that it doesn’t look like it belongs to any member of the clergy that I’ve ever seen. It’s an inky black A-line dress with white decorative buttons down the front from the white-collared neckline all the way down to the mid-calf hem. The wrist cuffs are set off in white. The belt pops—it’s bright white too. The effect is striking.
After showering and getting dressed in it, I’m stunned at how refined and… classically beautiful it makes me look. And feel, which is perhaps more of a surprise.
I’m in borrowed black heels. Heels are footwear that I haven’t gone near in years, ever since I started waitressing. When you’re on your feet all day, you don’t do anything to screw up what you need to be standing and moving on for the rest of the week.
But the gal who lent me her shoes swore these were the best pair of designer footwear in the world, and that I wouldn’t suffer while I was strapped into them.
She might be right. So far, I’m not pinched or pained anywhere.
And oh. My. Starships. Heels make my legs (and my butt, if I can trust myself to be objective) look sexy.
Thus, I find myself ascending the stone steps up into the old Gothic church following a pack of werewolves in a startlingly stylish garment I actually like.
I’m going to werewolf church.
I blink, processing it, trying not to gawk at the stained glass windows and the aged wood interior of the place and the ancient-looking wooden pews with their carvings of wolves and lambs.
And all the people. So many people. How many werewolves can fit in a church?
Ginny holds my hand as we walk further in, feeling conspicuous.
“What do we do?” Ginny asks under her breath. She’s clutching me like she wants to run out of here or she’s afraid I will.
Biting my lip, I try to look around. There are people in front of us, people on both sides of us, people behind us. Pews are everywhere. Row after row after row. And they’re all occupied. “I have no idea.”
“Howeyeh, you two,” a familiar voice says, and we turn to find Finn pushing through people to join us.
His friendly familiar face is a relief to behold. And he knows it. “You both look more nervous than a scabby slag in church,” he teases.
The man directly behind him cuffs him upside the head.
It’s Deek.
I’ve seen him decked out in his church suits on Sundays before, but maybe the part where we have to venture out into traffic and vroom around town by car in order to arrive here keys him up in the worst way, because he’s never this relaxed, standing tall, shoulders straight, brow unpinched. Never this… quietly confident. This meek yet debonaire.
Because yes, he still has his eyes submissively lowered and all that, but he’s… here, among his Pack, in this place, he looks so different.
Nice different.
Humbly commanding. And something about the way he’s smiling as he shakes his head at Finn with something like brotherly disapproval has me feeling extra fond of him.
I just like him. Deek’s good people.
So is Finn, but I don’t feel the same way about him that I do for Deek. Some undefinable thing. And I may not be able to put my finger on what it is, but where I’m slightly resistant to getting to know Finn any better, I find myself drawn to Deek, and I’m up for learning everything about him.
Finn is holding a bundle of white and gold satin fabric, and with a deeply provoking smile aimed at Deek, he shakes it out.
“Is that—” Ginny starts.
“No way,” I say.
Finn laughs at us and shoves his arms and head into the vestment, letting its folds flutter down until he looks respectable and… holy. “That’s right, ladies! I’m a choir boy.”
“Bullshit,” I accidentally exclaim.
Ginny’s eyes go wide. I slap my hand over my mouth. Deek laughs.
Finn adopts a devoutly religious expression and posture. “It’s the honest-to-God truth.”
“Wow,” Ginny says.
“I second that,” I agree.
“You two are casting aspersions on my character,” Finn informs us, hands folded and head bowed.
“That’d be the case if you weren’t full of it,” Deek tells him. To us, he indicates we should move ahead of them with a polite sweep of his arm. “Ladies, if you’d like to sit over here? Finn will join you between songs.”
“Wait, he’s really a choir boy?” Ginny squeaks, laughter in her voice.
“Have been since I was a virtuous and innocent eight years old. I can’t believe you