Being(s) In Love 03 - A Beginner’s Guide to Wooing Your Mate Read Free

in his mouth. He chose to eat the rest of it in a single, delicious bite, then wondered what it said about the state of his life that, of all the things he should be thinking about, like his future, finding a job, unpacking his stuff, he was most interested in a sugar cookie.
    He didn’t get long to think about it. The patio was starting to fill up. He drank his cappuccino while covertly glancing around at the people joining him, mostly ladies, mostly weres. Several of them appeared to be together, but they all seemed to know one another. They were visibly surprised to find Zeki among them, but he sipped his drink and feigned not to notice while he thought about what he ought to do next.
    He was looking forward to spending more time with his dad. Zeki had been so focused on finishing his studies and making the most of his opportunities that he’d taken every extra course and seminar he could, which hadn’t left much time for visiting home. But staying in town meant he’d have to get a job, and there was hardly anything here to suit his qualifications—although he noticed the town still had no official wizard. Witch, wizard, sorceress, brujo, whatever the title, it all meant the same thing, a practitioner of magic, someone with a natural talent and the training to use it reliably. What style of magic depended on culture, more than anything else.
    Werewolves probably assumed their strength and healing would save them if any magical unpleasantness happened. Zeki snorted at the thought. He’d read stories of the human version of magic being turned against dragons and demons. Werewolves might think they were invincible, but they were not.
    Anyway, if he was going to stay for a few months, he should try to get some kind of a job, even if only to get out of his dad’s hair.
    “Anyone sitting here?” a fortyish werewolf asked, then sat down in the empty chair by his table without waiting for an answer. She was followed by several of her friends, who pulled closer until Zeki was surrounded. Every single one of them was his height or taller. Some were wearing plain shirts and jeans, others had on suits or uniforms. The lady next to him was wearing a long dress and chunky jewelry in what looked like the style of some of the tribes in the Southwest, although Zeki didn’t know which one. She had the body of an Olympic track and field champion and brown eyes that reflected gold when she turned her head. “Good choice,” she praised his location, while gesturing across the street at the firehouse.
    Zeki belatedly, and with some slight embarrassment, recalled one of Wolf’s Paw’s other traditions.
    Once every two weeks when the weather was nice, the firefighters would open the great firehouse doors and come outside to wash the fire trucks. It sounded innocent. It was not. It meant a dozen or so incredibly fit humans and weres slowly, deliberately washing every inch of their gleaming red fire engines, usually while wearing pants, suspenders, tight T-shirts, and nothing else. They used hoses and far too much soap and everything, everyone, had always been left soaked to the skin by the end.
    The firefighters made it a rule to never acknowledge the crowd of people ogling them from the coffee shop across the street, although most of them were werewolves and undoubtedly heard every lustful whisper and pounding heart.
    Teenaged Zeki had never made it outside to watch, but rather stared through the window from over the top of his book while wondering feverishly if the town was out to kill him. The firefighters had no reason to do it. They could have made a calendar like a normal town when doing a fundraiser. The display was probably some werewolf thing. Some human version of what frolicking, flirting true wolves in the wild might do.
    Zeki swallowed the last of his cappuccino. He licked foam and chocolate dust from his lip, and the woman closest to him smiled. Her smile had a lot of teeth in it.
    “You’re new.” She wasn’t