A Grey Wolves Howliday (The Grey Wolves #14) - Quinn Loftis Page 0,2

up from her phone.

“Yep.” Titus nodded. “And squads. There’s the light squad, the tree squad, the wreath squad, and some other kind of squad that I don’t think I’m allowed to say.”

“How do you know this and I don’t?” Sally motioned for him to follow her.

“Because Uncle Gavril has been teaching me how to hunt.” Titus puffed his chest out proudly. “He says a good hunter scouts his territory and gathers information before deciding when to strike. So, he told me to practice by being quiet and seeing if I could go undetected by my prey.”

“And let me guess,” Sally said, trying really hard not to smile. “You set your sights on Aunt Jen as your first practice prey?”

He nodded proudly.

“I think me and Uncle Gavril are going to have to have a talk about his teaching methods,” Sally muttered under her breath. She shuddered to think what other things her son might have heard while spying on his Aunt Jen. “You coming down, babe?” she asked Costin.

Just as he was about to answer, his phone beeped. He growled a second after reading the text. “I’ve been informed by the head of the celebration committee that if I don’t come down, she will drag me down by my tail.” Costin’s eyes were glowing by the time he finished talking.

“Want me to tell her you’re sick?”

“We don’t get sick,” he replied.

“There’s an exception to every rule. We’ve learned that by now,” Sally pointed out.

Costin stalked toward her and Titus. He swung their little boy into his arms, causing Titus to giggle. “I’m not afraid of the big, bad Jen,” he said before marching out the door.

“We could put a sleeping potion in her eggnog,” Titus offered. “Uncle Gavril said sometimes predators have to trick their prey. I bet Aunt Rachel would make us some.”

“Holy troll butts.” Sally groaned. “Costin, I think it’s time you had a come-to-Jesus meeting with Uncle Gavril.”

“Why?” Costin grinned at Titus. “I think that’s a brilliant idea.”

Okay, we can just make up for this poor parenting skill by teaching him to help old ladies cross the street and to eat his vegetables. Is it okay to weigh bad parenting tactics against good as long as the good came out on top? She mentally shrugged. Hell if she knew. She was just trying to survive the holidays without Jen permanently maiming Fane and Costin and without her son slipping roofies into people’s drinks. Just another day in the Romania pack.

*****

“Maybe you’re taking this celebration thing a little too seriously.” Decebel sat Thia in her highchair and poured some cereal on the tray. Jen stood across from him in the main kitchen of the pack mansion. She grunted and muttered but didn’t look up from the pad upon which she was scribbling. She paused to tap the pen on her teeth, then went back to work on her notes. Decebel tried to frame his words as carefully as he could. “Babe, this can be a … laid back … casual thing, and everyone will still have a good time. The important thing is that we are all together.”

“Of course everyone is going to have a good time,” she practically growled, still without looking at him. “Obviously they are going to have a good time. Any idiot can throw a celebration where guests have a good time. I want them to have a great time. No, I want them to have a stupendous, colossal, rocking-out-party-of-the-century time. I want this to be—”

Decebel put the sippie-cup down he’d been filling with milk and grabbed Jen’s shoulders. She sucked in a breath and finally looked up, her beautiful blue eyes meeting his. For an instant, he thought she was going to growl some more. Then her face softened, and her shoulders slumped. “I just want it to be special,” she admitted softly. “This year has been complete crap.” She laughed and then shook her head. “Who am I kidding? The last few years have been crap.”

“Ouch, Jennifer. I’m trying not to take that personally considering we met, mated, and had a child together during those complete crap times.”

“There have been moments of awesomeness.” She set the pen down and wrapped her arms around him. “I didn’t mean that all of it’s been crap. I just mean—”

“I know what you mean,” he interrupted. “Since Fane met Jacque, we’ve all been trying to survive from one bad guy to the next.”

“Exactly.” She nodded. “There’s barely been time to breathe, let alone celebrate the amazing things