Page 121 of Ensnared by the Pack: The Complete Series (Destined Realms #3)
AUDREY
“Go,” I told him as upbeat and happily as I could, making Velora’s sneer falter. “It sounds important.”
I dragged my gaze to the park, knowing I’d have to sit there alone until he returned, something that made me even more nervous, but then Quinn laughed at something, catching my attention, and I realized I didn’t have to be alone. I could help Quinn with the kids while I waited, which would keep me busy with someone I trusted.
“I’ll hang out with Quinn until you’re done and then we’ll have lunch,” I added, not having to force myself to smile. So far, I’d enjoyed every moment I’d had with Quinn and something inside me assured me that I could trust her… and despite that something telling me I could also trust Cyrus, I was going to believe it.
Bishop glanced over my shoulder at Quinn’s play station, his own smile deepening. “I won’t be long.”
Then he captured my lips in a quick but searing kiss that sent me reeling before he escorted me closer to the playground partitioned off for the kids.
“Hey, Audrey,” Quinn called out. “Come to keep me company? My shift isn’t done for another couple of hours.”
I stepped off the street onto the park’s soft grass and turned back to see Bishop still watching me and Velora tapping her foot impatiently while still smiling that too-sweet smile. I couldn’t have been the only one to see through that smile, but no one was looking at her. They were all looking at me.
I stepped back, crossing the colorful barrier into the kids’ space, and darkness flashed through Bishop’s eyes as his wolf gave me a hungry look before he hurried away with Velora.
“I don’t know what was hotter,” Quinn whispered, fanning herself, “that kiss or that look.”
I tried not to look at the crowd, who I knew were all still staring at me, as heat rushed over my face and down my neck. Both the kiss and the look were something better done in private and now the rumors wouldn’t just be about me spending time with Bishop. They’d be about how Bishop had kissed me, which was juicier and would spread like wildfire through the festival.
“Come on,” she said, saving me from spontaneously combusting from embarrassment. “Meet my pups for the day.”
I approached the art station and all of the kids instantly looked up at me, along with the adults at the nearby table.
I strengthened my smile and ignored the adults, hoping they wouldn’t freak out that I was near their children. So far everyone who’d spoken to me had been nice. Everyone who looked wary or angry had just avoided me, but I was no longer with a pack alpha. Those who’d held their tongue before might not now.
“Everyone, this is Audrey,” Quinn said, drawing my attention back to the kids.
The kids ranged from four or five to nine, maybe ten, and were a mix of boys and girls. Five of them greeted me, while the sixth, a little girl with big brown eyes and curly brown hair just stared at me.
She looked very familiar and I didn’t get the impression that she was staring at me because she was curious about me. It was more like she was wary and not just wary about me but about everything. I understood how she was feeling even if I didn’t know why.
I returned the kids’ smiles and greetings while wracking my brain, trying to remember her. Then it hit me. She’d been a part of the group who I’d saved from the grimalkin, the girl who’d been sobbing. And beside her, hovering protectively close was the other girl, the one who’d been deathly pale and silent.
“Read us a story,” the youngest kid of the group said, holding out a thin book in his gluey, paint-smeared hands.
“How about I tell you a story,” I offered instead. I would have loved to have read the book to them, but until I got some lessons, I wouldn’t be reading anything to anyone.
“I want this story,” the little guy insisted and the others voiced their agreement.
I smiled at his enthusiasm while trying to figure out a way to give them what they wanted. “It must be a great story.”
The boy vigorously nodded and now I wanted to sit with them and read even more. Maybe even have them pile around me to help steady their shifter souls, especially the silent little girl because I knew about some of her trauma and ached to reassure her.
But I was a stranger. It wasn’t my place to cuddle with them despite every instinct inside me screaming that I should.
“How about we finish our pieces of art first?” Quinn suggested, saving me from having to explain that I couldn’t read. I wasn’t sure if she’d figured that out or just thought I was reluctant to be around children.
But the kids all pouted. Even the two girls who I’d saved kept staring at me expectantly. They wanted my attention and I really wanted to give it to them, but I couldn’t?—
Except I could. I might not be able to read, but I could still spend time with them, and I had the perfect thing to entertain them.
I opened my satchel and pulled out the flipbook I was making to explain to Bishop how movies worked. It wasn’t completely done, I wanted to draw a few more pictures to get the point across, but I was sure the kids wouldn’t care.
“I think I have something just as good as a story.” The little guy — still holding the book — scrunched up his face in disappointment. “I can make a picture dance.”
I held up the roughly made book, catching everyone’s attention. I hadn’t asked for scissors and had had to rip the pages from my notebook then rip them into smaller pieces. The book hadn’t been intended for anyone except Bishop, but again, I doubted the kids would care.
“Have you seen a flipbook before?” I asked them.
The kids shook their heads and they and Quinn gathered around me. The adults at the nearby bench stared at me, one with a wary expression the others curious.
Holding the edge of the book tight — since it was only held together by some string Eloise had given me — I flipped through the pages, making my stickman jump and turn and start to hop to the side.
The kids and Quinn gasped.
“Audrey, that’s—” Quinn began.
“Again!” the little guy exclaimed, cutting her off, and the others picked up the call.
I flipped through the book two more times then scanned the picnic table, looking for paper. There was some, but not enough for all the kids to make their own book.
“Is it possible to get more paper?” I asked Quinn as I handed the book to the oldest kid and drew her aside. I wasn’t far enough away for the kids not to hear me even if I whispered, but I was hoping the book would distract them since I didn’t want to disappoint them if I couldn’t get the paper.
