By Hook or by Wolf

“You like her, don’t you?” She grins. “All of you? I was hoping that one of you would feel a connection to her, but all of you? This is too much to handle. How wonderful!” She jumps up and down and for a brief moment, I think my mother is going to faint. It’s all too much excitement for a frail old woman.

“Mom, I don’t think any of us is ready to make a commitment this second,” I say carefully, but it doesn’t matter because my mother has grabbed her planner and is flipping through it.

“What are you doing?” Lee asks.

“Looking at wedding dates,” my mother said. “You must have the mating ceremony before I die. I’m going to want to be a grandmother before I pass away, and you know, Natasha does have a child: a sweet little girl. Rebecca is her name.”

Natasha is a mother?

Very interesting.

She mentioned that when she was in the office, but I was so focused on her beauty and courage that I didn’t really pay as careful attention as I should have. So she’s an honorable thief with a kid. How very unusual.

Perhaps that played a role in her decision to return the stolen portraits once she realized how important they were to our family. She didn’t seem to want to keep something that might be valuable to another person.

“She’s a moral thief, huh?” Trevor asks, but Lee rolls his eyes. The two of us are the most similar and I know what he’s thinking: a thief is a thief. Is there ever really a good reason to steal? But I know in my heart that sometimes, there is a perfectly good reason to steal.

Sometimes it’s vital that you steal.

Sometimes there’s no choice at all.

“Yes, she is a moral thief,” my mother glares at Lee, who suddenly goes stoic. “I met her online. We met for coffee and I asked her to steal the Gem of Malice.”

“Why?” I ask my mom. That’s one thing I just really don’t understand. “That is your prized possession,” I tell her.

“I was given it when your father and I met someone from another planet,” she says. “It’s very important to me and I’ve always planned on giving it to one of your mates. I just never thought you’d all share the same one,” she says with a soft smile. “I believed that if someone could make it past all of your tech and security and traps and alarm systems, that she’d be smart enough to be the woman you needed. Well, the woman that at least one of

you needed.”

It was an interesting plan, to be sure, but now Natasha is gone. She’s pissed off and she feels tricked. My mother crafted a plan, but somewhere along the way, it went horribly wrong, and unfortunately, there’s part of me that wonders whether we’ll ever see Natasha again.

She was sweet and beautiful and she smelled so fucking nice.

But is she really the type of woman who wants to marry a wolf?

Is she really the type of woman who wants to marry three?

“I think that ship has sailed,” Lee says, almost sadly.

“She seemed pretty pissed when she stormed out of here,” Trevor agrees.

“I have to admire your tenacity, Mom,” I say to our mother. “But I think that this time, the girl is going to get away.”

“But she can’t get away,” my mother stomps her foot like a little child. “She just can’t.”

“She can, and she has. She’s lovely, Mom, really, but she’s got her own life and I don’t know that we have any place in that.”

My brothers murmur in agreement.

“Look, Mom, it’s getting late.” We’ve basically spent the day checking out the gallery and then dealing with our mother’s new illness and the consequences of her bad decisions. “Let’s take the portraits back to the gallery and then we’ll all go get dinner together, okay?”

My mother shakes her head and crosses her arms over her chest.

“I don’t want to go get dinner,” she says. “I’d rather just eat at home.”

“Mom, I’m not letting you starve. Besides, if your diagnosis is as bad as you say, you’re moving in with me,” I say to her. Her eyes go wide and my brothers nod. “You’re moving in with all of us,” I add. My brothers and I live in a huge house with plenty of space. Mom has always kept her own residence, but there’s no reason for that anymore. Not with everything that’s happened. From now on, she can make herself perfectly at home from the comfort of our place. If we really only have a few months with her, I’m planning on making every one of those months count.

And as much as I think Natasha would make a wonderful mate, I’m not about to harass her. I’ll drown my loneliness in alcohol and dating and I’ll try to forget the curvy brunette who sneaked her way into the most secure art gallery in Starton, only to walk away with nothing.