by Terry Spear
“Well, great. Now you can go to ours. We have different themes every year. I got to pick it this year, so I opted for a steampunk Halloween.”
“How fun. What about humans who attend the party? If I suddenly have to turn?”
“It’s strictly by cougar invitation only.”
It would make her feel better if she were welcomed to the community, though she could imagine being horribly self-conscious if she shifted during the party. At least for Ricky he had his brother who had been having the same difficulty.
“The two of them—Ricky and Kolby—sure were up to some mischief when they were newly turned,” Tracey said.
Mandy smiled. She could see Ricky being like that. “How did you get turned, Ricky?” she asked.
“One of the bad guys I informed on was a cougar and he bit me. So I didn’t have a choice.”
Oh, how awful. She could imagine how terrified he must have been, and she figured the guy hadn’t done it by accident, but to kill him. “What happened to him?”
“He was killed. We don’t jail murderous cougars. Not that we had much choice anyway.”
“Oh.” Now that, she hadn’t expected.
“It’s a different world for us as cougars. We can’t be incarcerated long term for fear that someone can’t control their shifting, or because some prisoner makes them angry and the prisoner who is a cougar shifts,” Tracey said.
“If you run into any trouble at all, you need to let one of us know about it right away. Like if someone sees you shift, or you accidentally bite a human. Or you’re injured and are in a hospital somewhere else where they don’t have a cougar medical staff. We heal too quickly. But at least our blood and everything about us is all human or all cougar, no mix of the two if anyone should run tests on you,” Ricky said.
“That’s good to know.” She hadn’t even considered that part of the equation yet.
“You planned to move to Loveland if you got a job, right?” Tracey asked.
“Yeah.”
“Okay, well, since you have a job here now, as soon as you can shift okay, you must be planning on moving here,” Tracey said.
“Uh, yeah, I’ll have to do that.”
“You’ll have tons of help. We just need to know what you need moved and when you want to do it,” Tracey said.
“I’ll have to go with whoever goes,” Mandy said.
“You could shift when it’s not a good idea,” Ricky said. “But I’ll go.”
“You have your leg in a cast.”
“I’m still going.”
“I have a roommate at the apartment, so I want to make sure I only get my things.” Mandy really didn’t want him going along for the ride. The others, sure, in case Edgar gave her trouble about moving out. But she didn’t want Edgar and Ricky getting into it.
“I’m sure she would let us know what is hers and what is yours,” Ricky said, sounding adamant about her not going.
“My roommate doesn’t know I planned on leaving and he’s a guy, not a girl.”
“He? He’s gay, right?” Ricky said.
“No, he’s not gay and we’ve been dating, all right? He wanted to make sure we were compatible before we tied the knot.”
“Is there any issue about paying the rent?” Tracey asked, quickly changing the subject. “If you had some agreement that you had to give a couple of months’ notice, we’ll handle it.”
“Thanks, but he was paying the rent. I was volunteering at a hospital until I could work as an LPN.”
“But you didn’t want to work in Durango,” Ricky said, sounding suspicious of her relationship with her boyfriend.
“It wasn’t working out, okay? That doesn’t mean you and I are getting together again either though.”
“Did he want you to leave Durango?” Ricky asked as they parked at the ranch.
When they arrived, Mandy loved the view of the mountains, barns, corrals, and horses, the wide-open spaces, just beautiful. “No. I told him I was doing the interview, but I didn’t tell him where I was going. I’m sure he assumed I was going to the interview somewhere locally.”
“When did you want to leave Durango?” Tracey asked as they piled out of the car.
“Right away. I might as well get this done, get my clothes and other things, and let him know I’m not staying with him any longer.” None of this was going to be easy, moving to a place she hadn’t intended, having so many people willing to help her out, when she’d expected to be alone in her new life, dealing with the cougar shifting business. “Aren’t the horses afraid of you when they smell you are cougars or see you wearing your cougar fur coat?” Mandy asked Tracey.
