To them, the four of us were mysterious and magnetic and just a bit unreal-even me. I recognized the feeling for what it was, but our very human-and easily fascinated-classmates had no idea. The impending full moon might have been giving the rest of our table werewolf ADD, but Maddy was perfectly Zen-much more relaxed than she normally would have been when all eyes were on the four of us.ĭespite our continued efforts to blend in, the buzz of power in the air and the unspoken promise that within hours, my friends would shed their human skin were palpable. Images-of the night sky, of running-leapt from her mind to mine through our pack-bond, as natural as words falling off lips.

Maddy was sitting perfectly still, blinking her gray eyes owlishly, a soft smile on her lips. In control of the impulse to leap out of my chair and run for the woods, I glanced across the table at the last member of our little quartet. To my left, Lake, whose history with Devon’s flare for the dramatic stretched back almost as far as mine did, rolled her eyes, but her lips parted in a grin every bit as irrepressible and lupine as Devon’s.Ī wave of energy-pure, undiluted, and animalistic-vibrated through my own body, and I closed my eyes for one second …two. The smile on Devon’s face widened, making him look-to my eyes, at least-more puppy than wolf. “It’s Thanksgiving break, Dev, not summer vacation, and technically, it hasn’t even started yet.” “Everyone sing along!”Īs the leader of our little group-not to mention the alpha of Devon’s pack and his best friend since kindergarten-the responsibility for shutting down his boy-band tendencies fell to me. Leaning back in his chair with casual grace, he shot a mischievous look around our lunch table. “NO MORE SCHOOL, NO MORE BOOKS, NO MORE teachers’ dirty looks …”įor a two-hundred-twenty-pound werewolf, Devon Macalister had a wicked falsetto.

Trial by Fire by Jennifer Lynn Barnes