Don't Call Me Luna

Chapter Three

DAVE

How to Fix a Broken World (Start with the Fence Posts)

The murder trailer came with three things: Harold's lingering presence, bloodstains in the bathtub from a m******e that happened two years ago (I found mini documentary about it on YouTube), and a coffee table that had given up on structural integrity sometime during the Clinton administration.

I'd hauled in my own mattress and Egyptian cotton sheets—call it Westwood survival instincts—along with enough supplies to stock a small army. After getting myself settled for the evening, I poured myself a mason jar of my home-brewed beer and got to work.

The Council's integration manual sat on said wobbly table, seventy-three pages of bureaucratic bullshit that started with "Establish Dominance Through Traditional Alpha Display" and went downhill from there.

Page twelve recommended territorial marking. Subtle territorial marking, as if there was a diplomatic way to piss on things.

By page twenty-three—"Acceptable Force When Establishing Hierarchy"—I'd had enough. The manual made excellent shimming material, leveling the table with professional bureaucratic weight. Harold's ghost materialized in the corner, gave me what I swear was an approving nod, then faded back into whatever dimensional pocket dead cult members occupied.

The trailer settled around me with creaks and sighs that spoke of decades holding damaged souls. Outside, night sounds filtered through thin walls—generators humming, someone playing guitar with more enthusiasm than skill, things rustling in the woods that probably weren't entirely natural.

I lay on my own mattress, staring at water stains that mapped territories I'd never explored, and wondered what the hell I'd gotten myself into.

---

Dawn came early in Kentucky, thick with humidity that made breathing feel like drowning in warm soup. I stood in the doorway with coffee steaming in my hands, watching Katana move through her compound like a general inspecting battlements.

She wore yesterday's jeans and a tank top that had surrendered to gravity three washings ago, but damn if she didn't make it look like armor. Her hair was twisted up with what appeared to be an actual stiletto holding it in place.

When she crouched to examine a busted fence post, morning light turned her skin golden and her scowl into something that kicked me right in the chest. Twenty-nine years old and I'd never felt anything like this racing through my blood.

She looked up, caught me staring. "You survived the night."

"Harold and I reached an understanding. He doesn't watch me shower, I don't sprinkle his corner with holy water."

"You threatened a ghost with—" She stopped, shook her head. "Never mind. Don't want to know." She kicked the fence post with boots that had seen better decades. "Add this to the list of s**t that's falling apart."

"I could fix it."

The look she gave me suggested I'd offered to perform surgery with a butter knife. "Fix it."

"The fence. I'm good with wood." The words hung in the air differently than I'd intended, but Katana was already walking away, muttering about city boys and their death wishes.

The fence post was barely hanging on, termite-eaten and rotting at the base. I glanced around to make sure nobody was watching, then placed my hands on the weathered wood.

Remember what you were, I asked it silently. Before the bugs, before the weather, before time wore you down.

Heat spread from my palms. My mama's magic—the kind that whispered instead of shouted, that built instead of broke. The wood shifted under my touch, cells regenerating, fiber strengthening. Termite damage filled itself in. Rot reversed itself like time running backward.

When I stepped back, the post stood straight and solid, like it had just been cut from a living tree.

"What the hell?"

I spun to find Tommy watching, nervous gamma eyes working overtime behind wire-rimmed glasses.

"Found some wood hardener in the shed. Amazing what modern chemistry can do."

He looked at the post—now somehow sprouting tiny green shoots along one edge—then at me, then back at the post. "Right. Chemistry."

After he left, I spent the morning in careful theater. The chicken coop's broken boards called to me like prayers, and I answered while hammering loudly for show. Henrietta supervised from her perch, still strutting on the leg I'd healed yesterday. When I placed my hands on the splintered wood, she clucked approval.

The generator that hadn't run in six months proved more challenging. Twenty years of neglect had left it more rust than machine, but I coaxed life back into dead circuits while pretending to check connections. It purred to life with the contentment of something remembering it's got work to do.

By noon, Kentucky heat pressed down like a wool blanket soaked in humidity. Every breath felt like drowning in warm molasses, and my shirt stuck to my skin despite the morning's relatively cool start.