“No. We raised them, and they’re used to our scent and sight, both as cougars and humans,” Tracey said.
Kolby hurried over to greet them. “I still can’t believe you bit Mandy and she’s not too mad at you that she would stay here with us.”
“She’s coming to the Halloween party. Doc gave her a job so she’s happy,” Ricky said.
Mandy scoffed. “Wait until I keep having shifting issues.”
“Come inside and I’ll show you your room and let you meet the kids and Hal,” Tracey said.
Hal was home and had the kids playing with finger paints, his own fingers just as covered with paint. “It’s washable,” he said, smiling.
“Uh-huh,” Tracey said. “Hal wants the kids to explore every artistic avenue to see if any of them have an aptitude in something. His parents were adamant that he’d never be an artist, so he’s determined to encourage the kids that they can do anything they set their minds to do.” She pointed to each of the kids, “That’s Liam with the blue paint on his hands and nose, Evan Chase with the green paint on his shirt, Tabitha with the yellow hands, and Denise who’s perfectly clean. This is Mandy Richards and she’s staying with us for a while.” Then she led Mandy into the guestroom where she would stay.
Ricky followed behind them in his walking cast.
“I think she only meant to show me my room, not you,” Mandy said to Ricky.
He gave her one of his winning smiles that had always charmed her. “You’re my nurse, so I need to stick close to you, in case I’m in distress.”
“Okay, well, as your nurse, I order you to return to the living room and put your foot up. Or go to the bunkhouse and get some sleep. If you have any trouble, Kolby can come and get me.”
5
The next day, though Mandy wanted to drive her own car to her shared apartment with Edgar in Durango, Ricky knew she couldn’t. Not with the problem she’d have with shifting.
They left early that morning, Hal driving a rental van and Chase driving a Suburban, carrying Mandy and Ricky. Ricky wasn’t sure what to expect when they arrived at her apartment and had to deal with the boyfriend, though he, Chase, and Hal were wearing deputy sheriff badges, jeans, jackets, and cowboy boots and they were armed. Unfortunately, Ricky was wearing a walking cast on his left leg. They were dressed for trouble in the event Mandy’s boyfriend gave them any difficulty.
When they finally reached the apartment, Mandy said, “Edgar’s car is here. And that’s one of his brothers’ cars.”
She sounded worried about it. Ricky was glad that Chase and Hal had come with them in case Edgar created a scene. He wished he didn’t have a gimpy leg to deal with, or he’d take care of Edgar on his own.
They got out of the vehicles and Mandy said to Ricky, “Are you sure you want to go inside?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. I want to help. I’m not going to beat up the guy if you’re worried about that.”
She smiled at him. “I was more worried he might hurt you. I already hurt you. You don’t need to prove anything to him or to me.”
“I’ll be fine.” Ricky was hoping once they got to know each other again, she and he could become more than just friends. He was glad she was getting out of her relationship with this Edgar guy.
Mandy frowned. “I hear his other brother is talking in there also,” she warned.
&
nbsp; “That shouldn’t be a problem,” Chase said as they followed her to the apartment, all of them carrying boxes.
Mandy unlocked the door and started inside, Chase and Hal following. Ricky was right behind them, hobbling along, wishing he could have been walking in with Mandy, to show Edgar she was with him, even if she really wasn’t.
A blond-haired man with a scraggly beard, immediately got up from the couch where two other men were sitting while they watched TV.
“What the hell is this all about?” the one man said, Ricky assuming it was Edgar.
“I have a job and I’m moving, Edgar. My friends are here to help me.” Mandy didn’t wait for Edgar to respond and she headed down the hall.
Ricky noted she didn’t tell them where she was moving to and he suspected she was worried he’d come after her and cause trouble. But what worried Ricky more was that the men were all cougars.
The man’s eyes went round. “You’re all cougars. Who the hell did that to you, Mandy?”
“You and your brothers are cougars too?” Mandy appeared as shocked as Ricky felt and she looked ready to collapse.
