Zephyr
I kissed her under the full moon, in front of my whole pack, with the mating song playing.
And the next morning, I hid.
There is no better word for it, so I will use the true one. The Alpha of the Nightbane Pack hid. I took my coffee in the map room at five. I ran the ridge trail alone in the dark before the yard filled. I invented a meeting with the quarry clerk, and the quarry clerk, to his lasting confusion, received me. I was a man with a mansion full of doors, and I spent the whole day making sure none of them were doors she was behind.
Not because I regretted it. That was the trouble. I regretted nothing. I had stood in the snow with Wren Ashwood in my arms, and every broken, locked-up thing in me had settled into place at once, like a house finally sitting true on its fou
