CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

“Don’t look now,” Diana said, “but you’ve got a tail.”

Scoffing, Lily bent and scratched French Fry between his ears. Fortunately, he hadn’t tried to flee again. He’d let the ladies tie his leash to the bench outside of the diner and was busily licking the remnants of a turkey special off a plate.

“Is the tail blond?” Lily asked.

“Yep.”

“Okay. That narrows down the list of suspects. Does the tail have on glasses?”

“Nope.”

“Fascinating. Not my father, then.” It was Lance. It was obviously Lance. She’d had a hunch before she’d even asked.

“He must think he’s hiding. As if he’d ever have the stealth.”

“Isn’t he supposed to be working?” Belle asked.

“He probably thinks he is,” Diana said. “Come on.” She guided them back inside the diner where Diana’s handpicked collection of lady Coyotes sipped coffee at the corner table.

Lance didn’t move close enough for Lily to see him out the window, but she didn’t doubt for a moment that he was out there, probably thinking she needed saving. That was the mistake he kept making, again and again. She didn’t need to be saved. She didn’t need him to protect her from herself. If they were better at being partners, he would know that. She would show him that her decisions were sound, even if he didn’t like them.

“So, ladies? What do you think?” Diana asked them. Even with the orange lipstick and chintzy blouse patterned with scavenging raccoons, she cut an imposing form. Tall, fit, fiercely determined. She had a way of making people listen. She was easy to respect. Belle seemed to respect her, and Belle had always been a hard sell.

“We talked it over,” Mamie Greer said, “and there’s one thing we just don’t get.”

“And what’s that?”

“Why us?” Mamie gestured to the ladies around her. “You got enough young girls in the pack hungry for adventure. What do you want with a bunch of over-the-hill bitties like us?”

“Speak for yourself,” Mrs. Aitkenson chided. “I get up every morning and can find my glasses on the first try. I am not over-the-hill.”

Lily suppressed a snort. She really didn’t want that woman’s focus on her and, curiously, she hadn’t said anything to Lily about Lance yet. She had no doubt that the older woman was simply biding her time. Lily didn’t know what to expect, but she wasn’t going to cower. If she’d made mistakes, she was going to confront them, just like her mother would have.

Diana didn’t bother stifling her laughter. “Listen, gals, I picked you all specifically because of your ages. Your magic is settled, and you don’t feel compelled to shapeshift as much anymore, right?”

The ladies murmured their assent.

“That means that it’s very unlikely anyone can use magic on you that can force you into a different form.”

“Are you saying these ladies have that ability?” Mamie asked, wide-eyed.

Lily sucked in some air and shrugged. “The truth is, we’re not entirely sure what they’re capable of. I do know that Lance was bothered by whatever kind of energy they were putting off. Me being human, I’m not impacted one way or another. I just know that Diana and Belle both agree on how we should confront this, and I think the fact they could form an alliance is something you should all pay attention to.”

“Maybe so, but I don’t get why we’d be involved,” Mrs. Aitkenson said to Belle. “La Bella Dama is your goddess. Can’t you talk any sense into her? She could probably make this stuff go away with a snap of her fingers.”

“You’re talking about the same goddess who compelled my brothers to take mates or else be stuck in their cat bodies for the rest of their lives,” Belle said. “She tends to observe problems from afar and do nothing until she gets well and truly pissed, which is rare for her. She just doesn’t engage. When she does, though, she lights fires under people for them to clean up their own messes.”

“As a mother, I guess I can respect that strategy. If you give kids enough space, they’ll usually find ways to surprise you in good ways…and bad.”

Lily held her tongue and planted her gaze on the side of Belle’s face.

“I’m not entirely sure whose mess this really is,” Diana said, “but I know we’ll be the best at squashing it. In the past few months, you ladies have really stepped up and tried to repair the negative impact past Coyote actions had on the community. Even if you weren’t to blame for the mess, you took on the burden of cleaning it up. You’ve made the humans less suspicious of what’s happening around them, and morale in the pack is so much higher because you’ve been trying to engage the populations on the fringes.”

“All that quarreling’s exhausting,” Zena Bates said. “Call me self-serving, but I just wanna be able to go and get my hair colored without some Cougar thinking I’m scheming to make a fuss. Finally got to the point where Val at the salon has given me the repeat customer discount card.” She sniffed. “I would have walked across burning coals for that fifteen percent.”

“That’s not self-serving.” Lily chuckled. “That’s just being part of a community you’re accepted in, and there’s nothing wrong with wanting the perks.” She smiled. “Take them.”

