I wasn’t sure if the she-wolf should be walking around so soon after giving birth, but I wasn’t given much choice.

When I left the house, shutting the door firmly in her face, she made such a racket that all the naturals came racing to the door, snarling at me in anger at pissing her off.

I wasn’t scared of the pack, not like I’d been that first day.

They weren’t giving off the same vibes. It was more of a ‘for God’s sake, shut her up’ kind of thing.

And considering I was Dr. Doolittle right now? I figured I’d be the one to know.

I blew out a breath as the she-wolf muttered, “Useless female.”

My lips twitched though, because I couldn’t blame her. It was one of the council leaders’ women, and I had to admit, she looked useless.

From the pack meeting last night, where I’d been formally introduced as the new omega, and the pack had learned that I was mated to the alpha, beta, and enforcer, I’d seen how the women in the pack had a hardiness that wasn’t exactly common.

They all looked like they could build a house without a man to help them—that kind of thing.

I figured that was because of a few reasons. One, this town was way off grid. That was why Ollywood’s had come here, because the nearest city was Vancouver, and that was a long ride west.

The master of ceremonies, a son of a bitch called Niall, drooled over coming to these small communities where people were starved for entertainment.

What the crowd lost in having small numbers was made up for in the amount of cash they were willing to spend.

So this place was definitely on the smaller side, and it was also a little isolated. The people around here had to get used to being self-sufficient, except, it seemed, for the woman sneering at me.

She screamed city girl.

As did most of the pack council, now that I came to think of it.

As I pondered why that was, wondering how most of the pack were hardy and built as though we were still living in the pioneer times, but the leaders were all city slickers, I moved ahead of the bitch and headed into the store.

Eli said that I could ask the housekeeper for whatever I needed, but I had my period and I wasn’t going to ask anyone for tampons. I could buy the damn things myself.

On top of that, I’d wanted an opportunity to roam around the town and get used to the changes that started happening last night. Yep, my powers were evolving, and I’d been feeling weird all morning. So getting out of the house had been imperative for that, but also because I wanted to see for myself where my new home was founded.

The interesting thing was, of course, that I’d expected to have a guard with me, to have either Austin or Ethan at my side, but the second the she-wolf had gotten to her feet, not looking like she’d been in a life or death situation just four days ago, Austin had settled back into his seat and gotten back to work.

Evidently, they thought she was my guard.

What was interesting about that was I knew she had appointed herself as that, but I hadn’t exactly told them.

My mouth twitched at the thought, especially when the she-wolf growled when I told her, “You can’t come into the store.”

“Stupid humans.”

I grinned as I ducked inside, muttering inwardly, “I won’t be long.” She huffed, but I felt her take a seat. Whatever elixir was in that gross Hannibal Lecter fruit, it had worked the same miracle on her as it had on me, but the truth was, she was a little stiff, which told me how close she’d been to death.

I felt her aches and pains, felt them and wanted to heal them, but I wasn’t a healer. All I could do was stroke her and keep the fire stoked.

She wasn’t used to living inside, that much was clear, but she made the sacrifice for me and her pups.

I was both honored and perplexed by it.

Still, I wasn’t about to complain, not when her presence gave me some freedom.

I hurried down the small grocery store’s aisles, trying to find tampons.

There was an irony to the fact that I’d hoped one of the things that didn’t shift over with the transformation was periods, but no such luck.

As I wandered toward the small selection, I heard the whispers of thoughts as I passed.

I knew who was human and who was pack, simply because the whispers came from my people.

Yeah, my people.

These magical creatures who were both man and beast were mine now. Not the regular folk who wandered around, homo sapiens pure and simple.

The beasts from paranormal books.

My life had turned out better than I could have imagined, and Kali Sara, was I happy for that.

If I thought about how miserable things had been less than two weeks ago, I’d probably start crying.

Which was why I didn’t think on it.

Why I couldn’t.

My future was bright now, gleaming like the sunlight through a hundred gemstones, and even if it would take a while to be accepted by the pack, I could deal with that.

They couldn’t be much more suspicious than carnies of a new member on the staff.

The store was as small as Ethan had warned. He told me the staff drove the two-hour ride to the nearest Walmart once every ten days with a pickup truck to get most of the groceries.

Men.

What was I supposed to do until then?

Just gush blood on the floor?

Even as my lips twitched, I heard a soft cry from someone in the back of the store, and I twisted around just in time to see one of the pack children eying the back of his hand and rubbing it.

It was bright pink.

Outraged, I stared at the person who’d slapped him. I was even more angered when I realized the guy was human. Not pack.

“Sticky fingers get slapped,” the human snarled, and I strode over to the child, not knowing who he was, but just aware that he was one of mine.

“How dare you slap—” In his head, the boy whispered, “Daniel,” so I tacked on, “Daniel. He was helping me shop!”

The grocery store manager scowled at me. “Ain’t never seen you around this store before, but I’ve seen him plenty. Always got his fingers where they shouldn’t be. Well, I’m sick of it—”

I glared at him. “If you have a problem with him, you should contact Eli Highbanks.”

The manager frowned at me. “Why would I do something like that? Mr. Highbanks has nothing to do with this—”

“This, what?”

The guy sniffed. “Oliver Twist.”

The little boy started sniffling at that, and I felt his misery at the likeness.

Something was going on here, something I needed to figure out, so I ground out, “Contact Mr. Highbanks, and whatever Daniel has stolen, put it on my bill today.”

The manager, a guy whose tag on his plaid shirt told me his name was Robert, huffed but nodded. “Will do, don’t you worry about that.”

When he stormed off, I reached for Daniel’s hand and stared into his face. “How old are you, Daniel?”

The little kid bit his lip. “I’m nine, ma’am.”

I crouched down so I wasn’t looming over him, and asked, “What did you take from the store, Daniel?”

“Some candy,” he whispered.

“Do you know who I am?”

He bit his lip harder this time. “Yes.”

“Who’s that?”

“You’re the alpha’s lady—the new omega.”