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Patty sent a direct message at the same time.

Patty: SAY YES.

I stared at the invitation. The room around me was suddenly too quiet, though my phone continued vibrating in my hand.

So far, I had existed inside this family without a face. I had joked with them, helped them, learned their habits, and allowed them to fill spaces in my life I’d stopped acknowledging were empty.

Going to the reunion would mean being seen. It would also surely mean being caught.

I read Hudson’s message again. Then Grandma Ruth’s.

My thumb hovered above the screen, locked between the life I had and the one waiting inside the invitation.

5

HUDSON

PLEASE DON’T BE MY COUSIN

I had expected to face many problems as the future alpha of a small wolf pack.

Land disputes. Council negotiations. First shifts happening in public places. Teenagers deciding that full moons were an excellent time to test how fast they could run beside moving vehicles.

What I hadn’t expected was one of those problems to be accidentally flirting over text with someone who might possibly be my cousin.

Yet there I was, sitting at my kitchen table at eleven thirty at night, staring at a message from Sloane and wondering whether my unlikely connection to her violated several laws, at least one social taboo, and every principle of basic human decency.

Sloane: For the record, I think carrying two spare car batteries is excessive.

I smiled at the screen before catching myself. That was the problem. The smiling. I’d been doing far too much of it lately.

Hudson: One is mine. One is for emergencies.

Sloane: Technically, yours is also for emergencies.

Hudson: Mine is for my emergency.

Sloane: And the other is for the emergency of anyone within a fifteen-mile radius?

Hudson: Twenty, depending on road conditions.

Sloane: You need a hobby.

I leaned back in my chair and looked at the door that connected to my mother’s house.

I had hobbies. I enjoyed trail running. I worked with wood when I had the time. I occasionally read books that had nothing to do with pack history, local development policy, leadership, emergency medical care, or wildlife regulations.

Granted, the last book I’d finished for pleasure was two years ago, and even that one had been about wilderness survival.

Perhaps Sloane had a point.

The fact that I cared what she thought created the larger issue. Sloane was family. Possibly. Nobody seemed entirely sure.

She had belonged to the pack at some point. Grandma remembered her. Karen remembered criticizing her hair. Several people remembered things that sounded plausible when stated individually and became increasingly unhinged when put together.

Our family tree was complicated.

I typed a response to Sloane, erased it, then set my phone facedown. Before I allowed this thing—flirting, or just plain interest—between us to continue, I needed to figure out whether she was related to me.