“No wonder it’s so confusing when you have the same word for three things! I told Nichs I was going to buy an Aussie-English Dictionary.” Iughed; this was fun.


    “Back to speaking Minnesotan. Hot Dish.”


    Nichs was clueless. “A frying pan?”


    “Sorry,” Lucy said. “A baked casserole. Vicki, have a biscuit.”


    “A cookie! I love my desserts,” I said with a smile


    “Correct! Back to Nichs. Minnesota State Bird.”


    He shook his head. “A duck?”


    “Sorry, that is the Mosquito, or a Loon if you’re literal. Vicki, your word is Mozzie.”


    I had no idea. “Someone from Melbourne?” This answer got the audienceughing.Owned by N?velDrama.Org.


    “Sorry, that is ALSO a mosquito.” Crap. “Nichs, your word is Skol.”


    He was thinking hard. “Someone said that at the party. Cheers?”


    “Correct! Vicki, yourst word is Pash.”


    I smiled at this one. “A kiss?”


    “Correct! Last one for Nichs. Have a bar.”


    He closed his eyes. “Chocte?”


    “Sorry, it means a pan cookie or brownie,” Lucy said.


    “This is whymunication is so difficult,” I said with augh. “I’m learning fast, though. I love Australia!”


    “And Australia loves you. You also earned six hundred dors for your Foundation; the screen is showing the information for the Sharkbait Foundation if anyone else would like to donate. Where can people meet you today?” I talked through our scheduled appearances, thanked her, and then it was off tomercial.


    “That was great!” I got up and hugged Nichs. “I can’t believe you got three of five!”


    “I’ve been doing research too,” he said.


    “Thank you for having us, Lucy.”


    “My pleasure. I’d like to interview you again if you’re back in Australia again.”


    I looked at Nichs and smiled. “I’m sure that will happen. No matter what, I have your contact information, and maybe we can do something when the shows areing out featuring Australia?”


    “That would be lovely.”


    The aquarium appearance was pretty standard, but it was fun meeting the kids and signing photos with the other girls. The two appearances were well-attended, and Mercedes was pleased. It had been a good day, and we were tired by the time we left the second store.


    Our day was far from done, though. We had a conference call with Leo, Steven, and the others right after dinner, and I was hungry. We found a barbecue restaurant on the South Bank called San Anton by Bludsoe’s BBQ, and it was pretty good. It served American-style barbecue with ribs and brisket, but the sauces had a unique Aussie twist to them. I was curious and spent some time talking to the owner about my second-favorite subject after sharks.


    I was rxing in my meata on the way back to the hotel when my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number; it was in New York State. Few people had my personal phone number. “Hello?”


    A woman’s voice answered. “Vicki, it’s Bonnie Carver. I hear congrattions are in order.”


    “Luna Carver?” Bonnie was the mate of Lnd Carver, Chairman of the North American Council. “I’m sorry, but about what?”


    “Finding your mate, of course! It was good thinking with the whole ‘cut my shoulder on a rock’ bit, but he’s sporting a matching bite under that shirt of his if you look carefully. He’s a strong and handsome young man; you’re a lucky girl!”


    “Thank you, ma’am.” My mind was racing; thanks to all the paparazzi, hiding my mating bite didn’t work as I hoped. I wasn’t ready for this conversation at all.


    “I was hoping to learn more about his family, but there is no Nichs Corcoran on any of our Pack rosters. Is he a human? A rogue? Are you changing him without permission?”


    Oh. Shit. “My leaders are fully aware of the circumstances, Luna. Thank you for calling, and you’re right. I’m a lucky girl who cannot talk of this now because I have no privacy.”


    “We’ll talkter, then. Lnd has questions of his own.”


    “Goodnight, Luna.” I hung up and immediately called Leo, informing him about what just happened.


    I’d hoped we would have months to settle things down with the Corcoran family before the Council got involved, and I hadn’t wanted to announce my mating until the Council Summit.


    Poof.


    There went THOSE ns.


    Nichs and I hurried up to our room, where my Mom and Amy joined us for the conference call. I saw Alpha Steven and Luna Carolyn on one camera, Adrienne was on the second, and the third had Unky Leo and Ian Corcoran. “Hi everyone,” I said. “Did the Council call?”


    “I got a call from Chairman Carver about two minutes after I got the message from Leo,” Alpha Steven said. “He said he was disappointed that he had to learn about the mating of a Mantled Alpha Heir from wolves watching social media instead of from her Alpha.”


    “How did you handle that?” Bosses hated looking bad when they didn’t have information.


    “I told them that you had requested privacy due to your unique situation. After all, you are halfway around the world in a high-profile job among humans. You barely had time toplete the mating before rushing off to your nextmitment. I may have promised a party to celebrate at ater time once you return to the United States.” That seemed fair. “After that, he was questioning whether you would continue in my Pack or return to Miesville. I told him you only changed because you were living with Amy and Kai’s younger sisters; if you moved out on your own with your new mate, you’d likely go back to Miesville. That seemed to satisfy him for now,”


    “I can live with that. Thank you, Alpha. I’m d I left the political stuff to you.” Thest thing I wanted was a bunch of Werewolf Council poking around in my business. It was far too early to expose Nichs’ family to the other Packs.


    “It’s not going to be that easy,” Leo said with a sigh. “I got a call from the Chairman next. He knows Nichs isn’t on any Pack roster with the American or European Councils. No Corcorans are active in any Pack, including in Irnd. He’s not on the list of known rogues, and he wants me to find out why.”


    “How long can you hold him off,” Adrienne said.


    Leo shrugged. “A few days?”


    “You may not have that long,” she replied. “One phone call and I was able to find Philip Corcoran in the European Pack Archives. Someone is going to say that if he’s not in the archives, maybe his father or grandfather was. It’s all electronic, and if they ask the same archivist? They’ll find out that I found out the answers first, and didn’t say anything.”


    “If they start pulling strings, we are screwed,” Ian said. “They don’t even have toe here. They can use public records in Australia to trace our families and identify every Corcoran back to Colonial times.”


    “We can’t allow the Council to take over down here,” I said with panic in my voice. “You know what they think about humans who know our secret! They’ll want them killed, or forced toplete the change!”


    “The Council can have investigators and enforcers down there in a day,” Adrienne said. “Hell, they might already be on the way. By the time they arrive, they’ll have names and addresses of every rtive to Nichs Corcoran they can find. A rental car and a few days, and they’ll know two things. One, there are a lot of humans among them, and two, most of them are in the Miesville Pack. That fact ces both groups under the authority of the North American Council.”


    Ian looked confused. “Our ancestor hailed from Irnd, so shouldn’t it be the European Pack that has authority?”


    Adrienne shook her head, no. “They would like to im credit, and if they had found the Corcorans before Sharkbait did, that would have been the case. The problem is that there was no Alpha in Australia, and the Corcorans never formed a Pack structure. Legally, the Wicklow Pack ceased to exist centuries ago.”