Of course, it helped that Kaci’s family was no longer looking for her. She was presumed dead in the same attack that had killed her mother and sister. Her father had erected a memorial headstone for her months earlier, and by all accounts seemed to be trying to come to terms with his loss and grief.
But in the end, none of that mattered because by the time the spring semester had started a week earlier, Kaci was too weak to go. She got winded just walking to the barn, and took several naps a day. Her skin was pale and sometimes clammy, and she got constant migraines and occasional bouts of nausea.
She couldn’t go to school until she’d Shifted and regained her strength. Until then, my mother was home-schooling her in the core subjects.
Neither of them was enjoying it.
“I can’t do it.” Kaci’s frown deepened as she rolled onto her back to stare at my ceiling, rubbing her forehead to fend off another headache.
“Yes, you can. I can help.” I went back to the bag for my toiletry pouch and hair dryer, still talking as I set them on the bathroom counter. “Dr. Carver says that once you’re Shifting regularly, you’ll get better very quickly. Then you can go to school like a normal kid.”
“Normal!” She huffed and rolled her head to the side to meet my gaze. “What the hell is that?”
I groaned at her language. How the hell had she managed to pick up all of my bad habits and none of my good ones? “You know you can’t talk like that in front of the Alpha, right?”
Kaci rolled both big hazel eyes at me. “You do.”
Damn it!
From somewhere near the front of the house, my mother laughed out loud, having obviously heard the entire exchange. She’d always said she hoped I had a kid just like me, but neither of us had expected that to happen quite so soon.
But Kaci was right, of course. I sank onto the bed with a frustrated sigh, and she rolled onto her side to look at me, her face in one hand, her elbow spearing the comforter. “Kaci, you do not want to model your life in this Pride after mine. A smart girl would learn from a few of my mistakes, instead of choosing to repeat them all just for the experience.”
She frowned and stared down at the comfortor. “My dad didn’t let me cuss, either.”
My heart jumped into my throat. Kaci hardly ever mentioned her father, or anything else from her previous existence, as if it were easier not to talk or even think about them. Though I understood that, I also knew that ignoring her problems wasn’t the healthiest way to deal with them.
But before I could encourage her to go on, she changed the subject with a sudden shake of her head. “Besides, you look like you’re doin’ okay to me.”
“But you could do better. You could do anything you want. Starting with public school.”
Kaci sighed and flopped back over to stare at the ceiling, her hands folded across her stomach. But I could see wistfulness in her eyes. She wanted to go to school, no matter what she said to the contrary. I’d been in her position—aside from the whole refusing-to-Shift thing—and knew exactly how badly it sucked to be stuck in one place, under constant, nagging supervision.
At the end of the bed again, I dug in the duffel and pulled out my bloody, ruined jeans, tied up in a white plastic Wal-Mart sack.
“What’s that smell?” Kaci rolled onto her stomach and sniffed the air with a spark of interest as I dropped the bundle on the floor. That night I would have to fire up the industrial incinerator behind the barn and toss the whole mess inside.
Hmm. I wonder if it’s still hot from the recent mass cremation….
“You’re probably smelling the stray who slashed through my jeans,” I said, glancing at the bag in irritation. “That was my favorite pair.”
“No, that’s not it.” She stuck her nose into my duffel and sniffed dramatically, and when she rose, the zipper pulled several strands of thick brown hair free from her ponytail to hang over her cheeks. “It’s Marc.” She shoved the loose strands back from her face. “Your underwear smells like Marc!”
I flushed and pulled my bag off the bed. When I was thirteen, there was no older woman around for me to ask about guys, other than my mother. And I wouldn’t have asked her about sex if the future of the species depended upon my understanding of the process.
Which, according to my mother, it did.
Caught off guard by the questions I could practically feel her forming, I crossed the room to upend the rest of the duffel into my regular hamper, a purple ribbon-trimmed wicker thing my mother had put in my room when I was twelve.
