Bitter Cold

[FineDelusional]

Too cold, way too cold. The sort of cold that clings to the inside of your nostrils and the back of your throat, aching like icicles instead of the warmth your breath normally offers. It was that sort of bone chilling temperature that greeted Lucia van Sant, little werewolf 'princess', off the plane from Miami, to what she considered the frigid wasteland of Northern New York. Snow and ice clung to everything, and for the first time since she was a toddler, she had to wonder if life really existed outside of the warmth Florida had offered her.

But this place was going to be home. Safety. Maybe not comfort. But if it kept her alive, then she could ignore comfort. She had succeeded with the help of some very nice 'friends' in getting a job at a local bakery, a small apartment in the middle of town somewhere too close to the Adirondacks and too far away from any beach, tanning bed, or other necessity she left behind.

With a luggage filled with more expensive shoes than cold weather clothes, she had managed to score a taxi after a thirty minute wait, and hit the apartment in the middle of the night. To her dismay, there was nothing open, not even a gas station. How in the world was a late twenties, highly social girl going to live in Podunk?

It hadn't been her idea. She was more than content to hang out with her crew of insane friends, creating havoc in Surfside, while meandering with some of the more upper class citizens and shoppers at Bal Harbour, because a woman needs a thousand dollar pair of shoes. But this…this place was so damned drab. Had they ever even heard the name 'Louboutin'? Doubtful. If looks were any indication she'd be sporting a pair of Carhartt overalls and hunting boots before the winter was over, at least to look human enough for a wolf-girl.

Lucia loved Miami. The warmth, the shopping, her friends and family. But family was her thorn in the side now. Dear Father had messed up in a big, Federales way. Whatever he had done, meant sending his wife away back to the Dominican Republic, and his daughter to the middle of nowhere, where her face meant nothing to anyone, and her backstory wasn't questioned. Ripped up like a diseased tree and tossed out. To say she was pissed would be an understatement of the century.

Sure, the locals didn't know what to do with a naturally tanned, quick mouth, blonde haired woman. But a few of the locals understood and knew exactly how to handle a very distressed and worried little wolf, who occasionally went for a 'walk' in the national forest that bordered the town. They walked at a pace nearby, watching, cautious, judging the newcomer into their pack space. Curious as to whom the spunky white wolf was when she wasn't trotting about in her fur.

The morning she had woken up in the small hamlet, had been quite a start. Tangled dirty blond hair that hung the straightest possible since she had long hair, her expression looking in dire need of a pick-me-up via an IV of coffee. She wasn't overtly short, somewhere around the 5'5" mark, extremely lithe thanks to a healthy Lycan metabolism and a whole lot of running about, hazel eyes that matched her father's when she wasn't running about on all fours in the middle of the forest. Her face and size screamed innocence, but inside was the type of creature only a pair of alphas could make: another alpha. She radiated the calm calculating energy, despite her bouncy looking nature and charming smiles. If ever threatened, she could easily show off just how one became and one remained, a leading female.

Despite whatever distaste her human side of the brain held on living in the hamlet, the wolf part of her with it's instincts and it's joy over eating wild dead things, exalted in its new found home. No more alligators, no more trying to survive the heat in your wolfen coat.  For now, Lucia could only curse at her reflection, nab a scalding shower to help shake the cold air, and put some makeup on to face the day. Today, she had to learn how to live with the locals, charm the other wolves in town, and how to make at least one delectable pastry at the bakery.