Page 1 of Bully Wolf’s Nanny (Silvermist Wolves #1)

Daisy Copperfield fidgeted in her cracked vinyl chair, the afternoon sun warming the small room to a sticky humidity, her fluffy blonde curls just beginning to stick to the back of her neck.

In front of her piles of paper glared up, numbers and letters swirling together into a pounding headache at the back of her skull.

The weak blue light and consistent drone of the ancient computer only made it worse, and Daisy screwed her eyes shut, pushing back from the desk.

There was so much still to do, and a quick glance at the clock told her she had barely any time to do it.

The accounts were due any day now, and the printer had wheezed one last pathetic sigh several days ago before promptly shutting off and refusing to turn back on again.

Which, unfortunately for her cramping hand, meant everything had to be written out in a scratchy ballpoint pen.

If she was late, the company wouldn’t get paid. If the company didn’t get paid…

It wasn’t worth thinking about.

She rifled through the pages, stacking them as neatly as she could, but in her haste, one sharp edge of paper sliced her thumb, crimson blooming from the cut.

She hissed, tears stinging the corners of her eyes as she sucked on the injured pad, anxious to not get any blood on her cream shirt.

She’d already ruined one work-appropriate shirt this month trying to clean spilled paint from the carpet of her rented apartment, and there was no way she’d be able to afford another shirt anytime soon.

And if she didn’t turn up in ‘work appropriate attire,’ Kevin would never let her live it down.

She’d once made the mistake of wearing a T-shirt, and the only times his eyes weren’t fixed on her tits had been when they were screwed up with laughter at whatever crass joke he’d come up with.

She tried not to let it bother her. Really, she did.

Greenmill was a small town with hardly any jobs available, and if she had to put up with a slightly gross manager to make ends meet, she would do it.

After all, she had Thea to think about. Her little girl was growing so quickly; she would be seven years old soon.

It seemed like every time Daisy saw her, she had grown another inch.

There was nothing she wouldn’t do for her daughter. Thea was her whole world, her whole reason to wake up in the morning. She loved her more than life itself.

Even when she spilled paint on the carpet.

Glancing at the clock, she watched the hand trudge closer towards five p.m., her deadline.

She gnawed her lip. The sharp tapping of her pen against the desk echoed from the grimy wall of the storage container—sorry, rustically charming temporary office —and she cast yet another baleful look at the busted printer stuffed in the corner.

“You couldn’t have lasted three more days?" she grumbled.

“Talking to yourself again, Daisy? That’s the first sign of madness, you know!” Kevin guffawed at his own joke as he strode into the small office, beefy arms folded against his bulging stomach.

Daisy forced herself to smile. “Yes, well, as I told you on Monday, the printer’s broken. It’s not an issue or anything, of course I don’t want to complain.”

“That printer’s basically brand-new! I don’t see how it could have died already.”

She sighed, gathering the papers. “I’m nearly finished with the accounts. It’s taking slightly longer than expected, what with, you know…”

A black look crossed Kevin’s face, his lips thinning and his brow furrowing. “Yes, well, actually, Daisy, I’ve got a bit of news for you on that front.”

“Oh?” she tried to keep her voice light, fighting against the instinctive jolt in her chest at the ominous words.

Kevin coughed, pulling down on his greasy shirt, rubbing his hands together. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that Greenmill Timber hasn’t been doing all that great.”

“I assumed that was because it’s nearly summer. Demand always dips a little before—"

“It’s fucking Iron Logging, that’s what it is!” Kevin spat. Daisy recoiled despite herself, shrinking away from his anger. She hated it when Kevin got angry. He would bellow and spit, his face would turn red, his fists would clench together and shake.

It was pathetic, really, her being scared of him. After all, he was a human. She…was not. Though she supposed that was easy for her to forget; she couldn’t remember the last time she had shifted.

“I know they’re competition, Kevin, but they’re based hours away! Surely it can’t be as bad as all that.”

“It fucking is,” Kevin grumbled, pacing in front of the desk. “Their expansion has been ridiculous. They’ve stolen several larger contracts from us, not to mention Jason and the boys down in the city. Fucking treachery, that’s what it is. Whatever happened to loyalty?”

