chapter TWENTY-ONE
Berg picked Charlie up at the corner, outside the hotel. He’d planned to come alone, but Britta and Dag insisted. They sat in the backseat, waving at Charlie when she looked at them.
“Everything okay?” he asked, pulling back into mid-day traffic.
“Yeah. I got a job.”
“Really? Doing what?”
“Making sure my cousin goes through with her wedding. I’m supposed to remove all obstacles. Legally,” she quickly added. Not that Berg doubted that. He didn’t think Charlie would kill for anyone but her sisters and only to protect them.
“Obstacles?” Britta asked. “You mean, like, the priest not showing up? Or the cake not being delivered?”
“My aunt has a wedding planner for that, apparently. I’m guessing, based on what she told me about my cousin Carrie, it’s a lack of love.”
“Your cousin doesn’t love the guy she’s marrying?” Berg asked.
“I don’t think so, but I don’t think it matters to my aunt.”
Britta leaned forward, her hand resting on the headrest. “Who’s the poor schlub she’s marrying?”
“Uh . . . Ronald P . . .” She thought a moment. “Farmington. The Fourth.”
“Oooooh,” Britta said, leaning closer. “He’s rich. Like he-could-have-a-gold-yacht rich.”
“I assumed. My aunt was adamant she needed this wedding to go through. To the point that she’s willing to pay me eighty-five grand.”
“American money?” Britta asked.
Charlie shook her head. “What is it with you and my sister and this concern over me not getting American money? It’s the strangest thing.”
* * *
The SUV turned on a street and Charlie looked back at Britta. “How expensive are you guys?”
Britta frowned. “Pardon?”
“I meant as security.”
“Oh! Oh. Oh, we’re very expensive.”
Charlie looked at Berg and he nodded. “We really are. We do it to weed out the reality TV people who just want big guys walking behind them, looking terrifying while they’re throwing wine in some woman’s face. Why?”
“You and Britta have seen my dad, and I was hoping you could come to the wedding as additional security to keep the idiot from coming in and making an already horrible day even worse. It’s this Saturday. I can get you specific times later.”
“We can do that,” Berg said, pulling into a large building’s parking structure. “We’ll do it for free.”
“No you will not.” Charlie smirked. “But only because I won’t be the one paying. My aunt is covering expenses and she wants my dad not to infiltrate. So I expect you to double what you normally charge.”
“Well—”
Knowing Berg was too nice, she looked at his sister and said, “Double charge.”
“Got it!” Britta’s fingers flew across her phone and, after a few seconds, she added, “Booked.”
Berg stopped the SUV at the security booth. A man that had to be at least seven-and-a-half-feet tall looked down at him.
“Berg.”
“Garland.”
The metal gate went up and Berg drove in, quickly finding a parking spot.
They all got out and walked to the elevator. The doors opened and Charlie stepped in, her mouth open as she looked around.
“This thing is huge.”
“We don’t like to feel trapped.” Berg pressed a button for the top floor. “Now, if you don’t feel comfortable at any time, if you feel unsafe, you just let us know, and we’ll get you out.”
“Okay.”
The floors ticked by.
Berg faced her. “Are you armed?”
“To the teeth. Anyone even twitches wrong—”
“No, no, no.” Berg shook his head. “I need you not to kill anyone today.”
“But if they twitch—”
“No!”
“What Berg means,” Britta explained, “is if there are any problems, we’ll handle it.”
“Exactly,” he agreed, nodding.
“If, let’s say, some feline from Katzenhaus gives you any trouble, we’ll be the ones to rip his arms off and beat him to death with them!”
“No,” Berg sighed, again shaking his head. “That is not what I meant either.”
* * *
Max peeked around the corner, watching her cousin Carrie on her cell phone. She was pacing and crying, but keeping her voice low.
Carrie turned to pace in Max’s direction, so she quickly moved back behind the wall.
“What’s going on?” Stevie asked.
“She’s on the phone and crying.” Max looked at her sister. “Crying.”
“People cry.”
“Honey badgers don’t cry. Honey badgers don’t cry.”
“I heard you the first time.”
“But I felt it can’t be said enough.”
“Hey!” Dutch barked, coming down the hall and both Max and Stevie shushed him.
“What?” he whispered, dramatically slamming his back against the wall, his gaze bouncing from one end of the hall to the other. “Are we under fire?”
