“No, don’t… ah, shit.” Declan rubbed his hand over his buzzed head, clearly struggling not to issue me an order. “Listen to me, Teagan. I can’t order you not to, but you’d likely lose your hand before you found your packet of noodles. Most of the town’s trashcans have ghouls living in them, and that’s if there isn’t something worse in there.”
“Ghouls?” I stepped over to the bin, and sure enough, there was something in there. Well, there was more of a great mass of nothingness in there. The filthy metal cylinder seemed to defy the laws of light. My package of noodles floated just at the top of a well of deep darkness, but, somehow, I got the impression that something within the bin was quivering in anticipation.
Declan’s hands were up, halfway reaching toward me. “My head is literally exploding right now. I want to order you not to touch those god-forsaken noodles, but I don’t want to ingest my own ball-sack. Please believe me when I tell you ghouls will eat pretty much anything—which is wonderful for mother nature but a bitch for your fingers.”
“That darkness is a ghoul?”
When I leaned in to get a closer look at the trashcan, Declan tensed like he really might explode into action. “Unless it’s a shade,” he said in a measured voice, “Which is much more dangerous than a ghoul.”
“It looks like liquid darkness.”
He peeked in. “Yep. That would be a shade. In five seconds, I’m just going to move you a few feet away. Damn it. If I end up having to eat my testicles, tonight...” He started making unintelligible sounds of frustration.
“Declan, I’m not going to reach for the noodles.” I stepped away from the trashcan, turned, and pointed up into his face. “But, don’t touch my things again, werewolf.”
“On my honor, I will never touch your nasty-ass packet of noodles again. The lesson is learned. I’ll buy you another one if you were attached to eating meat powder on freeze-dried noodles.”
“How about you buy me a real meal instead—if you’re still offering.” I laughed. “The only attachment I had to those noodles were that they cost ten dollars and were my only food.”
We ended up three blocks away in a little burger take-out window, sitting at a picnic table loaded up with burgers, fries, and chocolate malts.
I dipped a fry in Declan’s ketchup. “Sorry, I just did that without asking. Do you mind?” I asked after I did it. For some reason, I just felt so comfortable around this massive, tatted up werewolf.
Declan shrugged nonchalantly. “My ketchup is your ketchup, Teagan.”
“So…” I pointed my fry at him, “When you said that Jasper was protecting me up until you took over, what you were really saying was that Jasper has been watching me this whole time since the bar, and I didn’t know it, right?” I asked before popping the delicious, salty french fry into my mouth. This very well could be my last meal for a long time, and I was savoring every bite.
“Did I say that… no, I think I said something more along the lines of…” he startled at my basket of food in an exaggerated way, “Look at that. You ate that fast. How about I grab you another burger?”
“It’s okay, Declan. I’m a stray wolf that’s bringing all kinds of danger to Jasper’s territory and pack. He has every right to keep tabs on me.” I paused to consider the situation, playing with the back of my earring while I thoughtfully chewed my french fry. “I’m just shocked that someone followed me around for almost twenty-four hours without me noticing. I’m more out of touch than I thought I was.”
“Don’t beat yourself up. Jasper is…” Declan looked at a loss for words, and he went with, “Different.”
“What do you mean by different?” I froze with another fry halfway to my mouth. “More powerful? Sneakier? Is it something magical?”
Declan grinned. “You’re just going to have to see for yourself.”
“Fine.” I sighed. “So, does the pack run a store or restaurant or something?”
“Nope.” Declan pushed another burger into his mouth, and when I say pushed, I mean he had to shove the last bit in to fit it.
“Okay…” I squinted at him. “Then what job are they offering… exactly?”
Declan’s eyes went wide, and he raised a hand while he continued to chew.
“There isn’t a job, is there?”
“Well, there’s not technically a job… as of this moment, but we could come up with a job pretty easily,” Declan finally said. “There’s more than enough to do… cooking, cleaning, gardening.”
“I see.” I hadn’t really been considering working for the pack, except as a last resort, but if I was going to stay in Grayhaven until my hand healed, I wasn’t going to make it without making some more money. I held out my bandaged palm. “Well, it’s appreciated, but those are all jobs that take a lot of hand stress, and the whole reason I’m here is to let my torn muscles heal. It would be a little hard to do all of that left-handed.”
Declan winced as he looked at my palm. “Well, I put my foot in it, again. Here’s the thing, Teagan…” He wiped his mouth off with a napkin and threw it in his empty basket, before sweeping it aside. Leaning his elbows on the table, he threaded his fingers under his chin. “I know for a fact that Jasper wants all werewolves in Grayhaven under one roof where he can make sure we’re all safe. The pack has money. We pool our resources together now and from our lives before. Some of us were rich when we came in, and most of us have skills that are in high demand by this town. However, we
