by R. J. Blain
“I resemble that remark,” Jace called from the kitchen.
“You better be guarding my chicken, Jace.”
“I am. It’s safe. Otis is whining, but he hasn’t taken any.”
“Give him a drumstick for coercing Uncle Henry into buying me a laptop.”
Jace laughed. “I’ll give him one of my drumsticks. That’ll be part of my contribution to today’s fun. I’m also mugging everyone in the kitchen for your money, and I’ll add you to one of my credit cards if you need gradual treatments. You can pay me back with reasonable interest.”
“You’re the one who told me attorneys don’t make all that much. What gives?” I considered abandoning my uncle for going into the kitchen and holding my interrogation of my brother at a reasonable volume. “You can’t afford that.”
“I’m doing pretty well for myself right now. I’m representing older lycanthropes now, and some of those older lycanthropes have a lot of money kicking around, as they haven’t attempted to raise their state’s average number of children per household on their own.”
My father dodged my brothers, who passed around money without bothering to get up from their spots. He patted my back and kissed my temple. “Just let Jace help, little kitten. Uncle Henry can help, too.”
“If I am given a few extra pieces of chicken, I will consider it.”
My mother laughed from the kitchen. “I’ll make sure you’re fed, little kitten. Don’t you worry yourself about that.”
Knowing my mother, she’d send me off with an entire picnic basket loaded with fresh fried chicken. Knowing me, I’d make it a few miles before I pulled over and participated in a feeding frenzy. Food tamed my virus, and if my brothers were sniffing after a mate, I’d heed the warnings and gorge until my virus didn’t care so much about finding an appropriate feline male. “Anything else about this bounty hunter, Uncle Henry? You’ve never really mentioned much about them unless one has done something interesting.”
“This one is interesting, because this one gives almost no warning before accepting a bounty, gets the job done in record time, and vanishes before any of the handlers can catch up. So, limited people know who this hunter is, and it’s driving me a little crazy. I’ve room for a new hunter in my roster, and this one would bring good money to the table.”
Ugh. Right. Bounty hunters with a handler made a lot more, but their handler took a slice of the profits in exchange for helping general operations. If I was the bounty hunter my uncle discussed, I’d be upgraded to more dangerous but profitable jobs, and I’d be able to cut my time to earn enough money to fix my face to months rather than years if I landed a good job.
I loved Uncle Henry, but we wouldn’t get along on the bounty hunter front.
He’d tell my daddy, and my daddy would tell my momma, and I’d be locked up for the rest of my life and then some for doing a dangerous, messy job.
Under no circumstances could my uncle discover my side job.
As soon as I made it out of town and to a decent city, I’d have to check my record to see if I had been blessed—or cursed—with a handler.
I needed the money. The money would fix my face, I’d stop scaring the kittens, and life would be easier.
“How good would the money be if you became this bounty hunter’s handler, Uncle Henry?”
“This one will probably bring in a few hundred thousand a year for the handler.”
Oh. Oh. If the handler was getting a few hundred thousand a year, the hunter would be making millions. A year.
I wanted to run to the nearest CDC headquarters and beg them to give me a handler. I would bring in every damned illegal lycanthrope in the country if needed to earn that sort of paycheck. Long after I had the scars removed to discover what I was supposed to actually look like, I’d still do the job because I liked making sure no one else could be hurt by a renegade lycanthrope.
“That’s a lot,” I muttered.
“This one would be a profitable hunter. I’ve got two higher on the pay scale, so I’ll be expecting you to accept your laptop right along with your chicken.”
“You’ve done good for yourself, Uncle Henry. You work with several bounty hunters who bring you in that much?”
“It’s hard work, and no, I absolutely refuse to teach you how to do it. You would get into trouble, possibly take over, and use your powers for evil.”
“I don’t want to be some bounty hunter’s handler.” Being a handler would put a major damper on my work. And pay less. “Your job is safe. I think I’d rather deal with idiots on the phone.”
