by Zoe Chant
There were times when having a reputation for taciturnity was a distinct advantage. He shrugged one shoulder and carried on chopping.
Finger-sized, lightly steamed, Diana had instructed. She hadn’t said what size finger. Her finger? His finger? Average-length fingers? What was the average length of a finger? Maybe he should Google it.
Rory also seemed to have fingers on his mind. He was counting backward on his own, folding them down one after another. He looked up again, brow furrowed. “Cal, I have enough younger siblings that I know babies. And that one is at least ten months old. That means she has to have been conceived sometime around last March.”
“Busted!” Blaise crowed. “Cal, you weren’t even in America then.”
“I was. Los Angeles.”
It was, in fact, entirely true. And from what Diana had said about barging into a hotel room, he really could be Beth’s father.
Which only made matters worse.
“—not buying it,” Blaise was saying. He hoped he hadn’t missed too much of her sentence while he’d been lost in thought. “You never mentioned going to Los Angeles.”
He slid the carrots into the simmering water. “I don’t tell you everything.”
Diana, he had to find something for Diana as well. She might be hungry. What would she like? There was too much to do. He cast around for a piece of paper. A list, he needed to make a list.
“You’re not telling us anything,” Blaise said, interrupting his switchbacking train of thought. She planted herself firmly in his path, arms folded. “Callum! Stop running around and talk to us!”
“Can’t.” He could barely keep enough focus on the conversation to form coherent replies. His attention kept skipping to Diana and Beth. They were tucked away in the infirmary, being treated by Wystan. Were they safe?
His mind skittered like a spider over the web of lives all around. He could detect Seren and Fenrir combing through the forest down by the road. Both the hellhound and the shark shifter had special senses of their own. Rory must have sent them out to follow the trail of the man who had attacked Diana. From the way they were moving—a methodical, sweeping search pattern—it was clear they hadn’t managed to pick up his scent yet.
Callum cast his own senses wider, searching for any hint of threat. Mice, squirrels, deer, a distant bear—
“Cal.” The hint of alpha power in Rory’s voice snapped him back into the kitchen. The griffin shifter’s eyes were concerned, but his jaw was set in his I am your boss as well as your friend expression. “I’m sorry, but you really do have to explain yourself. Who is that woman? Why is she here in the first place? Why does she think you’re the father of her child?”
He needed to cook the carrots. He needed to guard the base. He needed to baby-proof a cabin and come up with a plausible story to tell them all and persuade Diana that she could trust him and take her in his arms and kiss her until she saw stars.
Yes, his pegasus interjected. That last one.
There were a million and one things to do. His head was a swarm of angry bees. He couldn’t concentrate. He just wanted them all to go away and give him space.
“Rory.” Alone out of all of them, Edith wasn’t staring at him with accusing eyes. She tugged on her mate’s sleeve. “One question at a time. Can’t you tell Cal’s barely holding it together? You’re just making things worse.”
Anyone who thought autistic people couldn’t be empathic was flat-out wrong. Somehow, she always seemed to understand him even better than his friends who’d grown up with him.
It was probably because she hadn’t grown up with him. She’d only ever known him as an adult. An individual.
She saw who he was. Not just who he wasn’t.
“Edith’s right,” Joe said. “Back off, bros. Cal, your pan’s boiling over.”
He spun round. Foaming water was cascading out from under the lid, threatening to douse the burner beneath. He hastily yanked off the rattling lid.
“Let me help, bro.” Joe came over to the stove, peering over his shoulder. “What are you making, anyway?”
“Carrot fingers. They’re for Beth. Diana said she doesn’t like purees. Beth, I mean. Not Diana.” He turned in a circle, opening a cupboard as yet another task occurred to him. “Tea. I have to make tea as well. And the carrots have to cool, so Beth can pick them up. Buck’s car just turned up the road. B and C squad are with him. Crackers, Diana said crackers were good too. Herbal tea, peppermint. For Diana. I think Seren and Fenrir just found something. Peppermint tea. Wystan said he might have some.”
