Sissy turned on her mate, slapping him in the back of the head. “This is your fault, Mitchell Shaw!”

“My fault? I wasn’t the one subtly questioning her wolf prowess by repeating the word badger over and over again!”

“I’m not talking to you anymore!” Sissy yelled, heading off to the kitchen and a sobbing Blayne.

Mitch was right behind her, too. “Yeah, right. How long will that nirvana last?”

Smitty sat down on the third step of the stairs. He sighed and said to the wolfdog pup Dee had left at the house a few days before, “I understand more and more every day why you won’t shift to human.”

Abby made a little whining sound and kindly dropped a Milkbone into Smitty’s lap. “Aww, thanks, darlin’.”

Lock was cutting through the practice rink, hoping they could get done with practice early today, when he stopped midstride. Lock focused his gaze on the ground and wondered if he’d seen what he thought he’d seen. Deciding it was best to check before moving into the team’s locker room, he looked up at the support beam that went from the very basement of the building and straight up into the full-human portion until it reached the roof. Although, in this instance, Lock didn’t really need to see the entire pillar. What he saw was quite enough since that was the portion his best friend and team captain was attached to.

Frowning in confusion, Lock asked, “Are you up there for a reason?”

“I’m up here for a reason,” Ric calmly replied, “but I’m not up here on purpose.”

“If you’re not up there on purpose, then why are you up there?”

“Because some hybrids have issues with rage.”

“You made Blayne mad?” That seemed strange. Blayne had an incredibly high tolerance for other people’s issues. However, when she did hit a wall, she hit it with all the power she had and usually took the wall down.

“No, no. Not Blayne. Another hybrid.” Ric glanced over at the ice, and Lock followed his gaze to Bo Novikov skating backward around the rink while he worked on his drills. That shifter was on the ice every day whether they had a practice planned or not. If he wasn’t on the ice, he was in the gym. He really worked to be as good as he was, making Lock feel a little lazy for not working nearly as hard. Then again, he saw hockey as a fun diversion that helped pay for his studio and woodworking equipment. If he never got on the ice again, Lock wouldn’t lose any sleep. Novikov, on the other hand, seemed like the kind of guy who would play hockey on some backwoods frozen lake somewhere until he died of old age.

“What did you say to him?”

“I simply asked about his intentions toward Blayne. He told me it was none of my business; I strongly suggested it was; and it was downhill from there.”

“Downhill or uphill?”

“Lachlan.”

“All right. All right. No need to get hysterical.”

“I’m not hysterical.” He wasn’t. Not even a little, but it was fun to act like he was. “I’m just uncomfortable.”

“He has a hell of an aim to get you right on that hook, too.”

“Yes. We’re all impressed by Novikov’s aim.”

“How long have you been up there?”

“Long enough.”

“I can’t believe you let him put you up there.”

“What can I say? I was weak, didn’t even put up much of a fight as you can see from the bruises on my face and knuckles. Yeah, I just let the seven-one, nearly four-hundred-pound, bear-lion hybrid descended from the very loins of Genghis Khan toss me onto this goddamn hook!”

“Now you’re kind of hysterical.”

“I know!” Ric took a breath. “Now are you getting me down or not?”

“I would, but I can’t climb very well. Maybe if I was still ten—”

“Lachlan!”

“Calm down. Calm down.”

Lock sized up the teammates walking by him and tapped the arm of one. “Hey. Bert. Can you help us out?”

Bert lumbered over to his side. “Sure. Whatcha need?”

“Can you get our mighty team captain down?”

Bert looked up. “Huh. I didn’t know wolves could climb that high.”

“They can’t. The polar-lion tossed him up there.”

“What’s he doing fighting a guy six times bigger than him?”

“Got me.” Lock leaned against the pole. “Hey, Ric. Bert wants to know—”

“Would you two just get me down?”

“The yelling seems unnecessary,” Bert observed.

“That was my thought.” Lock stepped back from the pole. “Can you get him down?”

“Yeah. Sure.” Bert handed Lock his duffel bag and grabbed the beam. He climbed it easily, not even breaking a sweat, but he was a black bear. And an almost typical one, too. He didn’t have much height at six feet but he made up for it in width. Lock remembered Gwen softly stating one day that Bert was, “a low wall that skates.”

Bert reached Ric in seconds and gripped the beam with one arm and both legs while using his free hand to lift the annoyed wolf off the hook he’d been tossed onto. “I’m sending him down,” Bert called out.

“Okay.” Lock stepped back a little farther and blinked when Ric hit the ground.

“I thought you were going to catch him,” Bert said.

“You didn’t say I needed to catch him. You said you were sending him down. You should have been more specific.”