Her Undercover Refuge

by Linda O. Johnston

  But having someone like the lovely and apparently brave woman who now stood there looking up and down the hall as if taking it all in, to help in one of those emergencies...

  That should be a good thing.

  “So which one is mine?” she asked. “Oh, and I’d like for you to point out who lives in which unit, in case I need to talk to one of the residents after hours, when I assume they’d be inside.”

  “You assume right,” Scott replied, “although they all know, and hopefully you do, too, that everyone’s on call if there is any need to help our animal guests.”

  “Of course.” He liked the way her expression turned slightly annoyed, as if she wondered why he would even ask such a thing.

  And even that expression looked good on her pretty face.

  “Okay, you’ll be near the end,” he said quickly, and edged by her toward the far end of the hall on the right side of the stairway.

  “Do I get a keycard?” Nella asked.

  “You get several. Here we are.” He stopped outside the next to last door along the hall and pulled two cards from his pocket. He used one to unlock the door, then handed Nella both and pushed the door open.

  He watched her expression as she went inside and studied the place even more intensely than she had the hallway. He edged in front of her again and gave her a brief tour of the main living area, small kitchen, bathroom and bedroom. He couldn’t help glancing at the bed, then back at Nella. She, too, seemed to be studying it.

  But he felt certain that whatever she was thinking, it had nothing to do with the possibility of their sharing a bed someday.

  Which, no matter how great that sounded, was entirely inappropriate.

  “Does it all look okay?” he asked as he stepped back out the bedroom door.

  “For now,” she said, “it looks perfect.”

  Chapter 5

  And it did look pretty perfect, Nella thought. Not that she intended to live here forever, or even for a very long time—unless it was necessary to keep the residents safe. But at least for her initial foray into working at the Chance Animal Shelter, and until she found her own place nearby, this small but appropriately located apartment would be great.

  Now she sat on the sofa in the little living room. Scott had left, but she would see him later. There wasn’t much else in that room except for a small television screen on the wall, a low-slung mostly glass coffee table in front of the sofa and a padded armchair in the same gray as the couch.

  She realized she was smiling. It had turned out that Scott wasn’t just the director and therefore head manager and a member of the Chance PD. He also was a gentleman, since he’d offered to bring up any luggage she had in her car in the shelter parking lot.

  She might just take him up on it, too—later. Right now, she was taking a small break before returning downstairs to meet the other staff members.

  And then—well, Scott had also asked her to join him for dinner that evening, a good thing since she obviously didn’t have any food in her brand-new apartment.

  She pulled her cell phone from her purse and pressed the number for her friend and former superior officer, Dan Poreski.

  The LAPD deputy chief answered immediately, even though he was most likely at the station. “How did it go?” he asked, obviously seeing her identity on his cell phone.

  Nella pictured him sitting in his office, leaning forward as he usually did while talking on the phone. Dan was in his late forties, with a shaved head to finalize his growing baldness. He kept in good shape, so his uniform fit well, and although there was, of course, nothing between them, Nella always appreciated the way he looked at her with his twinkling brown eyes.

  “I got the job,” she told him.

  “Fantastic! Tell me more about it—but only what you’re allowed to talk about, of course.”

  Nella hadn’t initially known how much Dan knew about the place besides the basics and its covert nature. Now she understood better and filled him in a little bit about the two levels of employment—and that the staffers weren’t just volunteers.

  “Then there are all the animals we help,” she continued, using we since that was now appropriate. “I’ll meet more of them this afternoon when we’re done talking.”

  “Glad to hear that,” Dan said. “I want you to keep me fully informed about what you do there—and I promise to keep it to myself, of course. And—well, I love the concept. I’ve actually been pondering how to maybe start something similar here.”

  “Really? Wow!” Maybe Nella could eventually even return to L.A. to help out.

  “I’d enjoy coming to visit sometime to see how it works.” He paused for a second and went on before Nella could offer her opinion that it might be a great idea. “Jon’s been asking about you. I’ve told him you’re okay and were applying for a good but covert job now, but after the gang task force—well, he’s concerned about you.”

  Nella sighed. Sergeant Jon Frost had also been on the gang task force with her. In fact, he’d been a great backup, which she had appreciated except for when he attempted to take over its leadership—to help her, he’d said. Plus, he’d seemed overly concerned about her for a while. She liked him as a friend but that was all, from her perspective, though she’d believed he wanted more.

  “Please tell him you’ve talked to me,” she said, “and I said hi, but I’m fine.”

  “Will do,” Dan said. “So—I’ll hope to see you there soon. And be sure to keep me informed.”

  “I will,” Nella replied, said goodbye and hung up.

  And shook her head about Jon—a nice guy but too interested in her. And too overbearing at times when they worked together. Well, she could put him in her past now with everything else.

  She had work to do.

  She’d been facing the window in the room that opened over the courtyard. The windows in the outer walls were decorative, but their wood-framed panes were narrow and the glass was thick—the better to keep bad guys out, she figured.

