by Lauren Esker
Avery looked up desperately.
"No," Cho said, before he could say anything. "I'm going to run back down to the Market before the trail goes colder than it already is. There might be witnesses around, or security cameras."
"But—" Avery began.
"Look, otherwise I'd need to describe to you exactly where I found it. Besides, I've spent the whole day at the Market. The vendors know me. It makes more sense this way, Avery, tell me it doesn't."
It did.
"Put the kids back in the box," Avery told the interns.
There was a chorus of "awes". Yesenia began making a new nest in the bottom of the box out of paper towels.
"As for the rest of you—Rivkah, you're in charge." She was the most responsible of the bunch, or at least, the one who was least likely to precipitate a department-wide crisis and/or burn anything down if left alone for a few hours. "Call me if there are any more disasters. And in the meantime," he sighed, shouldering the box of unhappily squeaking puppies, "I'll go see if Dr. Yates's day needs a box of puppies as much as mine does."
Chapter Two
Nicole Yates was not having a good day either.
"We can't cut the postnatal home visits, JJ. I don't give a damn about funding. That program works. In some cases it's the only thing keeping these families from ending up back here in crisis a few years down the line."
What she didn't say, couldn't say, was that at-risk shifter families were even more likely to end up in crisis than human ones, and therefore more in need of intervention. For healthy families, the close-knit nature of shifter communities tended to act as a buffer against social breakdown. But those who fell through the cracks could easily go into free-fall, reeling under the triple blows of dealing with poverty, raising what basically amounted to special-needs children, and being a minority in a society they had to hide from.
"So what else goes, then?" her supervisor asked over the phone. "Do we chop hours off the counseling and home visits for kids who are neck deep in shit that most adults would have trouble dealing with? Do we cut back on domestic violence shelters? Cut funding for substance abuse treatment, or youth suicide programs? This grant will only stretch so far. If you could email me some stats, maybe, on which programs are working—"
Nicole tucked the phone into the crook of her neck, only half listening. The light was blinking to indicate a call on another line, and she was typing an email at the same time. "JJ, both my caseworkers are out today and my receptionist called in sick. I've already had to cancel every out-of-office appointment this afternoon because I'm holding down the fort by myself. I can get you something tomorrow."
"I need to turn in the paperwork tonight. I'm doing you a special favor holding this for you, Nicole. We could've just made arbitrary cuts, but I'm trying to help."
And he really was trying, which was, in a way, the worst part. More sources of funding dried up every year, and to Nicole Yates fell the thankless job of attempting to address the special needs of the shifter community while trying to keep their very existence a secret. In the process she'd cultivated a reputation as the branch office that dealt with "difficult" cases. Sometimes this meant dealing with kids who turned into tigers and tried to eat their parents, but at other times they were not shifters at all, just regular human children who had been through so many abusive situations that other caseworkers didn't want to deal with them.
"I have an appointment tonight, but I'll try to pull some figures together after that, okay?" After all, who needed to eat? Or sleep? "JJ, I have to go. Call you back later, yeah?"
Without waiting for an answer, she hit the button to switch lines, but whoever it was had already hung up without leaving a message.
I really hope that wasn't important.
It was almost five anyway, not that she ever managed to get out of the office at five, or even close to it. Allowing herself to fudge the time a bit, she flipped all the phones to voice mail (rerouting the emergency line to her cell as usual), hung out the CLOSED sign, and pulled down the blinds on the door. Then she steeled herself and went back to the email—a follow-up on a home visit that hadn't gone well. She had another scheduled for tonight at seven, the only time she'd been able to fit it in. She was exhausted just thinking about it.
Her cell went off: her sister, who was also her landlord. She thought about ignoring it, then put the phone on speaker and set it next to the computer so she could keep typing. "Not the best time, sis."
"Hi to you too." In the background, Nicole could hear the cheerful babble of life in the Leung-Yates household, as Erin's two kids competed with the TV to see who could be loudest. Erin talked over the top of them without seeming to notice. "I just needed to know if you're working late tonight. Should I set another place at the table, or put aside a plate for you?"
"Erin, you don't have to. Tonight's going to be another late one. I can microwave something at the office."
"Uh-huh. Because ramen cups are great fuel for someone who works ninety hours a day. Speaking of, are you sure—I know how you get when I ask about this, but I know you're not sleeping a whole lot, and I promised Mom I'd make sure. That you aren't. You know."