When I finally gave up and pulled off my shirt to split firewood for future use—even blessed boys had their limits—I heard something between a gasp and a growl from behind the main trailer.

Katana stood frozen, holding what used to be a coffee mug before she'd apparently crushed it. Dark liquid dripped through her fingers, but she didn't seem to notice. Her eyes moved over me like she was cataloging weaknesses for future reference, except her expression suggested she'd found something else entirely.

"You're..." She stopped, swallowed, tried again. "You're very..."

"Sweaty?" I offered, trying not to notice how her tank top had gone transparent with spilled coffee, how morning light made her eyes flash gold. "Sorry. I can put the shirt back on."

"No." The word came out fast, fierce. Then, catching herself: "I mean, it's your heat stroke. Die however you want."

She fled back to her trailer, leaving ceramic shards and the lingering scent of want in the thick air. Want was new on her, wore different than her usual armor of anger and suspicion. Made the knife in her hair look less like a weapon and more like ornament.

I went back to splitting wood, hyperaware now of eyes on me. Not just Katana's—though I could feel her watching from her window—but the whole pack's. Assessing. Calculating. Wondering what kind of man showed up to fix things instead of break them.

"Read about you online. You were JAG." Cheryl appeared with ice water and the casual tone that meant serious interrogation. "Military lawyer. Could've stayed in, made colonel before thirty."

"Could have." I accepted the water gratefully, noting how she positioned herself between me and potential threats. "But courtrooms started feeling like cages."

"So you traded them for different ones."

"Maybe. Or maybe I just like fixing things more than arguing about who broke them."

She studied me with eyes that had seen too much to trust easy answers. "Last person who came here to 'fix' us left in an ambulance."

"Rock salt to the face, I heard."

"Katana's got good aim when motivated."

"I'll remember that."

"It's for your own good." She paused, manufactured casual: "She hasn't taken her eyes off you since you took your shirt off."

I glanced toward Katana's trailer, caught movement at the window. "Probably calculating firing trajectories."

"Sure. That's definitely what she's calculating."

The pack kitchen had seen better days. Hell, it had seen better decades. Grease coated every surface like archaeological layers, and the industrial stove wheezed with the effort of existing. But underneath the neglect, good bones remained.

I rolled up my sleeves and got to work.

The pantry held exactly what I'd expected—expired cans, mysterious boxes, and ingredients that defied classification. Good thing I'd come prepared. My truck held coolers of real food, supplies I'd bought on pure instinct. Call it Westwood paranoia, but I'd suspected their resources might be limited.

A blue jay landed on the windowsill, head tilted like it was offering assistance. Then another. Within minutes, I had an advisory committee of local wildlife watching my progress with keen interest.

"You trying to help or just supervise?" I asked a particularly bold cardinal.

It chirped something that sounded suspiciously like encouragement.

I cleaned and organized with the efficiency of someone who'd learned that useful people didn't get kicked out. The stove needed more healing than fixing—twenty years of questionable meals had left it more scar tissue than appliance. I placed my hands on its sides, asked it to remember better days, and watched it hum back to life with mechanical contentment.

Feeding ninety-seven people with limited resources required creativity and small miracles. I found vegetables in Hiro's garden that glowed with more than health—his magic ran through the soil like underground rivers. Margot contributed herbs that were "probably not hallucinogenic, but no promises." The chickens, led by Henrietta, donated eggs with the air of personal favors not to be expected regularly.

My animal advisory committee proved surprisingly helpful. The blue jays located a cache of preserved goods stashed behind the pantry. A family of raccoons—apparently Ricky's extended network—delivered fresh fish from the creek in exchange for future considerations.

By evening, the kitchen had transformed from health code violation into something resembling functional. The dining hall—a converted chapel that kept the pews but lost the pulpit—filled with pack members drawn by actual food smells instead of the usual aroma of heated catastrophe.

