Chapter 47 #2
My wolf is sand colored with a creamy tipped tail. This little she-wolf pup is cream-colored with a sand-dipped tail tip.
“Bailey?” I ask, but I already know the answer.
Bailey’s eyeglasses are on the rug with a bunch of rose petals.
The pup yips and wags her tail.
“Bailey?” I say again and hold my hand out.
She ignores my hand and yelps at the steak on the rug, then turns to the unopened container of food and noses the lid open.
This one is also steak, a smaller tenderloin, loaded baked potato, and green beans.
Bailey’s wolf goes right for the steak and yanks it out of the container, dropping it on the bed.
“Shit,” I mutter, then laugh as she pushes this one with her nose and yips at it, looking down at the rare steak on the rug.
She launches herself from the bed and tumbles twice on the rug before she pauses on her back.
She yips a high-pitched sound before she lunges and lands on four paws, going for the bigger, rare steak. I reach for it so I can cut it for her, but shit – she catches my hand with her tiny teeth, drawing blood.
“Rrr.” She warns, baring those little teeth diving in with intent to scarf the meat down before I can steal it.
I watch her for a minute, then snatch her up by the scruff, lifting her up in the air, examining her.
“Arf!” She licks the air as if licking me.
“Holy shit, this is fuckin’ funny.”
She was pissed she lost the big, rare steak and wanted nothing to do with the smaller, non-bloody one.
She stretches her neck and belts out the cutest little howl I’ve ever heard.
I sit on the edge of the bed and set her on my lap, running my fingers through the soft fur on her back. She scampers, putting both front paws on my chest, stretching up so she can lick my face.
“I suspect your little wolf isn’t mature enough to understand anything but food right now.”
She licks my hand now, cleaning up the droplets of blood she just spilled from me, wagging her tail.
I laugh again because a mating night between two wolf shifters often includes the exchange of blood on both sides. I had no idea going into this that Bailey would be consuming my blood tonight, too.
She’s sniffing the air now, about to hop off my lap and I suspect she’s ready to explore the house in her four-pawed new state, but I grip the scruff of her neck a little more firmly.
“Bailey,” I look into her eyes. “Shift!”
The tiny wolf quickly becomes my mate who is now naked and on my lap with very wide eyes.
“What in the fuckity fuck, Jase?” she exclaims.
I wrap my arms around her nude body and bust up laughing. “You’ve got a wolf after all, Bay.”
“I shifted!”
I laugh some more.
“I shifted, Jase!” she exclaims excitedly before she bursts into tears.
My arms wrap tighter around her, and I kiss her quick, saying, “It’s okay. Don’t be upset. This is good news, isn’t it?”
“It’s the best news, Jase,” she cries. “This is happy-crying. That’s the pup I’ve been hearing! I thought maybe it was our child but, but…”
“Breathe, baby.”
Her heart is racing and her body’s shaking.
Out of nowhere, purring comes from my chest.
And Bailey sinks into me, heaving out a long sigh.
Finally. Here it is. I guess the final piece of the puzzle was meeting her wolf. And her getting emotional like this, maybe.
I shove the messy blanket with flower petals and food containers aside so I can scoot backwards and lay back with her in my embrace.
A few minutes pass with me holding her, purring, and stroking her hair. And being able to hold her warm, nude body like this while comforting her with my purr might be bringing me as much comfort as it’s bringing her.
When she seems sufficiently loose, I stop purring and ask,
“What happened?”
“Thank you for that,” she whispers. “I love that.”
“Anytime you need,” I say low, kissing her.
She snuggles in and pulls the blankets over us as she nuzzles my neck with her nose. “You’ve never given that to anybody but me.”
“Nope,” I confirm.
She sighs happily, then shakes it off. “Where are my glasses?”
I grab her glasses from the rug.
Putting them on, she looks about ready to burst with excitement but then takes them off.
“Whoa. They’re way too strong. They’re definitely making me woozy.
