"Can I help you, ma'am?" A woman's voice called from a few houses down, and Lola glanced up to see a girl in her twenties coming out of what had been Marcy Shultz's house, back in the day. She had a baby on one hip and a cautious expression on a face that was as familiar as the house.
"Good Lord," Lola said. "Are you Marcy Shultz's granddaughter?"
The young woman's eyebrows shot up. "Marcy Keogh, yeah, but…who are you?"
"I grew up here," Lola said with a gesture at her house. "Marcy and I got on like a house on fire when we were kids. You look just like her," she said fondly. "I'm Lola—Charlotte—Nelson."
"Oh my gosh!" The girl's jaw dropped. "Holy shit, you came back! Grandma will be thrilled! Nana! Grandma!" The last two words were bellowed, and the baby in the girl's arm squalled with dismay. "Oh, dammit, she went into Syracuse for a doctor's appointment this morning, I forgot. You have to come back later and see her!"
"I'll be around a few days," Lola said, caught between caution and delight. "I'd love to see her again. Please tell her hello for me."
"Obviously, but holy crap, where have you been? She's going to want to know! Can I get your number so she can call you? Did you know Sam Todd is alive?"
Lola's heart lurched even as she couldn't stop a laugh. This was exactly why she didn't want to come back to Virtue: everybody knew everybody else's business. Even two generations removed, apparently. "I did, yes. My own granddaughter told me."
The girl's eyes went round. "You have a granddaughter here? In Virtue?"
"I do. Charlee, the chef over at?—"
"Oh my God! I work there! I know her! Holy shit! I didn't know she was, oh myGod, Grandma's going toflip!"
Lola, remembering Marcy as a feet-firmly-on-the-ground kind of girl, had a momentary delightful image of that same girl, seventy years older, doing an actual flip. She ended up beaming at Marcy's granddaughter. "I'd like to see that. She can find me through Charlee, then, if that's all right?"
"That's perfect! That's amazing! That's, oh, hush, you're okay, aww, c'mon, sweetie…" The young mother brought her attention back to the theatrically crying infant, and Lola, smiling, left her to the hard job of parenting.
So far the return to Virtue had been much more positive than she'd imagined it would be, in all those years of wonderingwhat if. Lola tucked her coat around herself a little more securely, walking into the wind now as she headed back toward town. Maybe she could handle going out to Sam's house, after all.
Maybe she could handle anything, after all.
CHAPTER6
We're wasting time,Sam's fox told him impatiently.Our mate is back and we're here talking with these silly shifters.
Part of Sam thoroughly agreed. The other part of him—some decades older and wiser than he'd once been—knew the investments from these gentlemen could make or break Virtue's future as an independent shifter sanctuary town, not reliant on modern corporate development.
And the third part of him (you don'thavethree parts,his fox said, still impatiently) was also confident Garius Beren and Conri Lyell would help fund anything Virtue needed without Sam himself glad-handing them and showing them around town.But still,he told his fox.This is how business is done.
Does it have to be done while Lola is here?his fox demanded.
Sometimes, yes.They'd explored most of the old train station by then, admiring its old bones, investigating the state of the tracks that had gone unused for years now. It was still a beautiful space, though it made Sam's heart ache: most of the time he'd spent here had been in desperate hope that Charlotte would return, even though he'd known she wouldn't.
"I understand the town is voting on whether to bring the rail back," Conri called from down on the tracks. "If they vote in favor, I know just the architect to redevelop this space. It's got such promise."
"It isn't just here, though," Sam was forced to say. "There are another four sites south of here, and three north, that have to be redeveloped if there's going to be any point in bringing the line back. There are connection points north of the border, but we've got to reopen the whole line."
"We can help invest in that, if it's what the town votes for," Garius said. He'd climbed up to the old office and leaned through a broken window to call down to the other two men. "Right now the train goes north-east from Saratoga Springs, right? And the old line came up through Virtue to the north-west?"
"Up to Ottawa," Sam agreed. "Brought a lot of trade, at least at the time. Less tourism, but things have changed. Virtue's got more to offer, now."
"We'll make it work." Garius came down the long way, via the stairs—as if Sam had doubted he was a bear, and not a great cat. "The whole township is the sanctuary?"
Sam nodded. "Biggest township in New York. The charter was granted in the sixteen hundreds, and we've been working to keep it as wild as possible ever since, but it doesn't matter how wild it is if the town can't sustain itself. The ironic thing is that as the town has reinvented itself, we've gotten more and more outside interest in really developing the area, and we're trying to balance between keeping ourselves alive and keeping our secret. Your investments would be…" He shrugged, not wanting to exaggerate, but meaning it: "Life-changing."
Conri bounced up onto the train platform with the ease and enthusiasm of youth. Sam briefly considered kicking him, but he'd probably lose his balance, fall, and break his hip.
His fox sounded offended.We would not!
No,Sam said fondly.You'd save me.The animal hadn't talked to him this much in years. He was surprised at how much he'd missed it, now that it was vocal again.
