“If they’d been used to store drugs, the smell would still be there,” Bowman said. “To Shifters, anyway.”

Jamie broke in. “Don’t drug dealers use coffee grounds or whatever to hide the scent from sniffer dogs?” He wrinkled his nose. “Not that I smelled coffee grounds either.”

“Turner uses a distinctive blend of coffee,” Cristian said. “You’d have smelled it if it had been him out there. It’s very good. I will have to ask him where he acquires it.”

“There was much mist under the trees,” Afina said, her voice going quiet. “I do not trust the mists.”

Cristian frowned at her, but uneasily. “It’s winter. Of course there is mist as the air warms and cools.”

“That is not what I mean, and you know this.”

Cade watched both of them. “What are you two talking about?”

Cristian gave his mother another scowl and shook his head at Cade. “Romanian folktales. It is of no matter.”

“So you say,” Afina returned. “But you’d do well to avoid the mists. You don’t know everything, son of mine.”

Cristian bristled. They would launch into one of their famous arguments any second.

Bowman was grateful for the soft buzz of his cell phone. He again hadn’t found a signal in Turner’s trailer, but now that they were higher up the hill, the phone worked fine.

It was Kenzie. “You need to come home,” she said, her voice sounding too bright. “A couple of our Shifters are asking to be mated.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Kenzie took her place near Bowman that afternoon as the Shifters gathered for a mating under full sun. The ceremony had been thrown together in record time, but Shifters were always ready to party.

Streamers had been tied to the trees by females and cubs. Bianca’s sisters had rushed to a flower shop in the nearest town and then wove Bianca a garland that was a bit lopsided. Amid the laughter and excitement, though, no one cared how makeshift anything was.

Bad things were happening outside Shiftertown, but the Shifters were eager to put aside fear and embrace this celebration of love, life, and continuity. Because the moon was in one of the three days of the full, Bowman would conduct the sun ceremony now and the full moon ceremony tonight. The moon ceremony was the more important of the two and would seal Bianca and Marcus’s mating in the eyes of Shifters and the Goddess.

The mate bond the two had already found would seal them more permanently than any ritual. The mate bond was older, a spiritual joining that had no material form. The link would keep them together through thick and thin, good times and bad, and couldn’t be broken. Only death severed the bond, and sometimes the second of the pair didn’t survive the grief.

Kenzie didn’t necessarily have to participate in the mating ceremony. She could simply stand by while Bowman gave the blessing and be a silent symbol of a successful mating. She chose to give a blessing herself today—Bianca was special to her.

Bowman faced the couple in the woods between the houses, under a tree full of streamers. Friends and family formed a circle around Bowman, Kenzie, Marcus, and Bianca, while the rest of Shiftertown ringed them in ever-widening circles.

Though it was cold, the snow had ceased, and the sun poked through the clouds. When a beam touched Bianca, Bowman lifted his hands.

“Under the light of the sun, the Father God, I declare you mated.”

A cheer went up, nearly drowning Kenzie’s words. She had to shout them. “The blessings of the Father God be upon you!”

The cheer renewed. Ryan leapt into the air on youthful legs and did a handspring when he came down. Bianca laughed, and Kenzie pulled her into a hug. Kenzie hugged Marcus next, the long-limbed Feline nearly crushing her in his happiness.

After a marathon of hugging, fire flared high, in both bonfires and barbecue grills, and music boomed out of speakers Jamie had wired up in the trees. It was late afternoon, and as soon as the sky darkened and the moon rose, the second ceremony would commence.

For now, there was plenty of food and drink, music and dancing. Kenzie found herself drawn into a circle dance with Bianca and her sisters—all the cousins who had grown up together. They joined hands and swayed in the eternal dance of love and fertility.

The males circled in the opposite direction outside them, always interested in fertility. The men might stay calm until the moon ceremony, but after that, no female Shifter would go without a male tonight, unless she was very fast and good with her claws. Looking at the eager faces of her female cousins and Bianca’s girlfriends, Kenzie knew they wouldn’t try to run very fast.

Bowman didn’t join the dance, though Jamie did, celebrating his cousin’s joy with him. Bowman stood with Cade outside the circles, Cade grinning, loving the ceremony. Bowman didn’t smile, but Kenzie could tell he was glad of this mating.

Matings meant more cubs, stronger Shifters. The cubs born of the mating frenzies tonight would never wear Collars, if Kenzie and Bowman could help it. That thought made the occasion even brighter.

Bowman caught Kenzie’s gaze and held it as she danced. His eyes were smoke gray, the sunlight bringing out the sparkle in them.

He was virile, strong, his sweatshirt and jeans showing off his honed body. More than one woman looked his way in longing. He might be mated, but Bowman hadn’t formed the mate bond, and there was always a chance he’d find it with one of them. A cub born of a Shifter leader was powerful indeed.

No, Kenzie decided after watching the women watch Bowman awhile. It wasn’t just the prospect of a strong cub that made all the unmated females look at him. Bowman was in-your-face, body-clenching hot. Simply touching him made Kenzie ripple with fire, and the fact that she could touch him whenever she wanted made her tighten in satisfaction.

Kenzie shot him a smile, one that said she didn’t care how many women followed him with their eyes. Bowman was hers.

Bowman frowned back at her, his look becoming fierce. He had no idea what wild fantasies were flitting through her head, and that made her smile widen.

More scowling from Bowman. The expression made his face hard, his mouth tight. Kenzie would soften it with kisses later.

Bowman held her gaze until the dance took her around the circle and too many Shifters got between her and him, and he was lost to sight.

The sun sank, the winter night closing fast. The clouds parted and the moon rose. Another cheer went up, this one holding a wilder note. Voices turned to howls as clothes were shed and Shifters assumed animal forms.