“Well, then,” Mamie said. “I guess I speak for the others if I say we’ll do it if we can. I just hope nobody gets hurt.”

“Excellent!” Diana exclaimed. “I knew I could count on you ladies. As long as the guys keep their distance, we should be able to keep this intervention from going sideways.”

“Right,” Belle added. “Keep in mind that your ultimate goal is to make the Jaguars too uncomfortable to stay. Make yourselves visible. Move around a bit, get your energy out where you can. Ideally, they’ll read this as a Coyote town and ignore the Cougar taint altogether. You can keep me in the loop via text. I’m heading home now to make sure my energy doesn’t foul things up. My aura probably has got a lot of contamination in it from being around Lola so much, and they may be able to read it.”

The ladies waved goodbye to her and watched her climb into her truck through the window.

French Fry picked his head up from his meal and pressed his nose to the glass.

“That is the cutest, ugliest dog I’ve ever seen,” Mrs. Aitkenson said.

“That’s what I said about my husband thirty years ago,” Mamie said.

The group dispersed to a chorus of groans. They made their way to their cars to move into position.

One held back, though.

Oh hell.

Mrs. Aitkenson cleared her throat and nudged a few chairs back into their proper positions. Lily looked anywhere but at her and focused on the sound of Diana, behind her, murmuring into her phone.

In her attempt at gaze avoidance, she caught the edge of Lance in her periphery.

Sighing, she looked out the door. He was strolling down the sidewalk across the street, hands in pockets, pretending to be casual.

She knew better.

Diana put her finger over her phone mic and said, “May as well get used to it.”

“Being stalked?”

“It’s not really stalking if you know he’s there. Just give me a sec. I need to get rid of a lady.” She dropped her hand from the phone and hustled into the ladies’ room, but not quick enough to muffle the sound of her telling someone, “We’ve already been through this countless times before. I don’t know if I can explain it any clearer.”

Mrs. Aitkenson walked up beside Lily and looked outside as well.

Lily tittered nervously. She’d never been prone to stage fright, but meeting the mother of the person she’d impulsively eloped with was an experience she could never have planned for.

“You’re not even a Coyote,” Mrs. Aitkenson said.

“Should I be?”

“You are what you are. I guess, living as we were before, I could never imagine anything different for him.”

“And you’re upset, I take it?”

“Nah.” Mrs. Aitkenson made a dismissive wave in Lily’s general direction. “Good that you’re not. Gene pool’s getting stale. I’d been saying that in Sparks for years, but nobody wanted to hear it.”

“Oh. Um…”

Lily hadn’t been expecting that sort of practicality. It was the sort of statement her mother would have made, but she knew her mother was a bit of an acquired taste for most people.

“Isn’t the way around that gene problem to just make more Coyotes out of humans?” Lily asked.

“If you wanted to make a bunch of weak ones fast, yeah, I guess you could. I don’t think it’s necessary.” She cut Lily a sideways look. “Your mother doesn’t think it’s necessary, either.”

Grimacing, Lily twined her fingers in front of her belly. “My mother…doesn’t have much of a filter.”

“Hey. If I were her, I’d probably feel the same way. If I had a perfectly normal kid who wouldn’t gain anything from becoming…this…” Mrs. Aitkenson pointed to herself. “She should stay the way she is.” She gave Lily a matronly stare over the top rims of her glasses. “You weren’t thinking about any nonsense like that, were you?”

Busted.

She wasn’t going to lie. Knowing her luck, the lady could probably smell it on her.

“Maybe briefly. I wondered if that would make him happy.”

“Oh, please.”

“You don’t think it would?”

“In the end, no, I don’t think it would.”

For a while, they stared out the door in silence. Lily didn’t know what else to say, and idle chitchat didn’t seem appropriate. There were so many questions she could ask—important ones about their path forward, but the venue was wrong, and she didn’t know how to be gentle in her phrasing. Didn’t know how to balance the intimately personal aspects of her and Lance’s coming together with the more general things that any daughter-in-law would ask about.

She craved the guidance.

Lance wasn’t even pretending to be subtle anymore. He was seated at the bench across the street, arms draped over the back, legs crossed at the ankles, staring straight ahead. He raised his shoulders in a do something about it fashion.

She was trying to do something about him. She just wasn’t sure what that was.

“I don’t get him,” Lily said. Simple truth. An inroad to important conversation. “One moment, we’re trying to decide how we’ll divorce because obviously this thing isn’t going to work, and then he’s sweet and tender, and the next moment he’s ready to throw me away because I’m willing to take risks to grow a family and he isn’t. And yet there he is.” She nodded discreetly toward him.

