What a Wolf Desires (Lux Catena Book 1)

8.

T he inside of the Lodge was brighter than Lizette remembered, the foyer spiraling up a dizzying sixty feet. Twin staircases graced either side, each one leading to a catwalk that appeared to float across the

impressive space.

The foyer opened onto a massive great room dominated by a huge stone fireplace. She’d spent many an evening lying in front of it, chin propped on her hand, studying the flames.

She longed to sink into one of the big leather couches in front of the fireplace, but she had her instructions. Her orders. She was to report directly to the Alpha as soon as she set foot in the building. Disobeying wouldn’t be a good way to start her visit.

And a visit is exactly what it’s going to be. As she walked the familiar path to Max’s study, his presence was like a beating heart in the huge Lodge. Each pulse dragged her closer to him, even though every nerve screamed for her to run back out the door and never stop.

“Lizette?” a young, feminine voice called behind her.

She stopped and pivoted toward it. “Haley?”

A dark blur shot from the other end of the hallway. Before she could say anything else, Haley threw itself into Lizette’s arms, wrapping her in a tight, perfumed hug with surprising strength.

She patted her friend’s springy, light brown curls. “Have you been working out?”

Haley laughed and pulled back so they were face-to-face. “It’s the wolf,” she said, her white, even teeth bisected by the thin metal wire of her retainer. “I can’t believe how much it’s changed me in such a short time.”

Six weeks earlier, Haley had convinced her guardians to let her spend a weekend with Lizette. Haley turned seventeen that past Christmas with no sign of her wolf emerging. The Turn happened at different ages for everyone, but it usually happened by puberty—and because girls tended to mature faster than boys, females usually Turned earlier. But Haley hadn’t made the change, and her guardians worried she never would. Among werewolves, such wolves were called latents.

Latents had a wolf counterpart, but they couldn’t Turn. They felt the pull of the wolf’s instincts but had no outlet for them. Lizette had heard it described as being a pianist with your hands permanently tied behind your back.

It was a sad, frustrating existence for wolves, cursed to live trapped inside their human bodies, unable to transform into their other selves. The hope of finding a mate was slim, since they lacked the ability to form the lifelong bonds so treasured by the wolves, and many couldn’t bear to be around normal werewolves.

The problem had even spilled over from werewolf society and trickled down into the human world. Every now and then news headlines told of a madman or killer who’d committed some unspeakable crime. In some cases, it was just a random crazy human. But in others it was a latent who’d lost his or her grip on reality, and the local Alpha would dispatch a group of wolves to quietly take care of the problem.

In the morning the human police would find the defendant hanged in his cell. Was it murder? Yes, but it was too risky to allow those wolves to live.

The human word lunatic was a lot closer to the truth than most people realized.

At first Haley’s guardians thought she might simply be a late bloomer. But when puberty came and went and she still hadn’t Turned, they were desperate. So they sent her to Lizette, hoping some time with another female around her own age might relieve some of the Haley’s anxieties. What if she never Turned? Latents often lived a sort of half-life. Cut off from the werewolf community, many committed suicide.

To everyone’s delight, Haley Turned for the first time during her stay at

Lizette’s place. She and Lizette had danced around the apartment blasting One Direction and Taylor Swift until Lizette got a migraine and the downstairs neighbor pounded on the ceiling to shut them up.

Lizette squeezed Haley’s bicep. “I’m impressed. You have Madonna arms.”

Haley laughed, her pretty face lit up with joy. It made Lizette’s heart happy to see her like this. In a way she felt protective of her, and not just because Lizette was there the first time Haley Turned. Like Lizette, Haley lost her parents as a child. Although Haley was raised in a werewolf community, they’d both been foster kids of a sort. Haley knew what it felt like to be an outsider.

Haley’s expression grew abruptly serious. “Have you seen him yet?”

Lizette swallowed. Of course Haley knew why Lizette was here. There was only one thing—or rather one person—who could have compelled her to return. “Not yet. Soon.”

“Oh.”

They stared at each other. Even at seventeen, Haley understood that being summoned to appear before the Alpha was serious business. Everyone did. In Lizette’s case, however, it held a special significance.

“I should go.” “You should go.”

They both laughed.

Lizette took a reluctant step toward the foyer. “I’m sure I’ll see you later. We have a ton of things to catch up on.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “Like boys.” Although goodness knew Lizette had little advice to offer in that area. Aside from one brief—and that was generous—relationship as a teen, her love life was DOA.

“Definitely,” Haley said. “And I want to run together before you go.”

Lizette gave Haley a little wave and tried to ignore the way her stomach lurched as she headed back the way she’d come. She stopped in front of a set of big double doors and wiped her palms on her jeans. She angled her chin down and took in her sweater and mint green Chucks. Was Aiden right? Maybe she should have changed.

This is ridiculous. She was twenty-four years old, not fifteen…so why did she feel like a teenager reporting to the principal’s office?

Or a woman on a first date.

Not going there. She’d see what he wanted and then go home. Simple as that. She took a deep breath and knocked.

“Come,” said a low voice from behind the door.

The sound ripped through her like a thunderclap, and her knees almost gave out. She clenched her fists and pressed her fingernails into her palms—a trick she learned from Dom. The pain steadied her. She pushed the door open…

…and locked gazes with the Alpha. Her Alpha. Maxime Alexandre Simard.

He sat behind his desk, his posture relaxed. A lord in command of his domain.

And in the werewolf world, that’s exactly what he was.

The first time she saw him was in the back of a Los Angeles County courtroom. Her caseworker had called her foster parents the day before, breathless, saying a relative had come forward—a distant cousin of Lizette’s mother. He was flying in from New York and would be there the next day to file the paperwork.

In court he wore a charcoal gray suit and a dark blue tie. His jacket sleeves rode up when he shook her foster father’s hand, exposing his shirt cuffs and the strange metal jewelry he wore there instead of buttons. When she slid past him to climb into the limo, she accidentally brushed his sleeve, and the fabric felt like a cloud against her skin. He’d smelled of pine and soap and something…darker...a rich spice she couldn’t identify.

Lizette knew right away that he wasn’t human. There was something other about him. At fifteen, she’d been old enough to see through a disguise, even a convincing one. As soon as the door closed, she’d blurted, “Are you human?”

“Not entirely.”