Rory and Blaise exchanged glances.
“Okaaaaay.” Blaise plucked the mug out of his hands. “I’ll make the tea. Joe will take care of the food. And for once he won’t put chili in it, will you, Joe.”
“Well, I read that you’re meant to introduce babies to as wide a range of tastes as possible,” Joe started—then broke off, holding up his hands as Blaise glared at him. “Okay, okay! Bland it is. No chilies. Sea dragon’s honor.”
“I’ll find some crackers.” Edith started poking through the cupboards. “You just sit down and rest, Callum.”
“Can’t. Too much to do. All Beth and Diana’s things burned in the car. I have to—”
“Callum.” Rory’s hands closed firmly over his shoulders. The griffin shifter steered him into the chair. “Sit down before you fly apart. We’ll help you. You don’t have to do everything alone.”
He pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets, trying to calm the storm raging within his head. He could sense the rest of the crew heading up the mountain in their vehicles. Soon, there would be even more lives assaulting his senses, human souls, bright and distracting. Trying to concentrate with all that going on around him would be like trying to take a calculus exam in a disco.
He had to take care of Beth and Diana. Even if that meant admitting his own limitations.
“I do need help.” It was hard to say the words, but a weight lifted from his chest the instant they left his mouth. “Thank you.”
“Anytime.” Rory took the seat opposite him, resting his forearms on the table. “Callum, why didn’t you tell us about Beth?”
“I didn’t know about her until today.”
Rory nodded, as though he’d been expecting this. “I couldn’t imagine you’d just abandon a woman in need. Even if she isn’t your one true mate.”
He hesitated, but this was one truth that would be impossible to hide. And he found that he didn’t want to hide it.
“Diana is my mate,” he said.
Blaise looked up sharply from the box of tea bags she was rummaging through. “What?”
“But I thought shifters couldn’t live without their mates,” Edith said. “Once they’ve met, I mean.”
“We can’t.” Joe was also staring at him as though he’d just announced that he was a small pink bunny. “At least, not without going stark raving nuts. Believe me, I should know. I mean, I’d only dreamed about meeting Seren, and forcing myself to stay away from her all those years still made me a few bananas short of a fruit salad.”
“Just a few?” Blaise muttered.
“Cal, I don’t believe that you’ve been hiding the fact that you met your mate eighteen months ago,” Rory said. “Even you aren’t that stoic.”
He was worried about that too. Surely, if he’d really met Diana before, if he really was Beth’s father, he should remember?
“I didn’t know that I’d met her.” He made himself say the awful possibility out loud. “I don’t know if I met her.”
Blaise blinked. “Huh?”
He put his head in his hands, as though he could somehow forcibly squeeze the memory out. “Apparently Diana and I were in Los Angeles, at the same hotel, on the same night. You know I don’t do well with big cities. I was angry about…things, which made it even harder to control my talent. So I took sleeping pills. I don’t remember anything that happened after that.”
Edith looked horrified. “You think sh
e came into your room and—without your consent?”
“No!” He didn’t want anyone thinking such a terrible thing about Diana. “Diana had good reason to think that I was fully consenting. I was fully consenting, if it actually happened. But she might not have been. If, if I truly am Beth’s father, it’s because Diana came into the wrong hotel room and mistook me for someone else.”
“And if you’re not, it’s because she really was with someone else,” Blaise said slowly. He could tell that pieces were starting to connect in her head.
“Which means…” Rory trailed off, his golden eyes widening as he too came to the obvious conclusion.
“Oh,” Joe breathed. For once, words seemed to have deserted the eloquent sea dragon. “Oh, shit.”
That was exactly his sentiment too.
“Do you know which one it was?” Rory asked him.
He shook his head. “She didn’t know his name. Just that he was a firefighter.”
“Well, that narrows it down,” Blaise said. Then she frowned. “Or, actually, maybe not. Given what they’re like.”
“Oh come on,” Joe said. “Yeah, it’s a hilarious trick, but I’m sure they wouldn’t take it that far.”
