by Angela Foxxe
Richard’s offer stunned her. She looked at Paul, who looked stricken but otherwise accepting of what Richard was proposing.
“Would you be alright with that?” Sabrina asked him.
“I wouldn’t,” he said honestly. “But it doesn’t matter if I’m alright with it. The most important thing is that you’re not here against your will and you’re not stuck with me. Fate may have chosen us, but if that’s not what you want, I’ll support that.”
Even if it kills me, she heard his voice say in her head, but she knew that he hadn’t given voice to that thought.
“Would you leave this place?” she asked Paul. “I mean, if there was a shot at a better life elsewhere?”
“No,” he said simply and without thought. “As long as HLF is able to convince the government to keep us here, no place is really safe for a WereLion except here. Leaving would not solve anything, but it would put the people who depend on me at risk. I’m not willing to do that, but I am willing to let you go if that’s what makes you happy.”
She watched his face, searching for any sign that he was bluffing, but she only saw honesty and pain. He was serious, and he didn’t care if it hurt him, he was going to do the right thing. She thought back to those moments in his arms and the way he had loved her so completely without asking for anything in return. He was a good man.
And she would be a fool to let him go just because she was scared.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“He loves you, you know,” Annie said, sitting with Elijah on the side of the wraparound porch. They were sitting there after dinner, enjoying the late afternoon sun.
Sabrina was watching Richard and Paul load up supplies, clothes and more in the back of the van. The third-row seat was folded down, making plenty of room for Mr. and Mrs. Davies to sit together in middle seat, leaving Richard up front by himself. She observed the older couple, and her heart melted a little with each tender gesture, and each touch.
It was obvious they loved each other very much, and that Charles was focused on his wife and her needs more than his own. They were a sweet couple, and Sabrina was glad that she had met them, even though it was under less than perfect circumstances.
“I know he does,” Sabrina said finally, turning her attention to Paul. “I don’t know when I realized it, but I think somewhere deep down I’ve known since before I met him. I just didn’t know who he was.”
“I understand. Fated Mate dreams are rough on humans. I thought I was going crazy, and I threw myself into my work, trying to exhaust myself so the dreams would quit.”
“Did it work?”
“No. The dreams actually got worse. They didn’t let up until I was firmly rooted here, and I got pregnant. I didn’t even know I was pregnant until I was almost three months along, but I remembered the day the dreams stopped. I did a little counting and found the correlation.”
“I’m not sure I’m cut out to be a mother, or the wife of any man, let alone a WereLion,” Sabrina said, looking at Elijah and smiling.
“You would be surprised what you’re cut out for. Fate chose you for a reason. Just because you don’t see that reason, doesn’t mean that it isn’t there.”
“But what’s going to happen when people around here find out about my past? They’re nice now, but I’ve killed WereLions for your father. They aren’t just going to let that go.”
Annie took a deep breath, turning so she was looking at Sabrina.
“If they can forgive me, then they can forgive anyone,” she said, her voice heavy with despair. “I’m the one that started the repatriation project for shift-human babies.”
“What project?” Sabrina asked.
“Paul didn’t tell you?”
“Every time I ask him a question, we either get shot at or he tells me it’s not the right time. He hasn’t mentioned anything about the program.”
“Maybe he wanted you to get to know me before you found out what I did. At any rate, I’m sure there are a lot of things he’s waiting to tell you, and I’m not going to step on his toes there. But this part is my story, and I feel like I can share it with you.”
She looked down at her son then, kissing him softly while he slept in her arms.
“We’re not fighting because we’re moved here. To be quite honest, no one here really cares about leaving The Zone. We’re safe here, we face no discrimination, the border is open to us in the north, and we have an easier, simpler way of life.”
“But you have no freedom,” Sabrina countered.
“We do have freedom, just not the freedom to travel south without jumping through a lot of hoops or sneaking away. Now that the HLF knows where our tunnel is, it’s going to be more complicated to sneak away, but we don’t really need to. Putting us all here wasn’t the devastating, isolating event that my father had hoped for.”
“I’m sure he would be furious to find out how WereLions are living here,” Sabrina admitted. “We are told that it’s basically a war zone here, and that the lions had destroyed every house and business that’s here, in hopes of returning the land to the wilderness it was a hundred years ago.”
Annie laughed and shook her head.
“My father has always had a flare for the dramatic. He lives in an alternate reality, and I often wonder if he even realizes that he’s a liar.”
“He must,” Sabrina offered. “On some level, he has to realize that the lying will catch up with him.”
“I doubt it. He plays on people’s greatest fears. That’s how he got so much legislation passed against the WereLions and any interspecies mating. And that was where my program came in. The funding is earmarked as a sort of un-brainwashing facility. When the shifters were seized, many of them had families.