My uncle chuckled. “Had a rough call today?”
“It was not particularly enjoyable, but I endured, got through the call, and my boss praised me for handling the idiot with grace.”
“Well done.” My uncle hopped to his feet and caught me in a hug. “Come along, little kitten. I’ll give you your hard-earned presents, and then you can run off with your momma’s chicken and go on your vacation. But mark my words. Next year, we’re coming for your vacation, and we’re going to treat you properly. No matter what you think, you deserve it.”
As arguing would land me in hot water and delay my escape for hours, I surrendered. “I get five days off, and I have to preplan them, so I guess I’ll just tell you what my schedule is.”
“That’s a good girl. And think about the loan. I can afford it, and I don’t care if it takes you decades to pay me back. If you need the scars removed to be happy, then we’ll get your scars removed. It’s that simple.”
I’d let him think what he wanted. I understood my scars weren’t my fault, but I wished I could walk out my door without needing to cover my face to keep people from wincing—or yelping and running away.
Sometimes, I thought my virus hated most males because it recognized when my face repulsed potential partners and spared us both from the anguish of having a partner who couldn’t accept me as I was. Maybe that was why my virus enjoyed making Sebastian roar.
I pissed him off so much from walking into the room that he didn’t give a shit about what my face looked like.
Oh well.
Three
Using the kittens was rather ruthless and drastic, yes.
When my family decided to do something, they forgot their limits, cared little if they drove themselves straight into debt, and could teach demons lessons about excess. The laptop had cost my uncle thousands of dollars; I’d be able to play the latest and greatest games on it without issue. My brothers worked hard to ensure I could play the latest and greatest through forcing me to accept their gifts of said games, using the kittens to win my cooperation. When the kittens gave me boxes wrapped in pretty paper, using their devilishly cute pouts as their weapon of choice, ‘no’ abandoned my vocabulary.
I accepted the gifts along with a new purse my mother foisted on me to carry some of my ill-gotten gains.
Shaking down my family for lunch money scored me almost six thousand dollars, more than enough to go get a new piece of shit vehicle. Or pay for numerous scar-removal consultations.
My bastard family would have to pay for their reckless rampaging of their accounts to spoil me.
“This is too much,” I declared, holding up my purse filled with cash, gift cards, and a new makeup kit I’d put to good use as soon as I found somewhere to pull over without getting caught. It included glittery eyeshadow, and while it wouldn’t cover my scars well, I’d have pretty eyes.
I’d leave the state before making use of my better makeup kit to hide my scars.
“Deal with it,” Harvey ordered before kissing my cheek. “When you refuse our offers of help, we have to resort to drastic measures.”
“Using the kittens was rather ruthless and drastic, yes.”
“But effective. Be careful with the chicken. Mom’s brain is broken, and I’m pretty sure she used cinnamon to go with the cayenne, and she had the saffron out. I hope you survive. I hope we survive. The kittens are getting macaroni and cheese just in case Mom made poison
instead of fried chicken.”
Fortunately for Harvey, our mother hadn’t heard him. “You better get one of our brothers to take over the cooking until the second trimester,” I muttered.
“We have a plan. Dad will distract her, and we’re taking turns proving to her we’re capable of living on our own. Tomorrow, Uncle Henry will be doing the cooking. The kittens have asked for fried fish, and Uncle Henry claimed dinner duty, much to Dad’s relief.”
The house would be a war zone for at least another month. “I’m going to ask my boss if I can take an extra unpaid week to delay having to come back to this mess. You bastards paid me enough I can afford it.”
If I could score three weeks of bounty hunting, I might return home with a fixed face and debt to go with it, but it would be worth it. If I was the lucky bounty hunter promoted to having a handler, three weeks might be enough to pay for the whole damned thing if I landed some good jobs.
