“Good. I mean, right. The stairs are back there, by the elevators.”

She nodded and let me lead the way.

The park wasn’t busy, so avoiding humans was easy. That took some of the challenge out of it, but a new place to run is always good.

We spent most of the afternoon as wolves, exploring and playing, working up a sharp hunger for the hunt. We’d found a few deer trails, but all of our tearing around scared the small herd into hiding. Probably just as well-in places like this, people pay attention to ripped-apart deer carcasses, and we’d have felt guilty later, knowing we’d nudged the line past acceptable risk. We settled for rabbits, the fat, dull-witted sort you find in preserves with few natural predators.

The snack was enough to still the hunger pangs without making us sleepy, so we followed it up with more games, these taking on an edge, the snarls sharper, the nips harder, fangs drawing blood, working up to the inevitable conclusion-a fast Change back and hard, raw sex that left us scratched and bruised, happy and drowsy, stretched on the forest floor, bodies apart, feet entwined.

I was on my back, shielding my eyes from the sun shifting through the trees, too lazy to move out of its way. Elena lay on her stomach, watching an ant crawl across her open palm.

“What about a second stop for our honeymoon?” I asked.

Her nose scrunched in an unspoken What?

“Well, I know St. Louis isn’t shaping up to be everything you’d hoped…”

“This afternoon is.” She grinned and rubbed her foot against mine. “I’m having a good time, but if you’re not…”

How the hell was I supposed to answer that? No, darling, our honeymoon sucks. I’m bored and I want to go somewhere else.

If it were true, I wouldn’t have minded saying so, though I supposed, being a honeymoon, I’d have to phrase it more carefully. Walking away from a threat set my teeth on edge, but it was better than having this mutt ruin our holiday. Still, given the choice between staying and making Elena think I was having a shitty time, something told me option one-even if it meant fighting a bigger, younger werewolf-was a whole lot safer.