Karen MacInerney - Tales of an Urban Werewolf 3 - Leader of the Pack, e-book
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“There’s someone to see you,” my assistant Sally said as I walked past her desk. In lieu of her
traditional spandex, she was dressed in a flattering blue suit that actually covered her midriff all
the way around. Sometime in the last few weeks, her wardrobe had undergone a major change. I
wasn’t sure why, but I liked it. She was even wearing fewer layers of eyeliner.
“Who is it?”
“He told me it was a surprise … said he’s an old friend.”
“No business card?”
She shook her head, and I sighed. She might look more professional from a sartorial standpoint,
but she was still less than ideal as an assistant.
I straightened my jacket and headed for my office, wondering what “old friend” had turned up. I
took a deep breath as my hand touched the knob—and froze.
“Something wrong?” Sally asked.
Yes, something was wrong. Very wrong. Unless my nose was deceiving me, Sally had let a
werewolf into my office. But I wasn’t about to tell Sally that.
“Next time somebody comes to visit me,” I said, “would you please have them wait
outside
my
office?”
She shrugged, and I resisted the impulse to snarl at her. Instead, I turned and opened the office
door.
He was sitting at my desk.
Also by Karen MacInerney
On the Prowl
Howling at the Moon
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For my sister, Liza Potter, with love
\
ONE
Most of the time, I’m not too crazy about
being a werewolf. For so many reasons: the
compulsory and inconvenient transformations, the excessive reliance on Lady Bic razors … not
to mention the difficulty explaining to potential mates that our children would probably grow a
natural fur coat and tail every twenty-eight days or so. Maintaining a normal relationship—much
less a career—is a hairy proposition when you tend to sprout fangs every time someone pops
Moonstruck
into the DVD player.
But there are compensations. The lightning-fast reflexes, for example. The ability to scare the
pants off of would-be muggers and rapists. The deep, almost carnal enjoyment of a rare prime rib
at Ruth’s Chris. And, as was currently the case, the ability to smell every nuance of a gorgeous
spring day.
It was a warm mid-March afternoon in central Texas , and I was on my way back to Austin from
a meeting with my favorite client in San Antonio . The radio was playing full blast and the
windows in my M3 were wide open, letting in the mingled scents of fresh earth, new grass,
cows, and a complete and total absence of werewolves, which was fine by me. The cows,
however, were making me hungry. Lunch had been a long time ago, I realized as I gulped back a
mouthful of saliva and reached for my tumbler of wolfsbane tea.
I was mentally reviewing the more intimate details of my meeting with Mark Sydney, CEO of
Southeast Airlines. He was my client, to be sure—and landing the Southeast Airlines account had
recently netted me partnership—but most of the afternoon had been spent at a romantic River
Walk restaurant staring over a giant margarita at my client’s deep blue eyes . I was reviewing our
good-bye kiss when my cell phone rang.
I flipped it open as the M3 rolled past another tasty-smelling herd of cows. “Sophie Garou.”
“So, how did your ‘meeting’ go?” It was my best friend, Lindsey.
“Fine,” I said. “We did some strategic planning and talked about general accounting practices.
Everything’s great.”
“Are you dating yet?”
“Not officially. We’re kind of keeping things quiet; I’d rather Adele didn’t know.” I didn’t want
to know what my boss thought of my mixing business with pleasure. And boy, was it a pleasure
…
“Mark’s a good match for you. I liked Heath, but he just didn’t have the same … I don’t know.
Zing?”
Lindsey was right about Mark—he was all about zing—but my heart still wrenched a little at the
mention of my ex-boyfriend. Heath had asked me to marry him on Valentine’s Day, about a
month ago, and I’d had to decline. Partly because I wasn’t sure how he’d take the whole “I’m a
werewolf” announcement, of course. And partly because I suspected he was sleeping with his
gorgeous associate Miranda. But even without those rather significant mitigating factors, things
just hadn’t been right between us for a long time. It was a hard decision, but I was pretty sure it
was the right one.
“For the record, Mark and I are not dating,” I repeated. Even if we had enjoyed a few—okay,
more than a few—steamy episodes together. “He’s my client,” I reminded her. But Mark was
also something else—something even stranger than I was. About a month ago, when I’d gotten
into trouble with a pack of deranged Mexican werewolves, he’d appeared out of nowhere
wearing wings and what looked like a full-body coat of liquid napalm. Which was convenient—
as was the fact that he knew I was a werewolf—but enough to give me pause when I thought of
becoming involved with him long-term. It was bad enough that my children would have
intermittent episodes involving a full coat of fur and a tail. A full coat of fur doused in napalm
would be a bit much. Particularly if it occurred while I was giving birth.
Still, I had to admit Mark was absolutely fabulous in bed. I squeezed my legs together just
thinking about our last episode, which had taken place between acts at the Zachary Scott Theater
…
“Is he up for this weekend?” Lindsey asked.
“What?” I asked, pulling my mind up out of the gutter. Or, in this case, the coat room at Zach
Scott.
“The Howl. Aren’t you going?”
I’d blocked it out of my mind so thoroughly I’d almost forgotten about the upcoming inter-pack
meeting, which was scheduled to start Friday in Fredericksburg , an hour or two west of Austin .
Since I wasn’t affiliated with any pack, I didn’t feel too inclined to attend, even though
Wolfgang, the leader of the Houston pack, had asked me to poke my nose in. To which I’d said a
polite no thank you. As far as I was concerned, the less I had to do with the werewolf world, the
better. “God, no,” I said to Lindsey.
“Since you’re not officially
dating
, why don’t you drop in and leave Mark behind? You might
meet a cute single werewolf.”
Like Tom?
I thought before I could stifle it. Tom was perhaps the most intoxicatingly handsome
werewolf I had ever met. Granted, I hadn’t met a whole lot of werewolves over the last twenty-
eight years—I’d been “undercover” for most of that time—but I’d seen enough to know that Tom
was something pretty special. He had long blond hair, chiseled Nordic features, shimmery gold
werewolf eyes, and a tanned body I just couldn’t stop staring at. And then there was his smell,
which was enough to reduce me to a quivering puddle of lust…
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