Page 26 of The Beta's Heart
“That’s so nice, thank you.”
Ren ordered coffee and the young woman disappeared into the kitchen.
“Is this some of thatspecialtreatment you were talking about last night?” she asked.
He smiled. “Yeah. It’s not abnormal for lower-ranked wolves to want to make the high-ranked ones happy. You’re important to me, and that makes you important to the pack. Are the fae like that? I don’t even know if you have groups like packs within your people.”
The waitress, whose nametag read Kaitlyn, appeared with a carafe of hot water, a mug and saucer, and a plate with four tea bags on it. She filled Ren’s coffee mug.
“Are these okay? Paula said to tell you that she can get different ones if you don’t like these.”
“These are perfect, thank you, Kaitlyn. My name is Kismet, by the way.”
“It’s nice to meet you. Are you ready to order?”
After placing their orders, Kismet selected a peppermint teabag, poured hot water into the mug, and lowered the bag into it.
She looked at her mate. “Anyway, you were asking about groups like the packs for the fae, and the answer is that we don’t have that sort of thing. There are guilds of fae, where those with similar powers work together, but it’s not like the way things are for your people. They don’t live and work in the same area and have a ruler like Acksel who creates laws for them.”
“You have a court system,” he said. “There’s no fae king or queen?”
“There is, but they’re over the whole of our people. It would be like if Acksel were the king ofeverywolf.”
He hummed in thought. “It’s interesting how different our people are, but you and I fit together very well despite the differences.”
She smiled. “Yep.”
Their food arrived, and her stomach growled in response.
Ren cut up his eggs and said, “There’s a double wedding Saturday night. Would you like to go?”
“I’ve never been to a double wedding before. Is it pack members?”
He nodded. “Yes, it’s the two couples who are stewards in the pack and take care of the retirees—Jeremiah and Honey, and Adam and Dani. Everyone is a wolf but Dani, who’s a reindeer.”
She paused with her egg and potato-laden fork nearly at her mouth. “A reindeer shifter? I didn’t know there were any. I always pictured shifters as predatory animals like wolves and big cats.”
“There are a lot of different types of shifters. Where my parents live, there’s a nest of owl shifters, and when I was a kid, my dad told me he’d met a group of rabbit shifters.”
Kismet tried to picture a human body changing into something as small as a rabbit. “Were they regular-sized rabbits? Or were they like monster size?”
Ren grinned. “Normal. Hard to imagine, right? And is there anything less masculine than a rabbit? If my shift was something small and fluffy, I’d be embarrassed as hell to call myself a shifter.”
“But you’d be so cute!”
His upper lip curled as his eyes danced. “Betas are never cute.”
“Oh, I don’t know. You’re pretty darn cute right now.”
He chuckled and said, “Anyway, before Dani came into town, I’d never met a reindeer shifter before, either. She came through Wilde Creek one full moon and she and Adam scented each other.”
“I’d think her animal wouldn’t be too happy to shift around a whole group of wolves.”
“She actually stays home with Adam on the full moons and they run around their backyard in their shifts.”
Kismet pictured a reindeer and a wolf playing together, and thought it was adorable. “I’d love to go to the weddings.”
“Great. I’d like to take you out on a real date on Friday night, too.”