Free Wolves of Haven: Lone by Danae Ayusso Page A

“So you can
eat all the damn soda bread?” she scoffed. “No. I’ll take my
chances with stinking everyone out of the house before I let you
eat all of my bread, and yes, it is my bread. Fae likes me better
than you, so I know he’s been baking up a storm.”
    Connell whimpered. “I hate how well
you know me. Hurry up!” he barked out with a smirk before hurrying
to the dining room.
    Akia growled under her breath;
she’d be lucky to get two loaves.
    “Fae won’t let him eat it all,”
Louvel assured her.
    She nodded and gave him a half hug
since Beowulf wouldn’t relinquish her. “Uncle Lou, you look well.
How are you? Adopting again, I hear.”
    Louvel smiled. “Yes. When a
precious gift crosses your path you mustn’t allow it to slip
through your fingers.”
    Akia nodded, getting the underlying
meaning of his comment. “We’ll catch up later. At the moment I have
brothers plotting against me and silently trying to get me to play
with them, and I’m starving, tired, have to make a couple of phone
calls, and finish up a report for the irritable Inspector. Father,
you have to call in soon,” she reminded him.
    Beowulf huffed, and it made her
chuckle; for being hundreds of years old, he still acted like a
child when he didn’t get his way.
    “Go before I put you in time out,”
she warned, motioning towards the study on the other side of the
foyer.
    He kissed the side of her head
before turning her over to Louvel.
    “Some things never change,” she
grumbled under her breath, watching her father sulk across the
foyer like a scolded puppy.
    “You changed,” Louvel said,
escorting her to the dining room. “Now I can clearly see your
beautiful ocean blue eyes, before they were always downcast towards
the floor.”
    Akia groaned under her breath; she
didn’t take compliments very well. “I grew up, Uncle Lou. I just
needed to spread my wings some, I guess… Don’t you dare!” she
yelled when just before they entered the dining room movement from
behind the two caused her to spin around, but it was too late. She
pushed Louvel out of the way just in time to take the full force of
the three men trying to ambush her, knocking all of them to the
floor.
    “Ow,” Akia complained from the
bottom of the pile, and they laughed. “When I can reach my gun, I
will start shooting indiscriminately,” she warned.
    “Sis, don’t be like that!” Faelan
complained from directly on top of her, most of his weight and that
of his brothers being supported by his thick arms to keep from
crushing her. “We missed you!”
    She gave him a look. “I talked to
you a few days ago, Smart Ass.”
    The other two gasped. “You did?”
they asked in unison.
    Faelan gave her a look. “Gee,
thanks. Now I’m never going to hear the end of it from these
bitches,” he flamboyantly complained before reaching back and
wrapped his thick arm around Rafe’s head then pulled the punching
man over him and into a headlock, effectively rolling off of Akia
in the process.
    “Ow!” Rafe yelled, punching Faelan
in the sides, but the hulking ginger was impossible to
shake.
    “Call me daddy, Little Man,” Faelan
taunted, giving him a noogie.
    Connell stretched out on the floor
alongside his sister as they watched the other two go at it. “It
greatly amuses me that the one on bottom doesn’t remotely correlate
his bucking and attempt at giving Fae a wedgie as being beyond
homoerotic, which is even more amusing since Fae is as queer as
they come, and the apparent bottom in that relationship is adamant
that it says exit only.”
    Akia chuckled. “Yet another
reminder that I’m home.”
    “Blue hair off the top rope!” Ulrik
yelled before pile driving on top of the two on the floor and was
easily rolled up into a ball by Faelan. “Okay, I should have
thought that through better,” he admitted before yelping. “Ow,
dickhead! That hurt.”
    “Let me guess, Kid?” she
asked.
    Connell nodded. “You have to give
him credit; he’s