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Freddy rushed to my side, holding an open bottle of water. I don’t know where he found it, but when he handed it to her and she drank from it eagerly, soothing her coughing, I was grateful. For all my supposed smarts, I hadn’t even thought of getting her some water. In fact, I didn’t even know what I was thinking other than I needed to get her outside and to our doctor. A new and strange feeling for me since, while I was friendly with people, I tended to be more reserved than my outgoing twin. I liked the calm and quiet. It took time before I warmed up to people. And to worry about them, well, that took even longer.
A soft hand patted my chest, pulling me from my thoughts. “I’m good, big guy. You can put me down now.”
“No.” Freddy and Noel looked at me as if I was crazy, but I didn’t care what they thought. I only knew that I didn’t want to put her down. I liked having her in my arms. And for some crazy reason, I thought she’d be safer if I held her.
“Teddy,” Noel tried to reason with me, but I wasn’t having any of it. Instead, I tightened my grip on her as if I worried that someone would take her from me.
“No. She’s sick. She needs me, needs us.” And the moment I said the words, I knew it was true… both parts. I could feel the unnatural heat rising from her body. I’d never been around someone with a real fever since I didn’t spend that much time with humans in a close capacity and shifters had to be poisoned or cursed to exhibit a fever.
But it was the second part of my statement that floored me. She did need me, need us. I knew it with every cell in my body even if I wasn’t willing to say the word yet. Besides, I didn’t even know what type of paranormal she was, if she even was one as the council did have some people on their approved lists who were human, so saying what I suspected she was might cause more issues. From what we’d been told, humans and witches didn’t understand mates. Some of them reacted badly when their mate told them too soon. And I wasn’t about to add to her worries when she was sick.
“Teddy, is that your name?” She pressed her hand to my face, turning it until all I could see was hers. I was resigned to see anger or fear at my high-handed declarations, but instead, I found sympathy and awe, along with a healthy dose of concern. That emotion I understood because I wasn’t acting like myself. And to someone who didn’t know me, didn’t know how I usually thought everything through over and over until even I was sick of thinking about it, I probably looked like a crazy person. Someone who needed some mental help to deal with a past trauma. “Thank you for taking care of me while I was coughing. The air is better up here. Less dust and staleness. But I’m good now.”
“You’re not,” I tried to argue. “You’re running a fever.”
She scoffed. “I’m a shifter. And I’m not used to cold like this. My body’s just trying to adjust.”
Her words sounded rational, and I had no basis to disbelieve her, but I did. Something seemed off whether she knew it or not. So, I tried once again. “Are you sure because it doesn’t feel that way to me.”
“I’m sure.”
“Teddy, she’s fine.” I glanced at my brother. He was the other half of my conscious. Whenever I retreated too far into myself, he was the one who pulled me out. Or when I became too serious, he pushed me into having fun. If he felt that I was going overboard with my concern than he’d be the one to tell me, the one I’d trust.
“Okay” I lowered her to the ground, but kept my hand on her waist, needing the comfort and reassurance of her touch to know that she’d be okay. “I’m sorry.”
She turned in my hold, putting her back to the open door and the cold wind that blew in. A grimace of pain flashed across her face but then smoothed away. It was so fast; I began to wonder if I’d imagined it. But when she shivered under my fingers, I wrapped my arms around her tighter and spun, using my big body to block the artic air that poured in. “Noel, shut the door.”
When I heard it click, I relaxed a little, but still, my protective instincts were in overdrive. I brushed my fingers over her cheek. The heat popped beads of sweat onto my forehead. Something I read in a human book once came back to me. Something about how you should strip down someone with a fever to help their body not to overheat. Without stopping to think or even ask permission, I yanked her toque off her head, freeing a wave of long, wavy hair that reminded me of sand in colour. All those golden hues that never translated as well into pictures as it did in real life. The ones that made it seem like there was actual life in the sand.