“You should. You haven’t had a vacation in years. I bet your boss would approve it, since there’s always people trying to get extra hours where you work. You complain about how hard it is to get extra hours all the time.” My brother lifted the strap of my new purse off my shoulder and gave it a shake. “Get yourself a new phone, too. Yours is an antique. If you get low on cash, tell Uncle Henry you need a phone. He’ll bite.”
“He’s not a charity.”
Uncle Henry marched out of the kitchen, put his hands on my shoulders, and shoved me towards the front door. “I bite, and I’m not a charity. I’m your uncle. Stop whining, or I’m showing up at your home with your daddy’s copy of your keys, and I’ll be leaving presents you can’t return all over your place. I’m a bored, single lycanthrope, and you’re our family’s only little girl. Don’t challenge me. You will lose.”
I checked the time, narrowed my eyes, and considered my few options. “You can leave a decent but not too expensive phone on my coffee table, but I swear if anything has been touched beyond that in my place, I will hunt you, skin you alive, and sell your fur. Then I’ll wait for you to heal and do it all over again.”
“How about I keep your new phone here, and you can pick it up when you’re back from vacation? I value my fur.”
“Vain cat.”
“That I am.” Uncle Henry pushed me out of the house. “Leave.”
Laughing over my eviction, I headed for my father’s truck, opened the passenger door, and dumped my purse next to my excessive collection of creatively spiced fried chicken. The cab contained all of my luggage, including the backpack with my cheap laptop. As my family would find ways to keep me from getting on the road, I hurried to get behind the wheel, locked the doors, started the engine, and eased the big truck out of the maze of vehicles. While tempted to test my luck and drive right over my junker, I restrained myself.
To make certain none of my nosy family followed, I drove for twenty minutes before pulling over and indulging in chicken. Despite my mother having gotten creative in the kitchen, the chicken classified as unique but edible. As I often failed to eat enough, I rampaged through the entire basket of chicken and licked the bones clean.
Saffron, cayenne, cinnamon, and whatever the hell spices my mother used didn’t really belong together, but the lycanthropy virus liked meat, approved of my feeding frenzy, and took herself to a corner to pass out for a while.
I needed to remind myself excessive eating could tame my virus and keep her from suggesting I should waste less time worrying about my face and spend more time thinking about luring some male cat to bed. My virus would be disappointed. Most male lycanthropes fell into the canine category, and I was related to the majority of male feline lycanthropes in my state.
Most feline lycanthropes started their hunt for a mate early, with my family being an oddity with a high number of single young men. I played a part in their unwillingness to pick a mate, settle down, and join my parents in adding to the state’s birth rate. Until they determined I could take care of myself or I roped a male, they’d hover. Brothers who hovered over their sister didn’t date, which left them single and available to drive me crazy.
Maybe I’d check out Cincinnati’s population of single feline lycanthropes. I couldn’t strike out forever even with my scarred face, could I?
Damned scars.
I stopped at the next gas station, tossed out the chicken bones, and programmed my father’s truck navigation system to take me to Fargo. Ridding myself of my scars would be my first step. Then I’d cut a deal with my virus, and we’d hunt for a man capable of handling my entire family. She wanted a cat. I’d accept a human—or even a damned wolf as long as he treated me right.
If my virus had an opinion on my thoughts, she kept quiet for a change.
Fargo, North Dakota made an excellent place for me to start my dirty work. Most folks minded their own business, I’d been through often enough to not draw attention at my preferred coffee shops, and I didn’t feel like I needed to sell my soul to the devil to buy a drink. Armed with an extra sweet coffee, I dug out my old laptop, booted it up, and began the tedious process of tunneling into a chain of compromised servers until there was no realistic way the government would be able to trace me to my actual location. It cost more time than I liked, as my preferred server in Germany liked to give me problems on a good day, but it served as an excellent speed bump for anyone trying to identify my location. After an hour and a second beverage, I hit up the CDC’s bounty site, logged in with my legitimate credentials, and checked the list of available jobs.
