Chapter 25
CHAPTER 25
E mery
“You’ll look fantastic,” Reese, Chance’s sister-in-law, says.
At least, that’s what she would be called in the human world. Among the pack, she’s the wife of the alpha and therefore referred to as the Alpha Queen.
Yet, when I first met her hours ago, she insisted I call her Reese.
I knew for the past few weeks that on the day of the supermoon, the alpha was scheduled to return with his wife for the ceremony. It’s tradition that he’s here to welcome the new wolves and escort them during their first run.
I expected to be intimidated by his presence since everyone in the pack refers to him with such respect. And while Chael’s tall, muscled figure and sharp, wisdom-filled gaze would normally be intimidating, I’ve spent the past few weeks in the bed of the most enchanting man I’ve ever met.
Meeting his alpha, although great, wasn’t nearly as intimidating.
Reese, for her part, is as warm and welcoming as everyone says she is. It didn’t take any time at all for me to warm up to her as we spent breakfast talking and comparing notes on how we both found ourselves in this mysterious yet wonderful world of wolf shifters.
Not only that, but Reese is a seer. Something she only found out once she came to live with the pack.
“I knew Chance would find you,” she told me. “He insisted he didn’t have a mate, but you look exactly like the woman I saw in my vision.”
I have to admit, it was a little weird to hear this woman had a vision of me asking for help long before I’d ever even met Chance. But it’s just one of many in a long list of strange interactions I’ve had over the past month or so.
“Though, your hair’s different,” she said as we finished lunch.
That’s when I blurted out that I dyed and straightened my hair for years.
That’s how Reese, Ms. Elsie, and myself ended up inside Reese and Chael’s bathroom, in front of the mirror.
“But, honestly, I’m tired of it,” I told her. “I’ve always wondered what my natural hair looked like. Without all the maintenance and upkeep my mother insisted I continue doing.”
Now, however, I’m getting cold feet.
“Are you sure?” I ask again, staring at myself in the mirror. A pair of hair scissors rests in the palm of my right hand.
My hair is soaked after having just washed it with some of the specialty stripping shampoo made by one of the pack members.
Half my hair is thick and curly at the roots, while the lower half hangs limply from years of straightening treatments. The gray streak that runs from the right front side of my hair all the way back is now on full display, thanks to the shampoo that stripped the dye away.
After my confession to Reese, she convinced me that maybe it’s time to cut it and go with the natural style I’ve wondered about for years.
“You said you wanted to know what you’d look like with your hair one hundred percent natural,” Reese says, smiling in the mirror as she stands behind me.
“I can already tell it’ll look phenomenal, right, Ms. Elsie?”
“Oh, yes, of course. It’ll look amazing.”
I swallow down the fear in my throat. I’ve never had hair shorter than shoulder length. There hasn’t been a time since I was ten years old in which my hair wasn’t straightened.
After I had moved to New York, regular straightening appointments became standard.
We have to do something about her roots. I remember my mother saying to the stylist while she flicked her hand in my direction with a look of semi-disgust on her face. As if the idea of puffy, non-straight hair made her somewhat ill.
I spin and look at Reese’s hair. Disgust is the last thing I feel as I look at her beautifully styled hair. It lusters with moisture and holds on to the curls she’s managed to put in it with twists, with ease.
“Okay,” I say after taking a deep breath.
Before I can second guess my decision, I raise the scissors and cut a chunk of the straightened, clearly damaged hair. Again, I cut another piece on the other side, knowing there’s no going back now.
I cut a few more times until I reach a hard-to-see spot. That’s when I pass the scissors to Reese. She finishes cutting the back of my hair while I hold a handheld mirror, watching as she cuts.
Ms. Elsie stands at my side, holding my hand as if she knows I need reassurance. It feels silly, but I do. I squeeze her hand and she gives me one of her signature smiles.
My chest warms and I have the silly notion of feeling comforted by these two women. One I just met today and the other only a few weeks ago. Yet, they already feel like an indelible part of my life. My heart aches a little at that thought.
What if I don’t shift tonight? What if I’m not what everyone thinks I am? Will I disappoint them? Most importantly, will Chance be disappointed?
If I don’t, does this mean that all of this was just an odd deviation in my life? I’ll return to New York to continue the life my parents have outlined for me.
The thought brings a tightness to my chest.
An image of Chance emerges in my mind’s eye. Something inside of me pains immensely of the idea of leaving him behind. Of not being with him. It doesn’t make sense the incredible pull I feel toward him. There aren’t words to describe it.
Then there’s the amazing people I’ve met in his pack. The women who don’t give me odd looks for being a stranger. Ms. Elsie and now Reese who don’t judge how I decide to style my hair or think I’m strange for not being made up at all hours of the day.
Ms. Elsie and a number of the older women actually encourage my interest in their pack’s history. They want me to continue my exploration through creating a living timeline of their pack’s history. There’s no chastisement for ‘playing in rocks’ or anything of the sort.
“Oh no! Did I pull on your hair too hard?”
The concern in Reese’s tone brings me back to the present. I look into the mirror to see my eyes are watery.
I immediately blink my eyes to push the tears away.
“No, nothing like that,” I tell her. “I was just thinking. It’s nothing.”
I stand from the stool since Reese finished cutting and styling my hair.
“Are you sure?” She peers at me with a wrinkle in her forehead.
I go to tell her the truth. That I’ve never felt more comforted or accepted by people in my entire life. Never more welcomed, not since the death of my birth parents.
But then Reese moves her hand to her belly and that’s when I remember she’s pregnant.
I push the stool her way. “Please sit. You’ve been on your feet, doing my hair for over an hour.”
She tries to wave me off, but I insist.
