Jeremiah nodded. “Thank you. You’ve done so much for us already that I don’t know how we can ever repay you.”
“Pay it forward,” I said with a smile.
As I left the apartment, I finally allowed myself to show how relieved I was that the hyena and the Hunter were no longer going to be my problem. I still wasn’t certain I’d made the right move by allowing them to stay with me, and I was certain Kade would have some choice words about it when he learned the whole story. But in my defense, I hadn’t known anything about the Hunters before one showed up on my doorstep. So I hadn’t realized the potential danger I was putting myself in as a shifter. Yet, it seemed to be working out okay in the end.
On the drive to work, I routed my phone through my car stereo and called my father.
“Hey, Dad. I have a favor to ask. It’s kind of a big one, and it’s kind of immediate.”
“What do you need?” he asked. I pictured his sun-weathered face, eyes lined from squinting against the West Texas desert sky during his many outings as a herpetology professor.
“Serena’s doctor thinks that she’ll do better learning to shift between human and reptile if she spends some quality time with me. I’d like to bring her out to the ranch this weekend if I can.”
“Of course,” Dad said. “You know you’re always welcome, sweetie. And I look forward to spending more time with her.”
“Maybe we can even get her to shift so mom might want to spend more time with her, too,” I said, laughing. Mom wasn’t anti-serpent, by any means—I don’t think any mother ever loved a child more than she loved me. But I also knew that she was much more likely to bond to Serena’s human infant form than Serena as a juvenile serpent. Dad had already fallen in love with her, from visiting her at the hospital, so that was no problem. In any case, I knew it wouldn’t take long for those two to become doting grandparents to however many infant lamias I brought home.
The ranch was a perfect place for me to spend this weekend. Kade was on duty in the ER, so he wouldn’t be around, anyway. And I was ready to get out of my own apartment and let the Jeremiah and Shadow situation resolve itself without me around.
Finally, it had been some amount of time since I had shifted into my most common snake form and spent time with Suzy, the enormous python I particularly liked to snuggle up with when I went out to the ranch.
I wondered how Suzy would feel about being a grandmother figure to Serena, too.
For the first time, I was more excited than anxious about bringing Serena and the other infant lamias into my life.
GLORIA HADN’T BEEN thrilled at my request for time off to “work with my foster-daughter’s doctor to develop her treatment plan,” but there really hadn’t been much she could do about it—not only did I have some time off built up, but the CAP-C had a generous parental leave policy that applied to adopted and foster children, too. It would’ve been hypocritical for them not to, of course, since their entire reason for existing was the well-being of children.
And although I knew Gloria wanted to look out for me, I was irritated at her response to my decision to take in and work with these infants.
At any rate, though, there was no way for her to stop me, and after a morning meeting with the teenager who swore she had never been diagnosed as paranoid—a session in which we did not get very far since she still insisted everyone she knew was out to get her—I left for the rest of the day during my lunch break.
When I got back to my apartment, Jeremiah and Shadow were waiting eagerly.
“So what did the matriarch say?” I asked since I could tell they were both eager to let me know.
“Keeya is planning to have us meet her on Monday morning,” Jeremiah said. “We will call her early that day and ask her where to meet.”
I glanced at Shadow. She wasn’t thrilled with the arrangement, from the looks of her, but she seemed content enough to go along with it for now, anyway.
“I realize it is an imposition,” Jeremiah was saying, “but could we possibly...”
“You can stay here,” I said. “I’ll be away this weekend, but you can use my computer and contact me via that email I created for you if you need to. And I stopped by a grocery store. There should be enough supplies here to get you through the weekend—be careful, and if anything comes up, you know how to reach me.” The two nodded, and to my surprise, Jeremiah, who seemed so reticent, reached out to give me a quick hug. Shadow did not follow his example, but she did nod gravely to me and gave a half wave as I headed toward the door.
It wasn’t the clear, clean break and ending that I had been hoping for, and I wasn’t going to be able to tell Kade about those two the next time I talked to him as I had hoped, but it looked like their situation was wrapping up fairly soon. At any rate, I didn’t think I needed to worry about them over the weekend. I hadn’t seen any sign of werewolf surveillance since going to Kade’s house, and I assumed if they suspected the hyena and Hunter had reached out to me, they would be watching me pretty closely. Just to be sure, I engaged my reptilian senses on the way out to my parking spot.
Nothing. I headed off to the hospital feeling pretty confident that everything
