by Jade Alters
Then three men hit on me. This happens to me from time to time like anyone else. I don’t think much of it. Except that they’re creepier than usual. They’re almost as creepy as Creeper. They come one after the other just when I’ve finished helping other customers. They stand at the counter, staring at the vague swell of my breasts under the camp shirt I wore specifically because it didn’t look at all sexy. They lean on the counter and smile lasciviously. Each of them asks me a bunch of questions.
I’m not wearing makeup, my hair is in a messy ponytail, and I’m sleep deprived. There’s no way I don’t look pretty shitty today. But of course, that doesn’t really matter when men like these decide they want something from you.
On the upside, I really don’t give a shit anymore about being polite to gross customers and creepy men. I glare and shut them down and ask pointedly if they need help finding a book. Eventually, they go away. But it’s really bothering me.
“I’m a stalker magnet,” I say to Winny. I feel as if everyone has been taking pity on me, but I’ve decided there are worse things. Winny treats me to a sandwich from the deli down the street for lunch. We’re eating in the breakroom because I didn’t want to go outside and risk seeing him.
“I’m sorry, sweetie,” Winny says, sighing. “It’s awful.”
I rant and rave and bitch about the three gross men and Creeper standing outside staring. Winny is sympathetic, and then I ask her about her kid because I need to talk about something else.
And besides that, I feel like I know why more men are after me.
It’s that goddamn spell.
Whatever the sorrel and lodalite did, it was bad. I have to think it’s why the worst kind of men are chasing me like I’m the top prize in a scavenger hunt.
Then I start getting calls. At first, it’s just some hangups. I never answer my phone if I don’t recognize the number, and a lot of times I like to google unfamiliar numbers and check if they’re spam. When I google these numbers, nothing comes up at all.
Then I start getting voicemails. This happens an hour after lunch. Heavy breathing. Five calls. All from different numbers.
The dick pics start coming in around three.
This is getting insane.
When it’s time for me to go home, guess who’s still outside?
I feel like the walls are closing in. I feel like I’m absolutely losing control over my entire life.
“I’m calling the cops again,” I say flatly to Becca when she comes to the register to relieve me. I’m on the verge of tears, but I’m trying to contain myself. I’m even blaming myself for having screwed up that stupid spell. But the truth is, only very powerful witches and warlocks can make a person do something against their will via a spell. Spells and potions don’t just erase inhibitions. That means all these creepy goddamn men want to be doing what they’re doing. So I really shouldn’t be blaming myself at all. But...I still am. It’s hard not to. “This has been the worst day,” I say shakily. I shut off my phone because I couldn’t take it anymore. I just don’t know what to do.”
“Okay.” Becca nods, sympathetic. As she pats my arm, she seems almost hesitant. Like she’s afraid to touch me. “You want to come up to my office again? Let’s get you another one of those airplane bottles from Dale he thinks I don’t know about, and we’ll go upstairs and call the police. Okay, honey?”
“Thanks,” I say, clearing my throat. I’m teary and I’m pretending not to be.
Up in Becca’s office, I plop down in the chair across from her desk and sip the whiskey from Dale. He gave me two bottles this time. I make a mental note to bring him a treat to thank him. I know he likes snickerdoodle cookies a lot. Sighing deeply, I lean on my hand. I drink and watch Becca who’s hunched over her desk, gripping her phone with white knuckles as she talks to the cops. She goes back and forth with them for ten minutes. Finally, she sighs in relief and tosses me a thumb’s up.
“They say since he threatened you this time, they’re going to take it more seriously,” Becca says. “Only they used more words than that.” Then I see her take an airplane bottle of vodka out of her desk and toss me a wink before she chugs it. “I swear to God. Takes so much pushing to get a goddamn thing done in this world.”
“Well, I really appreciate it,” I say, feeling a bit buzzed from the whiskey. I have a little tin of mints in my pocket and I take a couple out now, chewing them quickly. I don’t want the cops to think I must not know what I’m talking about because I’m drunk at work in the middle of the afternoon.
