“Stop!” Winter held up one hand in front of Bel while rubbing the other over his face. “I get more than enough needless updates on Rafe’s sex life. I don’t need to know about what freaky things are going on here.”
“What? I didn’t mean—”
“Uh-huh. I’ve seen enough starry eyes from Rafe and Marcus. I don’t need it from you too. Let’s just focus on the werewolf part of things.”
“Maybe we should sit,” Wyatt suggested while River snickered softly.
As Wyatt and River approached the couch where Bel was still sitting, Winter pushed to his feet and extended his hand to the older man.
“I’m sorry you didn’t get the best first impression of our clan,” Winter apologized.
Wyatt smiled as he took the vampire’s hand. “It’s understandable, considering our shared past and that we were not meeting under the best of circumstances.”
Winter released Wyatt’s hand and quickly shook River’s as well. Both werewolves seemed to relax, and Bel found himself able to breathe a little easier. It also helped that Wyatt and River settled on either side of him, wrapping him in their warmth and closeness. His brother smirked and shook his head, but he didn’t say a word about it.
“First, I want to know. Did you seriously not know about werewolves?” Bel demanded before Winter could ask anything. “I know it was a shock for Rafe and Marcus, but you always seem to be a step ahead of the rest of us, more in touch with various bits of information.”
“I didn’t know. Aiden never told me, and it never came up when I was digging around for information on…well, anything. I guess it’s as Aiden said—werewolves aren’t involved in our affairs, so there was no reason for me to encounter them.”
“What about witches? A witch was mentioned last night. Zelda? Are witches real?” River asked. He was leaning forward so that he was practically perched on the edge of his seat.
Winter nodded. “Witches are real, but I’ve not met any that I know of, and I’m more than a little skeptical of their abilities.”
Bel snorted. He found it extremely hard to believe that a human being had the ability to use magic to do anything.
His brother stared at him like he was an idiot. “Really? You refuse to believe in witches while you’re sitting between two men who can literally change into wolves. Why are witches that much harder to believe in?”
“I don’t know.” Bel threw up his hands, and Wyatt wrapped an arm around his stiff shoulders, pulling him in so that part of his back was pressed to Wyatt’s chest. “Yes, I’m not being particularly logical, but it just seems too extreme.”
“Yes, much more illogical than vampires and werewolves and all the other things that go bump in the night,” Winter mocked.
“Wait! There are others?” River asked.
Winter smiled at him, but there was a tightness to his expression that Bel knew was discomfort. It was one of those rare, unguarded moments when Winter felt he’d said too much.
“Let’s just focus on werewolves for tonight,” Winter murmured. “May I see you change?”
River twisted on the couch to look over at Wyatt, who shrugged one shoulder.
“Okay,” River replied. He stood and moved around the coffee table to an open place in the middle of the living room. Reaching up, he pulled his shirt off and dropped it on the floor, revealing nicely tan, smooth skin with a sprinkling of light-brown hair across his pecs and down his stomach. Muscles rippled with each movement, and Bel couldn’t stop a soft sigh.
“Whoa!” Winter shouted as River reached for the button on his jeans. His brother had squeezed his eyes closed and turned his face away.
Bel cackled, leaning more into Wyatt. “Are you kidding me? You were just complaining about my lack of logic. Did it not occur to you that they would need to be naked to shapeshift or risk destroying their clothes?”
“I didn’t know how it was done! Maybe the clothes magically appeared and disappeared. Maybe a fucking fairy flew out of his ass and sprinkled him with magic dust. I don’t know!”
“No magic fairies,” Wyatt said, though it sounded like he was trying very hard not to laugh. Which was fine because Bel was doing enough laughing for all of them. He couldn’t remember ever seeing Winter’s face so red.
“Sorry,” Bel gasped, trying to regain control.
“No, you’re not.”
“I’m trying to be.”
“Werewolves tend to be very comfortable with their bodies,” Wyatt explained. “As soon as we can shift, we spend a great deal of time with other pack mates naked.”
“Doesn’t bother me,” River added.
“Oh. If you’re comfortable with it,” Winter started and threw a dark look at Bel. “I just don’t want to hear any more happy little sighs from you. This is not a striptease. It’s science!”
Bel cleared his throat and nodded. That was the hard reminder he needed. He hadn’t completed as much research on the wolves as he’d wanted. He’d proceeded slowly, not wanting to make them feel uncomfortable in his home while they were still settling in.
But the prospect of seeing River shift again was always exciting. After what they’d told him about Brett and the MacPherson clan, he wanted them to feel as if they could remain in human form if they wanted.
River finished stripping down, and Bel had to bite his tongue to keep from making any noises or showing any emotion on his face. It didn’t help that Wyatt’s fingers were now biting into his thigh, reminding him of what Winter had interrupted in the music room.
With a wink at Bel, a soft glow started to envelop River. Something popped, and there was a crackle. Details were lost in the growing brightness of the light, but Bel could still make out River dropping to all fours. Parts of him stretched while others shrank. Skin was replaced by a thick growth of fur. There were more sounds of bones rubbing and breaking until Bel finally cringed.
“Does it hurt?” he whispered. Part of him wanted to shout at River to stop just so he wouldn’t be in pain.
“Not really.” Wyatt wrapped his arm across Bel’s chest, pulling him into a tight, comforting embrace. “When we’re young, the first few shifts can be extremely painful. But now, after so much time, it’s more like the burn of a good stretch.”
“Good,” Bel said on a relieved sigh.
The glow faded to nothing. In River’s place stood a wolf with white-and-gray fur. He shook his entire body. He stretched one rear leg and then the other.
“Wow,” Winter breathed in awed tones. “That is so amazing. He-he looks amazing. Smaller than I was expecting.” River’s ears snapped back in what sort of looked like an expression of shock and hurt. “No! What I mean is that you lost some of your human mass. I thought it would be one-to-one. The same size regardless of whether you’re human or wolf. Wait!” Winter’s eyes snapped over to Wyatt. “He can understand me?”
Wyatt chuckled. “Yes, our thoughts are still largely human in wolf form. We pick up the wolf’s sharp senses and some of their hunting instincts, but our brains still operate as human.”
“How does the pack communicate as wolves? Do you have a form of telepathy?” Bel inquired.