My virus definitely wanted me to get an up close and personal feel of Wayne from head to toe. “I’ll keep that in mind,” I replied in my driest tone.
“Let’s get down to business. Mr. Barnes, you have photographs of the culprits?” Rem asked, giving Wayne his attention. The other cops scattered, and they began investigating the ruins of the truck and my car.
“I have more than their pictures. I have the names of two of them. They’re part of a lycanthrope-friendly mafia group based in New York. I can only presume they caught a whiff of her scent when we met for coffee earlier today and opted to follow us.” Wayne crouched for a better look at the ruins of my car. “They hit her car to force her to pull over earlier. She tossed the one over his truck into his friend before bailing. I called it in.”
“Yes, I was notified you’d made such a call,” Rem replied. “Ma’am, do you have any former experience with either man?”
I shrugged. “My virus doesn’t like the brute.”
“The brute?”
“He’s big, he’s burly, and he seems like a rather brutish character to me. Uncultured swine,” I growled. “That’s what he is. He’s an uncultured swine. But that’s too much to say all the time, so he’s just the brute.”
“Is that the only occurrence?” Rem asked.
“That I know of.”
“Due to trauma-induced amnesia, it’s possible your virus could be remembering what you cannot. The virus is intelligent to a point. It definitely is aware of the same strains that created it—and it is definitely aware of the parent strain, or the virus responsible for your infection. While Mr. Barnes’s concern of a male lycanthrope smelling a single female is legitimate, it’s rare several males will gang up together to go after one female without more reason than a sniff or two on the street, especially when she’s keeping company with another male.” After a moment of hesitation, Rem scratched his head and regarded the crashed vehicles with a furrowed brow. “It doesn’t add up.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Wayne agreed. “What’s the current probability they’re involved with Joyce’s attack?”
Rem shrugged. “I wasn’t given information on that. I was only briefed on the circumstances.”
“Exemptions?”
Exemptions? Why would Wayne be asking about exemptions? I considered him, huffing my displeasure over the entire situation. When neither lycanthrope spoke, I growled, “What do you mean about exemptions?”
“He wants to know if he has legal grounds to become violent with any rival males,” Rem replied with a rather wolfish grin. “The instant you established you were uninterested in the rival males, he would have become invested because you haven’t made it clear you’re uninterested in him specifically. That’s how this works. If you want time to think about it, tell him that. Despite our reputation, we can be reasonable, and if he doesn’t respect your space, make him respect your space.”
I flattened my ears at that, as Wayne kept trying to make me leave my space so he could build his fortune. As nobody needed to hear me whine about that, I said, “Males fight over a single female all of the time. If males needed exemptions for that, we would all be in prison for a long time. Our race would be prison mutts.”
Rem barked a laugh, coughed to cover his reaction, and shook his head. “Somebody didn’t do a good job with your education, Joyce. You have a set of rules the CDC makes you follow, right?”
“Right.”
“Well, males get rules, too, and they’re probably just as strict as yours. If Wayne wants to pick a fight with other males over you, he needs an exemption. Courting is serious business, and the exemption essentially clears him of wrongdoing if he gets aggressive because someone threatens you. Yes, Wayne, you’ll need an exemption, but it should be a few minutes on the phone with the CDC to obtain one. She hasn’t pushed you out of her turf, and she allowed you into the vehicle with her after she educated those fools. Since she’s not aggressive with you in her turf, they’ll want to keep you around, and they can’t really deny you an exemption under those circumstances. I’ll help you along, as my body cam has caught footage of her temper tantrum for sure.”
I eyed the mangled truck, huffing over the amount of damage I’d done to it. “It’d be easier to move if it were in smaller pieces.”
Wayne grunted and shook his head. “If you’ve worked the worst of your temper out on it, leave it alone so it can be evidence. I’ll get a rental for us, although you’ll have to accept me driving due to your claws.”
“I can transform.”
“It’s unnecessary. Enjoy stretching your legs. It’s good for your virus to be in your hybrid form for a while. Your virus needs to develop.” Wayne straightened, his eyes roaming from the top of my head to my clawed feet. “Twenty-four hours will probably be long enough to give your virus some room to grow.”
Francine cleared her throat. “Don’t be an overprotective male.”
“I’m a beta and helping the pack wolves strengthen their virus is my job.”
“Oh, a beta. Whatever shall we do? Faint from awe?” Throwing her hand against her forehead, she slumped against her mate. “Spare me from male overprotectiveness, babe.”
Rem ignored his mate’s antics. “Ignore them both, Joyce. Allowing your virus to develop isn’t necessarily a bad idea, and it’s good for you to have your natural weapons and defenses intact, especially if Wayne is being shy and refusing to show off his wolf.”
“Wayne? Shy?” I blurted.
With a soft laugh, Wayne shrugged. “I have my moments.”
“Sure. I’ll believe that when I see it,” I muttered. While tempted to give the truck a kick, I stepped to the curb and gave myself a good shake. “What happens next?”
