Luring the Lykan with Almond Macarons

By Leslie Ann Brown

After waking from a healing sleep of seventy years, Joanna Kourakis doesn't fit in anywhere, not with her fellow dryads in their Florida Grove, and certainly not with humans and their technology. When she's sent to a small town in Northern Ontario to be a camp counselor for shifters who won't shift, Jo decides to make the best of it, and keeping to herself is what she does best. But it's awfully hard to ignore the handsome lykán wolf shifter who runs the camp, or the human hunters who want to bag themselves a wolf or two for Christmas.

• Language: Unknown
• Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
• Release date: Oct 27, 2021
• ISBN: 9781509238774

Leslie Ann Brown

Biography Leslie Ann Brown is an Ottawa writer with over twenty stories published in such venues as Strange Horizons, On Spec, Tesseracts anthologies and I <3 Geeks. She has placed in a number of RWA Chapter contests and had a story long listed for the Canadian Starburst Award for speculative fiction. Her website can be found at www.leslieannbrown.com.

Book preview

Kel crossed his arms. You’re a strange one. Not anything like Minerva.

I smiled. You have that correct. You leave me alone, and I’ll leave you alone. And everyone is happy. Is there anything else you wish to show me? If not, leave.

No. He subjected me to his amber stare a few seconds too long, obviously debating whether to say something else. He gave into the impulse. Keep out of the woods. The ones who stay in fur can be impulsive.

I cocked my head to one side. You’re telling a dryad to stay out of the woods? Did that work with Min?

No, but she could take care of herself.

My shoulders tensed. And I can’t?

His shoulders shrugged. I don’t know. There’s something about you. Something lost. Or sad. It makes you seem like prey.

I laughed. Does ‘impulsive’ translate to ‘hunt down and eat lone dryads found in the woods’? Do I need to carry some sort of protection? Like wolfsbane? A rolled-up newspaper?

Praise for Leslie Ann Brown

Previous works by Leslie Ann Brown have received honorable mentions in Best of the Year anthologies, reached the semi-finals in Writers of the Future, placed second in the Paranormal category of NWH RWA Lone Star Contest, placed first in the Sci-Fi Category of RWA On the Far Side Contest, and made the long list of the Canadian Starburst Award for short speculative fiction.

Luring the Lykan with Almond Macarons

by

Leslie Ann Brown

Christmas Cookies Series

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

Luring the Lykan with Almond Macarons

COPYRIGHT © 2021 by Leslie Ann Brown

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Contact Information: [e-mail]

Cover Art by Abigail Owen

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Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

Publishing History

First Edition, 2021

Digital ISBN 978-1-5092-3877-4

Christmas Cookies Series

Published in the United States of America

Okay, Jo, I officially confess to being lost in the Canadian wilderness, announced Nicky, my satyr chauffer. I raised my eyebrow at him and made no comment. We were driving through a lovely little town, all dressed up for Christmas with inflatable characters on front lawns and garland wrapped around porch pillars. It had snowed recently, but only a dusting covered the brown grass.

I think you exaggerate, Nicky. Where are those instructions you printed out? After three days travelling from Florida, the luxury SUV’s interior was a mess due to Nicky’s insistence on buying souvenirs every time we stopped to eat or sleep. I twisted in my seat to look behind and saw the dog-eared corners of the sheaf of directions sticking out from underneath a red sweatshirt bearing the declaration that the wearer loved Canada. I snagged the papers and leafed through to the last page. I frowned.

The directions end with this town. We’re supposed to punch some numbers into a GPS, whatever that is.

Jo, you know darn well what a GPS is. It’s been sitting in front of you on my dash for the whole trip. Punch the numbers in. Nicky pulled the SUV over in front of a store front whose window announced that hunting and fishing licenses were for sale within. I pointedly handed him the page with the information on it.

You know I don’t do that kind of thing.

For the sake of the vanished gods, Jo! gritted Nicky. I peeked and saw that his usually sunny yellow aura was turning muddy.

I was surprised. Nicky had been a pleasant travelling companion up until now, putting up with my technophobia. His handsome face with the stereotypic goatee was creased with annoyance. So now Nicky was tired of me, just like my Grove sisters. He had been delighted with the assignment to drive me to my new job in Northern Ontario when we were in Florida. Road trip! he had caroled and then told me to ignore the permanent tent in his pants that all satyrs sported. He would be the perfect gentleman. This was very un-satyr-like behavior, so I wondered if one of my Grove sisters had told him to leave me alone. If so, it was another example of them coddling me, even as they were forcing me out of the Grove. They didn’t think I could handle it on my own, that I was too fragile. Still, I liked Nicky and tried to smooth things over.

Why are you angry with me, Nicky? It’s not my intention to be obstinate.

He sighed and rubbed the spot where his horns