Bearly Breathing (Alpha Werebear Shifter Paranormal Romance) (15 page)

A section of trunk fell and landed with a heavy, decisive
thunk
. Two other men put some kind of brace underneath the chunk of now-dead tree, and carried it to a giant, ugly, industrial-looking metal bin, and threw it inside.

“People won’t throw their dead cats in the dumpster,” Celia said to herself. “But trees? Trees go right in the trash.”

Someone finally pulled up behind her and laid on the horn when she sat motionless through yet another light cycle. She jolted back to reality, and flicked her turn signal. She meant to head left, out of town, to investigate this lake and the monster living therein. Such a creature, she could use for her own ends... assuming she could manage to get it to take her suggestions.

“Look out below!” the big, barrel-chested lumberjack shouted before a massive branch fell to the earth unceremoniously and broke into four splintering pieces.

“No,” Celia snarled. “No way in hell.”

The poor man in the white panel van behind her laid on the horn again, then threw his hands dramatically into the air and gesticulated wildly, hoping that he’d maybe catch her attention with all the waving around.

The blinker still indicated left, but Celia floored the tiny, square pedal.

Slowly, the little car turned right.

In the panel van, the man shook his head, glared at the ridiculous car, and revved his engine, speeding out from behind Celia and then through the intersection before the Smart Car made it out.

Straight ahead of Celia, partially glimmering and partially too covered in moss that, Celia noted, really did need to be power washed, the Jamesburg County Courthouse stood. The misshapen domes on either side of the modest, five story courthouse made it look vaguely phallic, which never failed to entertain most anyone who saw the building from this exact angle.

Celia gritted her teeth.

Nothing, not even a penis-shaped building, was going to distract Celia.

There’s no escaping destiny. No escaping fate.

Celia was going to court.

––––––––

“O
h my God!” Erik stood up behind the lectern where he had a stack of papers six inches high, and slammed his hand on the desk beside him. “Calm down! Calm the hell down! Every single one of you yapping idiots,
calm down!
”

By the end of it, Erik was red in the face, Izzy was silently chuckling to herself, and the entire Complainer’s Court audience was staring at him open-mouthed.

Complainer’s Court – the weekly test of patience that Erik was convinced existed only because he had been such an asshole when he was in his twenties that he needed to suffer karmic reprisal – was every Friday. The official name for the weekly gathering was Community Outreach Discussion, but Complainer’s Court was a lot more apt.

It was similar to a town hall meeting, except that instead of everyone sitting around and falling asleep while other people talked about how they wish their neighbors would mow the yard more often, everyone screamed.

A lot.

This was the ebb and flow. For a time, people would just be called for their turn to speak and then present whatever hopelessly banal problem they had before the town council. Whichever town council member was most familiar with the issue at hand would speak up, and then a decision reached.

But then someone would dredge up some shit about a cheating ex-mate who decided to run off and literally join the circus and then come back to town a year later, expecting to still have a place to sleep.

Chaos. Like real chaos, not like a college on the first day. Like fire and brimstone, hell raining from the skies, dogs and cats living together, chaos. It never failed.

“Anyways,” Leon, the town drunk-cum-salamander, slurred. “I never meant to fall asleep under Jimmy Atwood’s shrubs and I surely didn’t know I did it on his worm bed.”

I said quiet!
Erik wanted to shout, but he knew that would just make them
all
shout. Just like running a kindergarten, he guessed, or training a puppy.

“Damn it, Leon,” Jimmy Atwood, an honest-to-God jackass shifter, said. “I told you four times that day when we was drinkin’ that you couldn’t stay over on account of my wife getting home from her Junior League dance marathon and wantin’ to go straight to bed.”

The door opened and someone came in – someone short enough that no one at the back of the room could see who it was. But, whoever just entered didn’t bother to say anything, instead just blending in with the crowd. Probably just another hoople-head with a stupid complaint.

Erik sat back, thankful that at least it was just two idiots shouting at each other. At the same time, he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. He really
was
, like really, listening to a jackass and a drunken salamander have it out as to who should have to repair the donkey’s hobby worm bed.

