“Served,” Wayne replied in a tone that implied I wouldn’t be serving anyone anything again in the future.
I missed having proper eyebrows. I couldn’t raise one at him despite wanting to. Settling with a grunt, I dropped to the asphalt, straightened, and brushed off the short skirt and blouse Francine had stuffed me in. Without a mirror, I couldn’t confirm it, but I expected I resembled a poodle with a fashion malfunction.
I hated mirrors. My virus turned my eyes green with hints of blue, and I remembered I’d lost my humanity thanks to some thug in an alley.
I’d been born with amber hazel eyes, and I missed them.
“Wayne,” I warned in a snarl, making sure to show him every single one of my sharp and pointy teeth.
“Yes, Joyce? I have a much better job for you. It pays better, has better hours, and I’m still setting your rent based on your current employment terms, and you’ll just have to suffer through it for five years.”
Better pay and better hours might have me eating out of his hand, and my virus liked the idea, especially if eating out of his hand led to our eviction from the singles’ pool.
Ugh. My virus was going to be the death of me one of these days.
“It’s still my job.”
“Not for long.”
I bowed my head and sighed.
“It’s one of the single male tricks,” Francine warned me. “He’ll goad you into putting him in his place, then you’ll realize how nice he looks in his suit, and the next thing you know, he’s no longer wearing his suit, and it goes from there. Rather than a suit, the uniform got me. Males are sneaky. They’re also like peacocks, and they wear pretty things to tempt you.” Francine pointed at her cop. “That one kept coming here wearing that damned uniform!”
Francine’s mate chuckled. “It’s your fault you kept calling the non-emergency line and asking to send the, oh, what was it she said, Gerry?”
“She wanted to know if we could send ‘the sex on a stick over’ and wanted a list of crimes she could commit that might involve you using a pair of handcuffs on her,” one of the older cops replied. “Dispatch had a field day with that for weeks until you took pity on her.”
Francine shrugged. “He’s sex on a stick and I wanted him to handcuff me.”
I compared the cop to Wayne. Wayne took the clean cut businessman thing to extremes, and despite the events of the day, he’d emerged with his hair barely ruffled. The cop went the other way, with enough scruff on his chin to give him the bad boy appeal.
I’d had a lifetime limit on bad boys, as the last bad boy to stomp into my life had about killed me.
I blamed my old prejudices and trauma on my inability to figure out what she saw in him. “If you say so, Francine.”
Francine laughed. “Sorry, babe. She’s not your type.”
“She’s an attack victim, and I fit the profile of her attacker. I’m more impressed her virus didn’t get riled up at my presence. I called in the CDC with your name and got a rather blunt warning you might go for my throat if I provoked you. You have a reputation.”
I spluttered, taken aback at the accusation I’d attack someone without significant provocation. “I have never!”
Wayne closed the distance between us and rested his hand on my shoulder. “The CDC tracks solo lycanthropes and gives them a hazard rating. Your file probably mentions you were infected under violent circumstances, which makes you a higher risk of snapping, especially as you don’t have a pack to offer you stability.”
I snarled and took my frustration out on the brute’s truck, swiping my claws at the siding and gouging the steel and plastic. “I have never.”
“I know. He didn’t mean anything by it. They just sent some of the local lycanthropes over in case you decided to go after someone.”
I yanked the door off the truck and flung it across the parking lot. It didn’t touch the ground until it reached the trees, and it disappeared into the underbrush. “Bring that fucking brute over here, and I’ll earn that reputation.”
The cops stared at where I’d flung the door, and Francine’s mate whistled. “I haven’t seen a temper tantrum quite like that since I told Franky she couldn’t have a round with my handcuffs because I was on duty, and all she did was punch the wall while cussing.”
“You just have to bring that up every time you get a chance, don’t you, Rem?”
“I sure do,” he replied with a wolfish grin. “You’re so much fun when you’re cranky. We have how many brats now because of those temper tantrums of yours?”
Francine waggled three of her painted claws.
“This is life with a mate, ma’am. And us males are just as bad as the ladies, so if you decide to keep Mr. Barnes, you’ll have your hands full with him.”