” She sets them down. “I kept hearing it. I thought it was our future child, that she was mad at me. It was so stressful. I met this lady on the plane on the way to Italy who knitted me baby booties, telling me she has a second sight that told her I’d be getting a daughter and a puppy.
And of course I figured when things went wonky with us that maybe I was fighting Fate who was going to give us a daughter who could shift like you, hence the daughter and the puppy, you know? ”
“Solid theory.”
“So, I figured it was the soul of this future daughter I kept hearing whenever I was trying to push away any feelings of a future with you. Like maybe I was preventing her future, which was really messing with me. But now I know it wasn’t our future child.
It was the wolf inside me. The wolf I didn’t think I had. Jase, I have a wolf!”
“You sure do, baby. Congratulations!”
“But I don’t think we’re in synch. I don’t think I have any control.
I don’t know how I shifted and I know I only shifted back because you alpha-commanded me.
I now know for a fact it was my wolf communicating with me, but suddenly, my wolf was here!
I watched, I could see what was happening, and I couldn’t do anything to influence any of it. ”
“Think back to what happened right before you shifted.”
“Well… I opened the first container of food and saw the blood and instead of being grossed out by it, I was salivating. I had to eat it. Had to. I stuck my finger in it and licked my finger, then suddenly something pushed out from here.” She puts her hand against her chest. “The push didn’t hurt, it felt weird.
Tingly. Bubbly, almost? She just… expanded out from here.
” She touches her chest. “And she was hungry. So hungry.”
“Yeah, I vaguely remember that sensation when I first started shifting.”
“I didn’t know at first what was happening, but then I saw things through a different lens that let me know I was shifted. Let’s go for a run, Jase. Like… right now! How do I get her to come back?”
“Bailey… your wolf is a pup.”
She frowns. “It always sounded like a young wolf to me.”
“Because it is. Your wolf is tiny.” I show her with my hands how big her wolf is. Around the length of a loaf of bread.
“What color is my fur?”
She doesn’t look upset. She looks ecstatic. And I can imagine she must be after living her life as half shifter with some shifter senses but thinking she’s without a wolf.
I tell her, “You know my wolf’s colors? Yours is the opposite. Cream. Tan dipped tail.”
Her jaw drops. “Weird.”
“Not so weird with all we know now, is it?”
She shakes her head. “Guess not.”
I say, “When I first started shifting, I was small. Real young. And I didn’t have much control over my wolf, which was obviously small, too.
Took a while before I could shift on demand, but an alpha could always get me to shift on command.
Control came with time, with frequent shifting.
Pops would take me out daily so I could practice. ”
“Oh.”
“So, your wolf was telling you to mate me so she could meet us both.”
“Yeah,” she says softly, more tears in her eyes.
I kiss her and purr some more.
She snuggles in for a minute, then pulls back. “Shit. Sorry. My wolf ate your dinner.”
I laugh. “And bit me.”
“My wolf,” she beams dreamily before straightening up. “I could make you something,” she offers.
“No thanks.” I raise my hands. “Don’t need food poisoning ruining our mating night.”
“Hey!”
She acts disgruntled and gives me a playful shove.
I laugh. “She wanted that striploin somethin’ fierce. Wanted no part of yours since it was well done. You want, I can whip us up something.”
“I’m not sure. Maybe I ate enough.”
“She ate the bulk of that strip; a whole lot of meat for a pup so tiny.”
“How about I clean this up while you make yourself something? If I get hungry, I can get something after. I will have some of that honeymoon mead, though.”
“I say we clean up together and then you hang out with me and drink some honeymooning mead while I make something, then if you decide you’re hungry, you can eat with me.”
“Okay,” she agrees. “Be right back. Need the little she-wolf’s room.” She beams a huge smile as I chuckle and grabs a robe to put on before leaving the room. I examine the take-out containers. The sides are still here, untouched, so I’ll warm them up.