He grinned. “Then you should sit in on our meetings with me and Gillian and Trent when we discuss computer systems.”
She giggled. “Hard pass. You’d never get any work done. I’d keep trying to blow you.”
He waggled his eyebrows at her. “I don’t see a problem with that, baby.”
“Okay, so we just bought ourselves, what, seventy-two hours?” Mateo said, scrubbing his face with his hands. “Now what? If we don’t want to literally ship them out to sea next week, I mean.”
“What’s this ‘we’ stuff, dude?” Ken playfully snarked. “Iwas the only one not panicking, and I’m the one who came up with the plan.”
“What I’m gonna do,” Badger said, “is run home, pack, and grab a bunch of DNA swab kits. Ken, if ye’d come with me, ye can get yer SUV and drive back here, and ye can bring test kits back with ye. There’s some of ye I haven’t done tests on yet.” Badger did a quick head count.
“Is that really necessary?” Carl asked. “What if the Seguras stumble over that information?”
Badger scoffed. “Do ye think I’m stupid enough to use real names, lad? I run it all through an anonymous system, no worries. But one of my unofficial jobs is keepin’ track of pack bonds and family lines. I’ve got some genealogy work done on many of ye already, but the DNA testing hasn’t been done yet. Time to rectify that now.”
Dewi hugged Ken. “Drive safe,” she said.
“Can I bring you anything?” he asked.
She turned to Duncan. “Actually, can I go, too? I never grabbed a shower this morning and I really need one. I’ll come back with Ken.”
He nodded. “Sure. Carl, Tamsin, and I will hold down the fort. Did anyone tell Joaquin and Beck and Da’von what’s going on?”
Malyah and Nami exchanged a glance. “Honestly, I didn’t even think about it,” Malyah said.
“Neither did I,” Nami said. “I’m…in shock.”
“Da’von should be home soon,” Brianna said. “I figured I’d wait until he got here. Nothing he can do about it, and it’d only be a distraction for him in class.”
Five minutes later, Dewi and Ken, with Badger driving, where heading back to the house. Dewi opted to take the backseat so Ken could more easily talk with Badger and take notes on his phone regarding the old shifter’s instructions.
“The most important thing, obviously, is labelin’ everythin’ right an’ proper. I’ll give ye plenty of extras in case ye need ’em, so don’t be bashful. I’d rather ye take too many than not enough. And the mailer box, ye can just scan the label and then stick it one of those pick-up boxes so it’ll be on it’s way in the mornin’. I’ll head to Davis and Imani’s house first before I head north, Prime ’em, and test ’em. I’ll work my way through the rest of their kin when I get back from Atlanta.”
“How fast do the results come back?”
“The rapid tests I can have results for in under forty-eight hours,” Badger said. “That’s why I want several swabs from everyone. So I can also get the in-depth tests done. The rapid tests will help me start nailin’ down the stray branches of this family tree into their rightful places on the trunk. Dependin’ on what I learn from this round of testin’, I might have to start lookin’ for extended relatives and test any I find to look for hints of who this corgi shifter is.”
“Is it possible it’s not a recent shifter?” Dewi asked. “Maybe it’s just the right combination of recessive genes popping up to say ‘hi’.”
Badger glanced at her in the rearview mirror. “An’ since when’s it ever beenthatsimple with our lot, missy?”
“Just thought I’d throw it out there,” she muttered.
“Sure, yes, it’spossible,” Badger conceded. “Stranger things have happened.” He glanced at Ken. “Like a grazer and a Prime Alpha matin’.”
Ken held up a hand without looking up from his phone. “Represent.”
“Like I said, inmyexperience, when an unexpected shifter pops to the surface, there’s almostalwaysa recent shifter ye can trace ’em back to within the past three generations. And whatever form they shift into is usually the most recent shifter in the family tree. At least now with DNA testin’ I can more easily find where someone fits and then trace out again to see if there are other potential sleeper shifters out there.” He looked grim. “Because if there’s one, yes, chances are there’s more.”
“And that’s how you decide who you need to keep an eye on?” Ken asked.
“Exactly. In the past when I’ve found families where I suspected a good chance of a sleeper shifter poppin’ up among a family of clueless humans, I’d pay ’em a visit, give ’em a few Prime orders, and they they suddenly become the beneficiaries of a distant relative they never even knew they had. Small monthly stipend—we adjust that based on their income level—from their share of nontransferable stocks in a private Idaho company. So, of course, they need to keep in touch if they want to keep receivin’ the stipends.”
“Oh!” Ken looked at him. “Sothat’show you keep track of them!”
“Right. Incentive. Once we’re certain there won’t be a sleeper showin’ up there, we taper off the stipend and tell ’em some excuse. Obviously, the Prime command makes them believe and accept all of that with no questions asked. And they call us if a shifter makes themselves known. But, as part of all that, they also have to keep us appraised of children, marriages, divorces, deaths, et cetera, and that makesmyjob easier when it comes to tracing back people who marry into their family. I send out an annual census form that I follow up on if I don’t get it back.”
“That’s fricking genius,” Ken said.
