guys don’t have anything to say when it comes to the way I treat my woman, you hear me?”
“Look, you do you,” Jonathan said. “But if you're going to be an asshole, then…”
“He’s not,” the woman said. “It was a misunderstanding. I'm going to get the salad, aren’t I, Matthew?”
The man looked between us, and then looked back at her.
“Fine,” he said and looked back down at his menu. I sighed and turned to Johnathan.
“Could you not?” I hissed at him.
“You know that…” he started, and I shook my head.
“Just observe,” I said because I had a feeling this moment was bigger than just a rough conversation.
Matthew and the woman eventually left. I think he said that her name was Jenny, and I stored that in mind. As soon as they were gone, I turned to my brothers.
“Did you guys feel that?” I asked them. Johnathan looked up at me.
“Like a lightning bolt, eh?” he said.
I was so glad to have my brothers with me. My blood brothers understood exactly what I was feeling without elaborating.
“Yeah,” I said. “It was so weird. When I saw her, I just…”
“I think that was just the bear in you,” Frances said. “Seeing someone treated that way was disgusting. Seeing someone treated that way by a shifter is even more annoying.”
“I think it was just...I don’t know,” Johnathan shrugged. “She was really hot.”
“There was that,” I said. “The fact that he’s a shifter abusing a human is dangerous for all shifters, whether we are wolf shifters or not.”
“Are you certain that she is human?” Jonathan asked, and I nodded.
“Yeah,” I said. “Aren’t you?”
“I mean, maybe she’s just spent so long with the wolf that she smells like him,” Jonathan said. “I didn’t really check.”
“Why are we still talking about a hot girl we saw ten minutes ago?” Frances teased me. “This isn’t like you.”
“You didn't think that was weird?” I asked. “The way we all felt like we were hit like lightning?”
“Maybe,” Jonathan said with a shrug. “I’m going to finish my steak though because that makes me feel hit by lightning.”
“I feel like I’ve seen her before,” I said as we continued to eat. “Do you guys recognize her?”
“Yeah, she sells the knock-off cowboy hats just off ranch property," Frances said. “At that shop just around the corner.”
“Oh, I know that place,” I said. “I hate that place. It seems like they knock off everything we do, but it’s just different enough that we can’t sue them.”
“I have tried twice,” Frances said. “But when I submitted for copyright, they circled the differences and basically sent me an email laughing.”
“Oh, that’s nice,” I grinned. “Anyway, so she works in town. How come we didn’t know there was a wolf shifter in town?”
“Dunno,” Johnathan said. “But I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” I admitted. “But I’m not sure what we can do about it.”
“We could report him to the wolf council,” Jonathan said, and I shrugged.
“We could, but do you really want to get involved with the wolf council?” I asked, and Johnathan sighed.
“I mean, not really,” he said. “But that’s just because they are terrible to deal with. I had to do something with them in my old town, and they were just so...ridiculously angry and all over the place.”
“Really?” I asked. “I didn’t know that. What was it?”
“There was a wolf shifter who killed a bunch of innocent humans in my town,” Jonathan said. “And I had to turn him in. It was a mess because the council didn’t believe me...his council, I mean. Our council just asked me why I was getting involved with it. They couldn’t understand who it would be bad for everyone if that got out.”
“I read about that case,” Frances said. “I didn’t realize it was you.”
“Did my best to keep my name out of the press,” Jonathan said with a grin. “Could you imagine the disaster that would have been?”
“That’s interesting,” I said. “So the wolf council is already aware of you?”
“Yeah,” he replied. “I mean, who knows, maybe they have forgotten about me by now. But my point is, I know what to do if it came to that.”
“Are we actually planning to do something about this?” Frances asked. I sighed
“I don’t know,” I said. “What do you guys think?”
The three of us were silent for a while, and then Johnathan spoke up.
“I think we should observe them a bit more,” he said. “Maybe see her run around town.”