Mrs. Aitkenson’s forehead deeply furrowed. “What do you mean by risks?”

“I thought we’d gotten past it, but he’s still worried about miscarriages, I guess. He won’t believe that the odds are as good for me as they are for pretty much everyone else.”

“Oh, Lance,” Mrs. Aitkenson whispered. She sighed and turned Lily away from the glass. The diner remained blessedly empty except for the waitress behind the counter who was practicing the ancient art of minding her own business. About half the staff of the diner knew about Maria’s paranormal population. Most of the shifters in town knew when they were scheduled to work and tended to visit at those times. “He’s got it all twisted,” she said. “He knows just enough to be dangerous. Maybe that’s my fault. I should have sat him down and explained things.”

“What do you mean? What doesn’t he know?”

“That I wasn’t typical, even for a Coyote. Yeah, it’s hard for some of us to conceive—especially those of us who are more than a few generations into this mess—but conceiving wasn’t my problem. My problem was that I had a body that wanted to aggressively attack everything it considered to be an infection. Lance was kind of like an inoculation. Taught my body, ‘Oh, well, we can’t let that happen again.’” She scoffed. “Aggressive immune system. Same reason I haven’t had a cold in fifty years. No matter what we tried, we couldn’t get my body to discern the difference between a welcome invasion and an unhealthy one. My sister didn’t even bother trying to have more after Kenny. She figured she’d have the same problem.”

“I’m so sorry.” Lily’s instinct was to reach and pull the woman into the kind of hug that ended in rocking side-to-side and watery eyes, but she didn’t think they’d quite made it to that stage. Her heart broke for her, and for Lance all over again too.

“Eh. It’s in the past, huh? It’s okay. I’m healed from all that stuff now, and I’ve found new ways to complicate and enrich my life. I guess the problem is that now he’s hung up on what he doesn’t even fully understand. I’ll explain it to him. I’ll tell him that because of what you aren’t, it’s not going to happen to you.”

“Thank you.” The words weren’t exactly a blessing, but Lily would take them as one. She’d take any support she could get. She’d needed that confirmation and encouragement that she could have every one of those things Lance had wanted for her.

The house. The annoying dog.

The daughters.

And maybe she’d even let go of them long enough for him to hold them, too.

She wanted to run outside and tell him, “I told you so—I told you we could have all that,” but they’d have time for that later. There’d be time for real plans and proud announcements to the whole damn town directly from their own lips later.

They just needed to get past the Jaguar suspense first, and Lily had a few more things to share with her new mother-in-law.

“He…has nightmares.” Lily forced the lump down her throat and rubbed her damp palms against the sides of her jeans. “He has nightmares about what happened to you.”

“Gods. Poor boy. I wish I’d known. I think parents sometimes have to lie to themselves about what kids notice simply so they can keep up their confidence and move on to the next thing. That shouldn’t have been his struggle. He didn’t have to take it upon himself. I blame myself. Shame and silence, and for no good reason.”

“It’s not your fault. I’m sure you did what you thought was best.”

“I sure tried,” Mrs. Aitkenson whispered.

French Fry started bouncing on the pads of his feet, straining against the strap of his leash, barking incessantly.

“Cat out there?” Mrs. Aitkenson asked.

“I’ll check.”

French Fry backtracked to her when Lily opened the door. He barked several times and then tried to haul off in the direction he’d been trying to get to.

Lily didn’t see anything that would have been upsetting to even the most high-strung of dogs. No cats. No squirrels. Not even any moving cars to chase.

But French Fry wasn’t a typical dog. He was a familiar and was sensitive to disturbances that other animals couldn’t see or hear.

Lily untied his leash from the bench and he immediately started to pull her along. He didn’t weigh much, but he had gumption.

“All right! I’m coming.”

“What are you doing?” Lance called as he crossed the street.

“You’re not supposed to be near me. Weren’t you and Kenny supposed to be doing something for Blue?”

“Taking a break.”

“You’re harassing me.”

“I’m not harassing you. I’m saving you.”

“I don’t need your help.”

“You’re getting it anyway.”

“Even though we told you to stay away?”

“Especially because you told me to stay away. You need constant monitoring.”

“By you specifically, or will any Coyote do?”

Lance got in front of her and grabbed both her wrist and French Fry’s leash. He didn’t say anything. His brow creased and nostrils flared as he ground his teeth.