He lowered his Sea World coffee mug out of sight and poured about three healthy slugs of whiskey into the cup. The next sip he took was a
lot
better than the one before. He looked over at his mate, Izzy, and shrugged. She scooted her chair closer. He looked past her gorgeous curls, to Professor Duggan, who was sitting with his arms crossed over his big belly.

It looked like the old hedgehog had actually fallen asleep somehow, but it was hard to tell with him. Duggan was in charge of the notifications and permits section of the town government, which suited him well because Duggan’s favorite thing in the world was a tie between economic history books so dry they could light Leon on fire, and a perfectly prepared, correctly filled out permit form.

To Erik’s left sat Jamie Ampton, the leather-clad werebat who served currently as the town’s community outreach officer. She had been recently pining over some new guy she met – apparently an incredibly rich blood drinker – and generally acting like a love-sick puppy. Jamie rhythmically tapped the heel of one of her knee-high leather boots on the tile floor, and then dragged it between the cracks.

All the way at the end of the table sat Ash Morgan, the single bear in the normally hyena-only Jamesburg Police Department. He was lucky enough to have been named the community liaison for the JPD, so he got to come to all these things as well.

“Now I swear it’s true,” Jimmy Atwood resumed. “I done told him six times he couldn’t stay over, and so when he was all good’n drunk – which by the way, he got snookered off
my
liquor – I said to him goodnight, and he said to me the same, and I closed the door. I expected he’d go on his way but instead he had the gumption to go right to sleep on top of my
goddamn worms
!”

Erik sensed that things were about to get heated again, and he was just tipsy enough that if it happened, he’d throw a lectern. Izzy – she wasn’t just his mate of course, she was also the town controller of finance – informed him that there was only enough for three more lecterns in this year’s budget. He couldn’t waste one on Leon.

“All right,” Erik cut in, raising his hands in a universal “please shut up” sign. “So, how much is this worm bed actually worth? Like are we talking ant farm money or... shit, I don’t even know. I feel stupid just saying this stuff.”

At that, Duggan stood up. Apparently he had just been resting his eyes. “They can get very expensive, especially if the worms were a mature breeding garden. I used to keep them myself.”

“Yeah!” Jimmy Atwood said. “This was a five year old bed. One of my worms won the worm size, girth, and color contest in
Bait & Tackle
. He was the champion for three years running!”

“Surely... that can’t be true,” Erik said. “Right? Worms don’t live that long. Right? Someone back me up, someone make me feel like I’m not actually the single sane individual in an entire sea of insanity.”

Izzy started in-laughing, and Jamie arched an eyebrow. Ash cracked his knuckles so loudly that the
crack
was audible over the growing din of noise. Humorously, that calmed everyone down a little bit.

“Well look,” Leon finally said. “I sure am sorry for what I did to my friend’s worms, especially the long, thick one that kep’ winnin’ fights or whatever he said. But fact is, even if I wanted to pay, I can’t. I don’t have a plug damn nickel to my name. I ain’t getting paid until Friday next.”

“Can’t squeeze blood from a salamander, I guess,” Erik said under his breath, in Izzy’s direction. “Wait. No, you can. That doesn’t...”

Just in time to stop either of them from talking any more, Erik stood back up. “All right,” he pronounced. “Since Leon’s broke until a week from Friday, and no one has any clue how much worm beds cost anyhow, would it be all right if he just helped you build a new one? Or dig one, or... whatever you do to make a worm bed?”

“Ah!” Duggan cut in. “Actually it’s a combination of digging, plowing the soil to make it nice and moist and oxygenated, and then you have to do what they call ‘seeding’ the bed. That means you have to get some worms to start off with establishing the colony and then you—”

Erik raised his hand. “Right, yes, thank you professor. I’m glad we sorted that out. So,” he said, turning back to the crowd. “Will that work for you, Jimmy?”

Jimmy Atwood looked like he’d just been asked to explain special relativity to a four year-old. “Jimmy?” he asked again.

“Oh, sorry,” Jimmy said, closing his slackened jaw. “I was thinkin’ about somethin’.”

“Sure you were,” Erik said. “So, the deal? He helps you build a new bed and then buys some worms when he can afford it? Will that work?”

“Yeah,” Jimmy said. “I guess that’ll be about the best I can hope for.”