I stared at the hamper critically, suddenly perplexed by its presence. What kind of enforcer’s hamper has ribbons threaded through it? I needed something else. Something utilitarian. Something big and sturdy, and not at odds with the blood-and sweat-stained clothes it would be holding.
Like, a big metal trash can. Or a barrel.
I turned toward Kaci, intending to ask her if she wanted the girlie hamper, but she was already talking before I could get the question out. “So, how long have you been with Marc?”
“Um…we were together for my last two years of high school, then we broke up for about five years. And we got back together last summer.”
“Why did you break up?”
Because I’m an idiot. I tossed my empty duffel into my closet and kicked the door shut. “It’s complicated, Kaci. Things get weird when you grow up. Enjoy being a kid while you can.”
“Whatever.” She rolled onto her back again. “Being a kid sucks. People tell you when to get up, when to go to bed, when to eat, what not to wear…”
I glanced up from my dresser, onto which I’d been emptying my jeans pockets, to see her watching me in obvious—and incredibly misplaced—envy. “Have you met my parents? In case you haven’t noticed, they still tell me what to do. All the time.”
“Yeah, well, at least you get paid for it.”
“Not this year.” Enforcers drew a small salary, in addition to free room and board. But as part of the “community service” sentence handed down to me from the tribunal in November, in addition to teaching my fellow enforcers to do the partial Shift, I had to forgo my salary for an entire year. All I had now was what little money I’d saved since college and the business credit card all my father’s enforcers had. And that could only be used for official enforcer business. Which apparently did not include a pint of New York Super Fudge Chunk. Or a trip to Starbucks.
Oops.
“You love Marc, don’t you?” In the mirror, Kaci’s reflection stared at me, one cheek pressed into the comforter.
Surprised, I turned from the dresser to find her watching me in undisguised curiosity, as if my life served no other purpose than to entertain her. Yet I wasn’t irritated, as I would no doubt have been if my mother were the one interrogating me, because Kaci had no ulterior motive. She wasn’t trying to talk me into anything, or manipulate me. She just wanted to know…everything.
Sighing, I crossed my bedroom and sat facing her on the bed, my legs folded beneath me, yoga style. “Do I love Marc?” I repeated, and she nodded, sitting up with her back against my headboard. I pulled my fluffy pink punching pillow into my lap—if I was going to voluntarily engage in girl talk, I might as well be properly armed.
“Yes, I love Marc.” So much that it hurts not to see and touch him every day.
“What about Jace?”
My chest tightened, and my heart seemed to be trying to beat its way free. “What about him?”
“He likes you. Like Marc likes you.”
“What makes you think that?” I gave her my best blank face.
“He watches you. All the time. If you need something, he brings it to you. And when he looks at you, his heart beats really hard. I can hear it.” She smiled slyly, and her big hazel eyes glinted. “Like yours is doing right now.”
Damn it. I resisted the urge to close my eyes, or otherwise betray my frustration, which she would probably notice, like she had my heartbeat. “Kaci, that’s really…complicated.”
>
“Because you don’t like him like that?” Bald hope flooded Kaci’s features, and suddenly I understood. This wasn’t about me and Marc. It was about Jace.
Kaci had a crush on Jace.
Oh, shit.
An interest in boys was a nice, normal development for a girl her age, and might go a long way toward convincing her to Shift, so she’d be healthy enough to start dating—with several huge, protective chaperones. But Jace was nearly twenty-five, and Kaci was only thirteen. She needed a boy her own age to crush on.
Yet another reason to get her enrolled in school.
But as for her actual question…“Kaci, I’m with Marc.”
“So, Jace is single, right?”
Kaci frowned again and glanced at my open bedroom door. Then she turned back to me, and when she spoke, her voice was a barely audible whisper. “How old were you when you and Marc first…”
Mayday, mayday!
