Hot and Badgered

by Shelly Laurenston

Max blinked in surprise, and she wasn’t easily surprised. “When did she tell you that?”

  Stevie thought a moment. “Three years ago. Over rabbit. At a French restaurant in the Alps. We went on a little vacation when I had a slight breakdown. I went after one of my colleagues with a fountain pen.”

  “Why?” Dutch asked.

  “I was under a lot of stress. And his tone, when he was telling me something about some tests we had run, bothered me. So, you know . . . fountain pen.”

  Dutch started to ask more questions about what Max knew he’d now call “the fountain pen incident,” but she bumped his elbow with her own. She knew that Stevie would never be able to explain her reaction to Dutch’s satisfaction. In those nice, straight lines of everyday storytelling. Her mind didn’t work that way when she had her “moments.”

  Instead, Max and Charlie tried to keep Stevie out of those situations where she might feel overwhelmed. She could handle a lot more than normal people, but when she did crack . . . she cracked big.

  “So what should I do?” Dutch asked. “To get your sister to like me?”

  “Absolutely nothing,” Max told him.

  “She’ll eat you alive.” Stevie dropped her spoon into her dish and sat back. She’d finished the entire thing.

  Max shook her head. “You’re getting another one, aren’t you?”

  “It’s so good.” She motioned to the waitress and ordered another, but this time with, “Extra chocolate syrup, extra caramel, and extra nuts.”

  When the waitress walked away, Max asked her sister, “You’re not going to throw this all up later, are you?”

  “Are you asking me if I have an eating disorder?”

  “Yes.”

  “No. I don’t have an eating disorder. I have a panic disorder and bouts of depression. I do worry I might start hoarding at some point, but it hasn’t happened yet. And, of course, when one needs a sense of control in one’s life it can definitely lead to an eating disorder or hoarding. But, personally, I’m more worried about the hoarding. Mostly because I do enjoy food and I don’t enjoy vomiting. Now if you’re wondering why I’m so thin these days, it’s because my metabolism has kicked up again. I’ve had to adjust my meds accordingly, taking them four times a day, which is unpleasant, but necessary because my system grinds through them so quickly. Thankfully, my doctors have really been on it, but they’re in Germany, so I guess I need doctors here. At least until we can head back. Not that I necessarily want to go back. I mean, don’t get me wrong, working at CERN has been amazing, but I don’t know. I don’t know if it’s still right for me but I could just be under a lot of stress right now and it’s probably not a good time to make those kinds of decisions.” She glanced off, looked back at Max and Dutch. “Does it seem like I’m talking a lot? I feel like I’m talking a lot. I can’t wait to get back on my meds. Tomorrow can’t come soon enough.”

  “What’s happening tomorrow?” Dutch asked.

  Max silenced her rambling sister with one raised finger. “Not a word.”

  “Oh, come on.” Dutch smiled. “You’re not going to tell me?”

  “No. Because you’ll want to help and you can’t.”

  “I’m very helpful.”

  “This is on us. And you can’t be there.” Max’s phone vibrated in her back pocket and she slid out of the booth. “I can’t be responsible for protecting you.”

  Dutch reared back like she’d slapped him. “When have you ever had to protect me?”

  Max pulled her phone out of her pocket and answered it. “Hold on.” She lowered it and said to her best friend, “Trust me on this.”

  * * *

  Another mountain of ice cream, bananas, syrup, and nuts was placed in front of Stevie and she’d already dug in before Dutch attempted to woo information out of her.

  “Sooo—” he began.

  “Nope,” Stevie cut him off before putting a spoonful of ice cream and banana into her mouth.

  He dropped back in his seat. “Come on! Tell me!” He began to wiggle around like he was still a teenager with what she was sure had been a form of shifter-ADHD. “Tell me!”

  “You never did listen to my advice about taking Ritalin, did you?”

  “I don’t need Ritalin. I have laser-like focus . . . hello,” he said to a pretty young woman walking by. “Beautiful day.”

  Stevie rolled her eyes. Men, in general, were disgusting. She knew that. That’s why she had very little tolerance for them.