Nicole gritted her teeth and bashed the keys a lot harder than she meant to. "Erin, I'm fine. Really. I monitor my mental health. I'm not going to push myself too hard."
Erin's voice dropped to a whisper. "Are you taking your pills and everything? Because I counted the ones in the bathroom and—"
"You counted my meds? Seriously?"
"I was worried!" Erin said defensively. "I just wanted to make sure! Because whenever I ask about it, you do this."
"Because I'm tired of people micromanaging my personal life! Not to mention treating me like I'm going to crack if they look at me funny!"
"It's called taking care of you. Someone's got to."
"You know I'm a big girl and can take care of myself, right?" She shouldn't have moved to Seattle for a fresh start. She should've moved to ... to Turkey. Or Antarctica. Anywhere her family was not. "I'm taking my meds, I really am getting enough sleep, and I am not going to fall apart just because the job is stressful."
"You don't have to bite my head off. I'm just looking out for you."
Nicole took a deep breath and massaged her temples. "I'm sorry."
Somehow whenever this happened, she was the one who ended up apologizing to Erin, even if she didn't want to. She was, after all, a guest in Erin's home, and no matter how many times Erin reassured her that she was a full member of the household, no matter how often she reminded herself that she pitched in on rent and no one minded having her there, she still felt like a freeloader. Especially these days, when she was too busy to help with household chores, let alone scrape together the time and money to look for a place of her own.
"De nada," Erin said, an Americanism she'd picked up and was now obnoxiously running into the ground. "And since an unfed Nicole is a cranky Nicole, your dinner will be waiting on the top shelf of the fridge."
"Thanks, sis," Nicole sighed. Retreat was often the better part of valor. "Love you."
Somehow a summer at her sister's place in the U.S. to get her head screwed on straight had turned into almost a decade of being the poor relation living in her sister's spare bedroom. She wasn't entirely sure how much more of Erin's sisterly concern, however well-meant, she could put up with, though.
Someday soon I will take some of that massive pile of vacation time I've built up, she promised herself. I'll shop around for apartments, and maybe even go home to see Mom and Dad. I just can't do it now, because we're heading into the holiday season. Maybe in January—no, that's when Kathryn is having her baby, so I'll have to cover her caseload. Maybe this spring ... oh, who am I kidding.
She tried to buckle down and finish up the email, and got a whole two more lines before someone knocked at the office door.
"Oh, for the love of Christ! Can't you read?"
They knocked again, louder.
If they weren't givin
g up, it might be important. Life-and-death important.
Or it could be her supervisor had dropped by to talk to her in person. Technically, she wasn't closed yet. By the clock, it was still 4:58.
All she wanted to do was stomp over, wrench the door open, and yell at them. Instead, she firmly schooled herself to calmness, ran a hand over her head to try to get at least some of the frazzle back where it was supposed to be, and then managed to walk, not stomp, to the door. "JJ, if this is you—" she snarled under her breath, and peeked through the blinds.
It wasn't JJ. It was a handsome young man she'd never seen before, dressed in the semi-casual way that passed for business attire in Seattle: dark jeans and a light gray sweater under a black wool coat. More curiously, he had a large cardboard box wedged between his chest and the wall, and he was trying to stuff a puppy back into it without dropping the entire box.
I know I will regret getting involved in this, she thought, but she was already unlocking the door.
When the door opened, he looked up quickly. His eyes were a clear grayish-blue, and dark hair flopped over his forehead. "Hi!" he said, giving her a smile that was slightly distracted due to another puppy trying to make a break for it. "Are you Dr. Yates?"
"This isn't the ASPCA," Nicole informed him. Then she took a closer look at the puppies. "Wait, are those—"
"Wolf," he said. "Werewolf to be exact. I'm Agent Hollen of the SCB. I'd show you my ID, but I've kinda got my hands full at the moment."
As if to demonstrate his point, a third puppy started to slither over the edge of the box. Nicole caught it just as it made its getaway, scooping it up. It was heavier than it looked. She noted in passing that it was a girl.
"Have they eaten?" she asked.
"No. One of our agents found them in this box at the Market—"
"Come on in," she said, against her better judgment.
Guard Wolf On Duty – Shifter Agents #2
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