“We’re spying,” Stevie softly explained.
“Oh, I love spying.”
“So we’ve heard,” Max teased.
Dutch grimaced. “Okay, I walked into that one.”
“Dumb ass.”
“Your sister still hate me?”
“Yes,” Max and Stevie said together.
“Seriously?”
“Well, she hated you before,” Stevie explained. “Now her hate is just enhanced.”
Max checked around the corner and saw that Carrie had gone in the back way to the big hall where her wedding was being set up.
“You know how Charlie is,” Stevie was saying when Max leaned back.
“She’s a Leo with a Taurus moon,” Max explained. “You’re lucky all she did was kick the crap out of you.”
Stevie rolled her eyes, a sound of disgust coming from the back of her throat.
“What?”
“You still believe in that astrology crap?” she asked.
“You don’t?”
“I believe in tangible things,” Stevie announced in her haughtiest voice. “Not ludicrous things.”
“What about Eastern astrology? I bounce back and forth between Eastern and Western, so do you believe in Eastern astrology?”
“No.”
“Where is Charlie anyway?” Dutch asked to stop the fight he probably knew was coming.
“Berg picked her up to take her to some meeting with the BPC, the cats, and your people.”
Dutch’s usual smiling, relaxed face fell. “What?”
“No one told you?”
“No.”
Max studied him a moment. “Should I go there and kill everybody?”
“Why is that always your first suggestion?”
“It’s the most expedient.”
“Should we be freaking out?” Stevie demanded. “I feel like we should be freaking out.”
“No. I’m sure it’ll be fine. If you’re worried, though, I could go. Protect Charlie.”
Max looked at Stevie and even her baby sister rolled her eyes.
“Dude,” Max felt the need to point out, “she’s surrounded by three grizzly bears. I think our sister’s safe.”
“Is she armed?”
Stevie snorted. “To the teeth.”
* * *
“She’s crying?” Charlie suddenly said out loud while staring at her phone. “What does Max mean she’s crying? Honey badgers don’t cry. Honey badgers don’t cry.”
Berg walked back to her and tapped her arm. She lifted her head, frowning. “What?”
“Could we get this done?”
She looked around and seemed to suddenly remember that she was in the middle of the BPC hallway talking to herself and tapping on her phone.
“Sorry,” she said. “Sorry.” She walked quickly to catch up to Britta and Dag, and Berg followed behind her.
They were headed to the office at the very end of the hallway. Bayla Ben-Zeev’s office. She was the head of the BPC.
Berg cut in front of her so he could walk into the office first. He wanted to look around, make sure everything was as it should be. It wasn’t that he was so worried, it was mostly habit. Personal security was his business, after all.
Unfortunately, Britta and Dag had the same idea, so the three of them ended up briefly caught in the doorway until Britta pulled free first, reaching back with both arms to slap him and Dag on the shoulders.
The two Van Holtz wolf males immediately looked out the window. Bayla sighed and rubbed her temples from behind her desk, and the newest New York head of Katzenhaus, Mary-Ellen Kozlowski, a cute but vicious little lynx, just rolled her eyes and sneered as only a cat can.
“Sorry we’re late,” Britta said. “Traffic.”
“No problem.” Bayla motioned to several empty chairs around her desk. “Come in.”
Dag stayed by the door and didn’t sit. He just stood there . . . glaring at the non-bears in the room. Britta sat down by the wolves so she could practically face the cat. Britta really didn’t like cats.
Berg turned to escort Charlie into the room, to let the others know—in no uncertain terms—the level of protection she had. But she was again focused on her phone, her thumbs tapping away on the screen.
“Charlie,” he said softly, trying to get her attention. “Charlie,” he said a little louder, but still . . .
“Charlie!”
She didn’t jump at his bark, just muttered, “One second.”
He couldn’t even bring himself to look at Bayla. Not when he already knew she hated to be kept waiting.
“Okay.” Charlie slipped her phone back into her jeans. She stepped around him and fully into the room. “So sorry. There’s a wedding, and you know how crazy those can be.” She said it so smoothly that she sounded like she was legitimately part of the wedding rather than just spying on her cousin for cash. “I really appreciate all of you taking the time to meet with me like this. I always get so worried about my family, but I’m sure this will make me feel much better.”