Knowing them as he did, he didn’t share the sea dragon’s confidence. “They would.”
“Wait, time out. What are you all talking about?” Edith was still looking puzzled. “I’m admit that I’m not great with faces, but that baby looks exactly like you, Callum. How is that possible if you might not be her father?”
Of course, she’d never met either of them. “Someone show her.”
Blaise pulled her phone out of her back pocket. She thumbed at the screen for a moment, then, without a word, passed the device to Edith.
“Why are you showing me a picture of Callum?” Edith’s brow creased. She peered at the picture more closely. “Wait a sec. Is this Photoshopped?”
“No,” Rory, Joe, and Blaise said in unison.
Edith’s gaze flicked from the photo to his face and back again. Her own face was baffled. “But then how can there be two Callums in this photo?”
“That’s not a picture of me,” he said grimly. “That’s Connor and Conleth. My brothers.”
Chapter 5
After all the trauma of the day, Diana could tell that Beth was running on fumes. Normally Beth’s favorite thing in the world was her late afternoon cuddle and milk. Today, however, she was fussy and distractible. One moment she would be latched on, sucking as though there was no tomorrow; the next, she would be doing a top-class owl impression, head swiveling and eyes wide.
Diana’s voice was going hoarse from singing Beth’s favorite lullaby over and over. She desperately wished that Beth would settle, even if just for five minutes. Jumbled questions whirled through her head, all wound about with worry.
Why was that man hanging around the base? Why was he looking for a way to get at Callum? Will he come back? Did he get my license number? Will he be able to track us back home? Why is Callum so different? What on earth is he mixed up with? What’s he hiding? Does he really want to be Beth’s father, or is it all an act for some awful reason? Should I leave right now? How could I leave? What am I going to do for diapers? Am I the world’s worst mother, bringing Beth into all this?
She was too on edge to unpack her anxieties or externalize them. She needed time to process events and her own emotions. If only Beth would give her a few minutes to herself to think.
“Come on, baby,” she crooned, shoving down the urge to scream. She rocked Beth, trying to keep her turned away from all the distractions in the office. She’d drawn the blinds and turned off the lights to try to encourage Beth to go to sleep, but even in the dimness Beth seemed to find the paperwork scattered across the desk and the dog-eared maps tacked to the rough wooden walls fascinating. “There’s nothing interesting to see. It’s nap time. You need to sleep. Please, Mommy needs you to go to sleep. Please.”
Beth started to settle at last. Her sucking grew slower and sleepier. Her eyelids fluttered.
The office door creaked open.
Diana had never in her life so badly wanted to throttle someone.
“Go away,” she whisper-snarled, hunching over Beth and praying that Callum would take the hint and retreat quietly.
“It’s my office, thank you very much,” growled an unfamiliar male voice. “Who the motherloving monkey nuts are you?”
Diana yelped, spinning round. Beth popped off her breast, giving the man in the doorway an eyeful of nipple. He yelped and spun round.
“U-um.” Diana clutched at herself, covering her chest with her free arm. Beth, seeing the precious boob disappear from view, howled like a banshee. “Callum said I could breastfeed here.”
“Did he,” the man said in flat tones. He kept his back resolutely turned.
Callum had mentioned earlier that the rest of the crew would be returning that afternoon. Now that she was no longer preoccupied with trying to settle Beth, Diana became aware of the sounds outside—booted feet, car doors slamming, tools rattling as they were unloaded. This man must be the boss. And he obviously had no idea what she was doing in his office.
Diana struggled to do up buttons one handed, juggling an increasingly furious Beth. “I’m so sorry. I’ll just—”
“Sit your butt back down,” the man interrupted her. He half-turned, still shielding his eyes with one hand. “And for the love of dog, will you give that baby what she wants before my eardrums rupture?”
Diana hesitated. The man shot her a fierce glare from under his hand—or rather, he glared at a point somewhere just above the top of her head, since he was still carefully not looking at her exposed chest.
“I’m not used to having to repeat myself,” he snapped. “Feed your kid. Ma’am.”