Daisy swallowed, choosing not to answer. Kevin hadn’t been nearly so concerned about loyalty when he’d charged Jason nearly double the market rate for the last batch of pine. She didn’t think bringing that up would be a particularly smart idea.

“It’s all the fancy tech money, that’s why they’re doing so well. Fucking suits stealing bread from our tables with their stupid phones and…and…computers and shit. What the fuck do they know about logging?”

“Didn’t they start out as a logging company?”

Kevin scowled at her, and she retreated further back into her chair. “That’s not the point. The point is we’re gonna have to cut some corners. Dave’s kid sister has offered to do some work for us for the experience. It’s not an offer I can really say no to.”

Daisy’s stomach dropped; her hands started to shake. “Wait a minute, Kevin, you’re not saying…”

“I don’t like it any more than you do,” he said, raising his hands in mock surrender. “But we’ve gotta face the inevitable. All you do is sit back here punching numbers into a fucking computer. It ain’t exactly rocket science.”

“Kevin, it’s not…that’s not…there’s so much more to it than—"

“And let’s face it, you never really fit in that well here. I mean, you never come down the bar with us, you stay in here all day—quite honestly, you’re a bit of a drip.”

Ignoring the insult, Daisy shot to her feet, clutching the edge of the table for some kind of support. “Kevin, please. I’m begging you, don’t do this. I’ll take a pay cut, I’ll work longer hours, I’ll do anything. Please .”

Kevin considered her shaking form, his eyes travelling slowly up and down her body, lingering on the curves of her breasts and hips. She fought back a shudder, squaring her shoulders slightly.

Seeming to come back to himself, he shook his head roughly and shrugged, “I know you’ve got a kid that you need to feed.

I feel bad, honest I do! But we have people we need to feed, too, and with the way things are going, the whole business will go under.

I’m sorry, Daisy. I’ve made up my mind. You’re fired. ”

***

“That absolute asshole!”

Daisy winced, holding the phone closer to her ear, glancing nervously around to see if anyone had heard her friend. Luckily, the bus was relatively empty, the few people on board too wrapped up in their own little worlds to even bother sparing a glance at her.

“I know, Amelia, but think about it from his point of view—"

“His point of view is absolutely shit. I’m sorry, but don’t you dare make excuses for him. He’s an absolute shit and you know it. I mean, actually, how dare he?”

Despite herself, Daisy couldn’t help but smile.

It was nice to know that, despite everything, Amelia would always be on her side.

They had met several years ago when both of them had reached for the last box of cake mix in the grocery store, and the rest was history.

Daisy had been there as a shoulder to cry on for more of Amelia’s shitty ex-boyfriends than she could count, and Amelia was always offering to take Thea shopping, or to the park, or the cinema.

“There’s no point getting angry now. What’s done is done. I just need to find a new job in the next week or so. No big deal.”

“Look, babe, if it’s about money, then you know I can always—"

“No,” said Daisy, her voice firm. “I love you to pieces, but I can’t accept your money. It would just make things weird between us.”

“It would only be a little bit, just to help you out whilst you get on your feet! When’s your rent due, it can’t be that much."

“That’s so kind of you, honestly it is, but I can’t let you bankroll me.”

It was the same argument they’d had a million times over.

Amelia worked remotely as an executive assistant to some fancy law firm in New York, and as such earned a ridiculous salary, especially considering she lived in Greenmill.

Sometimes, in her darkest moments, Daisy could admit that she was jealous.

But she couldn’t do the same sort of job, not when Amelia’s boss demanded she drop everything and travel to New York for a few days at least once a month.

Daisy couldn’t drop everything. She had Thea to think about.

Amelia was quiet for a while, and Daisy could nearly hear the cogs turning in her head.

“Do you remember me telling you about Sasha?”

Daisy frowned, shifting the phone to her other ear. “Sasha, as in your hairdresser Sasha?”

“Well, she’s not my hairdresser anymore, not since the salon went under. I go to this great place in New York now, you should come! Your hair is getting super long, and I think it would look super cute if you—"

“Sorry, what does this have to do with Sasha?”