“And men wonder why we bitch about them all the time,” Becca says, shaking her head. “With guys like these around.”
“I know there are good ones out there,” I say idly. “Just haven’t met one in a while. I mean Dale seems nice but-”
“Dale’s gay,” Becca says, laughing. “Ah well. There ya go.”
We head back downstairs because Becca is actually supposed to be covering a register right now. I’m off work, but now I’m waiting for the cops, so I grab one of the books I’ve purchased in the last couple of days and pass the time reading in the breakroom. Quickly, I realize I’m feeling too buzzed to concentrate on reading, so I pull out my phone instead. In the time it took for Becca to convince the cops to come down, I’ve received three different dick pics from total strangers. I block the numbers, but I save the texts figuring all this is more evidence for the cops. I’m not sure what it’s evidence for exactly. I don’t think it’s Creeper sending those pictures. I think it’s different men. And I think it’s because of that screwed up spell. But then, I don’t have to tell the cops that. I’ll just report that I’ve gotten harassing calls and texts and let them use it as part of their investigation into Creeper. I figure it can’t hurt.
If I tell them this is happening because I’m a witch who screwed up a magic spell, they’re going to think I’m out of my mind.
A few minutes later, Becca pops her head in and says, “The cops are here. Creeper bolted as soon as he saw them.”
I get up, stretch, and go out to talk to the cops. I see them from the back, waiting by the register. They’re two tall, super fit looking guys in street cop uniforms from the Pasadena Police Department. One is blonde. The other is a brunette. They’re both quite...well-formed from the back.
To say that I’ve been in no mood at all to think about a guy sexually in the last few days is a gross understatement. If anything, I just wish they’d all go away. But when the two men turn around I make a ridiculous little chirping sound of surprise in my throat.
They’re both drop dead gorgeous.
I quickly wipe all thought of anything sexual from my mind. It’s not as if I don’t know that looks can be deceiving. I thought Creeper was good looking too, and he turned out to be gross. And a couple of those guys who were hasseling me at the register earlier weren’t bad to look at either. All of them were just awful. Of course, I would hope that the cops who are supposed to be here to help me are good guys who are actually on my side. But I’m not going to make assumptions. I’ve come across cops I didn’t think much of before. And there are plenty of dirty ones or just bad ones out there.
The brunette, who wears his hair buzzed high and tight, and who has a jaw sharp enough to cut glass, sticks his hand out and I shake it, smiling tightly. He’s Asian American and I don’t know enough to guess his exact ethnicity, but I do know his dark eyes are pretty. His smile reveals straight white teeth as he shakes my hand. “Officer Ian Love,” he says. “Nice to meet you. I hope we can help you today.”
Oh my God. Did he just say, “Officer In Love”? I shake the thought from my mind before I answer him.
“Um, me too,” I say, feeling a little flustered.
The other cop is white and has sandy blonde hair that seems too long for a cop. He’s tan and has bright hazel eyes. He looks like a surfer dressed in a cop costume, and he grins like one too, with bright pink lips. “Officer Mitch Love,” he says as he shakes my hand. “Nice to meet you.”
&nb
sp; “Are...are you brothers?” I ask them.
“Not exactly,” Ian says, chuckling. “Long story. But let’s talk about your story right now, huh?”
I take a deep breath and say, “Okay.”
Ian
Last week, I turned one hundred and fifty years old. I know. I look good for my age. I’ve looked “good for my age” since I was about twenty-seven. I have a special little tonic that’s been passed down from fox shifter clan to fox shifter clan to thank for that. We take it once a year and it lengthens our life span. The only trick is to keep it away from humans, generally. The longer they live, the more trouble they end up causing for the most part. Anyway, twenty-seven is about when I stopped aging, just like the other three men in my pack who I call brothers. I say “call” because we aren’t technically brothers. We aren’t in any way related. We’re just four fox shifters in a leash. All four of us have been in the same leash or clan since we found each other as teenagers. But that was back in San Francisco, a long long time ago. Since then, we’ve lived in a few different places all around the world, Mitch, Darren, Brendan, and I. We’ve shared our lives, shared foods, shared beds– shared just about everything. We’ve relied on each other so much, there’s not much that could surprise us about each other anymore.
