Chapter Sixteen
It was the slow time of night at the Lion’s Den, after the dinner rush, before the party crowd started piling in. Jose tapped Flora on the shoulder as she set down her cleaning supplies behind the bar.
“Hey, I hate to bother you, but I was just wondering,” he said, glancing around. “Krystle’s been acting really strange since she got back from Cottonwood. Do you have any idea what’s up with her? Is she mad at me for something?”
“I don’t think she’s mad at you. I’m about to talk to her about something else. I’ll try to feel her out on what’s going on,” Flora promised.
“Thanks,” Jose said with a relieved nod. “If I screwed up somehow, I really wish she’d just smack me upside the head and get it over with.”
Krystle was standing outside, drinking a seltzer water and chatting with Liam and a couple of the other bouncers.
“What’s up?” she said when Flora motioned to her to take a walk down the block. They stepped into the recessed doorway of a furniture shop, now closed for the night.
Flora wanted to ask Krystle to go with her to Cottonwood, but before she did, she needed to find something out. Travelling across the Badlands was dangerous. She needed to know if she’d be putting someone besides Krystle in danger.
“Is there something that you haven’t been telling me?” she demanded, looking her cousin in the eye.
Krystle, who never avoided anything, looked away and stared out at the street.
“Lots of things,” she said with a shrug. “Where should I start? I had a threesome for my twentieth birthday. I don’t recommend it, actually. Too distracting. Oh, and I shoplifted from a drugstore when I was—”
“Cut it out,” Flora snapped, and resisted the mighty impulse to add “please”.
Krystle looked at her in surprise.
“You’re avoiding Jose and being weird, you’re not drinking alcohol, and you went to Cottonwood. Apparently, even though you said it was for a client, as far as anybody around here can tell me, you went alone.”
“So?” Krystle scowled at her.
“Were you scouting it out to find out if it was a good place to raise a family?”
Krystle stuck her hands in her pockets.
“And why don’t you just tell Jose you’re pregnant with his cub?”
Krystle didn’t deny it. “We don’t really talk about stuff like that,” she mumbled. “Who knows how he’d react? My track record with men hasn’t exactly been fantastic.”
Before Flora could say anything, Jose stepped into the doorway, and for the first time since Flora had met him, the unflappable shifter looked as mad as hell.
“Maybe you’d know if you’d just trusted me enough to tell me,” he said angrily. “Why would you go to Cottonwood by yourself when you were pregnant with my cub? Why risk your safety like that?”
“You’re still checking out every chick in the Lion’s Den! It’s not like you’re ready to settle down!” Krystle yelled. “And what are you doing spying on me?”
“I’m spying because I care about you, and I wanted to know what the hell is going on! And checking out girls is different than banging them! You were the one who said you wanted an open relationship, and I haven’t been with anyone else in months! If you wanted me to stop looking at other girls, you should have told me!” Jose’s face was turning red as he shouted at the top of his lungs. “How do you expect us to work if you won’t tell me a damn thing that’s happening with you?”
“See what you did?” Krystle snapped at Flora. “Why couldn’t you stay out of it?” And she stomped off, with Jose following.
Flora, shaken, stepped out of the doorway and saw Krystle shift into lynx form and run off, leaving an angry Jose standing there yelling at her as she fled.
She headed glumly back into the club, to return to work. Should she have kept her mouth shut? She didn’t want Krystle travelling through dangerous territory if she was pregnant – but she hadn’t meant for Jose to find out that way.
The next morning, Flora and Finn headed out to meet the bears. They were going to bring them into Hudson territory, pack some supplies, and leave after lunch. Finn knew a route that would get them there in three days.
As they walked, Finn tipped his head up and sniffed the air.
“Krystle?” he yelled out.
Krystle came trotting up to them, scowling. Her hair was rumpled and she looked as if she hadn’t slept well.