Those that were single species families were moved to The Zone together. But the shifters that were married to humans were given a choice between both parents going to The Zone together, or the human parent attending a repatriating camp with their child.”
“That’s a horrible choice,” Sabrina said, appalled at what she was hearing.
“It gets worse. The humans, mostly women, were led to believe that the WereLions had the power to control them mentally. They’re being force-fed propaganda to convince them that the WereLions were evil. In the process, the hope is that they will pass this belief on with their children.”
“What is the point of that?”
“Well, my purpose was to actually save these women. My father had me convinced that they were victims of intellectual crimes, and that if we could just get them away from the men, they would come to their senses.”
“It didn’t work like that, did it?”
“It did not. Many of the women are plagued by dreams. Their souls are so torn by the choice they had to make that they are tormented nightly.”
“And what about the children?”
“The children are why I was leaving, and in the end, what my father is trying to do with the children is why he ordered my murder. He’s got people in the repatriation camps that are working with the children around the clock, teaching them that shifters are evil.”
“But they’re half shifter.”
“Exactly. My father is teaching them to hate a part of themselves.”
“Why?”
“Because my father wants to build an army of shifters to take over the world.”
Sabrina stared at her, dumbfounded. She wanted to say that was impossible, but it all suddenly made sense. Decker was dogged in his pursuit of political gain, and he did a lot of things that Sabrina hadn’t liked even when she thought she was on the right team. Decker was all about approval ratings and coming out on top. It seemed that every time people questioned his tactics, or his agencies use of phony police uniforms and warrants to get people to give up their shifter neighbors, something big would happen to change the publics opinion about him.
“That’s what he’s been hiding?” Sabrina asked, still trying to wrap her head around what Annie had said.
“Yes.
He’s all about deflection. Any time his actions are called into question, something will happen that will distract the media. It isn’t always shifter-related, either. There have been some warehouse explosions in other states and all sorts of events that draw national attention that I’m certain my father was in on.”
“And then, when that quit working, you disappeared and were assumed dead.”
“That’s exactly where he went with that. It would have worked, but he made a mistake.”
“Choosing Richard as the man to take you out was an unfortunate mistake for him, lucky for you,” Sabrina said.
“Oh, it wasn’t a mistake,” Annie said, smiling wickedly.
“What do you mean?”
“My father likes to brag. He manages to keep his mouth shut in public and when it matters, but he brags a lot. To me, to his friends, and to his lover.”
“He told his lover that he was going to have you killed?”
Sabrina was stunned.
“Not exactly. But he did tell her that things were getting uncomfortable and that I was stepping out of line and defying him, and that he wouldn’t be surprised if something happened to me, and wouldn’t it be perfect timing?”
“He’s got to be insane,” Sabrina said in an almost whisper. “Who says that to another person?”
“A man who thinks that he’s smarter than everyone else. He’s always treated Cheri like she’s stupid, and Cheri has been tired of it for a long time.”
“Why doesn’t she walk away?”
“Because, she discovered that being in her position gives us all an advantage, and he’s incapable of even imagining that it could possibly be her betraying him.”
“What did she do, exactly?”
“She told Richard and I what my father said, and we hatched a plan. It was easy. My father likes his ego stroked, and Richard didn’t mind pumping him up to save my life. Richard started making himself available to my father for some of the more dirty work, hoping that he would get information, but also hopeful that my father would pick him for the job.”
“His ego must be huge if he fell for something like that.”
“You’ve met him, right?” Annie laughed. “Anyway, I went out of my way to be especially obnoxious, in Richard’s presence no less. When I left the room, Richard made an offhand comment about what a thorn in his side I must be, and it snowballed without much help.
Within the week, he had asked Richard to take care of dealing with me, and he had wired a hefty bonus to Richard’s account, which Richard promptly moved to an offshore account as so many of us do. Even then, my father never suspected a thing, and he was happy with Richard’s picture of my body and the location where I would be found. He told him to wait, that my disappearance would weigh on the minds of the people for many months.
Once the sympathy from that waned, he would announce big changes, start working towards some more legislature, making it criminal to mate with or marry a shifter, and then, just as he announced his presidential bid, my body would be found, pretty much clinching the support of the people.”
“And once he was president, he could pretty much do anything he wanted to make certain that there was always something deflecting from his shady dealings.”
“Yes. And he could quietly grow the army of children he stole, turning them into killing machines. The laws would change, and the shifters would be exterminated for the good of mankind. Once all the shifters were gone, only the hybrids would remain. They would be adults by then, and more than capable of mass destruction. With the shifters gone, there would be no soldier on this earth strong enough or fast enough to fight them.”
“And Tom Decker would rule the world.”
