Chapter 2

Serena

She was on her feet for nine hours before the night even started, and the heels on her feet were Lena's idea entirely.

"They're three inches," Lena said, from the bathroom doorway of Serena's apartment, watching her try to walk normally across the hardwood.

"Three inches is a philosophical position," Serena said. "My feet are not interested in philosophy."

"You look incredible." She said, beaming at Serana.

"I look like someone who is thinking about her feet."

Lena laughed. She was already dressed in a burgundy wrap dress, gold hoops she'd bought in a market in Accra three summers ago. Her natural hair was pinned up, soft and high. She was four inches shorter than Serena, but nobody knew because she wore monster heels and had the energy of a firecracker. Before she entered the room, she'd already decided to have a good time.

Serena looked at herself in the bathroom mirror. Black bandage dress, sleeveless, mid-length. Her hair was down; it was a feature she loved. Natural thick dark hair, falling past her shoulders, Damon was obsessed with it, and she wore it down when he asked, and she didn't have a reason to say no. 

She was twenty-seven, five-nine, and toned from all the agonizing pilates sessions Lena dragged her to. Her eyes were dark brown, deep-set, her face was beautiful but sharp, and people often mistook her for a bitch from a distance until she spoke and they realized she'd simply been concentrating.

Her hands betrayed the spoiled girl persona people had of her. As a florist, she was always using her hands, and she had light scratches.  She'd stopped being self-conscious about this around twenty-four. She built Voss & Green from a deposit, a lease, and twelve hundred dollars of starting inventory, and decided that her hands were not decorative objects; a few marks were worth it.

She named the shop after her mother. Vivienne Green. She still could not believe her mother had been dead for six years, in a car accident on Route 26 in the rain. That day, she got a phone call that had changed her life. She missed her mother deeply. 

She was still looking at the mirror, wondering if she looked too tall, when her phone buzzed.

Damon & Serena

Damon: We're meeting everyone at Onyx at 9. Joel's already there apparently lol 

Serena: Who’s Joel again? 

Damon: He’s a wolf, he's Gamma at the Ironveil pack. You almost ready? 

Serena: Five mins 

Damon: You look beautiful, btw. Preemptively. 

Serena: You can't preemptively compliment someone 

Damon: I just did. See you downstairs, my love 😘

"He's downstairs," Serena said.

"Mm." Lena was applying lip gloss in the mirror beside her. "How are things with Damon?"

"Fine."

"Fine like good fine or fine like fine."

Serena looked at her. "Fine, like fine is a complete word that means what it means."

Lena put the cap on the lip gloss and turned to face her fully, which was Lena's way of indicating that she was no longer making casual conversation. "You've been with him for two years. You barely talk about him. You talk about the shop, you talk about your aunt, you talk about the book you're reading. You don't talk about him."

"Some people are private."

"You're private. He's invisible."

Ignoring the comment, Serena picked up her bag. "Let's go."

Damon Cross was thirty, six-one, with amber eyes and brown skin that caught light and made even Serena a bit jealous. He was Beta of the Ashford Pack, which operated mostly out of the Cascade foothills. He was easy and warm and slightly deferential in a way that made people comfortable around him, which Serena had always suspected was more constructed than it appeared. 

She understood Lena’s curiosity. Serena and Damon were lukewarm; the fault was Serena’s, and she would admit that. It wasn’t that Damon was not attractive, but she just felt comfortable with him. Two years had flown by easily because she felt nothing. He was a good addition to her life, but she didn’t lose sleep when she thought of losing him.

He kissed her cheek when she came downstairs and said she looked beautiful. She knew he meant it.

"Two years," he said in her ear as they walked in. "How are we doing?"

"We're standing," she said, which made him laugh.

Onyx was at capacity. Too many wolves in an enclosed space, her own wolf was always slightly flat and watchful, but it became even more so in crowds with too many dominant frequencies. She was of low rank. It had never bothered her exactly since she basically lived like a human. She had no affiliation with any pack and had never shifted, but it meant that spaces like this, where most people sensed her weak wolf, were tiring.

She got a drink. She stood with Lena near the edge of the floor while Damon went to find his packmates. The music was good, she'd give the place that. Their DJ was perfect. Every song flowed into the next and kept you moving. She was watching the dance floor, not thinking about anything specific, when the world fell away. 

It was as if she were dragged out of her body. She felt it in the center of her chest; something had taken hold of her and pulled her somewhere or to someone. Her wolf went from flat and watchful to vertical in under a second. 

There, her wolf said, and it was the clearest her wolf had ever been. There. There.

She pressed her hand on her head. She looked around. The club looked like the club. There were bodies, light, movement, nothing that explained anything. She turned in a slow circle. Her wolf was vibrating, straining toward somewhere, some direction she couldn't —

And then it stopped.

Her wolf dropped back to flat, and the hook was released. Lena was looking at her like she was crazy. She was still standing at the edge of a dance floor with her hand on her chest, wondering what had happened. She breathed.

"Hey." Lena's hand clutched her arm. "Hey, you just —"

"I'm fine."

"You went completely white."

"The crowd." She took a slow breath in through her nose. "Too many wolves. I just needed a second." Lena knew she was a wolf, but nothing like this had ever happened.

Lena watched her, unconvinced about the excuse being given. Serena knew she was suspicious, but she had no answers to the question Lema would ask.

"Do you want to leave?" Lena said quietly.

"No. I'm fine, I just need a drink." Lena got her on quickly, and she took a sip of her drink. Her hands were unsteady.

Before Lena had the chance to ask more questions, Damon was back. He apologized for leaving, explaining there had been an issue, and he took some of the packmates outside to quickly intervene. Serena didn’t care, but talking to him gave her the perfect escape from Lena’s questioning eyes. She dragged Damon to the dance floor, grateful she had a way to distract herself. The party continued without much conversation.

Serana wasn't thinking about the event for the rest of the party, but by 1 am, which was when they left Onyx, it was present. The event was in the back of the mind like a tab kept open.

In the car, she leaned against Damon's shoulder, looked out at Portland moving past, and thought about the order she needed to place tomorrow and whether the refrigeration unit in the back of the shop would need replacing. She distracted herself from wondering why her wolf was pacing.

She'd never felt her wolf do that before in twenty-seven years.

She didn't know what to do with that, so when Damon pulled over to her apartment, she kissed him, and while he looked at her with eyes full of questions, he didn’t ask. She liked that about him. 

Serena took off her heels as soon as she entered her apartment. She picked up her phone to check if Lena was home. Damon had gotten a driver to take her home, but Serena liked to check in. She sighed, realizing Lena had already texted.

Serena & Lena

Lena: You good? 

Serena: Yes, why? Btw, are you home?

Lena: Yes, I am home, but let's focus because you had a weird moment and then pretended you didn't, and before you say I misread things, I've known you for 6 years 

Serena: It was just the crowd. I swear! With a lot of wolves there, I just felt weird for a second.

Lena: Serena. 

Serena: Lena. 

Lena: Ok, fine. But I'm watching you 

Serena: Well, that’s creepy, don’t you think?. Good night. 

Lena: night ❤️

Serena put her phone face down and stared at the ceiling for a long time.

Her wolf was still pacing.