“Holy fuck,” my brother took the words right from my mouth. Her hair was gorgeous and all I wanted to do was to run my fingers through it, letting it flow like silk over my skin.
“Now that she’s no longer coughing, can someone tell me who the fuck she is and where’s the fucking plumber?”
She pushed away from me, a glower on her face as she prepared to take on Noel’s mouth and the stuff he spewed from it, but I refused to let her go, turning to stand behind her, giving her support. Over her head, I glanced at Freddy’s shining, eager eyes. From the way she’d torn us down, he couldn’t wait to see her go against Noel with all her fire. And I couldn’t agree more.
Chapter Four
Mel (Melinda)
Fucking plumber?! I’ll show him who the fucking plumber is. The feeling of weakness and being washed out left by the coughing fit vanished under the steel of my ire. Yes, I was a woman. And yes, I was a plumber. So what? Women actually made better plumbers as we could usually fit into smaller, tighter spaces which when you thought about it, except for rough ins, most of a plumber’s work took place inside cabinets.
I shoved my hands onto my hips, surprised when I felt large hands under my gloved ones. Teddy’s touch had become so comfortable that I hadn’t even noticed he still had his hands on me. Something that wasn’t in my experience wheelhouse. Normally I shied away from letting people I didn’t know touch me—and even sometimes those that I did know. Growing up without a mom, or even a true community of shifters since my kept to the fringes and I wasn’t exactly welcome due to my mom, I wasn’t touched a lot, making it seem highly intimate, showing a level of trust with someone when it did occur.
Not that I let any of that cool the anger I felt. What was with these guys and opening their mouths only to insert their large feet in? And by large feet, I really meant it. The identical twins towered over my five-foot four height. And this new guy, Noel, was even bigger. For most shifters, I was short, even shorter than other sand cats. I, on the other hand, preferred to be called petite. It didn’t come with the same connotations that being short did. Besides, I always believed that the best things came in small packages… probably because we always had to fight to prove ourselves up to the tasks that others assumed we couldn’t do. It made us stronger, fiercer, and more determined to succeed. Hence my career as a plumber.
My face scrunched as I glared. “I’m the plumber. Have a problem with it? And yes, as I explained to these bozos”—I glanced between the twins, smirking to show them that there were no hard feelings after the care they showed me—“yes, I am a woman.”
“Y-you’re Mel Swindon?” He stepped closer, blocking the light that came in through the window in the front door with his wide frame. The man had shoulders that went on for days in contrast to the twins who were narrower, sleeker. I wondered if he ever played the human version of North American football or maybe rugby. He had the body for it. Large, powerful, built like a wall yet moved with grace and speed, all things useful in those sports. “The plumber on the list of council approved tradespeople?”
“Yes, and yes. Mel is short for Melinda.”
He stopped in front of me. His chest nearly brushing mine, squishing me between himself and Teddy who’d yet to move from his spot behind me. I should have felt scared, intimidated with them surrounding me, invading my personal space. Instead, comfort, safety, and a sense of peace—all foreign concepts to me—flowed through me like a warm hug from the rare occasions my father gave me one. It tamed the anger within me.
“Well then, Mel, what seems to be the problem with the pipes?”
I took a deep breath to steady my conflicting emotions. Since seeing these three, hearing their voices, and touching Teddy, everything seemed off. Like the world tilted onto its side and inside out. It made me unsure of everything I knew except my plumbing knowledge. That was vast and in my DNA. I understood their confusion over me. It had been designed that way since we knew that no one would take me seriously as a plumber in our more patriarchal world, despite all the changes over the years. Females still faced massive barriers when they entered trades. My great-grandfather, Mel, had started our plumbing business which passed on to my grandfather and then my father. I grew up going out on jobs with him since there’d been no one to watch me while he worked. And since each generation the first male child of the first litter had been called Mel, dad carried on the tradition… except there was no litter and no male heir.
So, plumbing was something I could do in my sleep.
