Page 20 of Labor of Love

The typing in Zenith’s apartment stopped. The alpha began to pace. Emre listened to him take five steps down the length of the room, then five steps back, on and on until it madeEmreitch.

When he couldn’t stand it any longer, he blurted, “Is there something I can help you with?”

The pacing stopped. “Huh,” Zenith murmured. “What do you know about shopping carts and babies?”

Emre’s eyebrows went up. He glanced at Abbie and Buttwheel. “Why do you need to know about them?”

“I’m... writing a book, actually. A cozy mystery. I need to know if someone could leave a baby in a cart, and have the cart follow them for a while.”

“You can’t look that up on the internet?”

There came a soft rustling, as though Zenith was running his fingers through his hair. “I, ah. I’ve cut off my internet so I don’t spend half my time scrolling through CartBook.”

Emre cracked a smile. “I thought authors just sit and write all day.”

“You don’t know how easy it is to open social media and get distracted by the hundred baby pictures your friends post,” Zenith muttered. “Unfortunately, having no internet also means I have no access to information.”

Emre laughed and watched Buttwheel clunk around the living room with its bad wheel. “That makes sense. How is your character treating the cart? Carts have feelings. The longer you spend being nice to them, the more loyal they’ll be to you. If you treat them like dirt, they won’t obey your commands.”

Zenith made a thoughtful humming noise. “So if a bad guy tries to send a baby away in a cart...”

“If it’s a random cart, it won’t go far. It doesn’t have any reason to obey,” Emre said. “But if you spend time walking with the cart up and down the grocery store aisles, and let it carry lots of things for you, the cart’s going to take the baby wherever you tell it to go.”

Emre shuddered and added, “Actually, that’s really fucking creepy, if a bad guy did that.”

“Hmm. I can work with this.” Zenith’s couch creaked, and the typing started up once more.

Emre couldn’t help but feel a little proud of himself for helping, even if the subject matter unnerved him. He peered out of the windows to make sure there wasn’t anyone suspicious lurking around the building, then shrugged out of his clothes so he could shift into a wolf and play with Abbie.

He lost track of time for a while. As a wolf, everything was simple—no complicated human thoughts, no debts he needed to pay. There were just his instincts: to protect his pup and keep his territory safe.

He thought he heard Zenith speaking some hours later.

“Emre?”

Emre cocked his head and gave a yip.

“I just realized that I forgot to thank you,” Zenith said. “I’d like to make you dinner, if that’s okay.”

Emre yipped again.

“I’m guessing that’s a yes?”

Another yip.

“Steak and potatoes sound good to you?”

Emre wriggled and yipped three times.

Zenith laughed. “All right. I’ll come over in a bit.”

Abbie fell off the mattress, and Emre nudged her back onto it. She clambered all over him and tugged on his ears with her little teeth. She wriggled under his paws, too, and pounced ona stuffed toy hiding under the pillow. Emre could watch her forever and not tire of it.

He looked up when someone knocked. His senses were sharper in this form; he could smell Zenith’s smoke-and-musk scent more clearly from under the door. Along with the scents of delicious food.

Emre trotted excitedly over and shifted when he remembered how difficult it was to unbolt the latches as a wolf.

Then he opened the door, and remembered again just how huge Zenith was.

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