“That about sums up his plans. Terrifying, right? And all this because of a program that I thought up, trying to help ‘victims’ of shifters find their souls again and rejoin the human race.”
“And now, you’re fighting to shut it down?”
“First, we have to find it. It’s at a secret location, and we don’t know where that location is. We can’t help the mothers and those kids if we can’t find them. That’s why we’re fighting; not for our freedom, but for theirs. We aren’t going to give up until every child is freed and mother and child are reunited with their family on this side. Once that happens, we will worry about the rest. But for now, finding those children and freeing them from the hell they live in is the least that I can do after what I did.”
“But that’s not your fault. Your father-”
“Fooled you, too. He fooled everyone. No one blames you for what he convinced you to do. You are only judged here by what you do once you know the truth. They’re watching what you do now, and that’s how they will decide how they feel about you. You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to. But don’t leave because you’re afraid that they can’t forgive you. They forgave you before they even knew you.”
Annie reached out and squeezed Sabrina’s hand.
“There is room for you in the van, if you want to go with them. No one will blame you, and Paul will survive. He has responsibilities that he can’t leave, though I know that his heart will hurt for a long while if you go.”
“I know that. Well, I guessed it. He hasn’t really told me everything, and I’m thinking that I’ll have to force it out of him.”
“He has his reasons, and knowing him the way we do, I’m sure that his intentions are good. He either thinks that it’s not the time, or that you’re not ready to hear what he needs to say. He’s bold, but he’s also patient when it’s necessary. It’s a great quality in a leader.”
“I don’t want to go to Canada,” Sabrina finally said.
“I was hoping you would say that,” Annie said, standing when she saw that Paul and Richard were putting in the last of the supplies and Richard was coming their way to say goodbye.
“I can’t believe how packed that van is,” Sabrina said quietly.
“They didn’t have much time to get out of there, and get here. They left everything behind and only brought a photo album and a few other things that were sentimental. Everything else is abandoned in their house. One thing you will learn about the people here is that they will never let someone go without.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“We’re all connected by the same heart,” Annie said. “It doesn’t matter what part of The Zone they come from, if we have it and they need it, then it’s theirs to take.”
The men walked up to them then, Paul looking less than happy, though Sabrina could tell he was putting on a brave face for her.
“We’re done,” Richard said, wrapping his arms around Annie and their sleeping baby. “They have everything they could possibly need for a fresh start, and they have a place to live for the next year or more if they want to stay.”
Annie smiled up at him.
“I knew Patricia would come through,” Annie beamed.
“She always does. I’m glad we have so much support from our neighbors to the north.”
“Hopefully, our own land will be like that again, someday,” Paul muttered, still scowling even though he was trying hard to soften his expression.
Richard looked at Sabrina, silently asking her if she was going with him.
She shook her head.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do, yet. But I’m not going to Canada.”
Paul’s face flooded with relief, though he said nothing.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Richard said. “You belong here, even if you don’t see it.”
“Thank you,” she said softly. “It means so much that people just accept me without judgment.”
“There’s nothing to judge,” he said simply. “Fate sent you to us, and Fate always has her reasons.”
He kissed Annie one more time, and tenderly kissed Elijah’s soft forehead.
“I’ll be home as soon as I can. I’m taking them to the safe house, then I’m driving back toward North Dakota to ditch the van just across the border. I’ll be
returning on paw, so it’s going to be tomorrow night before I come home.”
“I’ll wait for you,” Annie teased.
Richard kissed her again, then left them there on the porch. Sabrina stood with Annie and Paul, waving goodbye to the hunter and his wife, silently wishing them the best.
Annie looked at Paul and Sabrina, smiling before she spoke.
“I have to put this little nugget down before my arm falls off. I think he’s down for the night and he’s getting heavy.”
Sabrina chuckled.
“Thank you for having us,” Sabrina said. “See you soon?”
“You will be seeing a lot of me,” Annie promised before turning and going into the house.
Paul’s hand slipped into Sabrina’s before Annie had even closed the door behind her.
“I don’t know what changed your mind, but I’m glad you’re staying,” he said, leaning so that his forehead rested on hers. “I didn’t want to watch you drive away.”
“I don’t know if I’m saying,” she said honestly. “But I’m not going to Canada.”
She took a deep breath, measuring her words carefully.
“I want to fight. I need to fight. I know that no one blames me for doing my job, but I won’t forgive myself unless I make a positive change in the lives that I’ve altered. I want to help find those kids, and I want to help reunite those families.”
“And then you will leave?” Paul wondered aloud, his face still touched with sadness.
“I don’t know. My entire life has changed, and I don’t really know what my plans are. I just want to take things one day at a time, focus on what’s important, and kind of let whatever else happens, happen.”