Naomi pressed a hand to her stomach, where butterflies started doing somersaults. “Yes. I’m a little nervous.”
“Don’t be. She’s nice, and she knows, like, just about everything about shifters. Plus, she’ll make sure you’re caught up, education-wise, in all things Other.”
“I have a lot to learn. I didn’t know anything about the Council, or laws, or… or Chosen… or anything,” Naomi admitted.
“I’m in the same boat,” Tamera commiserated. “I didn’t even know there was such a thing as shapeshifters until a few weeks ago. Much less that I was one.”
“Wait! What?” Naomi stared at her in astonishment. “How could you not know?”
“My mom was the shifter, and she died when I was a toddler. I grew up in foster care. Ever since I was a teenager, I kept having these… feelings, I guess you might call it. Or vivid imagery of things like my claws in a tree. Stretching with the sun warm on my fur.”
“You must have thought you were going mad!”
Tamera grimaced. “I did. Literally. Earlier this year, I decided to seek professional help, and wound up on a seventy-two-hour involuntary hold, then a week’s enforced stay in an institution down in Alabama. When I got out, I made tracks away from there. It was just chance… or coincidence… that I wound up here, applying for a receptionist job at the vet clinic, and… well, here we are!”
Pondering that, Naomi had to agree. “Just like it was chance… or, again, coincidence… that the zoo called in Liam to check on my leopard, instead of their regular zoo vet. It kind of makes you wonder if there really is no such thing as coincidence, doesn’t it?”
“Right?” Tamera hesitated a minute, then continued. “I know you’ve been through a lot, and you must be uncertain and maybe a little scared still, but you might want to think about what you just said. Maybe…” and she tapped the table for emphasis, “maybe you were meant to be here.”
“Maybe I was meant to be here,” Naomi repeated under her breath. “I can’t even… that’s just… Wow!”
Tamera nodded, and rose to her feet. “Think about it,” she advised, heading out the door with a smiling wave.
With a guilty look around to be sure she was alone, Naomi slunk back to the buffet, and nabbed a few more strips of bacon.
A few minutes later, her breakfast finished, Naomi was just settling herself in the lounge with a second cup of coffee when Liam came through the door. The sense of relief she felt on seeing him was enormous, and she heaved a deep sigh.
“Liam! I didn’t know you’d be here!”
“You didn’t think I’d leave you all alone without any moral support, did you?” He dropped into the chair next to her. “I took a couple hours off work so I could be here for you.”
“I appreciate it, so much,” she told him. “I can’t help feeling nervous, but oh! I met Tamera, and Sasha, and Adina, when I came down for breakfast. Plus, about a dozen kids.” She grinned. “Actually, I think it was only five or six children, it only seemed like a lot more when I first walked in.”
“That leaves two of the women you haven’t met yet. Tamera’s sister, Layla, who has one son, and Takesha, who also has a son. Sasha has two older sons, Samir, who’s sixteen, and Zuni, who’s in his early twenties I think.”
She blinked at him. “And they’re all living here at the bed and breakfast?”
Liam nodded, stretching his legs out as he relaxed in the overstuffed armchair. “Yeah, for now, but not much longer. Tamera and Kester are looking for a house to rent, and Layla and her son, who’s just a few years old, will move in with them. It’s going to take awhile longer for the rest. None of the women have any experience of life outside the compound where they were kept. Their knowledge of the world is abysmal, they have no idea even how to manage money, how bank cards work. Not how to drive, or even take a bus. Nothing. They don’t even know how to make decisions for themselves.”
Naomi shuddered. “I can’t even imagine.”
“And there are more of them, some up in Maine. A few chose to go live in Britain, and one went to Egypt. The shifter community has stepped up in a huge way to help out. Making sure they get education, teaching them about… hell, everything! At the same time, we don’t want them overwhelmed, so everyone’s juggling schedules like crazy, trying to help them get up to speed, but still allow them to go at their own pace.”
Frowning, Naomi turned that over in her mind. “Wouldn’t it be easier to have them all in one place?”
“Sure,” he responded easily. “But remember, they’ve never had choices in their all their life. So that was a pretty big first step, to lay out the offers of refuge that came in, and let each woman pick where they wanted to go, who they wanted to stay with. Like Layla came here, because Tamera is her sister. Two of the women who chose to go to Britain were sisters.”
He grinned suddenly. “Jacinth and Douglas wound up taking in a fourteen-year-old girl. She had no family left, and from what I’ve heard, she latched onto Jacinth and wouldn’t let go, declaring she was going home with her.”
Naomi struggled to remember what she knew of the people here. “Jacinth is with Douglas, right? One of the veterinary clinic partners, and he has two young children?”
“That’s it,” Liam approved. “Talya… that’s her name… sees Jacinth as her last-minute rescuer, and with good reason. Once the girls had their fourteenth birthday, they were paired up with one of the men for breeding. And Talya turned fourteen last week.”
Naomi gasped, feeling the color drain from her face. “How horrible!”
He nodded. “Sickening. In a very real sense, Jacinth was her savior, so it’s not surprising she clung to her. Douglas keeps me updated when we run into each other at the clinic, he says it’s going really well. Talya’s bonded with the children, and Molly, the four-year-old, apparently just loves her.”
Both their phones started buzzing, and in unison they looked at the incoming text.
