Slow Shift by Nazarea Andrews (best ereader for pdf .TXT) 📗

“I want our Pack,” he says, “I want—.”

You.

Chase watches him and finally nods. “Lucas,” he calls, barely lifting his voice at all. Tyler feels some of the panic in his chest loosen when Lucas closes the door behind him. He picks up a book and sits against the headboard, and Tyler sighs. Then Chase is there, pressing in, curling around him.

Tyler tucks himself into the boy’s throat, inhaling the cool familiar scent of him, listening to the rhythm of their heartbeats, of his Pack. It drowns out the sound of his Alpha driving away.

~*~

When he leaves the next morning, he drives home, then Chase sits in his Bronco for a long time before he huffs. “Fuck it,” he mutters and pulls back out without going inside.

Harrisburg only has one hotel that someone like Chelsea would bother with, and even if it didn’t, he can feel the press of her, the weak bond that ties her to the Reid Pack, and he follows that.

She looks distinctly unsurprised and even less pleased to see him. “What do you want?”

“I want to know why you’re here, the real reason,” Chase says, “Not the bullshit you fed Tyler. He’s the only one who cares, Chelsea. So cut the shit and tell me what you want.”

She shrugs and pushes the door further open. Her hair is pulled into a ponytail and she isn’t wearing makeup, making her appear more approachable. She looks like Tyler when he’s with Chase and Lucas, relaxed and content.

It makes something twist unpleasantly in his belly, so he shoves that recognition away and steps into her room.

“Dangerous, you coming here alone.”

“Not really,” Chase says, glancing around curiously. “I’m your Shaman. And I’m the Standing Stones’ scion. Attacking me is...stupid.” He turns and smiles at her. “And you aren’t stupid, Chelsea.”

She stares at him and Chase tucks his hands into the pocket of his hoodie. “What do you want?”

“I want to forget this fucking town exists,” she says frankly.

“Then why come back?”

“Because,” she snaps, “you and my psychotic brother are making it really hard to ignore.”

“You mean the Cahils can’t ignore it. Tell me, is it you or your fiance who decided you should come get a handle on your wayward Pack?”

She flushes. “I don’t begrudge you the life you chose. I didn’t force Tyler to stay with me. I let you play Shaman. Why is it so horrible that I want to live my life? I have a Pack that’s safe and that wants me. I love my life there. Why is that so wrong?”

Chase stares at her. She’s asking, and he can hear from the earnestness in his voice that she doesn’t understand.

He whistles and walks to the door. “I was wrong, Chelsea. You are stupid.” She snarls and he pauses in the doorway. “We’re going to live. We want a quiet, little life, but I will not roll over and play bitch for every goddamn threat because it offends the delicate sensibilities of your adopted Pack. And fuck you for asking.”

He steps out of the room, then pauses, looking back. “He still loves you. He wants you to come home.”

“I have a home,” she says distantly.

“I know. But you need to know—for his sake, I need to say this: Tyler loves you and he wants his sister to come home. But that won’t last forever. Eventually, he’ll stop caring.” He shrugs. “It doesn’t change anything, but because I do love him—you needed to at least hear that.”

He walks away. She doesn’t stop him.

~*~

She leaves and he can feel it, the Pack bond stretching thin and wrong between them as she gets further and further away. He wonders if it's his fault, if he started this when he left New York, chose Lucas instead of his sister.

~*~

In the days after, Tyler spends a lot of time quietly, reading and writing—he started that while Chase was in his junior year of school, and rarely let anyone see it, but Chase thought it was ok. It helped Tyler, the way that cooking helped him and plotting helped Lucas.

And at least when Tyler was writing, there were no inconvenient dead bodies to worry about.

~*~

The wolf creeps through the woods, ears pinned to his head. He can smell traces of Chase, familiar and comforting, moving through the woods, and he creeps after him, whining.

Lucas presses against his side when he slows, licks his muzzle and when gentle doesn’t work, nips at him, hard enough the wolf huffs and pads along.

The glade is thick with the scent of lighting and honey, musk and sweat, rain and new growth. He whimpers, and ahead, Chase’s head tilts and he turns—

~*~

“Tyler,” Chase murmurs, and he shivers, curls closer.

“Leave him,” Lucas says, a quiet order, and Chase presses a kiss to Tyler’s hair.

~*~

His eyes gleam in the silver moonlight, a bright familiar gold, and he’s laughing, but he’s gentle as Tyler sits at his feet, curls there like a giant puppy.

There you are, Chase murmurs, and the wolf licks at him, earning him a soft hum of pleasure, before Chase moves away. Ready?

The grey wolf yips, and Chase closes his eyes as the scent of magic swells and grows, washing through the glade, rolling out of the Standing Stones in tight concentric rings.

The wolf closes his eyes and lets Chase’s magic wash him clean.

~*~

“Is it done?” Lucas asks, and Tyler murmurs sleepy nonsense into Chase’s throat. The boy is hot, hotter than he should be, but he feels steady under Tyler’s hands, and he sighs in quiet contentment, letting his worry slip away.

“It’s done. The land is clean again.”

~*~

Aurora arrives home two weeks early, a week after Chelsea drove out of Harrisburg without a backward glance, the morning after Chase strengthened his wards and purified the land of the Alpha’s touch.

Tyler thinks it’s more than that—the Pack bonds feel stronger now, like they’re shiny and clean, not carrying the sick feeling of rot that’d clung to them after Chelsea’s arrival. He doesn’t thank Chase