“It’s easy to make one of these,” I continued, “and if the kids want, I can teach them to make one of their own.”
Quinn sighed. “They’d love that, but I can’t leave my post.”
“I’ll go,” one of the adults, a woman in her mid-thirties, said as the others joined the kids to look at the book. “Gemma hasn’t looked interested in anything since the grimalkin attack.” She swallowed hard. “I didn’t get a chance to thank you for saving my pups and here you are helping again.”
“Her son and daughter were two of the kids you saved,” Quinn said as she pointed to the silent little girl who still looked as closed off as before, with the exception that she was staring intently every time the older kid flipped the pages of my little book.
“Thank you, alpha,” the woman said, running away before I could tell her not to call me that.
“Can you spread gossip?” I begged Quinn. “Please. People shouldn’t call me that.”
“Yes, they should. You’re mated to Knox and from the way Bishop kissed you in front of everyone, it won’t be long before you’re mated with him, too.”
“Still doesn’t make me an alpha,” I insisted.
“Kind of does,” said the man who’d been looking at me warily. His expression was still guarded, but it had softened a bit as if he was reconsidering how he felt about me — which I guessed was the whole reason I was here in public, letting everyone stare at me while I freaked out on the inside. “What is that thing?”
“It’s a flipbook,” I said and he raised his eyebrows telling me that wasn’t a good enough explanation. “If you, ah… If you create a series of slightly different images going from one position to another and flip the pages at the right speed, it’ll look like the image is moving.”
“Fascinating.” He turned back to the kids and watched as the older kid flipped the book again.
“Felix is an engineer,” Quinn said. “Bishop mentioned that you might want to talk to one. He has to know how things work or it’ll drive him crazy, so I’m sure he’ll be able to help you. He belongs to Owen, the one you handed the book to.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” I nodded and respectfully shifted my gaze to his ear when he looked back at me, making him frown.
“Alpha, you show me too much respect,” he replied, making me cringe.
“Please don’t call me that. I’m just a girl who was fated for Knox.” God, if calling me alpha caught on, Cyrus was going to kill me, and it wouldn’t matter if I was mated to Knox.
“I have a feeling you’re more than that. Beth says you’re the one who nearly killed herself rescuing her kids.”
“Well, I…” I had no idea how to respond to that. I couldn’t have ignored them if I’d tried. It had been stupid and terrifying and I’d do it again if I had to.
“What were some of the things you wanted to talk to an engineer about?” Quinn asked, saving me from having to come up with a response.
I shot her a thankful look and she returned a warm smile before turning to the kids and herding them back to the art table.
“I’ve heard a rumor that you’re from another realm,” Felix said, pushing his hands in his pockets and watching his kid show one of the younger kids how to flip the book. “Is it true?”
“It is.” And there were only two people who could have spread that rumor. Velora or Finn. Maybe that was why everyone was looking at me strangely. Except I knew it was mostly because I was mated to Knox, the strange, reclusive alpha of their pack… and now because Bishop had kissed me like he wanted me.
Felix nodded his head, his expression turning thoughtful. “That’s why you want to talk with an engineer.”
“And a scientist. I know about things that the pack might find useful, but I—” I dug my toe into the ground. Bishop had said sharing what I knew was a great idea, but everyone was going to be frustrated with me because I didn’t know how anything worked. “I just know about them. I don’t know how they work and for a lot of the things we’d need to figure out some kind of power source,” I said, the words coming out in a rush, my heart in my throat, waiting for him to laugh at me.
“So you don’t know how the flipbook works?”
“Oh, the flipbook is simple. The brain is great at filling in little blank spots. So when you draw the stickman moving in small increments then flip the pages, your brain fills in the action between one drawing and the next. It won’t work if the movement between one drawing and the next is too big, but you don’t need a million pictures with microscopic differences for it to work.”
He frowned at me. “Microscopic?”
Right. Shit. They hadn’t discovered microscopes yet. Whil had already told me that. There were some curved lenses in the realm for correcting vision, but the quality was rough and shifters didn’t have bad eyesight so the pack hadn’t explored that area of research.
“Microscopic means something that can only be seen by a microscope, which is a device with a lens or lenses, I’m not sure which, that helps you see small things that you couldn’t normally see.”
His frown deepened, but his eyes brightened as if he was fascinated with what I was saying. “Like what?”
I told him about viruses and things like pollen and mites and that there was a whole world of things we couldn’t see that affect our bodies — or at least human bodies — and the water and the soil and the air we breathed.
I was in the middle of explaining telescopes when the woman who’d run off to get the paper returned. Felix made me promise to meet with him again to hear more about the wonders of my realm and I sat at the table and taught the kids how to make their own flipbooks.
It didn’t take long before the kids were hard at work creating their books, the youngest with Quinn’s help and the sobbing girl I’d rescued from the grimalkins, Gemma, with her mother’s.
The rest of the adults chatted amongst themselves, no longer worried about my presence, and with a sigh, I sat back, looked up at the perfect, cloudless sky, and let the kid’s joyful chatter and the rush of conversation from those at the nearby booths wash over me. If I wasn’t looking at the festival goers and seeing them stare at me, I could pretend I was part of all the excitement, that I belonged.
And maybe I did.
Maybe Bishop was right and his pack just needed to see me to realize how plain and ordinary I was. The kids hadn’t cared that I was practically human or that I’d somehow mated their antisocial alpha, and once I’d gotten them excited about the flipbooks, their parents had stopped giving me serious looks. A few of them were still glancing over at me, but their expressions had changed to more curious than wary.