Ricky quickly grabbed her arm. He didn’t blame her. She had been living here with a cougar all along. One who had been turned or was born that way though? He suspected they’d been born that way, or she would have caught them shifting at some time or another.
Edgar made a step in his direction to pull them apart, but Hal and Chase quickly interceded, both showing their badges. Ricky showed his too, since today he was supposed to officially be on the payroll.
“Back off,” Chase said to Edgar, his tone dark and menacing. “You don’t want to interfere in this.”
Ricky again wished he wasn’t wearing a darned cast. He wanted to look as lethal as Hal and Chase appeared right now. Instead, he felt useless, though he wore his fiercest expression, but the walking cast ruined his bad-to-the-bone deputy sheriff look. He went with Mandy to help her pack her clothes and everything else she wanted to take with her in her bedroom.
Hal came back to check on them, bringing some boxes, while Chase remained in the living room, keeping the brothers in check.
“I can’t believe they’re cougars,” she said, packing her clothes in a couple of bags while Hal and Ricky packed the rest of her things in boxes.
“Yeah, we were sure surprised too,” Hal said.
Ricky figured it wouldn’t have taken long before Edgar decided she was the one for him and turned her. Now he was probably pissed off that he hadn’t done so already.
When they left the bedroom with the boxes and suitcases, Edgar asked Mandy, “Where are you going?”
Ricky didn’t like that he was asking, like he wanted to know just where she was going to be so he could continue to pursue her. Maybe even more so now that she was a cougar too.
“I’ve got a job. It wouldn’t have worked out between us.” Mandy continued to head to the door with her suitcases.
Again, Ricky noted she hadn’t told him where she was moving to.
“I would have turned you if I’d known you would have been fine with it.”
She rounded on him, her eyes narrowed in irritation. “I’m not fine with it. It was an accident though. If you had turned me on purpose, I would have hated you for it.” She walked outside with her suitcases while Hal and Ricky carried out the boxes full of her personal items.
Ricky worried she wasn’t fine with him turning her accidentally either.
Once they secured all the stuff in the moving van, they returned to the house to pack up her kitchen wares. “You can have all the food. I don’t need it,” she said to Edgar who had followed her into the kitchen as if to supervise what she was taking.
“You’re moving in with the gimpy guy?” Edgar asked, his tone sarcastic.
“If it’s any of your business, I’m moving in with the deputy sheriff and his family.”
Ricky wished she had said she was with him, but she was smart to try not to antagonize Edgar too much, when his brothers were watching and listening to everything that was going on. They were careful not to butt in, however.
Edgar watched her as Hal and Ricky helped her box up her kitchen items. Not once did she smile at Ricky or indicate in any way that she had been friends with him long before Edgar had come along. Was she worried about how Edgar would react if he knew Ricky was her old boyfriend? Worse, that he had bitten her? It sure sounded to Ricky like Edgar had planned to turn her eventually, but he’d just been working up to it.
“You didn’t tell me you were leaving.” Edgar folded his arms and looked cross at her.
“I told you I had to get a job as soon as I had my schooling done.”
“Not that you were leaving me.”
“I also had told you that it wasn’t working out between us. You wouldn’t listen to me. Now I have the job in Loveland. So I’m moving there. I have to. I want to. We had some fun times, but now it’s time for both of us to move on. It’s over between us.”
“How come a bunch of deputy sheriffs from Loveland came here with you? Did you tell them you’d have trouble with me when you tried to leave here?” Edgar was surly now.
“No, like I said, I’m staying with the one deputy sheriff and his family. I can’t drive now, not since I’ve been so newly turned.”
“How the hell do you think you can work a job since you’ve just been turned?” Edgar suddenly asked.
Ricky hadn’t expected him to ask about that.
“The clinic is cougar run.” She motioned to the filled-up boxes. “That’s all I want from here. I just need to get some things out of the bathroom and then we can go.” She hurried off with a box to pack her stuff in the bathroom while Chase watched the men and Ricky and Hal headed outside with the kitchen stuff.
