Jan kept struggling. “Bitch,” she yelled at Misty.
“See?” Misty said, wrinkling her nose. “She doesn’t like me much. Thinks I stole her Shifter.”
The soldier looked Misty up and down, his gaze lingering on the skin bared by her sleeveless top and shorts. “Why would you go out with one of them?” he asked. “Ma’am.”
“For the sex.” Misty smiled at him. “Try it sometime.”
One of the other soldiers laughed. “She’s not wrong.”
The soldier holding Jan released her and stepped back. “How about we go after some of the more docile ones?” he asked his colleagues. “This is going to take forever as it is.”
As soon as Jan found herself free, she took off, running in her long-legged stride. The first man gave Misty another once-over. “You get tired of Shifters, come and find me. I’m at the Shifter Bureau attached to the air base.”
Misty only smiled at him and walked away. She heard the other soldiers’ voices as they tramped on. “You don’t have a shot with her,” one said, laughing, “especially once she’s been with a Shifter. Tell you what, I’ll take you to this bar called Coolers. There are some hot Shifter women there.”
Misty drew a ragged breath, feeling sick to her stomach, then hurried out of the heat up to the cool shade of Graham’s front porch.
Jan stepped out of the shadows of the porch’s corner. “Why did you do that?”
Misty stifled a shriek and pressed her hand to her chest. “Crap, don’t do that. How’d you get here before I did?”
“I’m Shifter. I ran. Now, why did you help me?”
“So they wouldn’t test your Collar.” Misty leaned to her and lowered her voice. “It doesn’t work right, does it?”
Jan’s nostrils flared. “I’d think you’d want me to be caught. To be locked up, or executed.”
“Why would I? I didn’t like you wanting to beat me up, but sheesh. Killing you? That’s just wrong.”
Jan stared at Misty a moment longer then she inhaled. She let the breath out and looked thoughtful. “You aren’t lying.”
“No. I’m not.” Misty chewed on her lower lip. “Are there other Shifters whose Collars don’t work?”
Jan nodded. “Some. Eric has them safe. I waited too long to go to ground, and they caught me.” She paused, her gray eyes moving as emotions went through her. “Thank you.”
Misty gave her a nod. “You’re welcome.”
Jan dropped her gaze. “Yeah, well. I better go.”
“Yeah, you’d better. Stay safe.”
Jan glanced around at the empty street then drew a breath. “The blessing of the Goddess go with you.” She said it quickly, in one go, then she turned, jumped from the porch, and loped away.
“Wow,” Misty said softly. “That was . . . Hmm.” She pushed open the door and entered Graham’s house.
She paused inside the front door, an ache in her heart. The house felt so empty without Graham in it. He filled every space of it—the house knew Graham’s laughter, his bellowing voice, his swearing, the way he thundered up and down the stairs and banged around in the kitchen. In that kitchen, he’d made love to Misty, rendering her complete for the first time in her life.
Misty walked into the kitchen and stopped. Ben sat at the kitchen table, a bottle of beer in front of him, Kyle and Matt sitting on either side. Both cubs were in human form, dressed in sweats and T-shirts, and shoveling down ice cream. They were even using spoons.
Ben looked up at her and grinned. Kyle said, with his mouth full, “Hi, Aunt Misty.” Matt continued to eat, as though he’d never get enough.
“What . . . ?” Misty came into the room, moving faster with every step until she leaned down and buried the startled Matt in a big hug. “You’re all right.” Tears wet her cheeks.
“He was knocked around and bruised up,” Ben said. “No permanent damage. I took them to Andrea. She did her mojo.”
Misty released Matt, who grinned at her, and collapsed onto an empty kitchen chair. “Andrea’s still here?”
“Her, Sean, and their cub. But safely hidden away. Andrea was glad to help heal the cubs, though she said Matt wasn’t too badly hurt.”
“Thank God,” Misty said, heartfelt. “And the Goddess too, I guess. Do you know Andrea?”
“You should ask—did she know me? Answer, no. Not until I introduced myself. But I know who she is. I keep tabs on Shifters.”
“Do you really?” Misty looked him over. Ben, as before, had an innocuous look, despite his ex-con appearance. If he really was an ex-con. “You’ve been to prison, have you?”
“Oh, yeah. I just didn’t say whose prison it was.”
“And that means . . . what?”
Ben looked thoughtful. “The Fae put me in prison for a while. They talked about horrible ways to execute me, then they decided banishment would be even better.”
“Really? If Oison is typical, I can’t believe they thought letting you go was satisfying.”
“Well.” Ben folded his hands around the bottle of beer on the table. “They didn’t just banish me from Faerie. They banished my entire race. Walked us out into the harsh human wilderness, locked the gates and made sure they never opened for us again. Half of us died the first year. How do you think I feel, knowing that?” Something dark flashed in his eyes, endless pain that Misty guessed never went away.
“What did you do? To get put in prison, I mean?”
Ben shrugged, masking the anguished look. “I killed one of their emperors. I killed him because he was running a war that was slaughtering my people, whole clans at a time. I snuck into the emperor’s tent, pretending I was a pathetic sex addict who wanted the joy of an emperor doing me. The emperor’s ego loved that. He got all his guards to leave us alone, and then . . .” Ben sliced his finger across his throat. “I knew I’d never get away, and I was captured, but I didn’t care. Worth it. When an emperor dies, the High Fae clans fight each other to the last man to see who controls the next one, but in a rare case of Fae agreement, all the clans decided to banish me and my people.”
And half had died in the first year. Misty’s heart squeezed. “Ben, I’m so sorry.”
Ben shrugged, the flash of pain there and gone again. “Even so, more of us survived because that emperor was dead, and the Fae couldn’t use us anymore. We never thrived again, but we’re still around. We’ve been helping humans and Shifters survive encounters with the Fae for nine hundred years now.”