Page 28 of Bred Mate
“That’s one way of looking at it,” she says. “The other is that you are going to jail. You’re responsible for hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage, and worse, endless assaults. You’re goingto bear the brunt of the blame, because you were in charge. I left you in charge.”
“I was a child!”
“You were old enough to take care of the boys. They’ve all survived, and so have you, so perhaps stop blaming your mother for a less than ideal childhood.”
The fucking nerve of this woman is unbelievable. She is so delusional she is outright dangerous. I feel the hair on the back of my neck standing upright as I try to work out why she is here and what she wants from me. It can’t just be to gloat. She looks more intentional than that.
I have not felt this hopeless in a long time. I thought Karl would come for me, but I bet he’s probably tired of the whole situation. He’s been putting up with my bullshit for how long and all it’s gotten us is arrested. Also, on the way out, I’m pretty sure I saw machinery with floodlights on it. I’d bet that while we sit in these cells, heavy machinery is going to be ripping through the last of the houses on the home range.
We’ve lost.
I’ve lost.
Everything I cared about is gone.
“It didn’t have to be this way,” my mother says. “You could have had a piece of the pie if you’d just agreed to be slightly civilized. You could have gone to college, you could have met a nice man. You could have had a normal human life.”
“We’re not human, Mom, and you know it.”
Her eyes narrow at me, because I just said the one thing nobody is allowed to say to her. If we said it to her as kids, she made sure we suffered for it. It looks like nothing has really changed.
“That’s a delusion,” she says. “And a dangerous one.”
My mother is a shifter who won’t fucking shift. She denies she’s one. And she hates our wolf sides. She’s convinced herself that none of it was ever real or true. Even seeing her own kids shift isn’t enough to convince her. Some people don’t respect proof, no matter what you give them. No matter what they know about themselves.
“I can’t let you keep getting into trouble,” she says. “I can’t let you be in the way of what needs to happen. So you’re going to come with me, sweetheart.”
“No. I’m not.”
“Yes,” she says. “You are. I’m sorry, baby, but this has gone on too long. You’re living like an animal, and I won’t have it.”
The cell door opens, and two big, burly men step in. I’m not going to be given a choice in this. I don’t know what she plans to do to me, and I don’t intend to find out.
“Watch out for her, she’s vicious,” my mother says as they grab me.
“Don’t worry, ma’am. We know how to handle trouble,” one of them replies. I feel a brief prick in the side of my neck, and a moment later, everything goes to cozy, lovely black.
Back in the usual flow of narrative time…
Karl
“I tried to bail her out,” Gray says. “But I must have gotten her name wrong.”
“Alright. Let’s go in and get her.” I grab him by the lapel and stride back into the police building. Gray slaps at my hands, but I want him right beside me. This is the most important thing. We have to get Ellie out, and we have to do it now.
“Can I help you?” The cop behind the desk talks to me as if he’s already forgotten I just got out of here. He’s a middle-aged guy with a defeated look in his eyes. He might actually have forgotten me in the interim. Doesn’t look like there’s much going on up there.
“I’d like to bail my… girlfriend.” I say. I was going to say mate, but of course humans don’t recognize mates.
He sighs and slowly turns toward the computer, which is so old it has been yellowed by sun and probably runs on Windows 97.
“What’s her name?”
“Ellie.”
“Ellie…” he draws the pause out. “What’s her last name?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “We got arrested together, but I never asked her last name. We were busy with other activities most of the time.”
