to help solve a problem — he would.
She’d been forced into the role of Alpha Werewolf over eleven states. The least he could do was handle Chattanooga for her. Take on the job of the Alpha they’d loved and lost.
And so, with the beta and gamma positions finally settled after months of shuffling, more than a year and a half of upheaval, he’d decided the three top wolves needed a long weekend away from pack politics.
They needed to function as a team, and nothing built unity like good food, whiskey, and shared stories around a game of poker.
“Sounded like a V8,” Boone noted. “Not carburetor, fuel injection, so modern-day.”
Right. Their neighbor.
“Yeah. Big GX 550. Completely naked woman on the top deck. Gorgeous. No recent scents besides hers. Hamilton County tags.”
Silas looked up from the fire. “Pervert.”
He said it with a grin that suggested he’d have stayed to watch too — and then went back to arranging the coals with the focus of a man who takes feeding people seriously.
Silas had been around the pack forever, content to run his barbecue joint and show up for full-moon runs, but something had shifted in him after the Big Battle.
Now he was the man who made sure the pack had food when everyone came together, the one seeking out the wolves on the edge and handing them three barbecue sandwiches with a heaping side of potato salad while he got them to talk.
“Never claimed otherwise,” Kenny told him.
“We’ll have to be careful about changing and running, with her close,” Boone noted.
“She’s a hawk. We’re good.”
“You sure she didn’t see you?” Silas asked.
“Had her face in a screen.”
Boone had moved to town last year for the construction work, all six foot four and two hundred fifty pounds of muscle.
He could handle every piece of earthmoving equipment known to man and was worth his weight in gold, which was saying something.
The kind of guy who always knew the weather forecast and exactly how much concrete it would take to pour a foundation by eyeballing it.
Kenny did the math anyway, but Boone’s ability was still fucking impressive.
When everything had shaken out, Silas was his beta and Boone his gamma.
Boone might be twice Kenny’s size, but Kenny’s magic was stronger. His wolf was stronger.
It helped that neither of the other wolves wanted the headache of being Alpha. Silas says it’s all he can do to keep his business running and his employees in line. Boone came for steady work and a well-run, healthy pack, not supernatural politics.
“Weather report has the storm coming in tomorrow mid-day now, instead of tomorrow evening,” Boone said.
“I’m looking forward to watching it roll in from up here, so daylight should give us more of a show.
” Kenny moved one of the Adirondack chairs so he could watch Silas work, and sat with a beer.
The plan was to cook steaks over the fire tonight and let Silas work his magic after.
He’d wrap and bury a pig in the hot ashes, bank the coals, then build the fire to slow-cook the pork overnight so the meat would fall apart in the morning.
They’d eat breakfast and then enjoy a daytime run in the woods on four legs before the storm rolled in.