Bound to the Wolf (Southern Basin Pack #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter

One

There was a werewolf in her house, and Delainey Boyd couldn’t kill him.

She glared at the toilet seat and the small speck of pee on the rim. She gritted her jaw so tight her teeth might break.

Who did that? Who left the toilet seat up and didn’t bother to flush?

Okay, the freaking wolf had flushed this time, but two days ago there had been evidence. Delainey supposed this technically wasn’t a mark against werewolves. It was a mark against men.

And Elise was betraying the entire coven by bringing one of those into their midst.

The bathroom was exactly as cramped as you’d expect in a more than a century old Victorian that had been retrofitted to add running water and the other amenities of modern life. Which meant Delainey could reach her hands out and touch the opposite walls at once.

She and Elise had been sharing the hallway bathroom with its tiny shower, tinier window, and terrible ventilation for years. Adding a werewolf to the mix made the space intolerably small.

Delainey wiped the speck of evidence away with a vicious swipe of toilet paper, put the seat down, and did her business, all while seething with the fact that there was a werewolf right down the hall. She thought she had been doing okay tolerating this whole fiasco, but the man was an animal.

Literally.

She finished and washed her hands. Her frustration was compounded when the creaky pipes in the walls of the old blue Victorian that the coven called home burbled and coughed for a minute before giving her blessed lukewarm water that turned scalding far too quickly. She yelped and jerked her hands back.

“Seriously, you too?” she asked the house.

It got bad-tempered some days, and she might have thought it was haunted, but it was just old and cheap. That’s what happened when you got a good deal on real estate.

But it was theirs.

The smell of sage and lavender suffused the air from the spell work the coven did at home and the protective wards they kept up to date. Under it all was the scent of old coffee that had nothing to do with magic, except for the magic of caffeine.

Each windowsill held a collection of small rocks, meant for protection, among other things. And there wasn’t a table surface in the place that didn’t have smudges of wax burned into them.

Delainey clomped down the back stairs to the kitchen and nearly tripped over the pile of shoes at the back door.

She wanted to growl at Nico again, but that one was on her sisters and their allergy to putting things in the closet.

Though Nico’s shoes were the largest and they were jutting out the furthest, so she was still going to blame him.

Delainey still wasn’t entirely sure how this whole thing had happened.

She knew, of course, she’d been there. But how did a woman go from being kidnapped by a guy—a werewolf!—to shacking up with him in four months?

Four months? Ha!

Elise had fallen for the guy in a matter of days.

And though they didn’t technically live together, they were always in each other’s pockets now, whether they were at the coven house, or over with the pack, or hiding out in some little love hotel like they expected the fury of supernatural society to rain down hard on them.

Okay, Delainey had been that fury at one point, but she was trying to look out for Elise.

Elise was young and innocent, naive, really, or at least that was the vibe she gave off. It wasn’t like Delainey was that much older than her, but some days it felt like she had mountains more experience.

And all that extra experience sometimes tugged at her and made her want to go out and do something reckless. She wanted to get a drink or pick a fight, maybe get laid, anything except sit in the house and ruminate about their werewolf guest.

But it was three p.m. on a weekday. If she went out and started getting drunk right now, someone might think she had a problem.

And she didn’t want to deal with those concerned stares.

Not unless Serena went with her. But Serena was at work, and she wasn’t going to get into trouble without her partner in crime.

Plates were stacked up in the giant sink, which meant someone hadn’t loaded the dishwasher. The floor could use a sweeping, and the paper towel holder was empty. Delainey ignored all of that.

Late afternoon sunlight was streaming into the kitchen, and she soaked it up as it shone over her brown skin and reminded her that fall wasn’t over yet. She shoved a curl behind her ear, as if that might do anything, and wished she’d bothered to grab a hair tie. Too late for that now.

The coffee was old, so Delainey started a fresh pot, reaching automatically for where they kept the filters and the grounds. She was thankful that Nico hadn’t infiltrated this deeply into the kitchen.

At least the werewolf was civilized enough to understand the importance of the dark brew.

She heard a feminine giggle, and that was evidence that Nico was still in the house.

