Ruby (Ghost Mountain Wolf Shifters, #13)

by Audrey Faye

“Grandpa Cleve says we’re all shaped by what happened to us, and sometimes that shape is in a lot of pieces, but saying we’re broken is a decision to push the pieces away and shame them.”

Jules suggests courses of study to interns who ask for such input. Adelina was entirely shocked to discover hers wasn’t just a long list of engineering classes. I don’t think she’s figured out exactly why, yet. “Someone has to make sure Katrina doesn’t accidentally start her own country.”

The design of my ukulele does not require my input. It will be a simple instrument made of pine. James chose the wood.

Jade turns carefully toward the kitchen with what I can only call Shelley Dunn in her eyes. Which means Cleve will drink the tea and Jade will probably handle boss-of-the-muffins duties for the remainder of the morning. I spare a sympathetic thought for Damien, who will have the job of convincing the small dominants who like to help with muffins that Jade is their new boss. Mellie’s getting pretty good at that kind of nuance. Braden’s wolf is still a fuzzy menace who wants to believe the hierarchies he can smell are absolute.

“Pups aren’t a requirement to be pack, to be a mate, or to be a wolf I love fiercely and forever.”

Ani sent me fancy business cards. They’re ridiculous. I love them dearly and show them to absolutely everyone, even the professors in town. “I just make the deals.”

The first part of that sentence is a kitty who’s been reading spy novels again. I’m pretty sure the last part is the most recent insult one of the professors in town leveled at the group that showed up to do a class presentation wearing whatever they managed to scrounge from one of our town stashes of spare clothes.

“So Kennedy’s handling intricate politics with powerful humans in town and I’m on soup-stealing duty?” Three heads nod like that’s an entirely reasonable allocation of responsibilities. Which, to be fair, it absolutely is around here.

I survey the air battle. It’s pure chaos, which is the predictable consequence of having ordered every cat, bunny, and stray zucchini I could find to pick a team. There are also at least two wild ravens playing, and one of them is young and dumb enough to have put themselves in range of Milo’s teeth more than once. Possibly trying to snag beads from Kelsey’s hair. She’s wearing a particularly colorful array today.

It’s interesting Russell has that kind of Tressie bat signal. And that she comes.

Reilly asks people who don’t have the foggiest clue what calculus is to write calculus problems for him, which he then cheerfully solves.

Life and death. Love and war. The sounds and scents of wisdom for a ukulele that must grow old quickly if it is to fight well in the battle to come.

Not so long ago, I hated that radar with every fiber of my being. Now, it’s the way I serve pack. As are banana muffins.

Ten thousand years of sentinel history rise in my veins. I do not. I see him, and I see the holy monster in you, and I will not turn away.

Sofia thinks it’s because the four-year-old inside of me that I finally let wail at the sky where everyone could hear her isn’t done causing a ruckus, yet. Which is a frightening thought. The adult version of Jules Scott is plenty capable of public disturbances, but I’ve learned to polish the edges of the raw volcano that was my younger self. I wasn’t enough to save my dad—and I was too much for everyone else.

Reina pushes back her hood. “We don’t have time for this, you defective amoebas. It’s damn cold out here and this instrument needs to get out of the wind, so cut it out with the moronic posturing and get your asses moving. I have a customer waiting.”

A raven dives from the sky and passes close enough to brush Russell’s hair with her wingtip. A strand of beads drops into his hands. His eyes water.

A bear roars, off in the distance. I wish him swift snow under his paws. Phil has gone to tell the others of his daughter’s courage and how the skill of her hands has caused the red wolf of fury to pick a new home.

because he has handwriting that doesn’t look like it went round in a blender with a skunk. Even my bear thinks that sounds messy.

Terrence comes up with a rhyme that fits into Stinky’s terrible verse about cookies with googly eyes and a picnic in a forest. I believe the picnic actually happened, but I don’t think there were any googly eyes and I don’t think Stinky was born, yet.

Stinky makes verses to share the new lore he learns of his parents, and such tales don’t...

Russell rubs her shoulders the same way Finn does when Kendra has had a long flight. Tressie’s eyes close a little as she leans back into his hands.