Big Eddie lumbered in first, six and a half feet of Canadian bear shifter who'd found his way south for reasons nobody questioned. Luna followed, sixteen and floating three inches off the ground with psychic energy that made the air shimmer around her purple hair. Tommy claimed a spot by the entrance, wire-rimmed glasses reflecting the overhead lights. Uncle Hiro moved with the precise grace of someone who'd mastered both magic and martial arts. Crash and Burn—were-lions who used to love meth—entered together, amber eyes scanning for threats that might interfere with dinner.

Cheryl took her position at Katana's right hand, beta protecting alpha with quiet efficiency. Margot emerged from her lab, actually wearing clean clothes for the occasion.

And Katana... Katana had changed into jeans without holes and a shirt with all its original buttons, though the stiletto remained in her hair like a security blanket with an edge.

"You cooked." Her tone suggested I'd performed alchemy.

"Said I would."

"People say lots of things." She picked up a fork like it might explode, took careful bite of the fish bouillabaisse. Her eyes went wide. "This is..."

"Food," Margot supplied helpfully. "Actual food. Not heated catastrophe."

They ate like people who'd forgotten meals could be more than survival. Big Eddie made sounds that bordered on religious. Luna's psychic energy turned warm gold around the edges. Even Crash and Burn—who looked like they hadn't eaten for a week—slowed down to actually taste what they were consuming.

"Where'd you learn to cook?" Katana had taken the seat across from me, close enough that I could see gold flecks in her brown eyes, the small scar on her chin that looked like it had stories worth hearing.

"My mother believed in well-rounded education. Combat training and soufflé techniques."

"Useful combination."

"You'd be surprised. Good béchamel can de-escalate most situations."

She almost smiled—I saw it threaten around the edges of her mouth before she locked it down. "You're not what I expected from a Westwood."

"Disappointment's my specialty."

"No." The word came out serious, weighted. "That's not what I meant."

The air between us went thick, charged with possibility, and the kind of chemistry that rewrote molecular structures. Her hand rested on the table, close enough to touch if either of us was brave enough to try. The pack continued eating around us, but for a heartbeat, we existed in our own bubble of maybe and what-if.

Then Luna announced she was seeing prophetic visions in her mashed potatoes, and the moment shifted back to normal pack chaos.

Later, helping with dishes while the others dispersed to evening routines, I felt Katana's presence before she spoke.

"Thank you." The words sounded like they cost her. "For dinner. For the fence. For not being a complete asshole."

"You're welcome."

She moved closer, ostensibly reaching for a dish towel but really invading my space with deliberate intent. "Don't think this changes anything. You're still a Westwood. Still the Council's spy. Still temporary."

"I know."

"Good." She grabbed the towel, her hand brushing mine in a touch that felt like static electricity and possibility. "Long as we understand each other."

But instead of leaving, she stayed. Close enough that I could smell her shampoo—something clean and sharp that cut through the lingering dinner aromas. Close enough to see the pulse beating at the base of her throat, the way her breathing had gone shallow.

"Suzy..."

"Kat." The correction came out soft, almost vulnerable. "Nobody calls me Suzy except the Council and people trying to piss me off."

"Kat." Her name felt right in my mouth, like it belonged there. "Why did you really put me in the murder trailer?"

"Figured if you were going to run, might as well speed up the process."

"And if I don't run?"

She looked up at me then, really looked, and I saw past the armor to something that made my chest tight. "Then I guess we'll find out what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object."

"Which one am I?"

"Haven't decided yet."

The space between us crackled with tension so thick I could taste it. Her lips parted slightly, and for one insane moment, I thought she might—

"Katana!" Methany's voice shrieked from outside. "The spiders are spelling again! In cursive!"

The spell broke. Kat stepped back, walls slamming back into place so fast I got emotional whiplash.

"Duty calls," she said, but her voice was rougher than usual. "Try to survive the night. You're a better cook than Big Eddie."

I watched her walk away, all coiled grace and barely leashed power, and understood with crystalline clarity that I was completely, thoroughly, irrevocably screwed.

Because Kat Lightfoot wasn't someone you got over. She was someone you got under your skin, into your blood and bones and the spaces between heartbeats. She was every broken thing I wanted to fix and every whole thing I wanted to protect.