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“Her adorable, precious puppy!” Phoenix squealed.
“JoJo won’t mind. She likes cats.”
Phoenix let out a huff of exasperation, then turned toward the other women sitting at the table.
“No,” the woman said without without looking up from the two kittens she was playing with.
Merry did a double-take, then started counting kittens. She could have sworn there’d only been eight when she’d walked into the bar, but now, with the four in Phoenix’s hands, the one with Gigi, the two with Glory plus Spike and Drusilla…
“But Glory,” Phoenix began.
“You’ve already claimed four, Phoenix,” Glory said. “These two kittens are mine.”
“Damnit!" Someone roared from across the room. “I blame you, Adam!”
Phoenix pouted, then turned to Merry, a speculative look on her face.
Before Merry could offer her Spike and Drusilla, the door behind her opened and a voice called out, “We heard there were kittens!” and in a rush of movement, Merry found herself surrounded by three older women, who instantly reached into the empty box and started pulling out more black kittens.
“What in all the Realms of Hell is going on?” Merry muttered.
“What’s going on with that box of kittens?” Bygul growled.
“Is it my imagination or are those kittens multiplying?” Tivali asked.
“They’re not multiplying,” Soraya giggled. “We have seventy-three kittens on our caseload and I figured we might as well take advantage and place some with the shifters. I mean, look at those women! They’re clearly cat people.”
“They’re wolves, Soraya,” Muezza said severely.
“So?”
“So wolves are dog people,” Bygul said. “Sure, we’ve had the occasional success with them, but you can’t expect all wolves to—” He fell silent as the new arrivals started squealing and fawning all over the kittens, petting, cuddling and playing with them, all while arguing over who was going to adopt which one.
“Obviously, I can,” Soraya said. “Besides, the snow leopard has a dog companion.”
“What does that have to do with wolves and cats?” Tivali asked exasperatedly.
“Cats are way less accepting than dogs,” Soraya said. “So if a snow leopard can accept a dog, I figure these wolves should have no problems accepting a few adorable kittens.”
“A few?” Bygul asked incredulously.
“Well, she’s got a point,” Muezza said. “About the kittens being adorable anyway.”
“Regardless of how cute they are, you can’t send all seventy-three kittens to Jamesville,” Bygul said. “The wolves would riot.”
“I’m not planning to send all of them,” Soraya said. “Just the black ones. They’re so difficult to place.”
“Uh-huh,” Tivali said. “And exactly how many black kittens are on the caseload?”
“Forty-one, I think. Or maybe it’s forty-two.”
“You can’t send that many cats to the wolves,” Bygul exclaimed.
Merry counted the kittens racing around the bar. The women had decided to let the kittens down to play and from that point on, chaos reigned.
Just when Merry thought she had a handle on the number of kittens, she’d lose count and have to start again.
It wasn’t easy counting kittens who refused to sit still and who looked so much alike.
