“Don’t get smart, Elinor,” Meredith says wearily. “I want you to set a good example for my newest employee.”
“Course, boss.” Elinor offers her goofy salute again and Meredith stomps out, sighing.
“She likes to act like a ball-breaker, but she has a real warm heart underneath,” Elinor says as soon as the front door has slammed shut.
“Compared to my pack, she’s an angel,” I say.
Elinor pauses in her task of polishing wine glasses. “You had a pack?”
“Yup.” I yank open the dishwasher and pull out a rack of steaming glasses, needing to keep my hands busy. “I was, but I kind of got rejected, by my intended. Then, things got weird.”
She bites her lip and tilts her head to look at me sideways.
Definitely a bird shifter.
“That’s so rough,” she says. “I never had my own flock. I got rejected when I was still a baby. Kicked out of the nest…figuratively speaking,” she adds, when I look shocked.
“Got raised by some humans for a while, but it didn’t work out,” she continues. “And I worked my way over here. Heard this was a place where people didn’t mock you for your differences.”
“It’s cool you found it,” I say. I start to ask her something else, then I break off. It’s kind of tricky not being able to ask all the questions that are bouncing around in my head.
“You can ask standard questions,” she says, as if she’s read my mind. “But nothing too, personal, you know.”
“Like?” I ask.
“Like—” She casts her eyes up to the ceiling. “Like I should definitely not ask you who that guy was who brought you here.”
“That guy—” I murmur. And the force of Beau’s presence hits me like a bullet train.
How to explain what Beau was to me? A river god, who found me under the bridge and dragged me out of the mud. Breathed life back into me. Lit me up inside for the very first time in my life.
“He’s sweet on you,” Elinor interrupts my thoughts.
Heat floods me, and I can tell I’m blushing all the way to the roots of my hair. Crap. I hate it when that happens. “No, he’s not,” I say firmly. Quite the opposite, in fact. He couldn’t wait to get away from me.
“He couldn’t take his eyes off you.”
My breath catches in my chest.
But that couldn’t be true.
He wouldn’t have left if it was.
“Well, he’s gone now. That’s the last I’ll see of him.”
Elinor gives me a sly look, like a magpie that has caught up something shiny in its beak. “Don’t count on it.”
“You live here, too?” I ask, eager to change the subject.
“Yeah, along with… seven other girls.” She counts on her fingers. “Meredith looks after us. She doesn’t have any cubs of her own, and we’re like her kids. A bunch of rejects. I call us the Jects.” She does a silly dance. “The Jects of Perdue Town. P-Town!” she finishes triumphantly.
I wrinkle my nose.
She throws her hands up. “P-Town…like Chi-Town, ya know?”
“Nah, doesn’t have the same ring to it.” I grin, shake my head at her dorkiness. It’s just what I need to take my mind off Beau.
The door clangs open and a couple of guys amble in. They’re both big all over, but especially in the shoulders. Pale blond hair, light blue eyes. They could be brothers. Some type of bear shifters, I think.