  “Why were you never afraid of me?” Dutch suddenly asked.

  “Pardon?”

  “You were completely freaked out by those bears—and we won’t discuss why you ladies are currently living in an all-bear neighborhood—but you’ve never been afraid of me or my family.”

  “Bears eat people,” she said plainly. “Their paws can crush heads like I can crush a cracker in my fist.”

  “But I’m a wolverine,” he announced, as if that explained . . . everything.

  Stevie reached across the table and pinched his cheek. “And such a cute little wolverine you are too!”

  He gazed at her. “The worst part of that statement was your weird little girl voice.”

  “If it makes you feel better, I have always worried that one day I would have to testify in court because someone was rude to me and my sisters in front of you. ‘No, your honor, I have no idea how that man’s head got separated from his body. I blacked out. Dutch wasn’t even there. I have mental issues, you know.’ ” She grinned and Dutch laughed.

  “I appreciate that you’d lie for me.”

  “Of course. You’re like family, which should be obvious because Charlie doesn’t like you.”

  Dutch shook his head. “I still don’t get that. I am adorable.”

  “Of course you are.”

  He gazed at her banana split until Stevie said, “Just get one already.”

  “I am starving.”

  “When was the last time you ate?”

  “Like . . . two hours ago.”

  Stevie smirked. “That’s nearly forever for you.”

  “I know. It really is.” He motioned to the waitress and pointed at Stevie’s banana split. “Two of these, please.”

  “You sure Max will—”

  “Oh. Max. Make it three!” he called out.

  Stevie went back to her split and, in between bites, said, “You know what you can do for us?” Dutch, flirting with another woman across the shop, missed her question so Stevie snapped her fingers in front of his face to get his attention back. “You can do something for us.”

  “Oh! Cool. What?”

  “Get us a clean car. One that you don’t really need to return to anyone.”

  “A getaway car.”

  She hated using that term but . . . “Basically.”

  “Consider it done.”

  “Excellent.”

  “I can also drive for you guys.”

  Stevie started to argue that but she had ice cream in her mouth.

  “Don’t worry,” he quickly added. “I promise not to get out of the car. I’m just better at getting rid of cars than Max is.”

  Stevie shrugged. “Fine,” she said. “But Charlie’s not going to like it.”

  “Crazy.” He suddenly looked at her. “But you like me, right?”

  “I tolerate you.”

  “Which for you is good.”

  “It’s very good. Although the guy I went after with a fountain pen . . . I tolerated him, too.”

  “Good to know.”

  Max came back into the shop and dropped into the booth next to Dutch. “We’re all set for tomorrow’s meeting.”

  “I’m driving,” Dutch told her, sounding smug.

  But Max snorted. “Don’t act like Stevie told you everything. She didn’t. She just hates when I drive.”

  Stevie pointed her spoon at Max. “Because you drive like a maniac. We’re safer with the crazed wolverine.”

  Dutch winked at her. “See? You do like me.”

/>   “Nope,” Max corrected. “She tolerates you. And that does not stop her from hurting you with a fountain pen.”

  Stevie sneered, “I barely touched that whiny baby.”

  “I heard you nearly took his eye out.”

  “He shouldn’t have made me mad.”

  Dutch put his arm around Max’s shoulders, smiled at them both. “God, I missed you guys.”

  “See? He’s just proving my point,” Stevie pointed out to her sister. “Crazed wolverine.”

  * * *

  Dee-Ann Smith, wearing a Tennessee Titans T-shirt and her daddy’s old trucker cap, sat on the floor and warded off the blows from the plastic knife with her bare hands.

  “Good,” she encouraged. “Keep going.”

  Her mate walked into the kitchen. “Dee-Ann, we have comp—no!” He reached down and took the plastic knife from the small hand gripping it. “We have had this discussion,” he told Dee-Ann and the ball of energy glaring at him.

  He cleared his throat. “Knives are not toys or weapons. They are for cooking and eating.”

  “That’s not what granddaddy says.”

  Ulrich Van Holtz sighed and tossed the plastic blade into the recycle bin. “We’ve got to stop sending you to Tennessee every summer.”