Alarms went off in my head, and my eyes snapped shut in denial. I was not ready to have this conversation with Kaci. And somehow we were back to her looking at my life as a blueprint for her own. I didn’t want that kind of responsibility! I wanted the freedom to mess up and know that my mistakes wouldn’t screw up anyone’s life but my own.
Unfortunately, I’d kind of given up that privilege when I became an enforcer.
“Whoa, Kaci, back up a bit.” I shook my head and made myself meet her frank gaze. “You’re waaaay too young to be thinking about sex.”
She rolled her eyes, and the gesture was eerily familiar from my own adolescence. Okay, also from what little of my adulthood I’d survived so far.
“I was talking about kissing,” Kaci said, in that exasperated tone she usually saved for my mother, during home-schooling. “I just meant, how old were you when you first kissed Marc? But since you brought up sex…” Her eyes glinted with a spark of mischief. “Same question.”
Damn it! “Way older than you are.” My head was throbbing and pain was shooting through my chest. I was having a panic attack. The little whelp was giving me an aneurism!
I was a firm believer in telling the truth, but some of my truths weren’t suitable for such young ears, and I did not want to screw up someone else’s kid!
I had to redirect. Change the subject. Turn the conversation back onto her before my mother decided to step in. But Kaci was still talking…
“Was it your idea, or his?”
Oh, shit. But she wasn’t done yet.
“Does it hurt? ’Cause I heard…”
Okay, this has to stop.
I threw up one hand, palm facing her, in the universal sign for halt! Then I took a deep breath and glanced at the open door again, this time thinking of escape, rather than of being overheard. But that was the coward’s way out. If I could stand against multiple strays in cat form, wielding only a shovel, surely I could face a single thirteen-year-old and her birds-and-bees inquisition.
And, if not, I could procrastinate with the best of them.
“You’re throwing an awful lot of questions at me all at once, Kaci. And asking for a lot of very personal information.”
Her face fell, and she tugged aimlessly at the frayed cuff of her jeans. “You’re not going to tell me anything, are you?”
I sighed. Answering her questions—at least some of them—might go a long way toward getting her to truly trust me. Which might help me convince her to Shift. But no true compromise was one-sided. “I tell you what. I will answer three of your questions—any three you want…”
Her eyes lit up in expectation.
“…after you Shift.”
Kaci scowled. Then she stood, more color draining from her already pale face, and stomped across my room and through the open doorway.
“I take it that’s a no?” I called after her.
She slammed her bedroom door in reply, and I flinched.
Well, that went well…
Seven
“Again!” Ethan wrapped both bare arms around the heavy punching bag to steady it, and I shot him a look meant to scorch him from the inside out. Or at least to shut him up. “Harder this time. And a little higher. Hit his knee from the side, and he’ll go down. Then it’s all over but the beatin’.”
“He doesn’t have knees,” I snapped, wiping sweat from my forehead with an equally sweaty forearm. There was a clean, dry towel hanging over a folding chair near the bathroom, but I was too tired to cross the basement for it. “He doesn’t even have legs.”
“Oh, you got jokes?” Ethan grinned amiably, his green eyes flashing in challenge. He dropped his arms, then stepped around the bag, his sneakers sinking into the thick blue mat with each step. “If you’ve got energy to be funny, we’re not working you hard enough. Right, Kaci?”
“Right.” The young tabby tucked her legs up onto her folding metal chair and sipped from a covered mug filled with hot chocolate. Then she grinned at me and set her drink back on the bench press serving as an end table. The night before, she’d officially forgiven me for pushing the Shifting issue so hard. Still, she didn’t seem to mind watching Ethan kick my ass….
Little traitor.
Our basement was unheated, but was naturally insulated by the earth surrounding it, so the slight chill seeping in from the high windows was no problem for me or Ethan. After only half an hour of moderate lifting, he and I were both covered in sweat, even wearing only light workout clothes. In fact, he’d shed his shirt several minutes earlier.