The two friends sat down, friends once again.

Erik shuffled his papers and rubbed his forehead with the first knuckle on his left hand. “Okay, good,” he said. “Moving on.”

“No you
are not
!” Someone said from the back of the room. Someone who was pushing between the audience members to try to get to the front. “There is
no
next except Celia Maynard!”

He didn’t recognize the name, but the voice was familiar. It took Erik a second to place it, but when he did, it struck like a tetanus shot in the muscled part of his ass.

“Oh,” Erik said. “It’s you.”

“Now wait just a damned minute,” Jenga protested, waving his arms in the air for attention as he stood up from his bench. Atlas followed soon after, with a very pleasant smile on his face and a long tendril of drool that went from his lip to his belly. Some sort of pungent, high school dance type scent wafted off his skin. “I been sittin’ here for the last three hours waiting my turn and I’m not one to be upstaged by a four foot beaver!”

Celia, for the first time possibly ever, was dumbfounded. Speechless at what she witnessed, she just stood there, watching the jangly-bearded, rickety old man and the giant zombie approach the front table.

“Now all’s I need is for one of you to sign this permit.”

“Why do you always come to court to get this done?” Erik asked, at once irritated but also thankful for the few seconds reprieve before he had to deal with that crazy woman again. “Don’t you realize you can come literally any time at all and have these permits signed? What’s this for anyway, another zombie?”

Jenga smiled his yellow-toothed grin. “Yes, well, if’n I come other times, you have more of a chance to read it all.”

Duggan pushed himself to his feet, visibly excited. “A permit?” he asked. “Oh please, let me have it. Hand that over here.”

Erik sighed, Jenga frowned, and Atlas drooled, all with varying levels of enthusiasm. Celia, for her part, was just shaking her head, not sure what to make of any of this.

“What’s this for?” Duggan asked, pushing his glasses back on his forehead and squinting at the paper. “Why do you need another zombie? And where are you going to get the... er... parts?”

Jenga shook his head. “Already taken care of. It’s totally on the up and up, I swear. I got this pile of papers here if’n you really want to look.”

Duggan took a glance at the first one, winced, and then patted the stack. “I’m sure you’re telling the, uh, truth,” he said. “But I have to ask, again, why do you need another one? I thought Atlas was—”

“Not...him,” Atlas groaned. A wide, slightly disquieting grin spread across his face. “I...need.”

Opening his mouth to respond, Duggan’s voice hitched in his throat before saying anything. “You’re speaking very well, Atlas,” he said with a slight smile. “You... need a zombie? That seems a little socially tricky, I...”

“Girl...friend,” he said slowly. “Want some...one to smile...at.”

“Ah,” Duggan said, “I suppose we all want that. Yes, well, uh, I can’t imagine any reason to deny you the pleasure we all enjoy on a daily basis,” he said with a glance at Erik. “Or in some cases, much more than daily, and generally at the most inappropriate possible times.”

“Thank you, now just go ahead and sign that permit, and... there we are.” Jenga smiled, collecting his papers and backing away from the table. “Very good, very good.”

“Oh,” Duggan said, looking back in his direction. “You’ll have to pay the permit cost of course. That’ll be,” he pulled out a Palm Pilot – like an actual Palm Pilot – and started scanning through something. “Ah here we are. Right, so, zombie permit past the first zombie is... oh, that’ll be a slight discount from the one you got when you made your other, er, friend.”

Jenga pursed his lips and pulled a checkbook out of his loose-hanging Hawaiian shirt. This one had 1957 Chevrolets on it instead of hula girls. “How much?”

“Six hundred, fifty dollars for the base permit. And then... how large do you estimate she’ll be?”

“Not...nice,” Atlas said. “Ask...ing a lady... about her weight.”

Erik, Izzy and Jamie all started laughing at once. “He’s got a point, Professor,” Jamie said. “How about height, instead?”

“Oh, um, sure,” Jenga said. He grabbed a notepad out of his cargo pocket and started flipping pages, listing off whatever it said. “Head circumference, arm length... leg length – she’s a leggy thing,” he said, elbowing Atlas in the ribs. “Going to be, I mean.” He cleared his throat.