Green - a werewolf story

40. The Madhouse

Vanessa found herself seated in a lavish couch with a cup of coffee and a massive sandwich in her hands. So far everything about the scene was wildly appealing, but when you took in the people standing and sitting around her it went from cozy to straight up uncomfortable. Thank goodness his other sister and her family hadn't arrived yet.

"Doesn't anyone here have something else to do?" Green, who was sitting next to her and who'd most likely noticed her look of a deer stuck in traffic, said.

"No, we don't," a tall man seated across from them with his arm around his very pregnant wife said.

Ted Thrall, Vanessa thought. She'd seen him from afar, once, in Bloodbath, the club she used to go to with Jeremy. He'd looked like a cross between a businessman and a gangster and she thought he still did. Despite being busy with feeding his wife cupcakes.

"You have to understand that everyone's curious," Abby said between bites. "And eager to get to know your mate."

Vanessa shifted uncomfortably. This was far from the worst thing she'd experienced in her life, but she was fairly certain that at a few times in her life she'd had nightmares about being gawked at by a crowd. She looked down at herself. At least she was wearing clothes. Dirty and smelly clothes, but clothes nonetheless.

"And I would like to know how you came to be in such a state and why you called ahead to have me up the guards controlling the perimeter," Ted Thrall added.

"We were followed by a group of religious fanatics leaving Utah," Green replied.

"Fanatics? What would they want with you?"

"I think that's something best discussed in private," Green said.

Ted Thrall raised an eyebrow at that, but nodded. "Have it your way."

"I want to know why she hasn't accepted my son yet," the woman on Green's right said.

While Green's dad had given her a bone-crushing welcome, his mother was emanating cold. She seemed to be a pleasant enough woman to everyone else, but when she looked at Vanessa her deep blue eyes had turned glacial and her rather impressive nose had turned straight up.

"Mom," Green groaned.

"It's a fair question," Fiona Colt said. "Here you are, a gorgeous, clever wolf set to become alfa of his own pack, and here she is..." It was obvious she couldn't find anything impressive about Vanessa to point out. Instead she made a vague hand gesture. "Everyone can tell she stands to benefit most from this union so why is she hesitating?"

"Fiona," her husband said from her other side. "Some people prefer to take things slow."

"Slow? What on earth for?"

Normally, Vanessa didn't care all that much about other people's opinions of her, but something about Fiona Colt got to her. It might have been her insistence on talking about her as if she wasn't seated three feet away from her or it might have been the way she seemed to scowl every time her eyes passed over her. Whatever it was, it made her hold on to her coffee cup a little too hard and her teeth grow a little longer and pointier.

In an effort to maintain her cool, she put the cup on the table and reached for the necklace in her pocket only to find it empty.

"It's gone!" she exclaimed.

"What?" Thrall asked, coming to his feet and instinctively moving to protect his wife.

"I don't think she meant me," Abby said and pulled on his hand to get him to sit back down again. "I'm too large to be easily misplaced."