NOLAN

“This needs to happen today.”

The woman on the video call looked nervous now. Nolan’s tone was very firm.

“Absolutely,” she said. “We’ll send Yena’s acceptance letter right away. I’ll have a it delivered to the palace as soon as possible.”

Nolan paused.

“Actually, I am going to give you an alternate address to send it to. Yena is visiting her family tonight.”

The admissions lady nodded. “Of course. Whatever you need.”

“And you received the donation this morning by wire transfer?”

Now she smiled.

“Yes, and thank you so much for your generous gift! We’ve been trying to build this library for years. Your donation will benefit so many students.”

Nolan nodded. “It’s the least I can do to thank you for making this possible.”

The fact was that he’d wound up needing to give them a big incentive to move faster with Yena’s admission.

The prince’s donation would fund their entire budget for a new library. And Nolan insisted that it be anonymous, knowing the humans wouldn’t want to advertise any connection with werewolves.

He’d also paid the human private security firm in advance for their services. They were all set to run a covert operation for as long as Yena would be in the human world. They’d follow her at a distance to look out for lurking danger and neutralize any threats that showed up.

Conditions met and bribe accepted, the admissions team at the fashion school was no longer dragging their feet.

Yena’s admission was secured.

It was bittersweet for Nolan. It meant it was all really happening… the love of his life was really leaving him.

But he was genuinely happy for her, too. If this was what Yena wanted, it was what Nolan was going to do.

Because her happiness was most important. And he promised her he would help her follow her dreams, and he was a man of his word.

YENA

Tina had her head in the refrigerator and was rummaging through it, looking for something.

“Did you kids eat all the whipped cream?”

She turned around to see me and Evan silently glancing at each other with guilty faces.

“Uh-huh,” she said. “I see.”

She started taking her apron off.

“I’m going to make a quick trip to the store, then. And while I’m gone you two will keep things going here. Yena, you finish up the pie filling, it’s simmering on the stove, and Evan, you can set the dinner table.”

“I’ll go, Mom.” Evan put his hand on Tina’s shoulder. “It’s cold out, let me go to the store.”

Tina agreed. She grabbed a handwritten list off the fridge and gave it to him.

“Might as well pick up a few other things we need,” she said, handing it over.

“I’ll go with you.” I picked up my sweatshirt from the back of a chair and slipped it over my head.

Evan frowned at me. “You don’t have to do that. You can stay here in the warm—”

I flashed him a look – the silent cry for help. Darted my eyes at Tina then back to him.

Evan stifled a laugh and said, “Okay, yeah, actually I could probably use help figuring out where to find the…” He looked at the shopping list. “The wildflower honey.”

“Honey is by the sugar,” Tina started to explain.

“It’s okay, Mom! I’ve got Yena to help me!”

Then we were jumping into our boots and running out the garage door with hats and coats in hand.

“You know, you’ve been helping me feel sane again,” Evan said once we were in the car. “I thought it was just me that she drove crazy, but it’s comforting to know she has the same effect on you.”

“Bro, I love Tina so much. But I’ve made enough pie filling in the past week to almost completely turn me off pies forever.”

“That’ll be the day.” Evan laughed.

“I’m serious. If you see me eating any more pie, will you please stop me? My stomach can’t handle all the sugar anymore.”

“I promise you,” Evan replied, “that I will not do that.”

I rolled my eyes.”

When the car was warm enough, we drove out to the store. It was just a few minutes’ drive down the hill from our neighborhood.

“So, something actually that I wanted to talk to you about,” I said, once we were rolling. Somehow it was easier to bring up less comfortable topics when we were sitting side by side in the car and I knew Evan needed to keep his eyes on the road.

“What’s up?”

“I think that, for school, I’m gonna need to book a flight out really soon. Maybe as early as within a week. Are you still sure you want to come along with me, especially so soon?”

Evan didn’t hesitate. “Of course. Whatever you need, little sister.”

I smiled. That was something Evan used to call me a lot, and he hadn’t said it to me once since I’d been home.

Sure, the flirting with grown-up, new-and-improved Evan was fun.

But the glimpses of my sweet brother, like I remembered when we were kids, felt like a warm hug.

“Thank you for doing this with me, Evan. I don’t know what I’d do if I had to go alone. I’d be so scared.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about that. As long as you’ve got your brother, you’ll never be alone.”

Evan slid into a parking spot at the front of the store. I tore Tina’s shopping list in half and gave him one piece. We split up to get the shopping done faster and wound up getting a little competitive with it.

Turns out we tied, racing our full carts to the register lane and almost crashing into each other.

“Ugh!” I had gotten a little bit red and sweaty. “I am going to beat you at something someday, Evan… someday.”

He laughed. “I know you will.” He wasn’t even out of breath at all.

“And you got everything on the list?”

“Yep!”

The cashier rang up my groceries first. It gave me a chance to put my hat and scarf back on before Evan pushed his cart through too and we went back to the car.

We loaded up the backseat of the car with the “few things” Tina needed us to pick up, because Evan had the trunk of his car full of sports gear.

When I went to sit in the passenger seat, I found that Evan had put a tiny box of chocolates there for me to find.

“When did you even do that?” I asked.

He gave a smug, closed-mouth smile. Shrugged and said, “Wasn’t me. Musta been a secret admirer.”

He looked away as he said it, making a big left turn out of the parking lot as we started back home.

“Thank you.”

He shrugged again. “What for? Dunno who that’s from.”

I rolled my eyes. Evan had some really dumb jokes sometimes. I punched him in the arm and he pretended to be hurt.

“Oh, that reminds me,” I said. “Something I want to do before we leave.”

“What, beat me up?”

“No. Boxing! You mentioned you’ve been boxing as part of your off-season workouts.”

“Oh, yeah? You interested in that?” Evan looked surprised.

“Totally! It sounds so fun. Could you teach me?”

He smiled. “Yeah, okay, we could do it.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Sure. I’ll call the gym. Let ‘em know we’re coming in.”

“Okay.”

I beamed, thinking about how fun this would be.

But then I had another thought.

“Is it a place that gets crowded? Lots of people there? Or can we have some privacy?”

Evan smirked and narrowed his eyes at me.

I punched his arm again. “I just mean, it’s been a while since I’ve been in like, a public place without security. It just kind of makes me nervous.”

“Oh yeah.” The smile left his face. “I didn’t think about that.”

“Maybe we could ask if we can go before they open or after they close?”

Evan shrugged. “I guess I could ask.”

“Or I could ask. People don’t really say no to me.”

His facial expression showed me Evan wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

“I’ll call ‘em,” he said. “I’m sure we can work something out.”