Big Gator: A BBW shape shifter paranormal romance (14 page)

             
“
What
is it that you really want from this man, Brandy?”

             “
I
don't want anything that I expect to actually get,” Brandy said.

             
Marianne
nodded.

             “
Yeah,
I kind of figured this was what was going on,” she said. “You
know, I shouldn't even have to say this – “

             “
So
don't.”

             “–
but
I'm going to say it anyway.  You CANNOT BE WITH HIM.  He is
not a shifter.  You can't even screw around with him for fun –
not THIS guy.  He knows too much about alligators.  He WILL
one day figure out something is quite unusual about you.”

             
Brandy
really didn't have anything to say to that.  She unscrewed the
cap on her dwindling jar of coconut oil. The oil was half-clear and
melted, half-solid white and lumpy. She dipped her right hand into
the oil and spread some on her upper left arm,  feeling the
smoothness of the saturated fat as it glided across her skin. 
Within minutes of massaging it in, the coconut oil would mimic an
extra layer of her human-reptilian epidermis, easing away the dryness
of the phantom scales that were always a part of her biology, but
that just couldn't be seen right now.

             “
I
have another reason for going back in there, and this one you will
have to agree with.”

             “
What's
that, exactly?”

             “
I
have to go back in and get Hugh and Bobby Cliburn before they get out
and come get me.”

             
It
was true. Brandy needed to take care of business, and she planned to
do it as 'Shirley'.

             “
So
are you going to help me or not?” Brandy asked.

             “
And
if I don't?”

             “
I'll
figure something out.  I'll figure out a Plan B.”

             “
Plan
B for what?” asked Jenny, appearing in the screen door.  She
opened the squeaky door and came out on the porch, letting it snap
back on its own before it shut.

             “
How
come your skin never looks dry?” Brandy asked.  “I don't
ever see you brush.”

             “
Alpha-hydroxy,”
Jenny said. “I have a lotion that has both AHA and salicylic acid.
I use it twice a day.”

             “
Salicylic
acid,” Marianne said, “isn't that the stuff you use to remove
warts?”

             “
Yep.
Works like a charm.”

             
Marianne
asked her what the brand was, and then looked it up online with her
smartphone.

             “
So
you haven't answered my question” Jenny said to Brandy.

             “
You've
got your own plan to worry about, as dumb as it is.”

             “
Oh,
just tell her,” Marianne said.

             
Brandy
sighed and obliged. Jenny's jaw dropped to her ankles.  Then she
almost fell down laughing.

             “
This
is batshit insane!  And here you are giving me crap all week
about going after the LaBelles,” Jenny said smugly.  “You
know what – just to be a good sport – and because you're letting
me stay at your place – I'm going to help you.”

             “
What?”
Brandy said.

             “
Say
what?” Marianne gasped. “You cannot be serious.”

             “
Oh
yes, I am,” Jenny said smugly.  “This I've gotta see. My
cousin sneaking around Animal Sphere, daring fate. I'll try to give
you fair warning before we lift the curse, though, once and for all.
So, enjoy it while it lasts.”

             
Jenny
jaunted off the porch toward the banana trees.

             “
Hey
– be careful – there could be spiders in there,” Brandy shouted
after her.

             
A
banana stalk was indeed just about ready to be cut down – but not
yet.

             
Jenny
looked like she was about to try to pick a banana from the stalk.

             “
Not
yet!” Brandy told her. “We'll grab them in a few days.”

             “
They
look good enough to me,” Jenny called back.  But she complied
and left them alone.  She walked back to the porch and stretched
out on the wicker couch, her skinny little legs crossed.  She
reached down and scratched an itch on her calf.

             “
I
thought you said that lotion
worked
,”
Marianne chided her.

             “
It's
just a mosquito bite,” Jenny said. “Geez.”

             
In
the end, Marianne only agreed to help Brandy out because she knew her
best friend really did have to take out the Cliburn brothers,
gator-on-gator style.  Brandy was bound and determined anyway,
and if things went badly, Marianne would not leave Brandy to have to
deal with it alone.

             
The
plan they hatched seemed complicated, but oddly doable in the
short-term. 

             
Brandy
worked three 12-hour days a week, with three days off. She would call
McEvans on her first day off for the week and tell him she had
trapped 'Shirley'.  Brandy would then make an excuse about why
she couldn't bring 'Shirley' to Animal Sphere herself, but instead
would send the alligator with a couple of friends. 

