Chapter Five
“Why would you want to cure that?” Betty’s father cleared his throat. “What time is it? Pumpkin, it’s not even seven AM. What are we talking about?” He grunted as if getting out of bed. She heard her mom mumble something in the background. “Go back to sleep.” He spoke to Mom, not to her. “Sounds like a shifter thing. I’ll take care of it.”
“Dad?”
“I’m here. Let me turn on the coffeemaker.” More shuffling noises. She found comfort in all these familiar sounds. Her parents weren’t morning people. Both worked evening jobs—her mother at the restaurant and her father a security guard. “Okay, go. Something about soulmates.”
“Can a person reject their soulmate? I mean, is there a way to stop it?”
“Why would they?” He yawned. “Finding your mate is supposed to be the best thing to happen to a shifter. Your perfect match. A happily ever after.”
“For a shifter…” She let that statement hang, because that was the crux of her problem. Was she or wasn’t she a shifter?
“Do shifters find their mates outside their race? Like a human?” She thought she’d known the answer, then this had happened.
Silence answered her. She heard the ring of the coffeemaker finishing in the background.
“Dad?” Had he fallen asleep?
“Who are we talking about, pumpkin?”
Her stomach hurt, twisting in knots. “Me.”
“You found your soulmate?” His voice rose and he suddenly sounded wide awake.
“He found me.” She wiped a tear from her eye before it spilled down her cheek. “It’s a long story.” She hated the way her voice shook. It wasn’t fear. Well, not really. She wasn’t afraid of Ken. Just what he represented.
“I have all day. Start at the beginning. Oh wait, your mother wants to listen.”
He placed her on speaker phone. Mom must have heard him shouting about her finding a soulmate.
Betty could hear her mother cooking breakfast while Betty gave them the details, leaving out the kissing parts because they were her parents. Though they were miles and miles away, the conversation felt like home, sitting on her worn living room floor, pouring out her heart. She missed them so much it left her hollow at times.
“Did you smell the mating bond though?” Dad asked around a mouthful.
“No.” Her sense of smell was better than humans, but much less than a full-blooded shifter. “To be honest, the place smells of dog and burgers. I might have mistaken the mating scent for something else. I was kind of worried about being eaten at the time.”
“So he could be lying—ouch.” The sound of her mom smacking him upside the head made Betty grin. “He could be. She can’t always smell a lie.” Dad sounded defensive.
“Don’t listen to your father. He’s being a…father. There’s more to soulmates than smell. Remember the Connellys down the street? They’re soulmates. I brought over a plate of cookies when they first moved into the neighborhood. George said they were the best cookies he ever had and the next thing I knew, Martha had me by the throat.” Mom had never told her that story. “Your father wanted to press charges but the alpha stepped in and explained that the newly mated pair were—uh—hormonal the first few months.”
“Hormonal, huh?” That was her mother’s way of saying horny.
“You know what I mean.”
“Wait, are you asking me if I’m hormonal?” The blushing returned with forest fire intensity. Betty was close to her mother, but not that open about her sex life.
Where was an earthquake when she wanted the ground to swallow her whole?
“That’s it. We’re on our way,” her father announced.
Betty sat up straight. “No, it’s fine. Don’t do that.” The last time her father had visited, he’d adopted one of her dogs without permission from either her or her mother. Every time he came, he left with another canine brother. Her mother was ready to build him a permanent doghouse in the yard and make him live there.
What had she done? He had also pissed on the borders of her lawn, marking the territory. You know, just in case any single male shifters came sniffing around. It had taken Betty days to wash the stink away with a borrowed hose.
This behavior was pre-mating Ken.
“Let me take care of this.” She couldn’t imagine what her father would do, but whatever it was, pissing off the New Port Pack would mean trouble for Dad with his own alpha. Pack politics sucked. Cross-pack politics were deadly. Her father was low enough on the totem pole of pack hierarchy that he could visit her with just a phone call to the New Port Pack office.
The higher up the chain of power, the more difficult it was to travel.
“No hormonal werewolf is going to touch my pup, claiming to be her soulmate without verification if it’s true. That’s final.” He hung up on her.
She snapped her mouth shut as she stared at her cell phone screen. Wow, she’d thought things were bad five minutes ago.
Could she rent a time machine to stop herself from ever making that call?
In a daze, she shuffled back to the kitchen. The burger and coffee and stress were developing into a stomach acid’s version of the perfect storm. Digging through her cupboards, she finally found her antacids and chased them down with cold coffee.
She pinched her arm and flinched. Nope, not a nightmare. She knew her dad. An army wouldn’t stop him once he made up his mind. The only one who could talk sense into him was his alpha and she wasn’t touching that rat’s nest of trouble with a ten-foot pole. Some things were just better left in the past and forgotten.
Chris, Riverbend’s alpha, hadn’t been the alpha who declared she wasn’t a shifter. Chris was her high school boyfriend who had killed that alpha. He didn’t talk things through with shifters, like Ken had done with Beth. Ordering shifters around was more Chris’s style. He had the power to threaten the pack and follow through on those threats. Betty understood that sometimes this was needed to keep certain wolves under control, and Chris liked control.
She’d known that firsthand when they had dated. Leaving Riverbend meant leaving her family, but it also meant escaping Chris. So, no calling ex-boyfriends about new ones. Not even to stop her parents from barging into her life.