Didn’t he have somewhere to be? Didn’t he have to work?

Elise was working herself raw these days between her job at the zoo and her EMT training.

She’d complained more than once, mostly to Aya, that she didn’t have enough time to spend with Nico.

Delainey wasn’t sure that was such a bad thing.

A part of her thought that Nico and Elise should spend as much time together as possible, though hopefully somewhere else. That way Elise could get over this craziness, come back to sanity, and leave her little werewolf adventure behind.

Witches and werewolves didn’t mix, not usually.

They weren’t in active war, which was a good thing, and they tried to keep it that way by sticking to their territories and keeping the drama to a minimum.

That had worked fine until four months ago when Nico’s alpha, Cole, had been injured and Nico had made a desperate play to steal supplies from the zoo where Elise worked.

Unfortunately for Elise, and all of them, Elise had been working late, and Nico had confused her for a human veterinarian.

Yada, yada, yada.

He kidnapped her. Somehow they fell in love. Delainey didn’t care about the specifics.

And now they were bucking all the societal norms and trying to have a genuine relationship. It was slightly insane and very troubling. But the Southern Basin pack and Delainey’s coven had a truce.

As long as Nico and Elise were together, they weren’t going to start any shit with each other, no matter how much the pack deserved it.

Awareness prickled in the middle of her back. She snapped her gaze to the front of the house seconds before someone knocked on the front door.

That was a warning from the wards. The coven had amped them up after a werewolf attack related to the whole Nico and Elise drama. But if someone meant them ill intent, they shouldn’t have been able to get to the front door.

“Can I help you?” She heard Aya ask from the front door. Aya normally had a soft, sweet voice, but right now she sounded guarded.

It was probably someone trying to sell them a lawn care service or Girl Scout cookies.

Was it Girl Scout cookie time already? Delainey took two steps toward the door that led to the hall to the front, but kept herself hidden.

She would definitely buy some Thin Mints, but she refused to deal with somebody trying to aerate their lawn, whatever that meant.

From her hiding spot, she could see Aya’s straight dark hair and the edge of her shoulder. She was wearing a light sweater and jeans. Or, at least, the right side of her was.

“We’re here to see our daughter,” a woman with an imperious voice said. “Fetch Elise now.”

Crap. Oh, crap. Fuck.

Delainey risked a longer peek down the hall and saw two people standing in the doorway. This must be Brenda and Tim Nevin, Elise’s parents.

They radiated old coven energy. Powerful coven energy. They were both in their late fifties. Brenda wore dark gray slacks with a matching jacket, while Tim wore khakis and a polo shirt. They both stood with stiff backs and were looking at Aya like she was a speck of dirt on the ground.

Brenda glanced down at the scratched-up hardwood floor beyond the welcome mat and didn’t bother to hide her disdain for the less-than-stellar condition of their floors. What was she going to do next? Critique the crown molding? Was the hallway too narrow for her ego?

Brenda had the same blonde hair as her daughter, but it was cut short and hair-sprayed within an inch of its life.

Not even a gale-force wind could knock it out of place.

Tim was a gaunt man who looked better suited to a mortuary by the look on his face, even if he was dressed for the golf course.

Delainey couldn’t see a hint of Elise in her father.

She didn’t waste any more time taking Elise’s parents in. This was a grade-A emergency.

Elise didn’t talk to her parents, Delainey knew, and she hadn’t asked many questions. People were entitled to their own complicated relationships. But Elise was from the Wallace Grove Coven. That was what she had been born into, and that was where her parents still practiced.

It was a little bit like being witch royalty.

Wallace Grove was one of the biggest and oldest covens in the state, and they wielded power, both magical and political, like it was a battering ram.

Had they heard about Elise’s escapades?

Were they here to talk her out of it?

Delainey’s fingers balled into fists. Who the hell did they think they were to try that?

She might not be happy with Elise shacking up with a werewolf, but that didn’t mean Elise’s parents had any right to come in and start laying down the law.

And Nico was in the house.

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

Okay. They could fix this.

Just because werewolves and witches didn’t normally mix didn’t mean there was no reason a werewolf might be hanging out at their house.