  “Do that and I’ll walk there on my own.” Lizzy-Ann Van Holtz Smith stared up at her father a few seconds to get her point across before turning and walking away from him.

  Ric glared down at Dee-Ann.

  “What are you lookin’ at me like that for?”

  “You know why.” He pointed at their six-year-old daughter and whispered, “She’s your fault.”

  “I was never that arrogant. That’s a Van Holtz trait.”

  “Did you forget we’re waiting?” a voice yelled from the front door of their Manhattan apartment.

  “That’s because you don’t matter,” Dee-Ann retorted while getting to her feet and ignoring another glare from her mate.

  Growling a little, he went to walk their guests into the kitchen. Why, she didn’t know. They’d been here enough. They knew the layout of the apartment. Did they really have to keep all these airs and graces for a cat and a bear?

  Dee-Ann looked over and saw that her daughter had put out plates, napkins, and utensils on the island in the middle of their kitchen.

  “What are you doin’?” Dee-Ann asked.

  “Being a good host.”

  The refrigerator door opened and closed. A few seconds later, her baby girl attempted to climb onto one of the stools while holding a platter with a sizable hunk of angel’s food cake on it. When Dee-Ann tried to assist her, she pulled her little arms away. “I’ve got it,” her daughter practically hissed at her.

  “Watch that tone, missy. I ain’t ya daddy.”

  “Obviously.”

  Unable to get her ass up on the seat of the stool, Lizzy braced her legs on one of the stool rungs and the base of the island. Using all her strength, she lifted the plate of cake.

  Cringing, Dee-Ann quickly placed her instep against the outside of the stool so it didn’t slip and, making sure her daughter didn’t see her, she placed one forefinger under the plate and kept it balanced as Lizzy pushed it onto the island’s marble top.

  Once it was in place, Lizzy dropped to the floor and looked up at her mother with those cold blue eyes.

  “Told you I had it.”

  Dee-Ann flashed her fangs, accompanied with an appropriate growl of warning. Lizzy hissed back. There were no fangs but she got her point across. As had once been pointed out by Lizzy’s extremely frustrated teacher . . . until she’d looked up into Dee’s yellow-eyed gaze.

  After that, Ric went to all parent-teacher conferences.

  “Is that my favorite girl?” a voice rang out.

  Lizzy grinned and went around the island. “Auntie Cella!”

  Marcella Malone crouched low and opened her arms.

  “Come here, brat.”

  Lizzy-Ann ran into her godmother’s open arms, giggling when Cella kissed her on the neck and hugged her tight.

  “What are you up to, brat?”

  “Risking a good scruff-yankin’,” Dee-Ann volunteered.

  Lizzy ignored her mother and took Malone’s hand. “I have the table all set for you, ma’am.”

  Malone bit her lip to stop from laughing. “Why, thank you.”

  “This way.” Lizzy led her to the island and pointed at a specific chair. “You sit here.”

  Malone sat down as her mate and Ric came into the kitchen.

  “Uncle Crush.” She took Lou Crushek’s hand and led him to another stool before she climbed up on the island, resting on her knees.

  “Cake?” she asked, using her best “restaurant voice.”

  “Yes, please,” replied Crush, one of Lizzy’s many unofficial “uncles.” Already Dee-Ann feared for any boy who came sniffing around her little girl. It would not end well for hopeful suitors.

  Lizzy held her hand out. “Knife, Daddy.”

  “Nope.” He went to one of the drawers and pulled out a cake server, placing the handle in his daughter’s pudgy hand. “This will do to cut a cake.”

  Lizzy stared at the cake cutter and back at her father. “You don’t think I could use this as a weapon?”

  Ric went pale and Crush’s mouth dropped open, but Malone’s hand flew to her mouth, trying to stifle the laughter and failing.

  “Are you here for a reason, Malone?” Dee-Ann quickly asked in the hopes of preventing one of those long lectures Ric insisted on concerning their daughter.

