She laughed. Genuine, pure laughter poured out of her. He was shocked. Getting it under control, she broke into a giggle before saying, "I'm smarter than you. I'm stronger than you. I have a way better sense of humor than you. Why would I give up? I'm going to win." She finished her words with an open-mouthed grin, looking at him like he an attraction at Disneyland.
And suddenly he smelled it too -- she had no fear. No fear of him. No fear of anything.
A mere human woman wasn't afraid of him.
It was more than he could take. He pounced; he was in the air one moment and the next he had her pinned to the bed. "You were saying you're stronger than me?" he growled.
Her smile was smaller, but still there. She even seemed a little regretful, like the moment was bittersweet. It enraged him. She looked him in the eye, speaking slowly and clearly. "The only strength you've shown me is your body. But you'll know my strength when I win."
His hands transformed, cutting through the bedding and into the mattress beneath him. Her eyebrows rose high above her eyes, and she almost laughed again. She didn't say, "Why are you ruining your own bed?" but he knew that was what she meant with the face she was making. He couldn't help himself; he ran his tongue up the side of her face.
He pulled away then, surprised at himself. He didn't get up, just rose enough to get a good look at her reaction.
She wasn't disgusted, or particularly excited. She might have looked a little sad. Something in her was still trying to be bright, untouched. "I'm sorry," she said, shaking her head. "But I always win."
He wanted to rip her throat out.
----------
Trent was an omega. --Which always was always deeply disappointing to female werewolves when they met him; because boy, he would have been something to howl home about if he had been an alpha or even a beta.
The guy was tall, well-muscled, blonde, with a sweet boyish face and lovely white-toothed grin. Unfortunately, there was more to being top dog than looks. A rarity in werewolf kind, he had been born with terrible eyesight. He wasn't blind or anything. But he did have to wear huge coke-bottle glasses. Being in his wolf form improved things, but he still didn't have the eyesight other wolves had, and relied even more heavily on his other senses as a result.
Then there was the shyness. --Trent was terrified of women, social situations, loud noises (because loud noises usually caused people to lean closer to each other during conversation, which meant that a woman might, during some loud social situation, lean in toward him so that he could hear her better and end up smelling his breath which could be randomly terrible -- though it never was because he had other phobias as well which included) being unhygienic, and planes.
So Trent was a lovely, clean-cut, healthy, timid omega werewolf. He was really good at math. He was a team-player, and enjoyed serving the pack despite the fact his particular pack didn't treat omegas very well. He thanked Luna every night that he was a werewolf; not only because his mother had taught him to pray every night before bed, but because he was relieved by the fact he was a werewolf.
After all, werewolves had true mates -- which meant that when the right girl came along, she would know it as well as he did. There would be none of the awkwardness humans experienced while having to date. He would not have to convince her to love him -- which he was sure would be impossible even if he had to do it. Everything would fall into place easily. When he finally met his mate, they would live happily ever after for a thousand years, filling their den with dozens of cute little omegas to carry on after they were gone.
Trent was actually day-dreaming about his future mate, when a beta, Greg, walked by and kicked him. Trent face-planted in the flowerbed in front of him; he had been tending the one that lined the front walkway of the main compound. He got up quickly though, and waved good naturedly at Greg as Greg entered the building. "Shut up, Short Bus," Greg hollered in response to Trent's silent wave.
Elisa, another beta, wasn't far behind Greg and shook her head. "Just ignore him, Trent. He's such an asshole."
"Oh I should have been paying attention," Trent replied, blushing because the prettiest beta in the compound knew his name.
Trent got back to work, but was distracted by more and more betas hurrying into the compound. He checked his watch -- it wasn't the normal time or day for a meeting. Suddenly, Lucy, another omega who had been working not too far away sidled up to him. "What's going on, do you think?"
"I don't know," Trent replied, taking a step away from her for a little extra space. "Something big, I suppose."
Suddenly Earlene, the second-in-command to the Alpha, popped her head out the door. She scanned the area before her eyes fell on Trent and Lucy. "I can't find the head omegas," she barked.
"Oh, they're out sick," Lucy replied. Trent was too busy staring at the scars on the ancient bitch's face to reply. He wasn't bothered by the scars, but it was like looking at a train-wreck. He always had the urge to get a closer look; unfortunately Earlene was not only a woman, but the scariest damn woman on earth. He pushed his glasses up on his nose a bit higher, hoping for more clarity. But Earlene looked the same.
"Get the rest of the omegas working on the guest quarters. --The downstairs guest quarters."
Both Trent and Lucy were surprised -- not only to have gotten treated like the head omegas in the head omegas' absence, but because of the order. Humans were coming. -Humans who had probably just discovered the existence of werewolves and were going to have to be locked up until they were mated and changed, or killed.
Suddenly Trent's stomach fell.
Humans were coming.
Oh, his mate couldn't be a human. He had watched every episode of Friends -- human relationships were nuts! Luna! What if his mate was one of these humans that were coming?!?
He followed Lucy absentmindedly as they went to alert the other omegas. She seemed happy. "You know what this means!" she gushed, "Potential mates!"
"Yay," Trent replied glumly, as they passed through a hall. A teenaged theta passing by tripped him, and Trent apologized, "Sorry about that."
"You're gay!" replied the theta.
"That's so rude to gay people," Lucy tsked.
----------------------
The rogue werewolf, Moe, dragged Leah out of his room by the arm, before depositing her on the floor of the doublewide with the four other human women. The rest of them were dirty; hair matted, their skin grimy over their bruises. Moe's buddies, Luis and Bartok, were still sitting at the dinette table playing cards.
No one mentioned the fact Leah was still unharmed, untouched, despite all the time spent in Moe's bed.
No one mentioned the fact that the other women hadn't been raped once since Leah had been abducted and brought here.
The truth was beginning to spook Moe, Luis and Bartok. -And though they couldn't do anything about it unless they talked about it, none of them wanted to talk about it. It was too strange.
All three had wanted Leah the moment they smelled her; no, that wasn't it. They had wanted not her, but to know what she was. --No, that wasn't it either. They were attracted to her, but not sexually so much as... she was that feeling you get at the edge of a cliff, the feeling that wants to jump.
When they approached her that day in the park, she had turned and looked at them, like she knew what they wanted. Then she shrugged and said, "Okay, what?"
"What are you?" Moe demanded.
"Awesome," she replied. "Annnnnd... human, if that's what you're after, Cubs."
"We look like cubs to you?" Luis demanded, failing to notice that a human knew what they were.
Moe's first instinct was turn and run. But she said she was human, and once she said it -- it felt right. She was human. She was just a human. She was just a human woman, and she smelled nice. Why not add her to the harem? They needed more women, and here they were in a conversation with one. "You're coming with us."
Leah laughed deeply and loudly.
Bartok zapped her with a stun gun. She looked at him irritably. She took it from him and hit him in the head with it. Then she smiled again. "Good times," she said, laughing, before she walked away. Moe picked up the stun gun. It wasn't broken. They stared after her.
They stalked Leah for a while after that, trying to figure her out.
Leah was unnoticeable to other humans. She was 5'7, 200lbs in a good combination of muscle and fat that left her with a defined though slightly jiggly figure, and she seemed to be just about thirty years old. She had brown curly hair to the waist, green eyes and frequently chapped lips. As Moe, Bartok, and Luis followed her over the next couple weeks, they learned that she lived alone, drank lots of wine, and divided her time between cartooning and teaching. Sometimes they got the sinking feeling that she knew that they were there. Other times, she seemed oblivious.