When Ricky and Hal returned to the house, he expected her to be ready to leave. She was still in the bathroom. “I’ll go help her,” Ricky said, and hurried off for the bathroom. What he hadn’t expected was to see her clothes on the floor, a box packed, and her pacing across the floor as a cougar, her tail whipping about. She lowered her ears when she saw him and growled.
“We’re leaving. I’ll grab your clothes and the box of stuff. You can be in the Suburban and safe. Just follow me out. Most likely no one will even notice and then we’ll be on our way,” Ricky told her.
She growled low again, annoyed.
“I know. I’m sorry. It’s a pain in the butt in the beginning. But you’ve got a whole bunch of us to get you through it. You’re just one of us now.” He was really glad he’d bitten her instead of Edgar. In Durango, she would have been stuck in the apartment, unless there were more cougar shifters here he didn’t know about. And she wouldn’t have had any other alternative to mate anyone else but Edgar to keep her safe, Ricky suspected, if Edgar had bitten her. Whereas in Yuma Town, they had a whole town of cougar residents who would help take care of her until she adjusted to all of this. She wouldn’t have to be confined to a small apartment.
She followed Ricky out of the bathroom and Hal took the box of toiletries, towels, and her clothes from him. Edgar and his brothers were staring at her as if they really couldn’t believe she was now one of them and they hadn’t been the ones to turn her and keep her.
Edgar frowned. “What clinic is cougar run?”
Ricky smelled the aggression rolling off Edgar in thick waves. His brothers too. Ricky would have felt smugger about it if he really had known that Mandy would be his girlfriend again.
No one told Edgar where the clinic was.
They headed outside and loaded up in the van and the SUV. No one in the other apartments seemed to notice the cougar climbing into the back seat of the SUV. Ricky wondered what kind of work Edgar did. He set her clothes back there in the back seat with her just in case she shifted back on the return drive to Yuma Town.
Before Ricky climbed into the front passenger seat, he heard Edgar say to his brothers, “I’m getting her back.”
“You can’t go up against a bun
ch of cougar deputy sheriffs,” one of Edgar’s brothers said.
Smart man.
Ricky shut his car door and Chase backed out of the parking space, Hal following him with the van. “Did you hear what Edgar said to his brothers?” Ricky asked Chase.
“Yeah, he doesn’t know we live in a cougar-run town and everyone will be watching out for Mandy’s welfare. The word will go out about the men. I managed to get some pictures of them while they were busy fuming over the situation, and I’ll send them out to everyone in the community, including those in Loveland to give them a heads-up.”
“Oh, good.” Mandy might have pictures of Edgar, but maybe not of his brothers. Ricky was glad Chase thought of it. “Do you think they’ll look for her in Loveland?”
“Yeah. Though I’m watching to make sure they don’t follow us.” Chase turned down another road.
“Oh, yeah.” In Ricky’s earlier sleuthing-informant days, he was really good at that. But his head was so wrapped around keeping Mandy safe in her current cougar state—he glanced over the back seat and saw that she was lying down, her eyes closed—he wasn’t thinking about what Edgar and his brothers were sure to do.
“Too bad we couldn’t have made them believe she was just moving to somewhere else in Durango.”
“They’d know we didn’t work there, and probably that we didn’t have a cougar-run clinic.”
“Do you think they even believed that part of the story?” Ricky was hopeful they didn’t.
Chase smiled at him. “No. Who would ever think we’d have a whole cougar-run town.”
Ricky took a deep breath and let it out. “Yeah. You’re right.”
“It’s a long way to Yuma Town though.” Chase got a call on his Bluetooth. “Yeah, Hal, what’s up?”
“What do you want to do about these guys following us to Yuma Town?”
“We let them follow us and we’ll deal with them, or we try to lose them somewhere. But that will be damn hard to do with you driving that van and while we’re traveling together. I don’t want us to split up though. I’ll call Dan and get back with you on that.”