Page 47 of Accidentally Wedded to a Werewolf (Claw Haven #1)

Fun, Luna reminded herself. I am having fun.

It should have been fun, was the thing. It should have at least been relaxing.

The masseuse’s hands had left her muscles loose and bendy.

The aloe skin rub had left her shiny. Now they were reclining in the mud bath, which supposedly had healing properties from local mud pools.

Luna used to go crazy for this type of thing.

But she was sitting here in the pool, and she didn’t feel revitalized.

Didn’t feel like she’d gotten a new lease on life like the brochure had promised.

She felt like she was sitting in a hot tub full of mud.

And she still wasn’t warm enough. She sank lower into the mud, glad that she’d tied her hair up before she went in.

Hector plucked a cucumber slice off his eye and took a bite. He glanced over at Luna and laughed. “Having fun there?”

“You know it,” Luna said, as chirpy as she could manage. Her cucumber slices were currently lost somewhere in the ooze.

Hector slipped the other cucumber slice into his mouth. “Really? ’Cause you kinda look like you’re trying to drown yourself in mud.”

“Just trying to get the full effects,” Luna said, her mouth barely visible above the mud.

It was making her sweat, sure. But that was warming her from the outside in.

Not from the inside out, like a certain werewolf had done, with his huge hands and deceptively soft eyes once he finally stopped scowling.

Even that last time they were together, she’d felt it.

An echo of it, anyway—small and golden, almost lost in the blur of sensation as he thrust into her.

She thumbed the almost healed cut on her finger where Oliver had pressed the knife. I had such a fun time with you, she’d told him. What kind of cop-out crap was that? It was what she said to people who came to her parties. Oliver deserved more than that.

Her phone vibrated on the tiles next to her head.

“Hey,” Hector complained as she shot up and grabbed her towel to dry her hands off. “We’re relaxing! Peak cute, remember?”

“I know,” she said. “I’ll be extra adorable on the day, I promise. I’m just going to answer this email.”

It was Beth again. She was emailing to thank Luna for putting her in touch with a marketing expert, who had given Beth and many other shop owners a crash course on gift bags.

My to-do list is a million miles long, but I’m so excited, the email concluded. Anyway, g2g, coffee with Sabine. She’s so sweet!!! Hope you’re having fun at the spa!!! I looked it up, and it seems so fancy. Does the mud seriously cleanse your spirit???

Luna started typing out a reply about the dubious qualities of the mud, which she was less than hopeful for. She heard a wet squelch behind her as Hector sidled over.

“Don’t,” she warned as he hovered a muddy finger over her cheek.

“I won’t if you put the phone down,” he replied, turning his finger in a lazy circle.

Luna sent the reply—proud of u, yay sabine hang!!!!—and put the phone back on the gleaming tiles. “There! Try and mud me now. I dare you.”

“Well, if you dare me…”

She ducked out of the way. He grabbed her, hauling her back and shoving his mud-wet chin into her cheek.

She screeched, grinning. “Come on! Stop it!”

“You dared me,” he reminded her, rubbing mud into her face.

Luna giggled. It wasn’t as loud as usual.

She turned in his arms, bumping their noses together.

Trying to drag back the girl who was wholly entertained by Hector’s playful roughhousing.

Part of her was. But mostly, it was like playing with dolls.

After you hit a certain age, you couldn’t see the Barbie battlefields anymore.

It was just you in your bedroom, holding a doll over a makeshift spike pit made of hairbrushes.

At least he didn’t notice. His grin was simple and easy as he asked, “Want to try flotation therapy next? They had a cancellation and can fit us in.”

Luna thought about being alone in a tank with her own thoughts.

The last time had been fun, it had been relaxing, but she hadn’t had much on her mind back then except designing party invitations and planning their next trip to Paris and how she was going to remodel the kitchen.

She’d lain there in that dark tank thinking happy thoughts about paint swatches.

She didn’t want to know what weird, tangled thought spirals she’d get in that tank now.

“Not today,” she said.

Her phone rang. Luna lunged for it, elbowing Hector in the face when he tried to stop her.

He reeled back, blinking in shock and pain. He’d been teasing. Luna’s elbow had not been teasing when it dug into his nose.

Luna tossed back a nervous giggle as she climbed out of the mud pool. “Sorry, babe!”

“Um,” said Hector, muffled by the hand over his mouth. He dabbed at his nose, then checked his hand. “’S fine. Not bleeding.”

“Great,” Luna said, grabbing the phone. Sabine was FaceTim-ing her.

