Prince Of Wolves

Jacque Pierce sat in the window seat in her bedroom looking across the street at her neighbors house; she wasn't really being nosy she thought to herself, just curious. "Yeah," she snorted, "only if you call curious sitting in your window seat eyes glued to your neighbor's house like a hound on the hunt at ten o'clock at night. I can call a spade, a spade tomorrow morning," she told her conscience.

The Henry's were having a foreign exchange student stay with them this year. They didn't have any children of their own, though Jacque didn't know if that was by choice or because they weren't able to have children. She had promised Sally and Jen she would get the nitty-gritty on the situation and call them.

So here she sat in her window, scoping out the neighbors house, with her lights turned off and blinds cracked just enough to see and to top off her "James Bond" experience, she even had binoculars! Now if she only had the nifty back ground music to go with her shenanigans. She had been sitting there for an hour already and was just about to give up when a black stretch limo pulled to the curb. Now isn't this strange, she thought, a foreign exchange student arriving in a limo? She put the binoculars to her face and adjusted them to get a better look, settling them over the passenger door to see just who would emerge. She knew this was a little much but honestly in a town of 700 there just isn't a whole lot of excitement and Jacque would take it where she could get it.

The driver got out of the limo to go around and open the back passenger door, but before he could get there the door was already opening, and the boy who stepped out of that limo had to be the most beautiful guy Jacque had ever seen, and that was only his profile. "Wow, I mean wow," is all Jacque could think. Jacque couldn't even imagine what his entire face must look like. He was tall, probably six foot one or so, his hair was jet black, it was longer on top and she could tell that he had bangs that fell across his face sweeping to the left partially covering that eye. He had broad shoulders and from what she could see of his profile, high cheek bones, a straight nose and full lips. She quickly realized her mouth had dropped open and she was all but drooling over the handsome human being who had emerged from the vehicle. She watched as he and his driver conversed, it all seemed very formal until the driver suddenly hugged the boy with obvious deep affection. He must be more than just his driver Jacque thought.

Suddenly, he turned as if he had heard what she was thinking and looked straight at her window, straight at her. Jacque froze, unable to look away from the mesmerizing blue eyes that held her in place. All her thoughts seemed to fade into the distance and she heard, or thought, she wasn't quite sure which, the words, "At last, my Jacquelyn." Jacque shook her head, trying to clear the haze that had filled it. After she came to her senses from the intense stare she recapped in her mind what his face had looked like.

She was right about the cheek bones; nose and lips, what she wasn't prepared for was that his crystal blue eyes seemed to almost glow in the moon light; the hair that fell across his forehead and over his left eye only added to his mysteriousness, over all he had a very masculine, very beautiful face. The shirt he was wearing was black and thanks to her handy dandy binoculars she was able to see that it fit closely to his form and showed off a muscular chest and flat stomach. He had a black leather biker jacket on, but past that she couldn't see because the car was in the way, but she imagined his legs were every bit as nice as the rest of him.

When she looked back at the street the mysterious guy was walking into the Henry's house.

As she saw the door close she heard the voice again say "Soon." Jacque sat there for a few minutes more trying to get her brain to work again, everything seemed so hazy. After blinking what felt like a thousand times she pulled herself together, picked up the phone and dialed Jen's number.

Three rings later Jen answered, "What's the word?" she asked.

Jacque took a slow breath and said "I think you better come over."

"I'm there chick, see ya in 5," Jen answered and then hung up.

Jacque grinned to herself as she thought about how great it was to have a friend like Jen who you could always depend on to be there when you needed her.

Jacque picked up the phone again and called Sally, she answered after one ring, she had obviously been diligently manning the phone, waiting for Jacque to call with details to the latest small town drama. "Jen is on her way over," Jacque said. "I need you to come too, we need to talk."

"Okay," Sally said simply and hung up.

Fifteen minutes later the three friends were gathered on Jacque's bedroom floor, hot chocolate in hand, because naturally, how can you have a girl powwow with out hot chocolate?

"So, fill it and spill it," Jen said.

"Okay," Jacque said taking a deep breath, "so I'm sitting in my window seat, shades cracked lights off, binoculars in hand..."

"Binoculars, really, you honestly were using binoculars?" Sally interrupted.

"Well you said you wanted details, so I was getting you details," Jacque defended.