  Oh, yeah, this place might have been a regular apartment building before, she thought, but it had definitely been redesigned to minimize danger. Or so it appeared.

  Now Nella was eager to see the rest of the shelter, meet those people she hadn’t yet and also visit the poor pets in need of a new home.

  Only, they clearly weren’t so poor, since they had wound up at this kill-free shelter, where their care was important to everyone.

  She removed the jacket she had worn over her blouse and hung it on a hanger in the bedroom closet. Then she left her apartment, locking the door after her.

  She went down the steps and was glad the door at the bottom opened from this side without using a key, although she had brought both cards Scott had given her.

  In the shelter area, she saw Camp and hurried toward the dog enclosure where he stood with three people Nella hadn’t met.

  “Hi,” she said to Camp first, then turned toward the others—a man and two women. “I’m Nella, and I’m a new manager.” She was well aware that they seldom used last names around here—and that the names Camp would introduce them by would be the given names for their new identities.

  The man approached first. He looked a little young to be a staffer, but of course people of all ages were subject to threats that could require them to flee and take on new identities. “Hi, I’m Leonard. Nice to meet you, Nella.” His brown hair was fairly long, and something in his hazel eyes suggested pain. Nella hoped to hear his story eventually.

  The other two were Kathy, a very thin senior, and Muriel, thirtysomething and lovely, with a dark complexion.

  Nella would have several stories to hear—and even more she realized when Scott appeared with two more people, Warren and Sara. Two men, then, including Leonard. All the other staffers Nella had met were women.

  For the next half hour, they all strolled from one dog enclosu
re to the next inside a couple of buildings. In the final building was a cat sanctuary, where Nella was introduced to Meower, Kitty and Blackie, though a couple of others remained at the backs of their enclosures. A smaller back room held some other pets, including gerbils and guinea pigs.

  Each enclosure, no matter what size and for which type of animal, looked clean and well maintained, often decorated with comfy-looking beds on the concrete or tile floors, or cages for the smaller animals. No bad odors permeated the space.

  Nella loved how everyone seemed so centered on the animals and on each other, talking and laughing and apparently getting along great—no matter what in their pasts had brought them here.

  Would she remember all their names? Maybe the people’s, yes. And perhaps the cats. But not all the dogs because there were so many. Not immediately at least.

  Eventually, though, Scott said, “Okay, gang. Nella and I are leaving for a while. Have a great dinner without us tonight.”

  That was apparently directed only toward the staffers. As they turned away, Scott told Camp to go get Telma and join them in his office in fifteen minutes.

  “Sure, boss,” Camp said, and headed toward another of the shelter buildings.

  Instead of going to his office right away, Scott showed Nella the dining area on the ground floor of the apartment building, with a kitchen attached. He explained that the managers kept a good supply of food there so no one ever had to leave the grounds. “You’ll get to go on a shelter shopping expedition soon,” he told Nella, who liked the idea.

  In fact, she hadn’t seen anything she hadn’t liked here, nor met anyone, person or pet, she didn’t like.

  Next, he brought her into the offices at the shelter, upstairs in the other building just beyond the entry. He showed Nella around, including the small reception office in the front, then his office, which was the largest, and next the offices belonging to Telma and Camp.

  The last one he showed her was hers, and he introduced her to her new computer and how to access it, and also a few files he wanted her to get to know, mostly about the staff members and animals who lived here. Most important, though, he showed her a document that contained a detailed description of what managers were supposed to do and told her to study that carefully when she had free time. It was organized into descriptions of general but vital duties such as observation and security, then additional ones about what was expected of managers while working with residents and the shelter animals.

  “We’ll discuss your duties, too, of course,” he told her, “but this is a good, organized way for you to learn it all in depth.”

  There was also a file with the shelter’s goals and methods of potentially achieving them.

  “You can add to that,” he said, “but be sure to send a group email out to the other managers containing any changes.” He also showed her how to do that, including establishing an email address for her. In addition, he showed her how to access the emails sent to the entire facility.

  Before they joined the others, Scott also introduced Nella to the shelter’s main phone, a cellular resting in a charger on the main desk in the reception office. “We sometimes get calls or texts at this number, so we all check each time we’re nearby and handle anything accordingly.”

  Then he showed her a closet area off the main office where the shelter T-shirts were kept. He let her choose five from the stack that had Manager on the pocket in whatever size and color she wanted, and she brought them with her.

  As they then headed to his office, Nella, impressed, said, “This place is amazing.” The shelter had so many wonderful things about it, and she figured it had the magnificent possibility of saving all its residents from all their woes, as planned.

  “Of course it is,” he said with a laugh, gesturing for her to enter his office before him.

  There, Camp and Telma were sitting on a couple of the chairs facing Scott’s large desk. “Glad all my managers are here,” Scott said as he sat down. “I’ve got some good news.” He told them he’d checked further into what Telma had said regarding her interview of Ann and had done some additional checking himself besides his call to Edna. “From what I gathered, her claims of being abused by her stepson are true, and pretty nasty. So my decision is that she will now be hired as a staff member here at the shelter. Her name will be Alice from now on. And I’d like you two—Camp and Telma—to start her orientation tonight while Nella and I grab dinner. Okay?”