“Right, yes, sorry! Well, I met up with her for some drinks the other day, and she mentioned that she’s doing some nannying to save up for her own salon. The pay is ridiculous.”

“Nannying?” Daisy asked, clutching a handle tighter as the bus turned a bit too quickly around a corner.

“Yeah, you know, like looking after someone’s kid while they’re at work. They’re always looking for people apparently, and you can earn like, a shit ton.”

Daisy frowned. “Always looking for people? Is there that high a demand for nannies?”

There was a loaded pause, and Daisy’s apprehension grew.

“Well…that’s the only thing. It’s not a nanny service for, like…regular people.”

“What do you mean, regular people?”

“Well, I mean, you know…people like you. Shifters.”

Daisy sucked in a breath. “It’s a nanny agency for shifters?”

She ignored the hesitancy in Amelia’s voice.

Being a shifter wasn’t a part of her life that Daisy often, if ever, talked about.

Greenmill sat in between pack territories, and as such shifter politics didn’t have much sway over the town’s residents.

The town council had even signed one of the charters that meant shifters couldn’t claim the land.

It meant that a lot of the humans could conveniently forget that shifters even existed.

And so could Daisy.

“Shifter guys, yeah.”

“Shifter guys? As in males?”

Amelia’s wince was audible in her voice. “Yeah…males. Men.”

“Alphas?”

“Look, I don’t know the specifics, okay? All I know is that it’s a nanny agency that caters to shifter dads. I think you’d be really good at it. I mean, you’re an incredible mom to Thea. You’re kind, you’re organized, you’re an excellent cook—"

“But I’d be working for an alpha?”

“Are all shifter dudes alphas?”

“Most of them are.”

“Well, wouldn’t that be a good fit? I mean, you’re a shifter, so you’d like…get what they’re all about. I think the agency prefers shifter nannies because they know how to handle shifter kids better.”

“That’s not how it works, kids don’t shift until they’re like fifteen.”

“But they’re still probably quite, you know—animal-y.”

“Amelia,” Daisy said, feeling herself getting tired, “all kids are animals. And I don’t want to work for an alpha. I don’t want to work with a shifter. It would mean living in a pack territory and that’s just—it’s a whole thing.”

“I’m sorry,” Amelia said. “I didn’t mean to be insulting or anything. I don’t know that much about shifters. I just thought it would be a good opportunity to save up some money.”

“It’s okay,” said Daisy, “it’s fine. I mean, I never really talk about it. How are you to know? And it’s a good idea, really, thank you so much for telling me about it. But I don’t think it would work out very well.”

“So you don’t want the agency’s number? Even not just in case?”

“No. I’ll figure something else out.”

***

“Mommy! Mommy, look what I painted!”

Daisy accepted the messy painting of what she suspected was a dog, ruffling her daughter’s dark blonde curls. “It’s beautiful darling, really well done!”

Thea huffed in pride before returning to her notebook, scribbling happily away in bright red marker.

Daisy looked at her daughter, took in the messy hair, the rosy cheeks, the fraying clothes. Her heart stuttered in her chest, and she fought the urge to crush her daughter against her chest.

Lying on the table, visible in the corner of her eye, was a pile of letters with big bold words on them like ‘final reminder’ and ‘warning.’ Unpaid bills, overdrawn bank accounts, credit card payment reminders, the whole lot.

She swallowed a lump in the back of her throat, and turned back to Thea.

She would do anything for her daughter. Anything at all.

But her daughter had been the reason she had left in the first place. Her daughter and…and her daughter’s father.

That was not something she wanted to think about at all.

She’d promised herself she would never go back. She knew what it was like to grow up in a pack, within pack territory, to be at the constant whim of whatever stupid new rule the pack alpha decided to enforce. Most shifters wouldn’t have it any other way, but she…

She knew what it was like to live at the bottom of the pack. To be constantly pushed around, bullied even. To be defined by nothing else. She never wanted to return to that life, and she certainly didn’t want it for Thea.

But looking at her daughter, at the piles of bills, at the fraying clothes and empty cupboards, she knew she might not have a choice.

Picking up her phone, she took a deep breath and dialed Amelia’s number.

“Hey girl, what’s up?”

“I’d like the name of the nanny agency, please.”