She ignored me, stuffing clothes faster. “We’re leaving. Now.”
“Where to?”
“Harbor Bay.”
I stared at the acceptance letter in my hand, then at her. “Okay, that’s weird. How did you-“
“Questions later. Moving now.”
Twenty minutes later. We’re flying down the highway. Worst d?j? vu ever.
This exact scene of frantic packing, mysterious departure, Mom’s cryptic non-answers had been my childhood on repeat.
That’s when I saw them in the rearview mirror.
Wolves. Big, scary, running alongside our car like we were in National Geographic.
“Uh, Mom? We’ve got a situation.”
She looked back and went pale. “Switch places with me.”
“Are you insane? We’re doing seventy!”
“Just do it!”
Somehow we managed the world’s most dangerous driver swap. As soon as Mom was in the passenger seat, she pulled out what looked like a fancy stick.
I couldn’t help it-I burst out laughing.
“Seriously? We’re in a high-speed chase with werewolves and you pull out a souvenir from Universal Studios?”
Mom rolled her eyes. “We ARE werewolves, Ava. Did you think wizards were just fairy tales?”
Before I could tell her how insane that sounded, she started chanting in some ancient language.
The stick lit up, there was a flash of light, and suddenly the wolves behind us went flying like they’d hit an invisible wall.
I nearly drove us into a tree. “WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?”
“Magic,” she said, like a Brit discussing drizzle. “Good thing it was just scout wolves. If their Alpha had come…”
My hands. Shaking. Could barely hold the wheel. “Mom, what did you DO? Why is some Alpha trying to kill us?”
“It’s complicated.”
“I’m eighteen, not eight. Try me.”
I was getting frustrated. “And maybe start with why my werewolf mother just went full Hermione Granger on those wolves?”
“Fine, fine.” She waved her hand. “I’m a hybrid, sweetie. Half witch, half wolf. “
The car swerved as I took in that bombshell. “Wait, so I spent eighteen years thinking I was wolfless, when really I’m just…”
“Mixed blood,” she finished quietly.
Great. Just great. I was a magical mutt and nobody thought to mention it.
After that, life moved like someone hit fast??orward. New homes. New secrets.
***
Four years later.
Harbor Bay Mall clothing store.
“Ava, great sales this month. You’re getting a raise,” Manager Esther said during lunch break.
“Really? Thank you so much.”
Best news I’d gotten in the six months since starting this job.
My coworkers Cybele and Cynthia gave me the stink eye from across the break room. Whatever. Their jealousy was par for the course when you actually showed up and did the work.
I walked out of the store for lunch.
It had been four years since that dramatic highway escape to Harbor Bay. Mom and I had outrun whatever pack was hunting us, and I’d finally gotten the truth out of her.
Apparently, Mom had used her “sketchy” witch abilities to brew up something for some Alpha’s… performance issues. Instead of fixing him up, she somehow nuked his mojo. Now he’s convinced she cursed his manhood and has been hunting her ever since.
The explanation was so ridiculous I couldn’t even be mad. Knowing Mom’s chaotic witchy approach to everything, I actually felt sorry for the poor bastard.
As for why I’d ended up slinging clothes for minimum wage? That lovely wolfless Omega thing again.
I’d cornered Mom about the whole mixed-species situation. She had her wolf, despite being half-witch. So why was I defective?
“Probably too many generations of mixing,” she’d said after pondering. “Watered-down bloodlines, you know?”
I was genuinely taken aback that she’d explained it from a genetic angle. Very scientific for someone who read tea leaves for a living.
After eighteen years of curiosity, I’d finally asked the question I’d been too scared to ask. “What exactly was my father? Werewolf? Human? Or…”
I’d hesitated. “Vampire?”
Mom gave me the biggest eye roll. “Who wants to date some blood-sucking freak?”
If he looked like Robert Pattinson, I might consider it, I’d thought but kept to myself.
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