That’s what I’m thinking about as I rest my arm on the open window of the cruiser as Mitch drives us around Pasadena. It’s difficult to turn one hundred and fifty and not get a little reflective. But it’s easy to take things for granted after such a long time sharing your life with three other people. And I don’t want to ever say I take my friends for granted. So I like to think about that from time to time. I like to remember how lucky I am to have these men by my side and in my life.
“What’s on your mind, Ian?” Mitch says, raising his eyebrows as we cruise down Lake Avenue.
“I was thinking about how I kicked your ass at the range yesterday,” I say, grinning smugly at him.
Of course...they don’t need to know every detail of my thoughts either. And if I love anything in this world, it’s teasing Mitch Love.
“Luck,” Mitch says, shaking his head. “Pure luck. You know I’m a better marksman. Just keep being cocky, big man. Your time will come.”
“Uh huh.” I click my tongue at him and tap my fingers on the car door as my arm hangs out the window. “You just keep tellin’ yourself that.”
Mitch looks visibly annoyed even as his eyes are trained out the front window. But I know him well. He’s about to fight a smile. Sure enough, I see the corners of his lips turn up even as he shakes his head.
“Son of a bitch,” he mutters. I cackle with laughter at that.
Before we came to Pasadena, California a few years ago, the four of us fox shifters were living it up on the French Riviera having come into some money. The thing is, we’ve lived so long and with enough energy, youth, and general fascination with the world, that we’ve lived a few different lives together. We’ve lived in the underground of the magical world, sniffing out asshole wizards, soul-suckers, and other nefarious types and taken them down just because nobody else was doing it at the time. We did that for decades while making our way across Europe. That was a while back. After that, we lived in New York for a while and ran a theater on Broadway. We do something for a while and then we get bored and try something else. We tend to have a pattern of doing something that helps the world for a while, and then follow it up by trying something else for fun. Well, we had a lot of fun in Nice, so now it’s time to be serious again. We came back to America, scrubbed our names up once again so everyone would think we were just four regular guys from the suburbs and became cops. It was a different kind of choice for us. But we figured the world needed some good cops. We also chose Pasadena because we found ourselves missing California. It’s a nice area and a little out of the way of the hubbub of Hollywood. The weather is nearly always sunny and pleasant, except when it’s brutal in the dead of summer. We have a nice house in South Pasadena and we’re really enjoying our new lives. We also have more downtime than we’ve had in a long time. That just leads to more opportunity to be competitive. And we’re plenty competitive.
“We’re going again,” Mitch says now, tapping the steering wheel. “And I’m gonna beat your ass.”
“Okay, sure,” I say, shrugging casually. “Whatever gets you through the night.”
Mich scoffs at me. This is our usual dynamic though. We’ve always been the most competitive duo since the day we met as young fox cubs and started wrestling in the woods up by Big Sur. But nobody’s ever really won and nobody’s ever really lost. That’s just how it is between us.
Maybe, it’s because I’m the alpha.
“Such a dick,” Mitch says, shaking his head.
“That’s ‘alpha’ dick to you,” I say, smirking as I tap the car door again.
There’s always an alpha; a guy in charge of the pack who leads in battle and has the final say on the pack’s next move. It usually means you’re the most powerful and the toughest. That’s me. I’ve been told by other alphas I don’t seem like a typical alpha. I think that’s because I don’t feel the need to swing my big dick around. In my mind, if you have to tell people you’re tough all the time, how tough are you really?
“Just keep your eyes peeled for trouble, will ya?” Mitch snarks.