I have to tell Sienna. And Reina. Maybe not Katrina, because she’ll tell Adelina, and Adelina has a very big chemistry test coming up and it’s hard to do chemistry while knitting lacy cowls with beads in them because those are the best courting gifts.

Not much shakes Russell, but his inner compass deciding Tressie is his true north is definitely causing some wobbles.

I have no memory of that. “That was Russell, so Tressie could appreciate his legs.”

“She’ll have the help.” Lissa’s words are shards as sharp as those of any minivan. “And if you ever forget how much you matter, I will hunt you. Just so we’re clear.”

Every engineer in hearing distance glares at me. Their wiring skills might be questionable, but Ronan’s rules on not electrocuting innocent packmates are very strict.

Colin shudders. I don’t dim what comes for him, but I make sure he also feels his packmates as he passes. The packmates who are trusting him at their backs. His wolf steadies. He will not look away. Milo’s wolf leans against his shoulder. They will be loyal together.

a country song with verses about zucchini and robots

In human books, I think it would make me jealous, but humans are silly like that.

Then he hops down from his stepstool to go get the coconut milk Aurelia likes. It has a turtle on the front of the carton. She claims his name is Horace and he likes to knit kelp sweaters.

I do believe the provincial assessment portal is leading our sweet bear cub straight into a life of cybercrime.

One of her professors was overheard in a hallway saying her papers are the ones he most wants to frame and fail at the same time, and I don’t think anyone has ever given a cat a better compliment.

Several cats did extensive user testing.

I pat the shoulder of the teenager who was smart enough to come in here and let us steady her. Rio said she figured out yesterday just how much like Ruby Dunn she is. I could have told her that. Ruby often came to my kitchen when she needed a little steadying.

Tara considers turning me into a nice block of cheese and feeding me to the rogue cats. My wolf grins. Funny elder.

Families are choices. Blood is only one of the possible ways they get glued together.

Ruby watches the toddlers as their eyes close, as they nestle into each other and into dreams. She curls up on the ground around two small red forms who exist only in memory. Deep inside her wolf, a voice whispers. Their names are Hoot and Grady.

Ronan can’t hear James. He just decided to start making polite requests of the trees when one of his cubs needs a hand and his are busy. Softness. A grandfather who’s glad to serve.

Reese wraps a little tighter around Molly, who got to pet Smoke’s nose before he slept and then cried buckets of tears on Reese’s shoulder. She hums a quiet promise of screwdriver solidarity with the newest member of the Dunn clan. Which is only right and proper, as the last Dunn we claimed. I sign at her. My wolf thinks I’m Smoke’s uncle, which makes her his aunt and Reese something in the vicinity of his grandpa.

Reese threatens to tattoo my bony ass the next time I’m sleeping. I request a cute skunk with googly eyes. Bailey rolls her eyes. “You’re fired from uncle duty.”

basket with an adorable drawing of furry gray ears to the schoolhouse in the middle of the night.

Ruby meets my eyes. I rip my soul open and trust the combined forces of Rio, James, and Grandpa Cleve to help her see. Their names are Jules and Hayden. Their names are Jules and Hayden—and I forgot, too. Ruby sucks in a ravaged breath. I don’t quite manage.

Stinky’s trying to teach Smoke how to knit.

“You’d make a good drill sergeant.” She snorts. “That’s just a fancy word for healer.” I blink. That can’t be right, but it doesn’t feel all the way wrong, either.

Their names are Cody and Stinky and Grady and Hoot. I can grieve for my dead mate, and rage with the need to avenge him, but I must not forget. Or Ebony will put itch powder in my bra.

Reilly skids to a halt with a contraption in his hands that looks like the kindling pile and a mermaid entered a teleporter together and came out a single, melded entity.

I whisper tattoo words into her hair.

The psychologists and trauma counselors call it dissociation. Drill sergeants mostly call it how we get everyone out alive. Except for the times we don’t. Or we try too many times and then our souls separate into weirdly unattached chunks at very inconvenient times.

“Their names are Cody and Rennie and Aaron.”