She said all that without sarcasm. Without any of the viciousness that always seemed to taint the conversations of different breeds put together in one room.
Charlie sat down, her smile warm. “Um . . . I’m Charlie MacKilligan, which I assume everyone here knows. But I’m unclear on who’s who.” Out of everyone, she looked at the lynx first.
The cat in a tiny white designer dress and designer heels, her designer white purse resting in the big chair with her because she barely took up any room in the bear-sized furniture, took a moment. She seemed stunned. Probably because cats were considered so rude that most of the other breeds purposely ignored them just to get under their skin.
Charlie wasn’t doing that.
Pale green eyes gawked at Charlie before replying, “Uh . . . I’m, um . . .” She cleared her throat, quickly tossing on her mantle of not caring. “Mary-Ellen Kozlowski.”
“Hi, Miss Kozlowski.” Charlie got up again and went across the room, her hand held out.
Kozłowski jerked back, the legs of her chair scraping against the floor. Then she realized that Charlie just wanted a handshake.
Charlie patiently waited, smiling.
Glancing around, expecting an attack of some kind, Kozlowski finally took Charlie’s hand, shook it.
“Nice to meet you,” Charlie said before pulling her hand away.
Those pale green eyes narrowed, desperately searching for sarcasm. When she didn’t find any, she nodded. “You too.”
Charlie moved over to the wolves.
“Charlie MacKilligan,” she said to the younger Van Holtz.
“Ulrich Van Holtz. You can call me Ric. And this is my cousin, Niles Van Holtz.”
“Call me Van.”
“I thought he was your uncle,” Britta asked, also clearly uncomfortable with Charlie’s ease and warmth with everyone in the room.
“It’s a respect thing, right?” Charlie said, moving across the room to Bayla’s desk. “We have a couple of ‘uncles’ like that,” she laughed, reaching her hand out to Bayla.
“Charlie.”
“Bayla Ben-Zeev.”
“Very nice to meet you. And I love your name. Bayla’s pretty.”
“Uh . . . thank you?”
Charlie returned to her chair, sat down.
Immediately, Bayla opened her mouth to get the discussion rolling, to make sure that everyone there understood that Charlie and her sisters were under BPC protection, that she would not tolerate any of their bullshit.
Berg knew exactly what to expect from the head of the BPC and he also knew what to expect from the Van Holtzes—calm, rational, barely perceptible threats—and from the lynx—blatant, outright threats and viciousness.
But without letting Bayla get in a word, Charlie just began talking.
“I have to say that I really appreciate everyone coming here today to help us.”
Surprised, Berg looked up; his sister already gazing at him, eyes wide.
“I usually have to deal with these kinds of problems on my own and I’m starting to get overwhelmed. I mean, my father stealing money from his own brother, his brother using me and my sisters in the hopes of getting the money back by basically selling us to whoever wants my baby sister. And, I mean, I’m not handing over my baby sister to anyone, but especially not full-human males. My uncle knows we don’t have the money to pay him back and he also knows that no matter what might happen to me and my sisters, no matter how bad, how horrifying or brutal, it will mean nothing to my father. But my Uncle Will was hoping that I could get the money back from my father and he felt I would do that if someone had my sister. If her safety was threatened.” She blew out a breath. “Once again, my father has forced me and my sisters into a situation that could get all of us killed.”
There was a long silence until the elder Van Holtz asked, “Where’s your father now?”
“He came to the house I’m renting in Queens. He wanted money and someplace safe to stay. I . . . overreacted a bit and now I don’t know where he is.”
“But he has the money?” Ric Van Holtz asked.
“He did. Max—my middle sister—talked to him after I left and she seems to believe that he’s lost the money.”
Kozlowski looked around the room before refocusing on Charlie. “I understood that your father took about a hundred million dollars.”
“A hundred million British sterling, actually.”
“How does one lose a hundred million of anything?”
“Oh, that’s easy,” she said with a casual air. “By being the biggest fucking idiot known to man or God.”
* * *
Stevie wished she could say that such lowbrow activities were an insult to her amazing brain power and all her plans to change the world and humanity for good.
But she couldn’t say that because she was enjoying herself so much.
Carrie had stormed away from her mother, screaming, “It all sucks! I hate everything you’ve done! Why are you trying to ruin my wedding? This is my day!”
It seemed to Stevie that Carrie had one level. Loud and hysterical screaming. She had no off switch.