Luna clicked into the call to see Sabine’s scarred face smiling at her, Beth crowding into the screen and waving. They were in the back room at Beth’s store, Luna recognized from the wallpaper.

“Hey,” Sabine said, the audio glitching slightly. “Look at you! You’re so glamorous! Beth said you’re at a luxury spa?”

“I look like I’m covered in mud,” Luna said, wiping off her bikini with her spare hand.

“Healing mud,” Beth added, nose twitching excitedly at the end of her muzzle.

Hector raised a muddy hand from the pool behind her. “Hi! Which ones are they?”

“Sabine and Beth,” Luna said. “Uh, the sister-in-law and the chocolate girl.”

“There’s a chocolate girl?” Hector grinned. “Wow. Monsters come in all kinds nowadays.”

“Shut up, she’s a hedgehog.” Luna turned back to the screen, gaze roving over the two friendly faces inside it.

Beth didn’t look wholly comfortable pressed against Sabine’s side to fit in the screen, but she looked pleased to be included.

It hadn’t taken Luna long to figure out that while friendly touches bewildered her, she was almost always appreciative.

Except when people tried touching her spikes.

Luna had found that out the hard way, and Beth had spent the next half hour stammering apologies while they picked prickles out of Luna’s hand.

“I found hedgehog-shaped soap to put in my gift bags,” Beth started.

Sabine talked over her. “Hey! No shop talk, remember? Luna, how are you?”

“I’m good! How’s Grandmother doing?”

“She’s good,” Sabine said. “Sleeping a lot more lately, and she won’t be doing a lot of running this full moon. But her heart isn’t getting any worse.”

“Great! That’s great.” Luna wiped another slip of mud off her legs, mostly so she wouldn’t have to look back at Hector in the pool. She hoped the bubbling mud was loud enough to obscure her as she continued, “And everybody else? How’s Leo?”

“He still won’t let go of those light-up shoes.

We’re stuck until he grows out of them. Uncle Roy started grumbling about the postman; I think having you here took all his ire away from being suspicious of the rest of the town.

The aunts are making you a scarf—don’t tell them I told you.

You should get it after you get back from your honeymoon.

Heath has Ben working the early morning shift at the bakery, which has been annoying, but we get the afternoons to ourselves. And Oliver’s fine.”

“Fine,” Luna repeated. “Like…?”

She didn’t get a chance to continue. The spa door flew open, and three familiar faces walked in wearing towels and shining smiles.

Luna gaped. “Oh my god.”

Clancy Stack threw up a peace sign. His hair had grown a stupendous amount since she’d seen him last, and his goatee had finally grown in properly.

Behind him, their parents waved.

Beth asked, “What happened? Are you okay?”

“I gotta go,” Luna said. She hung up, jogging toward her family. “You guys weren’t supposed to get here until tomorrow!”

“Flight arrived early. Decided to come hang.” Clancy let out an oof as she collided with him, shocked by the force of her hug. “Jesus, Lu, can you ease up? You’re muddy.”

“You’re just about to get in!” Luna protested. But when she pulled back to hug her parents, she made sure to keep it light.

Hector whooped, muddy hands in the air. “Brother! How’s college treating you?”

“Kicking my ass,” Clancy declared. “Incoming.”

“You probably—” Luna’s warning was promptly disregarded as Clancy jumped into the mud pool with a yelp. Mud splashed over the tiles. Luna winced, glad she hadn’t put her phone down until now, and laid it carefully out of the mud’s reach.

“Did you break your ankles?” Dad asked as Clancy resurfaced. “No? Good.”

Clancy shook his hair, mud splattering over Luna’s torso as she climbed back into the pool with the others.

“You’re disgusting,” she told him. Then, overwhelmed with a weird fondness that made her think of watching the kids argue over the Musgrove dinner table, she leaned over and hugged him again.

Clancy paused in the middle of wiping mud off his face. “Double hugs. Alright. Didn’t hug me like this when you didn’t see me all freshman year, but okay.”

“I missed you,” she admitted.

He stared at her, obviously waiting for her to follow it up with a joke. When nothing came, her family traded surprised looks.

Hector slid over, tucking Luna into his muddy side. “We’re spending our honeymoon at a luxury resort. All-hours room service and massages. She’ll be back to normal after that.”

Everyone laughed. Luna joined in, trying to ignore the irritation niggling in her gut. Room service and massages? Was that all they thought she was?

Mom sighed, sinking back against the edge of the pool. “You must be so relieved to be back. I can’t imagine being stuck in a town that small for so long, nowhere to go, nothing to do.”