  From the big smiles on her fellow managers’ faces, Nella figured it was all definitely okay.

  She looked forward to the time when she would learn more about those orientations and be able to work with a new staff member that same way.

  * * *

  This wasn’t a date, Scott reminded himself as they pulled into the parking lot of The Last Chance Bar. He had just been a nice guy and invited a new employee to join him for dinner.

  So where did he take her? To one of the nicest places in town, which served really good food. He led Nella inside, where it was crowded as usual—but they were nevertheless shown to one of the round tables characteristic of the place, one near a wall.

  “This restaurant looks pretty popular,” Nella said as she sat down across from him. She was dressed up again—or at least she had put her jacket back on.

  He had changed his usual Chance Shelter denim or T-shirt for a cotton shirt with a collar, so he figured he was dressed up, as well.

  “Yes, it’s one of the best places in town,” Scott said.

  “Do you...do any of the staff members at the shelter come here to eat?”

  “Definitely not. Too dangerous.” Scott kept his voice low, but he stared at Nella with eyes that he hoped expressed his dislike of even the idea. “We can’t take the chance that someone might recognize them and defeat the whole point of the shelter. That kitchen I showed you is where all their food is cooked, and they eat in that informal dining area next to it. Plus, they’re given additional supplies so they can also eat in their apartments. But we managers go buy it all.” He moved slightly toward her over the table and said, “It’s safer that way.”

  Nella nodded. “I understand. I intend to keep learning all I can and appreciate your telling me anything I should be aware of.”

  “Definitely.”

  A young female server came over, handed them menus and asked if they wanted anything to drink. This was a bar, so Scott considered getting something alcoholic, but decided against it. “Just water,” he said.

  He appreciated it when Nella said, “Me, too, please.” He wouldn’t have minded if she’d asked for a glass of wine, but staying completely unaffected was best.

  When the server left, Scott looked around. He saw some familiar faces, since he’d been a resident of Chance for a while, but he saw none of his fellow cops.

  Which was probably just as well.

  “So I assume it’s better not to talk here about...what we’re up to,” Nella said. Her voice was soft, but she did look around at the filled tables near them.

  “Good assumption,” Scott said. “There’s a lot more I can tell you about it, but this isn’t the time or place.”

  They’d gone through the basics today, and Nella had seemed to pick them up well. But one of these days it would be good to describe his vision for the shelter a bit more, and what he hoped it would ultimately become.

  Not now, though.

  Nor would it be a good thing for him to start talking about his career before this one, in case there were eavesdroppers. And he wouldn’t attempt to get Nella talking more about her prior life, either. What they’d already talked about had seemed difficult for her, and there wasn’t any need to go into it further, at least not until they knew each other better.

  But she spoke first. “I called...my previous boss, while I was alone in my apartment before,” she told him. “I let him know I’d landed the job here, and he sounded re
ally happy for me. He’s even thinking about starting a similar animal shelter one of these days.”

  It was fine to talk aloud about the animal shelter aspects of their work. To the world, that was where they were both employed—a rescue organization for pets.

  “Glad he was happy about it. Is he interested in hearing more?”

  “So interested that he said he might like to come for a visit one of these days.”

  “He’s always welcome.” Scott had liked Dan’s attitude from the time they’d first held a conversation. And if he was truly interested in the possibility of starting a similar shelter in Los Angeles, even better.

  The server came over with their water and also took their orders. Nella requested grilled salmon, and Scott chose pasta with chicken. They both asked for salads.

  For the rest of the meal—a good one, as always—they discussed only acceptable topics. Nella mentioned her college degree in law enforcement, but didn’t discuss it or her prior, or new career. They’d already talked about her childhood a bit.

  They also didn’t discuss his earlier life—or why he had started the shelter.

  They instead focused on something logical—the pets they’d had while growing up. Nella’s parents were always traveling for their film production jobs but allowed her to have a dog—Squishy, a Pembroke Welsh Corgi mix. She smiled a lot as she described running with her short-legged dog.

  Him? Well, he’d had a dog, too—and more, which he described to Nella. His parents had owned a small hardware store in Los Angeles, and he had grown up before it became acceptable to allow pets in most retail establishments.

  But his mom had also volunteered at a private animal shelter and brought a lot of foster dogs home, one at a time. They’d played with their own Doberman pinscher, Dobie, so he wouldn’t feel ignored, and Scott and his brother, Mike, helped out after school by taking the foster dogs and Dobie for walks before doing homework.

  Thinking about Dobie and the foster pups from his childhood forced Scott to think about why he’d decided to become a cop, although he didn’t mention it. But his uncle Andy had been an employee at the hardware store and helped out with the dogs, too—until he was murdered.