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

Vancouver is not Harrisburg.

“How long will you be gone?” Chase asks.

Tyler’s gaze flicks down, a frown on his lips. “I think two weeks? I can design it in two weeks.”

“And six months for building?” Chase says, trying hard to keep his voice from shaking.

Tyler blinks. “No? I mean, yes—but I can leave the crew. They’ve done it often enough I just need to be there a few days every couple weeks.” His expression turns hurt. “You think I’d leave for six months?”

“I think,” Chase says, moving to sit in Tyler’s lap, “that if you wanted this opportunity, it would suck, but I’d never tell you not to take it.”

Tyler snorts. “That’s because you're ridiculously self-sacrificing.”

“I’m not,” Lucas says, “and I’d say the same. It’s good for you, even if the separation would be horrible. That said, I think you have a workable plan. And you didn't even need our assistance.” He smiles at his brother. “Excellent work, Tyler.”

~*~

Chase notices the girl before she speaks to him. She keeps turning up—in his classes, at the bookstore he works in, at the coffee shop where he sits with the pretty barista, Jessica,  to study, or with her roommate, Ezra, to read comics.

He can feel the way his magic hums around her, the quiet curious pulse against his wards, but she isn’t dangerous. She isn’t threatening, just...watchful.

It takes a week. He’s alone in the diner waiting for a grilled chicken salad for his father when she approaches him.

“Shaman Reid,” she says formally, her voice at odds with the distressed jeans and ratty sweater she’s wearing. “I come on behalf of the Lewis Pack in hopes of alliance.”

Chase cocks his head. “I can’t negotiate an alliance that the Reid Alpha will endorse.”

She smiles. “You would be surprised, Shaman, how little that matters.”

~*~

The Lewis Pack doesn’t come in strength. The Alpha is a dark haired man with an easy smile who introduces himself as Stephen and travels with his Shaman—Liss waves at Chase, a smirk on her lips—and his Second, Vince, a quiet black man who watches everything with sharp but friendly eyes.

Lucas finds the whole thing immensely amusing. “We’re a Pack of four without an Alpha. Why on earth would you want an alliance with us?”

“Because you’re a Pack of four without an Alpha that every Pack in the country is whispering about,” Stephen says frankly. “Chase, you’re the strongest mage in the country and have bound a Pack together without an Alpha.”

His gaze flicks to Lucas, but he doesn’t say anything about the reputation Lucas has built, and the older ‘wolf smiles, sharp and dangerous.

“And if our Alpha returns?”

Liss gives a sphinx-like smile. “How likely is that, do you think?”

Chase shifts. “You have safe passage in our territory for the time we consider your proposal.”

Lucas stands before his Emissary does, and Stephen looks faintly surprised. “You need to consider it?”

Chase grins. “We’re a Pack of four without an Alpha. We need to consider.”

He steals the last scone on the table before he leaves, Lucas quiet at his back.

~*~

They Skype Tyler and Aurora.

The thing is, they have a good life, their tiny alpha-less pack, but it all hinges on Chelsea being too distracted to care about them. Chase has spent an hour with the woman and knows that if she ever came back to Harrisburg for good, everything would change.

“It’s not keeping our head down,” Chase says, sprawled on the couch. Tyler scowls from his hotel room in Vancouver, dark circles under his eyes. Aurora is in bed, but her eyes are bright. “She won’t like it.”

Aurora smirks. “Do we care about what she likes?”

Tyler frowns. “Tell me what the benefit is.”

“They’re close—they have territory in south Cali, so maybe next time we have a dragon in the preserve, we’ll have help killing it,” Lucas says.

“It lends us some credibility,” Chase adds, “And it could be helpful to have an ally in our back pocket after Lucas finishes his to-do list.”

Tyler’s quiet, watching him, and Chase stares back, wishing like hell his boyfriend was home and not in fucking Canada building a house.

“Ok,” Tyler says quietly.

Chase feels some of the tension run out of him. He nods. “Ok.”

~*~

Formalizing the alliance is surprisingly mundane, done over a plate of fries at the diner instead of a chalice of blood in the light of the full moon, and Chase is almost disappointed by it.

The Lewis Pack leaves after that, with a list of phone numbers and a promise to be in touch, the wards around their territory ringing a musical farewell when they pass through.

~*~

Ben proposes to Brielle on Thanksgiving, and Chase watches, lit up with happiness for his best friend and aching for what he knows is coming.

~*~

On the first day of December, Aurora calls Lucas at three in the morning and screams, voice loud enough it pulls Tyler from sleep and Lucas goes almost feral when Chase confines him behind wards and rowan. It’s only Aurora’s shaking voice saying she’s coming home early that calms the werewolf, and even that—it’s a tenuous calm, a glass sheet over a raging sea, and he thinks it would take very little for Lucas to break.

~*~

He’s sleep deprived, strung out with nerves, and not even a little surprised when Andre Drake stops him at the door to the police station.

“Chase.”

“I’m too tired for this shit, Drake. What do you want?” Chase demands, shoving his hands in his pockets and watching the older man impatiently.

Drake’s face does something complicated. “My nieces and father are coming to Harrisburg.”

Chase goes very still.

“Brielle wants them here to celebrate the holiday and her engagement. My father hasn’t even met Ben yet.”

“Your coven is not welcome in our territory,” Chase says.

Andre makes a frustrated noise. “It’s Christmas. Can’t you make an exception?”

His fingers tingle and the wind is screaming, cold and bitter and familiar. Chase smiles. “Yeah. Fuck, it’s Christmas.”

Relief flickers in Drake’s eyes and Chase turns away, dragging out his phone and texting.

>>She took the bait.

>>Bonus: the old man