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"Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!"
"Would you like to leave her a message for when she wakes up?"
"No. Want her home. Mommy?" Her voice rose, taking on that imperative tone I knew too well. "Come home."
"Kate, she's--"
"Now. Come home now. Tell Daddy. Come home. Mommy and Daddy. Come home right now."
"I'll call back."
The message ended. Parental guilt for breakfast. Yummy.
Message two.
"It's me again. I apologize for that. I thought she was downstairs. As I was saying, it's likely Clay was right--that Dennis was investigating whatever you two saw in the woods. As intriguing as that is, though, I'm more concerned with these apparent new immigrants. I decided to call--"
"Is that Mom?" Logan's voice sounded in the distance, then stockinged feet padded across the floor.
"Yes, I'm just leaving her a message. If you can wait a minute, you can say something."
"I want to talk to Mom. Not her voice mail."
There are times when it's nice having a preschooler who can communicate so well. This was not one of them. It's like when they were infants and we couldn't wait for them to walk... then we were running ourselves ragged chasing after them, wondering, What the hell was I thinking?
"You will talk to her," Jeremy said calmly. "Later, after she wakes up. Now can you sit on the bed and wait, please? We'll be leaving soon." He returned to the message. "I decided to call Roman."
Roman Novikov was the Alpha of the Russian Pack. He'd made contact with Jeremy last year, through the interracial council, wanting to ask about a new mutt they presumed was American.
This may seem perfectly natural. It's the twenty-first century, we have computers, telephones, a million ways to keep in touch long distance, so why wouldn't Alphas share information and resources? But it just doesn't happen, no more than wild wolf packs interact. We each have our own territory and most are content to pretend the others don't exist. Roman is one of the more progressive Alphas. We weren't the first Pack he'd reached out to, trying to open the lines of communication, but Jeremy was the first Alpha who'd welcomed the contact, and they'd talked a few times since.
"Roman thought--"
"When is Mom coming home?" Logan asked. His voice was far enough away to tell me he'd obeyed the command to sit on the bed. As for waiting quietly, well, the quiet part had been implied, as Clay would say. Since it hadn't been explicitly stated, it wasn't an actual order.
"In a couple of days."
"You said a couple of days two days ago. A couple is two. So she should be coming home now. Is she coming home?"
"Not yet. Now--"
"When is she coming home? Is Dad still with her? Why do they both need to be away?"
"I know you miss them, but they're very busy. They want to come home and they will as soon as they can."
"Kate!" Logan called.
The distant thump of answering footsteps.
"Jeremy's on the phone with Mom again, Kate."
"Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!"
I sighed. Why kick up a fuss and risk getting into trouble when you can get your sister to do it for you? Sneaky little beggar. We were going to have to have a chat about this. A firmly and carefully worded chat, so he couldn't find a loophole.
Besieged by Kate, Jeremy tried calling Jaime, but she was apparently out of earshot, so he quickly finished leaving his message. With Kate screeching in the background all I caught was something about a call, presumably that he'd phone later.
I tried calling him back. Still no answer. I had Jaime's cell phone number, but that wouldn't solve the problem, as the kids were with them. I left a message at home saying I would try again later.