"Oooh, did you have the "Mission Impossible" sound track playing in the back ground cuz that would have been spy-tastic," Jen said enthusiastically.

"Actually," Jacque said distracted, "I was thinking more James Bond-ish, you know with the whole stake out thing..."

"No, huh-uh, that would be more like Dog the Bounty Hunter type stuff. But you couldn't be Beth 'cause you're not stacked enough on top, so you would have to be baby Lisa the daughter...." Jen rattled on.

"You are so, so not comparing me to Dog the Bounty Hunter's daughter right now and why are we talking about this anyway because it is sooooo NOT the point!" Jacque growled in frustration.

"Spy analogies aside, I was sitting there about an hour when finally a black stretch limo pulls up to the curb in front of the Henry's house."

"A limo, what foreign exchange student shows up in a limo?" Jen asked.

"I know right, that's what I was thinking," Jacque stated. "I assure you the limo is of no consequence once the person inside stepped out. Ladies, I saw the most gorgeous guy to ever grace my line of site."

"When you say gorgeous," Jen started, "are we talking Brad Pitt boyish good looks, or Johnny Depp make ya want to slap somebody?"

"No, we're talking Brad and Johnny need to bow down and recognize," Jacque answered.

"Aside from him being dropped off in a limo, and besides the fact that he is a walking Calvin Cline ad, it begins to get strange at this point in our story boys and girls," Jacque says in a spooky narrative voice.

"Like it wasn't strange already?" Sally asked.

"Well, okay strang-er. Just as he is about to walk up the path, he suddenly turns and looks straight at me, like he could sense I was watching him! Like, right in my eyes. I literally couldn't move; it was like I was mesmerized by him or something. Man when did I start using the word

"like" so freaking much?" Jacque said in exasperation. "Up until now it was strange, but now we are entering the world of "what the hell." As he is staring at me I hear a voice in my head and it said "At last, my Jacquelyn," then as he turned to go in the house and I hear the voice again say,

"Soon."

Jacque stares expectantly at her two best friends waiting for them to tell her she's finally jumped off the deep end, but they just sit there staring at her. "Well?" Jacque asked. Finally Jen stirs taking a deep breath in, she looks down at her empty hot chocolate mug and says "We're gonna need more hot chocolate."

"Agreed," Sally and Jacque say at the same time.

Once Jen had returned with three fresh mugs of hot chocolate and Oreo cookies she said,

"So let me see if I'm catching what you're throwing. Hottie exchange student drives up in a limo, steps out, rocks your world, looks into your eyes and speaks to you in your head? Am I getting the gist of it here?"

Jacque nodded her head sheepishly looking at the floor, "I mean, I guess it was his voice in my head. It could be a long lost dead relative who's been searching for me since they died and happen to find me the moment that hottie looked into my eyes." Jen and Sally both gave Jacque their "get a larger spoon if your going to shovel it in that big" look.

"What?" Jacque asked. "I'm just saying," she said throwing her hands up in the air in frustration.

Flopping back onto the floor Jacque groaned loudly and covered her eyes with the back of her hand, "Am I going crazy ya'll?" she asked.

"No sweetie, you been gone a long time now, we just didn't want you to know that we knew." Sally said with humor in her voice.

"Seriously, I know it sounds crazy, but I promise you guys I heard a voice, a beautiful, deep, masculine voice, in my head, and it knew my name! That is crazy, jacked up; put-her-in-a straight jacket, totally insane!" Jacque looked at them both with fear in her eyes; she truly did wonder if she had finally cracked.

There was after all, people in her family of questionable sanity, her mother being one of them. Jacque loved her mom and they had a good relationship, but she wasn't always in touch with reality. Jacque's father wasn't in the picture and never had been, he had bailed as soon as he found out her mom was pregnant. Thankfully she had two best friends who kept her feet firmly on the ground, which is why she was so fervently seeking their thoughts on this matter.

Sally finally spoke up "I don't think you are crazy, Jac, really you're not. There has to be some sort of explanation. We'll figure it out, we always do."

"Yea," Jen added, "it's 2 weeks until school starts. From now until then we are on scout detail." Sally nodded her agreement.

