Page 98 of Bears Behaving Badly
Nope.
“I’ll bet if I shook your family tree, a few SAS members would fall out. Or maybe SAS-adjacent. What good is a Shifter if he’s locked into one shape, right? You thought he was inferior, and you never kept it a secret.”
“I’m an idiot,” David groaned. “It’s how Caro nearly killed him! Here’s this poor cub, malnourished and weak and dehydrated, and she ripped him up. We couldn’t figure it.”
“Poor cub?” Mrs. Brennan (or Mrs. Lund) said sharply.
“I never saw his other self. When I rolled up, I just figure he’d shifted back from the stress of the attack. But he couldn’t shift. And Caro knew it and went for him.”
“That’s it! That’s it exactly!” Annette seized David’s hands. “We figured it out!”
“We need to clutch at straws more often.” David laughed.
“I know!”
“Will you two shut up?”
“Oh. Right.” She cleared her throat. “Once again, our condolences.” She opened her mouth to let out another platitude when the approaching sirens cut her off. “Ohhhhhh, that’s not great.”
Greg grinned, so any thought that it was a police siren unrelated to her present career difficulty faded. “Hear that? I don’t think you’re gonna be able to make our appointment tomorrow, cutie.”
Which is why you suggested it.
She traded wide-eyed looks with David. She couldn’t say it.
She wouldn’t say it.
David said it. “Nadia’s the only one who knows we’re here.”
Fuck.
Chapter 30
“Pat?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I ask you something?”
“You are.”
“Yuck, you sound like Annette.”
“That’s the biggest lie you’ve ever told.”
Dev smirked. “Wait.”
“Annette sounds like me. It’snotthe other way around,” Pat pointed out.
“Right.” Dev slid onto the stool across from Caro, who, after a Funyuns and ginger ale break, had begun writing again. A corner of Pat’s studio—well, it wasn’t really a corner since the building was round—was a mini-kitchen, complete with tiny microwave, stove, and oven, and the marble island they were sitting at had cupboards stuffed with canned food, snacks, and bottles of water. Pat had reassured them that they had sufficient supplies for well over a week, unless Annette dropped by.
Dev hadn’t thought it was possible, but he was getting sick of Pringles. “So. Um. The thing I wanted to ask about. Your…”
Caro looked up and shook her head. Dev exercised his prerogative as a younger brother and ignored her. “…face,” he continued. “What happened? Did you know Annette back then?”
“It’s how I met Annette.”
“No shit?”