Now, she stomped through the hotel like a linebacker in those ridiculous heels. She went straight for the exit and out on the streets.
Stevie, Max, and Dutch all followed, keeping in contact with Charlie through texts.
It was stupid but so much fun! Stevie rarely had fun like this. She was either working or in therapy. Only when she was around her sisters did she seem to have any fun.
Carrie suddenly darted into a bakery.
“She’s binge eating!” Max announced as they stood across the street watching the store.
“What is your obsession with eating disorders?” Stevie asked. “Maybe she just wanted a bagel.”
“It’s a French bakery,” Dutch felt the need to point out. “I doubt they have bagels.” When Stevie faced him, he added, “Maybe she wanted a croissant?”
“Stop talking,” Stevie said before she noticed that Carrie had come out the side door of the bakery and into the alley. And she wasn’t alone.
The traffic had stopped, waiting for the light to change, so Stevie ran across the street after Max.
They went down the block on the right side of the bakery, going until they reached another alley entrance. Stevie followed right behind Max, only stopping when she ran into Max’s back. Her sister didn’t even budge, intent on peeking around the wall to watch what Carrie was up to.
Not wanting to risk touching the dirty alley floor, Stevie climbed up Max’s back until she could look over her head and watch Carrie too.
Max leaned her head back to look at her. “Seriously?”
“Shhh.”
Stevie cocked her head in an attempt to hear what the couple was saying. The man towering over Carrie was big. Not full-human big either, unless her cousin had decided to start hooking up with NBA players.
“What is he?” Stevie whispered.
“Polar, I think,” Max whispered back.
The couple was whispering to each other—which made understanding what they were saying nearly impossible—and Carrie began crying at some point, which Stevie could tell shocked Max to her very honey badger core.
But weddings were stressful events. Right up there with funerals and divorce, so Stevie was willing to give her cousin the benefit of the doubt. And, if you added in that she was clearly in love with someone besides her fiancé . . .
Well, yeah. That had to be stressful, too.
Then, things changed a little . . . and the making out started. It was like they were trying to swallow each other whole. But, after a few minutes, Carrie pulled away and rushed from the alley, forcing Stevie and Max to dive behind a Dumpster before their cousin could see them.
Once she was gone, Max used her phone to take a picture of their cousin’s boyfriend before they made a quick escape as well.
“What do you think?” Stevie asked Max as they followed Carrie back to the hotel.
“I think she should stick with shorter guys. He was way too big for her. Watching them kiss was just . . . weird.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“Yeah,” Max replied, glancing at her as they walked. “Why?”
* * *
Berg opened the door and waited for Charlie to finish shaking the hands of everyone in the room, say her good-byes, and walk out. He followed, Britta and Dag bringing up the rear.
In silence, they made their way back to the elevator, waited for the doors to open, and got in. They went down all those floors to the parking structure. When the doors opened, Charlie stepped out first and they all followed. They reached his SUV and got in. He started it, then drove back onto the street.
Berg drove for about five minutes before he pulled over in a tow zone and stopped.
Staring straight ahead, he asked, “What the fuck just happened?”
Britta, who was now sitting in the front passenger seat, said, “A hybrid honey badger got three groups that detest working together to actually work together in order to find the person who has been trying to kidnap Stevie and shut him down.”
Berg slowly nodded. “Yeah. That’s what I thought happened.” He glanced back at Charlie. She was again texting. “And how, exactly, did you do that?”
Charlie looked up, realized he was talking to her, and went back to texting while answering his question. “I didn’t let it turn into a pit fight.” When no one spoke, Charlie lowered her phone and explained, “If you let it turn into a pit fight, then it becomes all about winning. So you don’t let it turn into a pit fight.”
“We still don’t know what that means,” Britta pushed.
“Okay, I’ll give you an example. When I was meeting with my aunt earlier, she brought up the fact that Max almost didn’t walk for her graduation for beating up this girl. Most of the family believes Max just beat her up, you know . . . because. She is honey badger after all. But trust me, this chick had it coming. For years, since junior high, this girl kept picking on Max. She was the perfect cheerleader type. Looked really sweet, was really a bitch. And she hated Max. She made fun of her all the time, saying Max has shoulders like a man; she walks like a truck driver. And if the cheerleader got some beer in her, the ho became racist. Max and I were only one grade apart, so when I was in school, I managed to keep the pit fight from happening.”