The three were quiet for a few minutes, each pondering ways to "run into" the new exchange student without seeming too obvious. Jen was lying on the floor looking up at the ceiling fan when she said "We need to find a way to introduce ourselves to him so that we can each get a good look and see if Sally or I hear a voice in our head."

"My mom was planning on taking over a good'ole Southern meal for him since he isn't from here. We could ask if we could go over with her, or would that be too lame?" Jacque asked.

"No, I think that's perfect," Jen stated.

Finally, by midnight they had thought up a somewhat weak game plan, the whole of it revolving around going with Jacque's mom to the Henrys to give their new exchange student some fried chicken, 'taters, and corn on the cob. Seriously, how lame could you get, Jacque thought as she lay in her bedroom floor. Jen and Sally had quickly fallen asleep on the other side of her room each with their own blanket wrapped around them.

Jacque sat up and looked around her room, and thought this was a place I feel safe and comfortable. The twin size bed with the new deep green bed spread her mom had bought her for her birthday, the stained-glass lamp with absolutely no theme whatsoever that sat on her small wood desk, she, Sally and Jen had carved various things on its surface. She looked at her dresser mirror which had pictures lining both sides, mostly of Jen, Sally and her in various places and poses; just a few hours ago I was just another 17 year-old getting ready to start my senior year, so normal she thought.

She had three homecoming mums hanging on the wall next to her bed, and on the other side of her bed was the window with a seat where she sat tonight, where her life had changed in a way she wasn't sure of yet. Jacque lay back down on her back watching her ceiling fan go around in a circle, the motor lulling her to sleep. Her last thought as she drifted off was of a full moon, whatever that meant staying he couldn't shake the feeling that something was off. Not necessarily in a bad way, he just felt unsettled, restless, and tense.

Well, it could be because he was more than a thousand miles away from home, he knew absolutely no one, it was his senior year in high school, and he was going to be spending it in a country he had never been to before. "Yes I imagine that might make a person tense," Fane said to himself. He looked at the house and noticed it was quite large; two stories with a wrap-around porch. It actually looked like a house you might see out in the country not in a suburb. The yard was nicely manicured with short green grass. There was a tall, full tree to the right of the walk way with a bench underneath. On the porch there were two rocking chairs and a porch swing, a little table in between the rocking chairs had a potted plant with one of those water globes sticking out of it. Overall it was a charming home, a home in which a person would feel comfortable; a normal home.

Fane hoped this was the case because normal was not usually in his vocabulary. He was, after all, from a family of werewolves, specifically a Grey wolf (Canis lupus), not only that, but he just happen to be the son of the current Alpha. Wait it gets worse, his name, Fane Lupei, literally meant "Crown Wolf" how fitting for the prince of the Romanian Greys. What could possibly be normal about your family being able to change into wolves, or being a prince of wolves as well? Nothing in that scenario could ever be normal.

"You made this choice," Fane told himself, "now you have to live with it so get out of the car."

Fane wasn't really sure why he even decided to apply to the foreign exchange program; he just knew he felt a pull, like a moth to a flame, to come to the United States and not to just any city but to Coldspring, Texas.. Why he thought it was a good idea to leave his home in Romania, which has largest numbers of Greys in the world, he didn't know. There are other places that Canis Lupus hold as territories like Ireland, the Balkans and Poland, even Italy and Spain have some Grey wolves. One would think that a Grey would go to another territory where Grey's were, but the problem is wolves are extremely territorial and unless a wolf wanted a fight, especially a male wolf, you didn't wander into another's territory. Fortunately there weren't any Canis lupus in the small town of Coldspring, Texas so Fane was free to come and claim his own territory, which was completely in his nature to do.

Ok no more stalling Fane thought. He looked up at Sorin his driver and friend, and said, "I guess this is it, mulţumesc (thank you) my friend for coming all this way to drop me off, I appreciate it."

"Think nothing of it my prince; it is always an honor to serve you."

"Oh, come now don't go getting all formal on me. Here in Coldspring I'm just a high school student, not a prince," Fane said.

Fane knew this was hard for his friend, though Sorin's title was actually "Guard to the Prince" and had been since Fane was a child. Sorin had actually wanted to stay in the U.S. with Fane, but Fane insisted Sorin go home and let him be on his own for a while. There were no other Greys in this area so it wasn't likely that he was going to get in a territory battle.