Iris pointed a spoon at him. “If you’re about to invite yourself along to our romantic getaway, Tyrone Neal, I swear to God—”
“I’ll go up north to the mountains,” he laughed, holding up his hands. “Come on. I wouldn’t do that.”
She relaxed a little. “No, you wouldn’t. You were always much more likely to babysit so Steve and I could get some time to ourselves.”
“Glad you remember. Man, who’s going to appreciate me now that my uncle duties are relegated to liking the kids’ Facebook posts?”
“Get out of the Stone Age, old man, they’re all on Twitter now,” Iris said. “Or, probably, they’re all on some app that I’ve never heard of, and they only tell me about their Twitters.”
“So no one appreciates me at all.”
“Guess not.” She grinned.
“Fine. I’ll go up north where my real friends all moved, see if they have a kind word.”
“These are your Marine buddies?” Iris perked up. “You should absolutely go visit them, Ty! I remember when you came back from that wedding you went to last year, it was like you were ten years younger, and all you could talk about was how good it was to see them again.”
Ty didn’t remember it exactly like that. Sure, the wedding had been great. He’d forgotten how solid the connection was between him and the guys. They’d all shifted and gone to run in the enormous craggy forests that surrounded Glacier National Park: him, Cal, Ken, Nate, Carlos, and even their old Major, now-Colonel Hanes. It had been a literal breath of fresh air.
But all he remembered from afterward was falling back into the job like he’d never left. Carlos had even called him up a couple of months ago, asking for advice, and had mentioned Ty coming up to visit—and Ty hadn’t even been able to consider it.
The job had loomed too large, putting out its own gravitational pull. Trying to escape it would’ve been like trying to fly away from the surface of Jupiter.
Except now Jupiter had shot him off into orbit all by itself, and here he was, stalled out in zero-gravity, not sure what to do with his fool self.
“It’s so beautiful up there,” Iris went on. “I’ve seen pictures. Not that you took any when you were there.”
“Too busy looking at things with my real eyes,” Ty said absently. “Okay.” He was decided. “Up north it is.”
“Good.” Iris came over and wrapped him up in a hug. “I think it’ll be wonderful.”
Ty hugged her back. “We’ll see.”
But he had a weird feeling growing inside him. It took him a second to identify it as excitement. When was the last time he’d felt that? He couldn’t remember.
And then, suddenly, he could. It was when he’d received Cal’s wedding invitation.
Well. Maybe this was the right move for a couple of reasons.
***
Misty
It had been a long, hard day. And as the shadows stretched out towards evening, it was shaping up to be even harder.
One final member of Ryan’s wolf pack was still on the loose. Misty knew Eli Haversham had been part of the group that attacked Pauline, Carlos, and their kids at Pauline’s home, but he’d run away before she arrived to arrest everyone. And he’d been in his shifted form the entire time, so Pauline’s witness statement wasn’t going to help in court.
She’d spent the last couple of months collecting evidence on Eli, casually chatting with his neighbors, figuring out his patterns. And today, she was going to catch him with stolen goods, pin him to the electronics store robbery two weeks ago, and finally put him in jail.
Eli had stashed his stuff in an old shed off the road, out of town, and far away from his own run-down house. Misty and Gene had parked far enough away that even shifter hearing wouldn’t catch their Jeep’s engine noise, and were slowly making their way forward on foot.
Misty had to hope Eli was in human form, because as a wolf, he’d likely catch their scents before they were visible. But there was no reason for him to be shifted while handling stolen iPhones, was there?
Hopefully not.
She motioned to Gene with her hand, and quietly, they slipped off the road into the forest. They were both experienced at moving silently through the woods, even in human form.
Unfortunately for them, though, neither of them had shifter forms that would help much with combat: Gene was a raccoon, and Misty—to her occasional frustration—was a deer.