“How could I get the blame?”
“Just come on.”
Her breathing had regulated once they left the airport. However, her breathing was feeling a little forced again. They had traveled a good hour or so from the airport, driving down the state highway and pulling off at the sign for Woodrush Point. Woodrush Point wasn’t too small a town but it was much smaller than the city she and Irini had been living in for the last ten years. They drove right on through so Caia could check it out. She was too nervous to really pay attention. Dimitri pointed out his own house but Caia could only nod numbly, a vague impression of a moderate sized white cladded home with a driveway and a huge tree out front registering with her. Over the tops of houses in the distance she could see the woodland, the woodland that followed the highway and seemed to encapsulate the whole of the town. It was easy to see why the pack had picked this place. Lots of trees to play in. With a sigh, Dimitri took a right past a car garage and they were out onto the highway again. Twenty minutes later, the Elder slowed his car, turning down onto a track in the woods that had been widened, the trees cut heavily back from it. The gravel kicked up under the tires and through the overhanging branches Caia could see flashes of white.
At last they pulled up into a huge circled clearing. In the center sat a large white home with an old-fashioned wraparound porch. She drew in a deep breath.
“The whole pack is here?”
Dimitri nodded, his kind eyes brimming with understanding. “It’s the only way to really welcome you, kid.”
Irini on the other hand was bubbling with excitement. Before Dimitri had even parked, she was out of the car and running for the house. He merely laughed and finally shut the engine off.
“Ready?”
“No.” She shook her head nervously. “But then I’ll never be ready for this moment so we might as well shove my ass out of the car, right?”
He chuckled getting out of the driver’s side. “That’s the spirit.”
Caia had no idea how she managed it, but she got out of the car and slowly followed Dimitri up the front steps to the porch. Her lykan ears could hear the sound of Irini crying happily and people murmuring warm words of welcome to her. She could hear her growl Lucien’s name, but then start crying and mumbling ‘I missed you brother’ over and over.
I guess all is forgiven, Caia thought wryly.
As her light foot came off the last step she was seized once more with absolute anxiety, undiluted and pure. She steadied herself, taking a deep breath. She couldn’t let them see how nervous she was. Dimitri had swung open the porch door, and was now throwing open the main door with as much grace.
“Well hell!” he shouted in amusement. “Look at you all … you didn’t eat everything already, did you?”
“I managed to save you some food,” a laughing female voice called back to him. “I hid it from these vultures for you.”
She could hear Dimitri smack a kiss on someone and the pack chuckled lightly. The sounds of familiarity between them all sent another wave through Caia’s stomach, but before she could melt into an anxious puddle on the floor Dimitri’s head popped back in sight around the door frame. “Come on, kid.”
A sudden hush fell over the room. Slowly, she pushed her way through the porch door and stepped into a beautiful open hallway with a wide antique staircase winding up from the center of the room to the next floor. Bracing herself against her own insecurities Caia turned to the opening to the left of the hallway and took in the sight of the large pack that was to be her new family. There looked to be about thirty of them - large feral, handsome males, young and older; beautiful, athletic females; small children with enquiring eyes.
This was Pack Errante.
The whispering immediately began as all eyes drank her in from head to foot.
Lucien was stunned. Whatever he had expected it was not this. Caia stood at the front door gazing at them, her cat-like green eyes still and calm as she took in the sight of the pack staring back at her from his large living room. He could tell by her tentative step towards them that she was more nervous than her placid expression let on. He watched in satisfaction as people came forward to shake her hand politely.
They had taken his warnings to welcome her to heart.
As distracted as she was by his pack she had yet to notice him, and so he took pleasure in the moment to really look at her. Her heritage gave her away, he decided… as did her smell. She wouldn’t realize it, how could she? She didn’t know. She was as graceful as the lykan she was but looked more fey than wolf. Moreover, she held herself far more coolly than the rest of them. She was like water to their fire.
He was stunned by his reaction to her.
He had not expected attraction.
He watched her sleek, light eyes widen every now and then depending on what kind of welcome she was given. Her skin was pale compared to the golden glow of his and his pack’s skin, her figure slight compared to the curvaceous shapes of the other women. He frowned, wondering how much of a problem this was going to be - she didn’t look like one of them at all. She stopped suddenly in the middle of shaking one of the mated female’s hands. Her bright gaze flew across to the other side of the room and widened.
“Uncle Magnus?” Lucien heard her whisper. In an instant Magnus had crossed the room and had the little lykan wrapped in his big arms. Lucien smiled at her surprise and then her tentative happiness. This is a good sign, he decided. It was a show of family, and it seemed to ease the tension radiating from his anxious pack. Magnus of course, Lucien realized wryly, seemed unaware of any tension.
“My Artemis!” Magnus exclaimed heartily, holding her slight weight away from him so he could inspect her. “Look at the size of you, Cy. I wouldn’t have recognized you on a clear, full moon!”
She teased her lip shyly between her teeth. She shed no tears, Lucien realized. Not like Ella and the others who had wept at his sister’s return.
He watched as Magnus lavished praise over her. She blushed prettily and kept holding onto him.
Suddenly Magnus looked up at him and turned the young lykan towards him. “Caia,” Magnus’ voice rumbled in the room, “I’d like to introduce you to Lucien: Pack Leader.”