A red banner at the top of the screen informed me that my presence was required at a CDC center, with a preference for the one in Fargo, which was where I typically showed up when someone wanted to get a hold of me.
As the flag didn’t bar me from picking up new jobs, I searched through the available contracts for a naughty lycanthrope in need of a whooping and some community service time. A kill bounty would put more money in my pocket, but with the one big job ready to put me in the running for starting the scar-removal process, I refused to ruin it all taking too many chances.
My entire family wanted me to accept my scarred face, but I’d accepted long ago I hated everything my scars represented and wanted them gone. In part, I blamed my momma, as she’d raised me to be stubborn. My daddy took the rest of the blame, because I wanted a man to look at me the way my parents looked at each other.
That initial flinch, which happened so damned often, even among my family when I showed up without makeup or warning, ruined the whole thing for me.
The only damned man who hadn’t flinched over my scars was the lion I loved to torment into roaring at me. Without fail, his roars brightened my day, pleased my virus, and could get me through just about any shitshow intact.
Flinching followed with guilty adoration didn’t fly with me and never would. I would find a permanent solution to my problems through my hard work, and I’d take pride in accomplishing my goal. That my hard work involved hunting those who’d crossed the line with the law didn’t bother me but would bother my entire family. When Uncle Henry did things like play the bounty hunter system and make good money, they loved it.
The thought of me even breaking a nail induced panic attacks, and some days, it amazed me they only bothered me three times a week making sure I hadn’t done something they’d regret.
My cell rang, and the display showed a private number. Scowling, I weighed the odds between a government contractor or a telemarketer. Had I not just logged into the bounty system, I would’ve assumed telemarketer. Dodging a government call might land me in hot water, so I answered, “Wells.”
“Where are you?” the growly voice of my favorite lion demanded.
Some days, it rained. Today, the sun shined, I had coffee, and I got to annoy the damned lion I loved pestering into roaring for me. Better, yet, I could walk up to him with my scars showing without him grimacing. “Somewhere neither here nor there. Finally getting around to confessing how much you miss me, Sumners?”
&nbs
p; “I need to speak with you in person, you murderous little fur-freak.”
Oh, oh, oh. When the lion got feisty, I got my roars early in the conversation. Unable to help myself, I purred. “Did the little lion get the tuft of his tail pulled?”
“Where are you, Wells?”
“Somewhere.”
“Don’t you dare say over the rainbow or out there.”
Next time, I needed to remember to do that, as I could have secured a roar already if only I’d known song lyrics could annoy him as much as my general tail-tuft yanking. “Did you miss me that much, Sumners? Last time, I swore I heard you say you never wanted to see my ugly mug ever again.”
He hadn’t actually said that, but twisting his request for me to ‘go do something productive’ never failed to get him up in arms. The lion’s wordless snarl promised it would be an interesting and rewarding call. “I didn’t say that. I said I wished you’d go in to get an attitude readjustment and to not bother me until you acquired some common sense. I said nothing about any mugs.”
Oh. Right. He had said that, too. I snorted, although I smiled at the lion’s reply. How much of his frustrations stemmed from his unwillingness to admit my face terrified most babies? “I have plenty of common sense. How good is my live capture rate again? And how about that kill rate of mine? Hmm? I’m perfection, little kitty, and you know it.”
Work wise, I did my best to live up to my boast. Personality wise? Once I got off the phone, I’d be roaring from laughter. One day, Sebastian would figure out how I ticked, and he would be all calm and poised, ruining my fun. If he didn’t make talking with him so amusing, I would’ve tried a little harder to be a stoic professional.
He made my job so damned fun.
While he knew I was a single lycanthrope, he had no idea I was a cat out for his roars. I bet he assumed, like everyone did, I was a wolf. Since enough wolves invaded my turf, I often smelled like them, too. And since more cats than anyone could shake a stick at lived near Fargo, smelling of feline was the default no matter what species one actually was.