“Almost nothing,” Clancy muttered.

Hector snickered. There was an uncertain edge to it, but it was barely noticeable as he leaned up to take a drink off the waitress who had come in with a tray.

“Oh, that’s awful,” Mom said as she took a glass. “She didn’t spend all that time having marathon sex with a werewolf; she’s about to get married.”

“Thanks,” Luna said quietly to the waitress.

The waitress blinked. It took her a second to smile, and Luna wondered how many people were thanking her when she brought them their drinks.

Luna sipped her drink. It was cool and bubbly and had a strawberry floating at the bottom. It was the best thing she’d tasted in months. And yet she found herself longing for a mug of hot chocolate in the Musgrove common room while everybody crowded around to watch the TV.

“Exactly,” Clancy said, saluting Luna with his newly acquired glass. “Going into married life with a bang.”

Luna dug an elbow into his side. “Ew, shut up.”

“Hear, hear,” Dad agreed. “They didn’t try to get you on the hook for any money, did they? It’s such a mess trying to deal with those damn magical registries—”

“They didn’t ask me for anything,” Luna said hastily. “And I’m not on any magical registry anymore, I told you. We broke the bond.”

“And good riddance!” Dad raised his glass. The others followed suit. Dad looked at her expectantly. “Honey?”

“What? Oh, right.” Luna raised her glass. “Uh, good riddance.”

Dad sat back, mud sludging over the side of the pool. “Then let’s relax. God knows I need it after this week.”

Luna clenched her teeth in a smile. “Yeah? What’d you do this week, Dad?”

“He was so busy,” Mom sighed. “He went to work four times this week.”

“Four times,” Luna deadpanned. “Wow.”

Hector tapped her collarbone. When she looked over, he was giving her that uncertain grin he’d been giving her a lot in the last several days. Like he was still hoping she was joking.

The room lapsed into silence, only broken by the soft bubbling of the mud and the occasional sip. Luna looked around at her family, all of them lying with their heads back on the cool tiles.

Luna sat up, twisting toward her phone. It was farther than she’d expected, out of range of the mud. The woman was mopping around it.

“Whoa,” Hector said. “Where’s that hand going? It’d better be signaling someone down for more drinks.”

“I’m just answering some more emails,” Luna replied. “They’re really piling up.”

Dad laughed. “What emails do you have to answer? You’re not organizing the wedding.”

Luna ignored him, grabbing her phone. Before she could even swipe into it, Hector grabbed it off her and tossed it in the air.

Luna made a noise like a broken ice dispenser as she watched it sink into the mud at the other corner of the pool. “Hec! Oh my god!”

“You need to chill out,” he told her, his arm coming up to her shoulder.

She shrugged him off. “That’s my phone!”

“We’ll get you a new one! It’s not a big deal, babe.”

“I have so many emails,” Luna said, already going through a mental list.

“You’re getting married! Everyone will understand if you drop out of touch for a few weeks. Relax.” He stroked her arm. It was meant to be soothing, but all she could think of was the heat of the mud, thick and suffocating and still somehow not warming her up where it counted.

She whirled on him, ripping his arm off her shoulders. “I’ve been relaxing! I’ve been relaxing all my life! I want to do something for a change! Not sit here in some useless mud, planning our next vacation! Our whole life is a vacation, one big party—it’s nothing!”

She stopped. The spa was silent. The mud bubbled quietly between them.

Luna’s cheeks burned. She hadn’t yelled at her family since she was a teenager. If she ever got mad, she swallowed it and turned her mind to better things.

“Uhhh,” Hector said. He laughed nervously. “Wow. I can’t wait for you to go back to normal, babe.”

“Hear, hear,” Dad repeated, raising his glass a second time.

Mom made a noise into her glass. “I don’t know if I’m a fan of these drinks. Could we get that girl back in here?”

Luna stared in disbelief as they lapsed back into their normal inane chatter. Of course, this wouldn’t put a dent in their conversation. They were Stacks; they weren’t about to let one outburst ruin their fun.

Hector sat back against the tiles, arm out in offering. He looked up at her, and his carefree smile wavered. His eyebrows raised in a silent plea. He wanted her to sit down. To let the moment of frustration pass. To come and laugh with them again. No worries, no consequences.

Luna climbed out of the mud. “I’m going to take a shower.”

“What? Come on, babe. Babe!”

Her family’s voices joined in as she strode toward the towel rack. She kept walking. She’d shower, get dressed, and go find somewhere that would sell her a phone.