But Kaci shivered beneath long sleeves, jeans, and a light blanket. She didn’t have enough energy to exercise with us, and she lacked the body fat to keep herself warm, but no amount of begging, coercing, or threatening on our part could convince her to go back upstairs, where my mother waited with more cocoa and an algebra textbook.
I could probably have made her go up, but I’d decided not to push the issue because she was still mad at me over the unanswered sex questions. Besides, we’d be heading up for lunch soon anyway.
“You’re not working me at all.” I reached up to catch the towel Ethan tossed me. “You’re practicing with me, not on me. Or do you need another reminder?”
“What I need is an actual challenge, smart-ass.” Ethan winked at Kaci, who grinned, enjoying our banter. “Think you can manage that?”
“Oh, you’re asking for it n—” Before I could finish the sentence, Ethan charged.
I lunged to the right, but I was too slow. His shoulder clipped my arm, knocking me off balance. I hit the thick pad on my hip and rolled out of the way. He slammed into the mat where I’d been, but I was already on my feet.
I dropped onto his back and planted my knee in his spine. Ethan howled and bucked. I straddled him for stability. My hand closed around his flailing right arm and I dug in the pocket of my workout pants for my cuffs.
Ethan’s left hand brushed my leg, then closed around the back of my knee. He tugged me forward. I leaned back to counter and snapped one cuff over his right wrist. He pulled harder, and I slid onto the mat with my left leg folded beneath me.
My brother tossed his weight over me, and we rolled. His elbow hit my ribs. His skull slammed into my right cheekbone, but I held on to my cuffs. Dizzy now, I stuck one knee out to halt our roll. We stopped with him facedown, me straddling his back again, and this time I didn’t hesitate. I pulled his left arm back and snapped the other cuff closed over his wrist.
Then I stood and backed away, waiting for the sparks. Waiting to gloat as he ranted and raged, demanding to be let loose.
Instead he shook with laughter.
I stared at Ethan for a moment, a little disappointed, then turned when I heard Kaci giggling behind me. “That was awesome!” she yelled, on her feet now, the cocoa forgotten.
“I agree.” Ethan’s words were muffled with half of his face pressed into the mat, and I turned to find him watching me, now lying on his right shoulder. “That was damned impressive.” He smiled, looking almost as pleased as he would have been had our positions been reversed
. “But let’s not tell anyone, ’kay? We’ll keep this a private victory, just between the three of us.”
“No way!” Kaci shouted, grinning so hard her cheeks were flushed with excitement. Or maybe with the cold. “Faythe owns you! I wish I had a camera. Wait till Jace—”
Ethan’s phone rang, Puddle of Mudd singing “She Hates Me.”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. “Whose ring is that?”
He let his head hit the mat. “Angela’s.”
Kaci glanced at the bench press, where two cell phones lay, alongside her hot chocolate and two bottles of water. She picked up his phone and glanced at the display, her eyes shining in mischief. “You want me to tell her you’re all tied up?”
“No!” Ethan shouted, scooting awkwardly across the mat on his side. “Don’t answer it. She wants to ‘talk about our relationship.’ I’ve been dodging her calls all week.”
I rolled my eyes and dug my handcuff key from one side of my sneaker. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just tell her you’re no longer into white rice? Or that you’re moving to Yemen? Or whatever you tell those poor girls when your attention span turns out to be smaller than your—” I hesitated, censoring myself on Kaci’s behalf “—IQ, and you get bored with them?”
“No.” Ethan went still as I freed his hands, then he sat up, rubbing his wrists as Puddle of Mudd played on. “It’s easier to avoid her calls until she gets the picture on her own. That way, no one gets dumped. Really, I’m doing her a favor.”
“You’re an ass.” I was seriously considering answering his phone myself. But then the ringing stopped, and Kaci dropped the phone onto the padded bench next to mine. “And just for that, I’m not letting you up next time.”
Ethan had barely regained his feet when I rushed him. My shoulder slammed into his chest. I drove him backward onto the mat again, and his breath exploded from his chest in a massive “oof.”