Down in the kennel, the dogs barked. They needed their walks. Luckily, she partnered with a retirement community down the block that didn’t allow pets. Many of the residents volunteered at her rescue. Otherwise she’d never have time to make her soaps and shampoos.
She descended to let the dogs outside to play in smaller more manageable groups, then sat at her desk to sort through yesterday’s mail.
Orphanage fundraiser. Electric, water, and phone bills joined the fundraiser in the recycle bin. Maybe she should look for a job and catch up on bills before her utilities were turned off. A notice from her landlord again. She held it at arm’s length. The rent had been paid, so what could this be? Money was super tight. She eyed the bin filled with bills and unwanted ads then turned her attention back to the landlord’s letter. This was the third one in a month. Maybe she should read it first.
With a heavy heart, she tore it open.
Hate to inform you…building sold…three months ago…eviction process…two weeks to move out.
She stared at the letter of doom, unable to move. Whose grave had she pissed on for such terrible luck in one fucking morning? Finally, the need for oxygen kicked in and she breathed. In and out. The tight panic in her chest made it difficult. Two weeks?
She pushed herself onto her feet and zombie walked to the backroom, then crawled into Peanut’s kennel with a blanket. Two weeks?
The Great Dane spooned her, resting her head on Betty’s shoulder. The dog gave her a reassuring lick on the cheek. No matter what, she could count on her dogs having faith in her even when she didn’t have any left in herself.
This was how Trixie found her. Her best friend knelt by the open cage door. “I tried calling you, but you weren’t answering the phone. I came by to make sure the werewolf hadn’t eaten you.” She waited, playing with Betty’s toes sticking out of the blanket. “Are you mad at me?”
“No.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“The werewolf wants to marry me.”
Trixie laughed. It faded when Betty didn’t join her. “For real?”
“He claims we’re soulmates.”
“But-but, I thought that—” Trixie cleared her throat. “Can he do that even though your old pack declared you human?” Her friend knew about her painful past. Trixie tiptoed around the subject.
“Apparently.” Betty squirmed. Trixie’s touch was tickling her. “My parents are on their way to meet him.”
“Oh…” She stopped touching Betty’s feet. “That’s bad.”
She handed Trixie the letter of doom. “My landlord is evicting me. I have two weeks to move out.” Saying her problems out loud made it feel more real. She had thought Ken was the worst of them, but now, he was the least of her worries.
“He can’t force you out. Where’s your lease?”
Betty buried her head deeper under the blanket.
“You have a lease, right?” She grabbed Betty’s ankle and pulled her out of the kennel. “Right?” Trixie hovered over her face.
“It was a month to month agreement. I thought I was protecting myself by doing it this way so I wouldn’t be trapped in this dump if I ever found enough funds for a better home.” Now all she wanted was to keep this scrapheap.
“Maybe you can make a deal with the new owners?”
She sat up. “That’s a great idea! Maybe I can, at least, get them to extend the eviction for a few more weeks.” Jumping to her feet, she pulled the notice out of Trixie’s hand. “The buyer is some kind of corporation. Ken’ichi Inc. Ever hear of it?”
“No.” Trixie swiped at her cell phone. “But I’m calling them.”
“What?” Betty spun around.
“Hello, this is Miss Newman’s personal assistant from the Almost Home Rescue. I’d like to make an appointment with whoever is taking care of the purchase of her property.” She gestured for a pen and paper as she gave them the rescue’s address.
Betty fumbled through her messy desk and gave Trixie an old envelope and a crayon.
“Mr. Calihan, Friday at nine AM. Thank you.” Trixie grinned. “There’s one problem solved. Now let’s make wedding plans.” She grasped Betty’s hands, her cheeks flushed with excitement. “You have to name your first puppy after me!”
“That’s not funny.” Betty yanked her hands free. “He’s moving way too fast. I need to catch my breath.”
“He makes you breathless?”
“And possessive and cray cray.” She pulled her hair then blinked in stunned silence. She was turning into her mother. She’d heard her say and do the same thing about her father. Betty dropped her arms. “We have our first date tonight.”
Trixie tugged Betty upstairs to her apartment.
What had he thought of her living conditions? He hadn’t said a thing about the plastic over her broken window or the hole in her bedroom floor.
Standing in front of the closet, Trixie asked, “Where is he taking you?”
“I didn’t ask.”
She made a frustrated noise. “How are you supposed to know what to wear?”
He had said for her to wear something sexy, but Betty kept that to herself.
“Something sexy,” Trixie said as if reading her mind. Her friend somehow did that occasionally, but never seemed to notice. She attacked Betty’s wardrobe with no mercy. “Do you own anything without dog slobber stains?”
Betty chuckled. Most of her clothes were of the jean or track pants variety. Maybe she owned a sundress. She wasn’t sure if she had packed it when she moved.
“Ha!” Trixie sounded triumphant and pulled out a pair of high heels she’d worn to a wedding a year ago. “Where’s the outfit to match the shoes?”
“I borrowed a dress from Kim.” One of their mutual friends.
Trixie dropped the shoes. “This will be a group effort then.” She tapped at her phone and Betty’s dinged.
She read the group text Trixie just sent out to their girlfriends.
Betty makeover now. Hot date. 9-1-1.
“Hot date? You think he’s hot?” Betty knew she did.
“Dudette, I saw him naked. Once we’re done with you, you’ll be getting a piece of that.”