“Seriously, I have more energy than I should at this stage of my pregnancy.” She’s in the early stages of her second trimester. “Chael says it’s because our baby boy is giving me strength.”
“It’s a boy?” I ask, excitement filling my tone.
She nods as she grins from ear to ear.
“It’s almost time for me to get lunch started,” Ms. Elsie says.
We both start to rise to help, but she waves us off.
“Don’t either one of you move,” she says in a voice so stern that Reese and I stop in our tracks. “Preparing meals for my pack is my job and one I take pride in. Neither one of you will take it from me.”
She smiles as she says this, but a thread of seriousness underlies her tone.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You two keep talking. I’ll let you know when lunch is ready.” She waves as she exits the bathroom.
Reese and I both watch as she exits, closing the door behind her, leaving us to talk.
“She reminds me of my Nana,” Reese says with a smile.
“I never knew my grandparents,” I say out of the blue. “Ashley and I only had our birth parents and then our adoptive parents. And each other, of course,” I add.
Reese takes my hand. “Now you have all of us,” she says. “I always longed for a large family. Here I have one. We can’t wait to meet Ashley, either.”
Her acceptance of my sister without even meeting her yet makes me smile. “She’ll love it here. I just know it.” Something tells me Ashley was made for wolf pack life.
We both were.
“Tonight, you’ll get the chance to meet all of the others as well. The rest of the pack from out west comes to attend the Supermoon Ceremony,” Reese continues.
“Chance told me. I’m looking forward to it.”
Reese smiles but it drops soon after. “Not everyone will be here, though.”
I scrunch my eyebrows. “Why not?”
She shakes her head. “We’re missing a member.”
“Oh no,” I say. “Did someone go missing? What happened?” The sadness in Reese’s voice propels me to ask questions, despite how rude or nosy it may seem.
“Yeah, Sera. She was becoming a friend, but she didn’t think she belonged among the pack for some reason.”
“She left willingly?” I ask.
Reese gives me a half-smile. “Yes. But I’m sure she’ll return eventually. This place has a way of bringing people where they need to be.”
Her eyes light up as she looks at me.
“Look at the both of us.”
A grin splits my lips. I can’t help but agree with her. The commune hours outside of Santa Fe is nowhere near the plans I had for my future, but it feels like home. More home than any place else I’ve ever been.
“I think I hear the guys coming back,” Reese says.
A current of nervousness courses down my spine.
“What is it?” Reese asks when I hesitate by the door.
“What if Chance doesn’t like my hair?”
In retrospect, wondering if Chance would like my new hairstyle was probably a silly notion. It’s my natural instinct to question my looks since it’s been drilled into me from a young age that my natural existence is unacceptable.
Yet, as I round the corner behind Reese into the kitchen, my skin prickles with the sixth sense that Chance is nearby.
Reese’s mate and the alpha of the pack, Chael, grins widely upon seeing her, immediately taking her into his arms as he enters the door.
Behind him is Chance.
He starts to enter the door but then looks up and pauses.
He’s utterly and completely focused on me.
The glow of the sun outlines his massive frame. Yet, the shine of the sun is nothing compared to the glow in his eyes as he remains completely still, studying me.
My breath catches in my throat.
I’m cemented in place underneath the intensity of his gaze. I should be used to the way he looks at me by now. But this time is different.
Yes, his eyes are glowing but even more than usual. They literally rival the brightness of the sun as he looks me over. His gaze stops on my face and hair. Slowly, he assesses my new look.
Reese styled my shorter hair into a beautiful twist that hangs freely, stopping a few inches above my shoulders. The gray streak I’ve covered up for years is prominent in the front right side of my hair.
His stare is as powerful as if it were his hand on my face, tracing it with the tip of his finger. His eyes narrow.
All of a sudden, my mother’s words about long hair being ideal come to mind. To her natural, short hair looked messy, unkempt and even unsightly. Fear grips my chest as the idea that Chance could ever associate me with any of those words overtakes me.
Does he hate it?
Should I have cut it?
I could have fought harder to find a place that does the hair treatments I normally get. Or, I could’ve bought a flatiron and learned to straighten my own hair.
The regrets and questions invade my mind so much that I don’t even notice Chance approaching me. Not until he’s close enough that he cups the side of my face with his massive palm.
The warmth of his touch causes me to snuggle my cheek against his hand. I open my eyes to meet his. The glow remains.
It’s as if that glow envelops my entire body, warming me from the inside out. No one has ever looked at me as if I’m the only person that exists. Not just in the room but in the entire world.
“So fucking beautiful,” he says, his voice low but with a growl in it.
“Ohhh, did Beta Chance just curse?” one of the young children in the room says from somewhere, but his mother shushes him.
Even the knowledge that we’re surrounded by at least ten different pack members doesn’t cause me to break eye contact with him.
I can’t look away. I want to hold on to this moment for as long as I can. Right here and now, I feel as if I know what it is to be the center of someone’s world.
Chance leans down and presses a kiss to my lips. He pulls back, though I can tell he’s reluctant to do so.
I gasp as I’m soon lifted off of my feet and into his arms.
Before I can blink, Chance is carrying me out of the kitchen, out of the house entirely. He doesn’t take his eyes off of me as I throw my arms around his shoulders. I don’t need to ask where we’re going or what he has planned.
The look in his eyes says it all.
It might be my mind playing tricks on me, but I swear I can smell my own arousal. Because it is arousing to be stared at the way he’s watching me.
“I’ve left some lunch for you in your fridge,’” Ms. Elsie yells from the doorway of the alpha’s house. I don’t have time, nor am I in the right mind to ask her how she had the foresight to put lunch in Chance’s refrigerator, because we reach his home in record time.
Chance spends the remainder of the afternoon, messing up the twist out, Reese styled my hair in.
Yet, I have not one regret in letting him do so.