Face hot with embarrassment, Diana got Beth back into position. Beth latched on as if she’d been deprived of sweet, sacred boob for ten months rather than ten seconds. The frantic sucking made Diana wince, but at least Beth’s head meant she was no longer flashing the grumpy firefighter.
She drew her shirt as far over her chest as she could. “I really am sorry. I would have fed her somewhere else, but Callum insisted on bringing me here. He said this was the most comfortable chair on the base.”
“Being the boss has its perks.” The man dropped his hand at last, revealing a weather-beaten, hawkish face. “And at least you’re giving me a novel excuse to avoid starting on my paperwork. I’m Superintendent Buck Frazer. I’m in charge around here.”
“Diana Whitehawk.” Diana spent a second trying to work out how to offer the Superintendent her hand without disturbing Beth, then gave up. “And this is my daughter, Beth.”
“Whitehawk,” Buck muttered. He studied her face for a moment. “Any relation to Elizabeth Whitehawk?”
“My mother,” Diana said, startled. “You knew her?”
“A bit. She was good friends with my sister Wanda, years and years ago. I was sorry to hear that she’d passed away. Mirror Lake disaster, wasn’t it?”
The old stab of pain went through Diana as she nodded. She’d only been eight when her mother had died, but some hurts never entirely healed.
Old grief shadowed Buck’s fierce face. “Tribe lost a lot of good people that day. The police ever catch the bastard that started the fire?”
“No sir. It was definitely arson, but they never found any leads. They ended up declaring it a random hate crime.”
Buck grunted. “Wouldn’t be the first time we were targeted like that.”
She’d been wondering if he had Native heritage like herself, from the set of his eyes and cheekbones. “Are you Lakota too?”
“On my mother’s side. Oglala. Don’t really have any contact with the tribe, though, these days. Wanda was always the one who was into that stuff. Kept bugging me to get involved, but I always thought I had better things to do, young jackass that I was. Too late now.” Buck shook his graying head, reverting to brisk, business-like tones. “Th
at your burned-out car down the road?”
“Yes, sir. I’m so sorry.”
Buck grunted. “No need to ‘sir’ me. Buck’ll do. And what have you got to be sorry about?”
“Everything, sir. I mean, um…Superintendent.” Diana had never before met anyone who so effortlessly exuded authority. She couldn’t bring herself to be so familiar as to use his given name. She rushed on, “Um, that is, I’m sorry for intruding.”
Oh no, I’m just making things worse. From the way Buck’s dark eyebrows drew together, her repeated apologies were only annoying him even more.
“I-I’m sorry!” And now she was apologizing for apologizing. Way to go, Diana, at this rate he’ll kick you out before you even have a chance to explain. “I’ll get the wreck towed away as soon as I can. But my cellphone was in the car, and everything burned up, and I haven’t had a chance—”
“Stop.” Buck held up a hand. “Explain later. You’ve clearly got more important things to do right now. And so do I.”
“I’m sorry,” Diana said, and winced.
Buck gave her a curt nod. “Let me know when I can have my chair back. Now, if you’ll excuse me, apparently I have to go murder a man.”
“Superintendent!” Callum appeared behind Buck, so suddenly he seemed to have materialized out of thin air. “I’m sorry!”
Diana had thought that the glare Buck had given her had been fierce enough, but it had been butterflies and rainbows compared to the one he turned on Callum now. “That seems to be a common sentiment around here.”
“I meant—to call.” From Callum’s heaving chest, he must have been sprinting flat out. “But I—forgot.”
“You forgot,” Buck repeated, in dangerous tones. “You’re normally a stickler for following protocol. Yet somehow reporting a serious fire right on our doorstep just slipped your mind?”
It was barely perceptible, but Diana thought she saw Callum wince. “It’s…been a day.”
“It’s my fault,” Diana said, prompted by an odd urge to defend the firefighter. “Callum’s been looking after Beth and me ever since he saved us from the crash. I was a mess after the attack. Please don’t blame him for being preoccupied.”