Sally’s not the problem.” Oz paused, considering. “Or at least, not the biggest problem.” Which was one of the reasons Oz had been happy to hear Annette had been en route. “It gets tricky for a couple of reasons. Big number one…”
“Mama’s new Stable neighbor.” Annette had just cut herself a slice of pie that was as big as a Stephen King paperback and plopped it on a plate, then slid the box to him. “How could Roy Harriss let that happen?”
“Oh, before I forget.” Mama was bustling from the fridge to the counter and back again. “Harry Harriss is back. I guess community college didn’t work out.”
“Normally I despise gossip, but that’s actually fascinating. Harry’s—what?” Annette frowned, doing the math. “Twenty-five? And he’s lived here all his life, except for a week here or a month there, those little tentative stabs at freedom?”
“And he always comes back, poor lamb.” Mama shook her head. “I don’t know why Roy doesn’t either put his foot down or give up and accept that his son will die in that house.”
“Wait, is that the guy who knew he didn’t get into college, lied and said he did, and didn’t come clean until they were physically on campus, trying to help him move into a dorm room he didn’t have? Because that’s commitment. That wasn’t a little white lie, it was the blackest of deceptions, and Harriss just flung himself into it. He packed and everything!”
“That’s him. But with all due respect to the Harriss mob, that’s not our problem. The Stable is.” Annette shook her head. “I still don’t understand how Harriss Senior let that happen.”
Say, now! Here was a chance for some fun. “Because he’s been trying to unload the house for years and beggars can’t be choosers?”
Annette shook her head. “He never should have rented to one of them.”
Oz felt his eyebrows climb. “You hear yourself, right?”
“I don’t have a bigoted bone in my body and you know it,” Annette snapped. “It’s a safety issue.”
He knew what she meant, but he could no more resist the chance to needle her than he could resist thinking about Lila’s curls and what they might feel like. Oz took a two-second mental break and reminded himself, again, that Kama-Rupa was not happening. It was so not happening, in fact, that he’d decided he wouldn’t bring it up. For what? The fleeting pleasure of confirming he hadn’t gone clinically insane in twenty-four hours? No and no and nope.
He forced his brain back on its accustomed “snark all over Annette” track. “Next you’re gonna say property values in the neighborhood are gonna drop like rocks.”
“Well, they might, but that’s more because of the economic indicators that would—dammit, it’s not a race thing!” she nearly shouted. “Or a species thing, rather. I don’t have a problem with Stables. In fact—”
“If you say you have a Stable friend, I’m gonna laaaaaaaugh.”
“Well, I do. More than one, even! Look, you know me,” she whined.
“I thought I did.”
“Oh my God, I’m going to beat you to death. You know I don’t think Shifters are superior. I think we’re all—”
“Separate but equal?”
“Dammit!” Annette practically howled.
“Children,” Mama Mac cut in. “Since there’s nothing to be done about Roy’s current tenant—”
“I wouldn’t say that.” From Annette, who’d calmed down and was now staring hopefully at the pie earmarked for Caro and Dev. “They never stay very long, Stables or Shifters.” She glanced around at the table. “We all know why.”
Oz snorted. “Then why are you saying it?”
“That’s true, m’dear, but that curly gal’s here for—damn, I’ve forgotten her—”
“It’s Lila,” Oz broke in at once. “Lila Kai. From Bloomington, Illinois.” At their inquiring looks, he elaborated. “Her old address is on the boxes of eyes and arms.”
“Boxes, plural?”
“Yep.”
“Of eyes?”
“And arms.”
“Good God.” Annette shook off the horror—literally shook—and then pushed her bangs out of her eyes. He’d never tell her, but her deep brown waves and white highlights were a striking mess. And no matter how many haircuts she had, she always looked about a month overdue for one, which should’ve made her look like an unkempt slob but somehow didn’t. He and the few who knew her secret—she was probably the only polar–grizzly were in the world—liked knowing her hair was the giveaway, out there for everyone to see if they bothered to pay attention. Multiple deceased bad guys hadn’t, Exhibit A for why they were deceased.
“All right, let’s stay on point,” she was saying, because she wasn’t just a polar–grizzly hybrid, she was