  Because, honestly, it wasn’t like Dee-Ann hadn’t warned him before she’d gotten pregnant. Then Lizzy’s lineage had been confirmed when the first thing their daughter did, her second day on this earth, was to bite down on the doctor’s hand. The shifter doctor didn’t even try to pretend that what Lizzy was doing was remotely normal. Especially when she stared at him with those intense blue eyes while she bit down harder. It was all gum and terror.

  Of course, the situation didn’t improve when Dee-Ann’s daddy took the baby from the doctor and said, “She don’t like you, cat . . . get out.”

  Malone didn’t respond to Dee’s question right away. Too busy trying to keep that laughter quiet. Eventually, she cleared her throat and said, “You free tomorrow?”

  “Yep.”

  “We got a call. Someone wants us to take a look at something.”

  That was . . . vague. Malone wasn’t really good at vague.

  “Somethin’ messy?” Dee-Ann asked.

  “Not for us. We’re just to observe and report.”

  “Report to who?”

  Ric, in theory, was her boss. Orders usually came from him or his Uncle Van. They’d been working together for the simply named Group since a few months after Dee-Ann had been discharged from the Marine Corps. A US-only protection team for shifters. All shifters, including the ones Dee-Ann’s daddy called “the mutts and the freaks.”

  Malone’s international team, however, only protected the felines. Katzenhaus not being big on the canine or ursus love.

  More and more often, though, they were forced to work together to protect everyone, but usually Dee-Ann’s orders came from Ric or his boss, Niles Van Holtz. But before Dee-Ann could point that out to the feline in her home, her daughter said, “It’s whom.”

  Dee-Ann gazed at her daughter, carefully cutting big wedges of cake and placing each one on a plate for their “guests.”

  “What?” Dee-Ann asked.

  “It’s whom. ‘Report to whom?’ Not who.”

  It took Dee-Ann a few seconds to realize her six-year-old was correcting her grammar. She handled that with a smirk and a sharp, “Shut up.”

  “Dee!” Ric chastised, shocked.

  Malone, however, burst out laughing, unable to hold it in anymore.

  And Crushek just ate his cake.

  “It’s all right, Daddy,” Lizzy replied, pushing a plate toward her father. “She just knows I’m right.”

&nb
sp; Dee-Ann reached over and took the plate of cake Lizzy had cut for her father, knowing full well it would annoy the hell out of her.

  “I still say we drop her off at the pound,” Dee-Ann told her mate after a few bites of her cake. Again, just to annoy her child. “She’s still small. Someone will take her.”

  “Yeah,” Crush said around his own cake, “but they’ll only bring her back.”

  Lizzy narrowed her blue eyes on Crush and, staring at him, reached over and placed one pudgy forefinger on his cake plate. Then, without breaking eye contact, pulled the plate away from him.

  At that point, Malone ran from the room, her laughter filling the apartment. And Dee-Ann followed, because she couldn’t stop laughing either.

  * * *

  Charlie was grateful when her sisters returned to the rental house with their next-day plans locked in tight and a seventy-inch flat-screen television in the trunk of Dutch’s car. While Max and Dutch set it up, Stevie told Charlie that their route was already mapped and they’d even stopped by the location to make sure everything they needed was in place, which wasn’t a lot. Just a few extra weapons and emergency clothes.

  What irritated Charlie, though, was that Dutch was there for the entire discussion, which meant to Charlie he was now officially involved.

  Charlie didn’t want Dutch involved but he’d promised to stay in the car and out of their way, if that was what she wanted. And it was. As far as Charlie was concerned, Dutch’s presence would only make things worse. And Max would be distracted because she’d be busy trying to protect him.

  So it was better this way.

  Also better, at least at the moment, was the new TV. Charlie was so glad Max had gotten it for them. It not only cut down on the arguing between her sisters—especially once they’d gotten the cable set up and found the horror channel—but it gave Charlie a chance to leave the house without her sisters noticing or worrying.

  Charlie sat down on the top step and tried her best to enjoy the summer night. There was just one problem. She had the worst migraine ever. So bad she couldn’t even look up at the streetlight because it felt like looking into the sun.

  She removed her glasses and pressed the palms of her hands against her eyes. Then she wondered if her brain was literally rolling around inside her skull. Because, at the moment, that’s exactly how it felt.