“Ah, you’re not letting that go, are you?” I asked, opening his bedroom door.
In the dark all the colors blended together inside my night vision. The bed was prominent and in the center of the room, making it easy to lower him onto it. I crawled in next to him and spooned around him. He fit perfectly against me and it took all my control not to fall asleep wrapped around him but Raiel and I still had a bit of ‘shopping’ to do.
I laid there for almost an hour after Nic fell asleep. When I got up I took off the shirt Raiel had lent me that now smelled like me and rubbed it all over the windows and doors inside Nic’s bedroom to keep the threats away. When I finally made my way into the hall, Raiel was cheek marking the doorway off Annila’s room.
“Just for protection. I’m not into her. She’s—Er… She’s a woman,” Raiel shrugged. “But I figured she’s family too now and wouldn’t be able to fight off a threat with how deeply she’s asleep.”
“I almost want to call everyone to sit in the yard and watch the house, but I don’t think they’d appreciate that,” I nodded. “I get it. Leaving them alone doesn’t feel right.”
“This is London not the middle of a warzone,” Raiel said but his scent didn’t match his words very well.
“You were there with the crazy lady, right? I mean, when she blew up the bar?” I asked him.
“She didn’t come to the bar to blow it up,” Raiel said as we headed downstairs. “Everything just sort of exploded. One minute I’m pouring this skunk shifter a whiskey sour and the next every window in the place imploded. Some of the glasses and bottles too. It was chaos.”
“But she helped Annila get away,” I said as we tiptoed out of the front door.
“Are we going to be able to get back in without setting off their alarm?” Raiel asked.
“I swiped the physical key and the keycard,” I nodded. “And you’re sure you know where they’re at?”
“Believe me. It’s hard not to notice them. Let’s just shift and get a move on. Besides, everything’s easier to snatch in our real form.”
I had already put the stuff to get back into the house on a little pouch I could wear around my neck. The cord was a highquality, braided material that would survive the shift. That way, I’d still have them when we arrived back with Nic’s final courting gift and wouldn’t have to rely on stashing them somewhere that anyone might stumble onto.
“Do you think there’s more of them?” I asked.
Raiel was already sprouting his mane and hair was coming out of his pointed ears. He clearly wasn’t going to answer me with his human voice. So, I gave into my cat too. Giving in was easy. It was always easy. Sometimes I wondered whether my people were cats first who later learned to shift or people who bonded with cats. There were myths and legends to support both theories but whatever happened occurred so long ago that our written history didn’t go back that far.
Once we were both on four paws, I asked my question again over the group link. We moved at a steady pace through the neighborhood, sticking to the shadows to keep from being detected. We weren’t sure if Clarence had called off the hunt for his so-called ghost cat or not. Either way, the less attention we drew the better.
“I’m not sure,”Raiel said.“I know Crilus called Teal and Morvan as soon as he figured out what was going on. Teal called me to ask me what I knew but besides two of them were dead at the time I didn’t know a whole lot. He’s Crilus’s friend and likes to kill assholes. I mean as far as hobbies goes, it’s not the worst I’ve heard of. I don’t think anyone will come tonight if there are more.”
“I don’t think there are. You think someone would’ve been there with Tops. He had to know that we’d taken body parts from his friends or flunkies or whatever they were to him,”I said.
“Who knows? I think we just have to stay on guard. I can stay a while if you like. Crilus gives me all the time off that I want because I didn’t quit the bar when it exploded. I’m notsure if he knows why I’m still there but I’ll take whatever perks while I can. I think after watching you with Nic I might skip the courtship gifts until I get him home where it’s safe.”
“Traditions are important, but it is your choice. Perhaps, your true-mate will be boring and no one will want to kill him,”I teased.
“You know what? I wouldn’t be mad at that,”he laughed.“Turn here.”
As soon as we turned the corner, I smelled what we were on the hunt for. Fur and claws filled my head. There had to be at least twenty-five of them. We slowed down, not wanting to spook them.
“This is a small colony,”Raiel explained over our group link.“It’s just getting started. Three mother cats and a tom. Plus whatever kittens they’ve had recently. They were tiny a few weeks ago when I stumbled upon them. I think they’ll be weaned by now. At least, weaned enough.”
In the shadows of trashcans and cardboard boxes hid the four adult cats and their kittens. The tom, a big black puff ball, was the first to stick his nose out. Then the mommas peeked out one by one. They didn’t run or arch their backs. A second later kittens tumbled out of a box and all hell broke loose as they mewled and hissed and their parents tried to gather them up. They had decided that we weren’t a threat being that we were cats and all. The tom stopped and locked his big green eyes on me. The look said it all. Why in the world weren’t we helping them capture the runaway kittens? We were dumb.
After all the kittens were gathered back into their boxes, I shifted back to my human form while Raiel stayed in his cat form. The tom jumped up on his back using him as a watch tower as he stood guard.
“So many needy kittens,”my cat said as I squatted down to look inside the box.“How do we choose?”
“Don’t think too hard about it. The rest of them will go back to the clan. Raiel’s going to take them.”
“How do you know?”my cat asked.“I didn’t hear him say that.”
“He and the tom are talking about it. The tom is quite keen to live on a world ran by cats. I can’t imagine living with all these dragons is very fun for them,”I said.
The kittens came in all colors creating a furry melting pot as they crawled over each other and mewed. A few stood up at the edge of the box as if they thought maybe I brought food, and they wanted to be the closest to it when I brought it out. None of them looked skinny or malnourished.