She just smiled at him, knowing how much he hated when she didn’t take his alpha dog routine seriously. Having Mason, Hank, and Sean for cousins, she’d been inured to the pompous masculinity for ages.

“Woman,” he snarled, “why are you like this?”

She smiled even more broadly and said in her most soothing desk-job voice, “’Cause you need me to be.” She made a teasing kissy face and, predictably, his stare fell to her lips.

She tapped his nose and made a “boop” sound.

After a few seconds of incomprehensible muttering on his part, the tension line around his eyes smoothed and his distressed breathing cadence slowed.

“Because you need me to be, sweetheart,” she repeated, softer.

He was about to say something—whether admission or rebuttal, she couldn’t guess—but before he could get the words out, French Fry started barking furiously again and was digging his feet in and trying to move forward. Lily managed to grab the leash back and broke into a jog, which got French Fry moving with even greater purpose.

He darted into the narrow alley between the coffee shop and the chamber of commerce.

“Lily, don’t—”

Lance must have noticed the out-of-place installation hidden in the shadow of the dumpster a second after Lily, because he didn’t continue the thought.

She thrust the leash at him and quickly grabbed the handle of Martha’s carrier. “What are you doing here, little girl?”

French Fry licked Martha’s cheek a couple of times and then, apparently considering his job done, tried to skitter away.

Lance grabbed him under the belly, though, and held him against his hip.

French Fry looked up at him with patent annoyance and made the tiniest of woofing sounds, but he didn’t bother squirming away. He was outclassed.

“If Martha’s here,” Lance started, “then where’s—”

“Tómala.”

The voice was fractured and distant, but somehow right there. Lance pivoted around in search of it, but Lily just closed her eyes. She knew she couldn’t see what wasn’t there.

“Tómala,” the speaker repeated with insistence. Still so far away, but somewhat clearer.

Nayeli.

“Where are you?” Lily demanded with possibly too much force, but she had that sinking feeling in her gut that screamed something bad was going to happen…or already had. “Why did you leave her here?”

“What is she saying?” Lance asked.

Lily held up her hand. She didn’t want to miss a word.

“Got to go,” Nayeli said slowly. English, perhaps for Lance’s shake.

“Go where?”

“Uy. Do not know.” She sounded frustrated. Scared, and Lily was scared for her. She didn’t know how to help. “I come back? Do not know.”

Oh no.

She was so young. Certainly, that wasn’t all the life she was entitled to.

“El Culto, uh, no sabe de ésto. No saben dónde estoy.”

“They don’t know she’s here,” Lily told Lance. “The Jaguars.”

“Pero van a saber.”

“But they will.” And probably soon, Lily guessed.

“You take,” Nayeli said. “I try to come back, sí? Do not let take. My baby…she need more.”

“I don’t understand what she’s saying,” Lance said. “What am I missing?”

“Hold on.”

Nayeli didn’t need to try so hard to communicate when Lily could meet her halfway. “¿Quieres que cuide a tu hija hasta que vuelvas?”

“Sí! Sí! Tú no te vas.”

“Oh.” Lily could practically feel her heart ripping into shreds. She’d thought she could appreciate how orderly shapeshifter practicality made some things, but Nayeli’s was a product of devastation and desperation. The girl probably had never learned what optimism was.

“What’d she say?” Lance asked.

“She said that I’m not going to go away and that…she wants me to hold onto Martha until she can come back.”

Lance’s lips flattened into a grim line. He had to have been thinking the same thing as Lily—if she could come back.

“Say yes!” Nayeli shouted, but her voice was so faint, nearly gone. Barely an echo.

“Well, yes!” Lily told her. “If that’s what you want, I’ll hold onto her.”

“¿Y Frenchy?”

Lily snorted through her sniffles. “Okay. Yeah. The dog, too. Shit, what am I going to do with another dog who doesn’t listen?”

“Hey,” Lance breathed with delayed indignation.

“We’ll take good care of them,” Lily said.

Nayeli didn’t respond. Not after a minute. Not after five. They stood there with the baby and the dog, listening for words that didn’t come. Probably both knowing it was pointless. Nayeli was gone.

“Maybe she’ll pop back.” Lance’s voice held a quaver of hopefulness that rocked Lily to her very core. “If we just wait, she’ll figure it out.”

She knew he didn’t believe that, but it was the only thing keeping her tears at bay.

His white lie was the only thing keeping her for screaming and cursing Lola for not being there to save Nayeli, even if she understood why she couldn’t be.

That baby girl was never going to get to see her mother again. Lily wouldn’t wish that kind of heartache on anyone.