“How?”
“I already knew Max could destroy her, so I focused on Max rather than the drunk cheerleader. I simply reminded her that we didn’t care what that girl said, that it didn’t matter what that girl believed, that our only concern was protecting Stevie.
“And that worked . . . until I graduated. Stevie was already in college working on her masters. And that left Max alone with the cheerleader and her friends for an entire school year. Max held out, though, for longer than we thought she would. But about a week from graduating . . . pit fight. Why? Because none of the teachers or the administrators knew how to stop a pit fight before it starts. And once it starts . . . you end up with a bleeding, babbling cheerleader with no front teeth.”
Britta cringed. She sometimes had nightmares about losing her front teeth.
“But then how did you get Max to still walk at graduation?” Dag suddenly asked.
“Oh, I knew the little bitch was going to be a serious problem and I knew that I’d graduate before Max, so I started keeping a file on the cheerleader. Basically, a dossier. I had enough information to bury her, and I made it clear to her extremely indulgent parents that if they didn’t back me with the principal, her daughter could only use that early acceptance from Dartmouth to wipe her ass.”
There was silence except for Charlie tapping away on her phone. Then, finally, Britta asked, “How old were you when you started keeping that dossier?”
“I guess I was about fourteen. Why?”
“Just wondering,” Britta replied. She stared out the window and muttered again, “Juuuuust wondering.”
* * *
Charlie met with her sisters back at the hotel. Britta and Dag had headed to Queens by then, but Berg had offered to come with her. She felt bad, though. He shouldn’t have to be around the ridiculousness that was her cousin’s wedding.
She found her sisters in some weird little coffeehouse built into the lower floors of the Kingston Arms. She didn’t understand why her sisters were there until she realized that this particular coffeehouse was all about honey. It wasn’t bear owned, though. It was honey badger owned.
And the honey badger was ridiculously unpleasant . . . Max loved it.
A large paper cup of coffee was slammed down in front of Charlie and a plate with several honey buns was thrown in front of a startled Berg.
He roared when the plate hit the table, and Charlie didn’t blame him one bit.
The badger sneered and walked back to his counter.
Grinning, Max asked, “Isn’t this place great?”
“No!” they all replied.
“You haven’t even tried the coffee.”
Charlie stared at the innocent-looking cup. “He probably spit in it.”
“I was watching him. Trust me. Try it.”
She did. And as much as it irritated her to admit it, the coffee was fantastic.
“Try the honey bun,” she pushed Berg.
He picked up the bun, sniffed it, studied it closely, sniffed it again—
“Oh, my God!” Max exploded. “Just eat it!”
Lip curling, Berg took a bite. He chewed, swallowed. Grudgingly smiled.
“Told ya.”
“Could you stop being smug,” Charlie asked, “and just tell me what’s going on so I can get out of here?”
“We think she has a boyfriend,” Max said before biting into a giant lemon–poppy seed–honey muffin.
“The bride?” Berg asked, already on his third bun.
“It’s gonna be messy,” Stevie sighed.
“Her mother is going to flip out.”
“If she doesn’t love her fiancé,” Berg asked, “then why is she marrying him?”
“Apparently he’s a very rich full-human.”
“We think he’s a polar bear,” Stevie said. “The boyfriend.”
“She’s screwing around with a polar bear when she’s about to marry a full-human?” Berg frowned and glanced at Charlie. “You understand he could tear that man’s legs off and do a little puppet dance with them, right?”
“Maybe you know him,” Max said, pulling out her phone to show him the photo she’d taken.
“I don’t know every bear, you know. So I’m not sure I can . . . This is your cousin’s boyfriend?” Berg abruptly asked. “Him?”
Charlie cringed. “He’s that bad?”
“He’s definitely a problem.” He motioned Max’s phone away. “His name is Damian Miller. He owns a jewelry store on Forty-seventh Street, but his whole family is in the diamond business. And you don’t get into the diamond business because you’re a soft, friendly guy. His family has been in the industry since before the Russians sold Alaska to the States.”
“Well, now we know what she sees in a man that’s seven feet tall,” Max remarked, dropping her phone on the table. “He’s rich and probably buys her jewelry.”
“He can still be a problem for your cousin,” Berg said. “If he’s territorial . . .”