             
The
manmade alligator swamp at Animal Sphere was big enough, and deep
enough, that 'Shirley' could feasibly disappear throughout the day
while Brandy was working.  She would stash several changes of
clothes in her employee locker, take showers on the premises, and
basically live there for a week.  When the time was up, she
would tell McEvans it was time to ship 'Shirley' back home on another
one of her days off.

             “
Is
this really going to be worth it?” Marianne asked her, hoping that
Brandy might chicken-out last minute.

             “
Yes!
I need to impress my boss,” Brandy said.

             “
This
is going way above and beyond professional.”

             “
You've
already committed, so you have to back me up on this now,” Brandy
told her.

             
A
few days later, Brandy made the call, and McEvans was ecstatic. 
His favorite alligator was on her way back to him.

             
When
Marianne and Jenny pulled up in Ray's pickup truck – which they had
borrowed under false pretenses for a fictional errand – McEvans met
them for the first time. Both women sized him up, and they both
immediately realized why Brandy was so involved with her job.

             
After
Brandy was unloaded, McEvans mounted her back – wrestler style –
and fixed her jaws closed with his bare hands.  Pulling her head
up and back toward him, he kissed 'Shirley' smack on the lips – or
where lips should be, if alligators actually had them.

             
Jenny
raised her eyebrows.

             “
That
man's got it bad for her,” she muttered to Marianne. “It's a
little weird for a man to be making out with an alligator, don't you
think?”

             “
He's
not
making
out
with
her,” Marianne said.  “He just gave her a little peck,
that's all.”

             
But
Marianne did see, for the first time, that something beyond the norm
was going on here.

             
Apparently
the poor man can't help himself,
Marianne
thought.  Brandy always had been able to attract a fair share of
gator shifters, but this was the first time Marianne saw a regular
human so smitten with her.

             
Brandy
had an immediate task when she was released into the gator pit. 
This first part would be to let the Cliburns know she was there.

             
They
wouldn't make a move on her during the day.  And, now, she could
get out at night. Already they had seen her from afar as she worked,
but they were smart not to attack her as a human. And previously they
had all concluded that if someone got killed or even just seriously
injured, that meant they would shift back into human form, leaving
inconvenient evidence of a very HUMAN murder. 

             
The
Cliburns had let Brandy know they planned to escape eventually and
would corner her on their home turf.  Brandy wasn't about to let
that happen. 

             
But,
if Brandy was to take care of business at Animal Sphere, that meant
Brandy would have to break protocol and not just kill – but EAT
both Hugh and Bobby Cliburn, even though they weren't her immediate
kin.

Chapter 16

             
When
Brandy made her first human appearance after 'Shirley' had returned,
McEvans grabbed her and gave her a bear hug. He smelled really good
to her on a primal level – a mix of swamp water and sweat.  He
had been swimming with 'Shirley' all that morning, and he hadn't
showered yet.

             “
I
have something for you,” Brandy said, pulling back from the hug.
She felt lightheaded both from this morning's swim and from the
hug.   The 'something' she handed him was her introductory
proposal for redesigning Animal Sphere's manmade swamp to look like
the real thing.

             
McEvans
took the binder she handed him and beckoned for her to follow him
back to his office.  He skimmed it front to back, then he went
back to the first page and started reading it slowly.

             “
You
know, I've wanted to to this before – but the permitting gets
tricky,” he said. “And what you're presenting here is more
sophisticated than what I had previously considered.”

             
Brandy
felt a wave of disappointment.  He was turning her down.

             “
Sketch
it out for me,” McEvans said, surprising her.  He pushed some
paper and a pencil at her.

             “
You
just said the permitting would be impossible.”

             “
I
didn't say it was impossible,” he said. “I said permitting
is
tricky
. 
Quite frankly, I didn't move forward with the plan at the time
because we got caught up in red tape, and I didn't have the patience
to deal with it. I was filming two documentaries and had a heavy
travel schedule.”

             
Brandy
took the paper and pencil and began sketching out what she envisioned
in her head. She could feel McEvans studying her while she drew.

             
What
he
really
noticed
was the fact that Brandy had a very elegant profile, with eyelashes
thick and long enough that they could swat a fly.  That sounded
dorky, even in his head, but it's what he thought.  He also
could see a hint of cheekbone set in away that indicated Native
American heritage, and that, too, had its own elegance.