Chapter Twelve
TWELVE
Ben’s list of things to Avoid If At All Possible featured one absolutely impossible-to-avoid thing. Every twenty-nine days the moon completed its cycle, having marched through the eight phases of new, waxing crescent, first quarter, waxing gibbous, full, waning gibbous, third quarter, and waning crescent. He’d learned that sequence in werewolf day care, where it was given the same import as learning shapes or letters or how not to blunder into traffic.
To be fair, it did control the werewolf existence. And how ridiculous was it that a celestial object 238,900 miles from Earth could wield that kind of influence on an entire species? But just as its gravitation pulled the tides, something in that white glow pulled a beast from inside him. It was the one night he truly lost control—not just in the panicked way of his brain trying to fight itself, but real, physical control.
It terrified him.
He stood at the window, hands braced on either side of the frame and fingers tapping agitatedly as he glowered at the rosy sunset. He should be working late at the Emporium, but since he didn’t want to transform into an animal with fangs and impulse control issues in a room full of fragile plants and terra-cotta pots, he’d come home to prepare. Once moonrise was thirty minutes away, he’d get in his car and head into the thick forest north of town. It was emptier than the woods on the hills rising to the east of Glimmer Falls, which housed the area’s famous hot springs and were frequented by visitors at all hours.
If Ben was going to end up rolling around in mud, persecuting the local wildlife, and shamelessly scratching his balls, he would rather do so far away from witnesses.
“Will you shift soon?” Eleonore asked from behind him.
He cringed. It had been less than twenty-four hours since the Masturbation Incident, and going on past experience, it would take at least twenty-four years to get over an embarrassment of that magnitude. The previous night he’d tossed and turned, having added “accidental public masturbation” to the litany of sins that ran through his head at two a.m.
“Unfortunately,” he muttered. Lycaon, why was he like this? Other werewolves loved the moonshift, which made this one more thing that was wrong with Ben.
He looked over his shoulder in time to see Eleonore plop onto the couch and cross her legs beneath her. Her notebook was open on the coffee table next to her tablet, the pages filled with bold scribbles about her upcoming performance. Having already overstepped massively, Ben had diligently avoided looking at her brainstorming notes.
“How’s prep for the show going?” he asked. “Do you need anything?”
“A cloak and something colorful to wear underneath it,” she said.
Right. Performers generally needed costumes. “Sorry, I should have thought about that.” He held out his hand. “May I have your tablet for a moment? I can log you in to my account so you can buy whatever you need online.”
She looked intrigued. “Anything I need?”
He hesitated. “Anything you need under a budget of, say…one hundred dollars?”
She laughed outright at that. “Please, Ben. How much could a cloak cost, five dollars?” She handed the tablet over. “I can’t imagine going over that budget, but I promise I won’t.”
Clothing prices had increased since the 1960s, but Ben trusted her to keep her word. He logged into an all-purpose online retailer and then walked her through how to search, put things in the cart, and check out.
A familiar tingle started beneath his skin—the itchy feel of his wolf-self rousing in anticipation of the full moon. Thirty minutes to go. He handed the tablet back, then hurried to the front door. “I’m heading out,” he said. “I can’t operate a cell phone while in wolf form, so if there’s an emergency, please call 911.”
She nodded, already immersed in online shopping. “Good luck,” she said distractedly.
Ben hurried to the car. He needed to get to his normal shifting place in time to strip naked, otherwise his clothes would be shredded. While he had an emergency backup shirt and pants in the back of the SUV, he’d rather not destroy these ones. Public nudity was on the list of things Ben would prefer not to engage in, but after a few mishaps as a teenager—werewolves started shifting during adolescence—he’d learned to get naked beforehand.
Traffic was heavier than usual, and his fingers drummed over the steering wheel while his left foot tapped a staccato beat. “Come on,” he said, eyeing the clock. He had the exact time of moonrise memorized, but he also felt it coming in the tightening of his skin. Shifting into a wolf inside his car would be unfortunate.
Thankfully, traffic eased, and soon he was speeding out of town on a narrow road that wound into the trees. Pines and western red cedars clustered close, and the air was crisp and fresh through the lowered window. September was a liminal month—hot on some days, with cool nights that would lengthen into a cold, dark winter.
At his usual pullout, Ben parked, then hiked into the woods. He stripped next to a stream, folding his clothes and placing them on a rock. Then he closed his eyes and waited.
A cool, shivery sensation raced over his exposed skin. It was followed by heat and the sound of bones grinding as his body rearranged itself. Shifting didn’t hurt, but it was strange and uncomfortable. There was an element of body horror to seeing his skin stretch over a new form before growing thick brown fur, so he kept his eyes squeezed shut. His face narrowed and elongated, nose becoming a snout and teeth sharpening. When he could no longer stand on two legs, he dropped to four paws.