I’m keeping my eyes peeled alright, just like I always do. Except that we’re on patrol in downtown Pasadena in the middle of a weekday, and the place isn’t exactly a hotbed of crime. It’s mostly business-y looking people walking from their office to have lunch in some fancy restaurant or go to the gym or the bank. At California Boulevard, Mitch almost changes lanes to go right and then ends up turning left.
“What was that?” I say, chuckling.
“I don’t know…,” he replies, trailing off. Mitch squints as he turns left again at the next side street, heading back to Colorado Boulevard where we started. “I have a weird feeling. Do you have a weird feeling?”
I search my feelings for something weird. I sniff the air and try to sense the world around me. My fox perks up.
I do feel weird.
But I also feel as if we’re somehow headed in the right direction.
“What do you think it is?” Mitch says.
“I don’t know,” I say slowly. “I feel magic coming… I just know that somebody needs us.”
Just then the CB radio buzzes, and I grab the receiver.
“Two-Adam-ten, two-Adam-ten…”
“Go ahead,” I say, into the receiver.
“Ten-seventeen at Baker Books. Six hundred Colorado…”
Funny, that’s exactly the direction we’re headed because of our mutual “weird feelings.”
“Ten-four,” I say into the radio.
It’s not a siren type of call and the ride is short anyway. We park right in front of the store, and I get that strange feeling again but more intensely. It’s not just that somebody needs our help, it’s that I feel as if something very important is about to happen. Just as we pull in, I spot a tall guy with messy black hair who was previously standing on the sidewalk in front of the store, start to jog down the sidewalk. It sets every sense aflame, but he’s gone too quick to make anything of it. I just have a bad feeling about the guy.
It’s funny, but when we walk in, I don’t have to ask who we’re talking to. I see her right away, and I just know. The manager, Becca, greets us. She’s not the complainant though, and I already know that. I know the complainant as soon as she walks around a shelf, and I see her for the first time. I never get instinctual feelings that small unless I’m up against an enemy or I’m shifted. But the girl in a loose plaid shirt, rubbing her eyes and looking tired as she nevertheless smiles softly and reaches out to shake my hand, is important. I feel strongly drawn to her and at the same time as if I’ve met her before. But I try not to give anything away.
“Officer Ian Love,” I say to her. “Nice to meet you. I hope we can help you today.”
&nbs
p; With some help from her manager, Victoria tells us about the asshole who won’t leave her alone. When they show us a picture pulled from a surveillance camera, I realize it’s the guy I saw run off outside.
Dammit.
She’s also been getting all kinds of harassing phone calls, texts, dick pics, and hangups. The poor girl’s been through the gamut. I try especially hard not to give off any creepy vibes despite my “weird feeling” and the sensation I have of being so drawn to her. It’s certainly the last thing she needs.
The thing is, I can’t even say it’s because she’s so hot or anything. Not that she’s unattractive. I can tell she has a pretty face. But she looks like she hasn’t slept in a while. She looks a bit pale and disheveled. The point is, it’s not like I walked in and saw the most beautiful girl in the world or something. This is just a girl. Why would I feel this way around her?
Nothing special happens between us as we take Victoria’s statement. We promise to keep an eye on the store and scare off her stalker if he comes back. We also arrange to have a patrol car drive around her building a few times that night, and we tell her we’ll be checking our book to see if the guy’s face is on any warrants.
“Wait, I think I can find his name.” Becca snaps her fingers and goes to the registers. “He usually pays cash but he held up one of our other cashier’s once signing up for our charitable contribution program. This was just two weeks ago, let me see if I can find the sign-ups…”
After a bit of searching, she pulls his name. Derek Hardhum. Given all the harassment Victoria has endured, it’s safe to assume that Hardhum is also sending the unwanted messages. Sometimes it’s hard to prosecute harassment, and I’m no lawyer, but she might be able to get herself a restraining order. In the meantime, we’ll look out for her at least.
I tell myself it’s just the seriousness with which I take the job that explains how strongly I feel about protecting this Victoria. I have to tell myself that. Because nothing else makes any damn sense.