“Why would he bother, though?” Max asked. “He’s a rich jewelry guy who could probably get any woman. Why care about one honey badger? Enough, I mean, to want to ruin her wedding?”
Berg shrugged. “Because he’s a bear. And he can.”
“Then we should plan for the possibility that he’ll make an appearance just to cause problems,” Charlie said. “And we have to keep him out.”
“Keep out a polar bear that wants in?” Berg nodded. “Good luck with that.”
“This is bad.” Charlie admitted. “But I’m not dealing with it right now. I’ll talk to Bernice tomorrow.” Charlie took another sip of her coffee before asking Berg, “Are you still up for tonight?”
“Are you?’
“I am if you are.”
“But you want to go, right?”
“Yeah . . . if you do.”
“Oh, my God!” Max suddenly barked. “You two are annoying the hell out of me.”
“Shut up,” Charlie snapped at her sister.
“You shut up.”
Before Charlie could get into it with her sister—she was in the mood to get into it with her sister—Dutch suddenly ran into the coffeehouse and over to their table.
“Hi!”
Berg growled a little and looked away. He was clearly not a fan of wolverines. Or, at least, not this wolverine, which she was fine with.
Dutch crouched next to her chair.
“I still hate you,” she told him. “So why are you bothering me?”
“I know you guys have had a long day, so I got you into the hottest steakhouse in Manhattan and it’s right upstairs. Top floor of this hotel. People wait months to get in and I got you a great table.”
“Ooooh,” Charlie mocked. “You got us into a fancy restaurant. How exciting.”
Berg leaned over and said low, “Uh . . . actually it is a good restaurant. Shifter owned and run. They just opened in the last few months, but they’re already booked through the first of the year.”
“So you’re saying you want to go?”
“I wouldn’t mind. Besides, if we leave now, we’ll just be caught in traffic on the way back to Queens.”
While Charlie pretended to debate the idea of taking Dutch up on his offer, Dutch began to beg.
“Please, Charlie! Please let me love you!”
It was so ridiculous that Charlie had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop from laughing.
The wolverine was so ridiculous.
“I don’t want your love, idiot,” she said when she could finally talk without laughing. “I will never forgive you.”
“But I will give my life trying to make it up to you. My life. My soul. My underwear.”
All Charlie could do was roll her eyes, but her sisters were laughing hysterically. Always so amused by their idiot friend.
Unlike Berg. He just motioned to the rude coffeehouse owner for more honey buns, his brown eyes glaring at the wolverine.
Dutch sat in a chair and grinned. “Charlie, let me plan your evening of love.”
“Ew.”
“I’ll arrange everything. For both of you.” He smiled at Berg and the bear’s giant claw suddenly slashed at the wolverine’s face, forcing Dutch to scramble back, falling out of his chair and landing on his ass. It wasn’t a vicious attack. Just a bear-swipe of annoyance.
For the first time, they heard the coffeehouse owner chuckle before tossing another plate of honey buns in front of Berg.
“We’ll take care of it,” Max promised while she dragged Dutch off the floor by his hair.
“That’s really not necessary,” Berg argued.
But Charlie wasn’t so quick to dismiss. “No. Let him do something right for once. You. Weasel. Go ahead. Do it. Create our night of love.”
“Come on,” Berg begged. “You’re making me nauseous.”
“But keep in mind,” Charlie went on. “I won’t forgive you. I’ll still hate you. I will always hate you.”
“There’s a fine line between love and hate.”
“Not for me.”
Max pulled her friend toward the exit. “Give us twenty minutes.”
Once they were gone, Berg asked, “Why do you put up with him?”
“Max likes him. She doesn’t like a lot of people.”
“Huh.”
That was all he said. And yet Stevie slammed her hand down on the table, stood, grabbed her notebooks, her bag, and her cup of coffee, and went across the small room to another table, where she made herself at home. Alone.
Berg cringed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to upset her.”
“I don’t think you really did. She just wanted an excuse to leave.” She glanced at her sister and smiled a little. “So she could work.”
Another plate of honey buns along with some cinnamon rolls landed on the table in front of them, causing both Charlie and Berg to jump a little. The badger bared a fang before going back to his counter.
Charlie nodded at Berg’s confusion. “He likes us,” she insisted.
“I wouldn’t want to see how he treats people he hates.”