Ben opened his eyes to a new world. Colors were no longer so vibrant, but he could detect the faintest quiver of leaves overhead. The wind carried the scent of earth and running water, along with a whiff of fresh scat and broken stems where a prey animal had passed. His stomach rumbled. The evening’s stir-fry hadn’t filled the ache, and saliva pooled as he identified the scent of rabbit.
No , came the distant protest of his human self. Not the rabbits!
Ben whuffed and bounded into the underbrush, wolven instinct drowning out thought. His muscles bunched and lengthened in turn as he ran, and the moon brushed his fur with its silvery caress.
A mouse skittered over the root of a tree, and Ben’s jaws closed on it before he processed the urge. It was a small mouthful, but the meat whetted his appetite. He crunched the tiny bones and spat out the tail, then kept running.
Alive. Hungry. Wild.
The rabbit posed no challenge. It was dead in an instant, neck snapped, and then Ben settled under the sheltering branches of a bush to consume his prey. Faint distress lay behind his delight at the taste, but it was impossible to focus on anything but the filling of his stomach.
A distant howl echoed over the hills—a werewolf calling for others to join the hunt. He cocked his head, listening, then returned his attention to the rabbit. He was a loner by instinct, and he had no desire to leave his territory.
Ben paused to scratch himself with his hind leg, then rubbed against a tree to mark it with his scent. This was his patch of land, no one else’s, and every month he marked the perimeter to keep it safe. His land, his trees, his stream, his rabbits.
Ben ran for hours, pausing only to mark trees and howl at the fat white moon overhead. His muscles burned, and the air came crisp and sharp in his lungs. He met no other wolves, just one startled midnight hiker who shrieked at the sight of him. Ben bared his teeth and stared the man down, raising a leg and pissing on a stump right then and there to indicate his thoughts on having his territory breached. The man backed away sweating, then turned and ran.
Good.
Ben howled his triumph at having driven off the intruder, then padded to the nearby stream. He jumped in, sending water splashing, then rolled around, letting the current carry away the dirt from his coat and the blood from his muzzle. Then he stood with his paws on the rocky bottom and drank.
Belly full of meat and water, Ben flopped on the bank of the stream for a few minutes. The forest moved and chattered around him, ever alive. His head felt empty and full at once—thoughts came distant and more in images than words, but the impulse to movement pressed on the inside of his skull. Despite the tiredness of his limbs, he pushed back to his feet and loped off again.
Hours passed like this. So long as the moon was high in the sky, its energy lent him strength. But eventually it began its retreat, and Ben returned to where he had started, feeling tired and cold. He curled up next to his clothes with his tail covering his nose, wishing someone was there to wrap him in a blanket instead.
When Ben woke, he was human-shaped, naked, and absolutely freezing. The sky overhead held the deep navy hue of the silent hour before dawn, and wind whipped the treetops. He staggered upright, cursing as he tugged his clothes back on with cold, clumsy fingers.
Rational thought returned in a rush, like the dam constraining it had crumbled, and he was flooded with the knowledge of what he’d done all night. One mouse and two rabbits had fallen to his fangs, and his mouth had a nasty coppery aftertaste. He groaned, covering his face as he remembered aggressively pissing in front of the stranger he’d startled. Christ, he hoped that wasn’t one of his customers. Reason said even if he was, the man wouldn’t recognize Ben’s wolf form, but panic said every horrible thing was possible.
He stuffed his feet into shoes, then staggered toward the car. It took a few minutes with the engine on and heater blasting to warm him up after his nap on the cold ground. His eyes were bleary and his head throbbed, and Ben white-knuckled the wheel as he drove back into town.
Once home, he tiptoed toward the bathroom for a much-needed shower and toothbrushing. His sense of smell was good even in human form, though, and when Eleonore’s uniquely luscious scent wafted down the hallway, he stopped in his tracks.
Hot, lustful blood surged, stiffening his cock, and he had a brief vision of flinging Eleonore over his shoulder and carrying her off to ravish her in the woods. Ben closed his eyes with his hand on the doorknob, struggling with the sudden impulse. It’s the moon , he told himself. The moon makes you aggressive and out of control. It would take hours for the final effects of it to fade.
Lycaon, he wanted Eleonore.
But Ben wanted all sorts of things he couldn’t have: a calm mind, a billion dollars, an extra five or six hours in each day. A future that involved no more public urination or dismembered rabbits.
And Eleonore deserved better than a self-loathing werewolf.
So he shook his head and headed into the bathroom, wishing shame washed away as easily as dirt.