Page 12 of A Pack of Lies and a Big Bad Wolf

I don't really want to elaborate. Family, other than my brother, is an uncomfortable subject for me. My mother met my father at a pack gathering and married up, and she has sliced her past away as cleanly as a knife.

From what little I gleaned from people who knew her pack in Colorado, her parents were alcoholics, dirt-poor, and embarrassing. The subject was taboo in our house growing up.

"Where do they live?"

"No idea."

“It would really help us to have more information about his genetics. I’m going to have an investigator track down the information. All right, let’s talk about your parents, aunts and uncles then.”

I don't care for the direction of this conversation.

"Hey!" I say brightly, spearing an asparagus spear. "You promised that if we trained with Bram, we’d get to use whatever we learn on you."

He sits back in his chair, amusement quirking his mouth. "I did say that."

"You did. In front of witnesses.”

"And what did Bram teach you?"

"Not to shift, mostly." I stand up, slowly, because Bram spent forty minutes this afternoon on something he called the wall sit. "That was the entire first hour. A shift takes 30 to 60 seconds for most of us, and you're useless for all of them. Anyone grabbing you is a shifter too. He knows those seconds are coming and he'll break your arm before your wolf ever shows up."

"Bram is a wise man."

"Also my wolf is a hundred and ten pounds of pure enthusiasm. Bram says enthusiasm is not a fighting style." My wolf is also pacing impatiently, and panting for Kieran, but I will literally die before I admit that.

Kieran gets to his feet. There's a lot of him, and he takes his time about it. He holds out one hand, palm up. "Show me."

"Grab my wrist."

He does. His hand closes around my forearm and his fingers overlap by a solid inch. His palm is hot. My whole arm goes stupid.

I step off the line. I rotate against the thumb. My wrist comes free, clean, exactly the way Bram drilled it.

“Very good,” Kieran says kindly.

Patronizing bastard.

So I hit him. A body shot to the ribs, weight behind it, elbow in.

Kieran looks down at me. "Ow," he says politely. "Devastating."

I hit him again, harder.

He pretends to wince. “There goes a rib. The pain. Thank God for shifter healing.”

I put my shoulder into the next one, hard enough that my own boots slide on the tile. He doesn't move. I hit him twice more and get nothing for it but a small, courteous nod.

I mean, I wasn’t expecting to do major damage, but he could look at least a little uncomfortable.

“It worked on Bram!” I groan.

"I have terrible, terrible news for you. Bram was faking it.”

I’ve had it with this smug bastard. I wind up and put everything I have left into his ribs, and he grimaces, gasps dramatically, and staggers back. “The lights…they’re going dim…”

“Oh, drop dead!”

“Tell my sisters I love them…Tell them to avenge me…”