9. Charlotte

Charlotte

Finally, finally, Charlotte entered the conference room. While dominated by a large central table, the walls were chequered with doors leading into smaller meeting spaces, several of them occupied by groups of people working on one thing or another. There was an intensity in the room that spoke of people focussed on their tasks and getting stuff done.

“Here she is!” James said, waving her over.

His caramel coloured hair now had distinct orange overtones, showing how stressed he was. It took her a moment to remember what his task had been — researching the background of the family.

“Bad news?” she asked, already dreading what he was going to say.

“No, not at all. They’re squeaky clean. Mom’s a childcare worker, dad’s a mechanic, and the daughter is in her second year of school.” He winced and cleared his throat. “Was in her second year of school. They moved to the neighbourhood because it was a shorter commute for the mom, and their daughter was enrolled at the school too. Just three blocks from the house.”

“What about his commute?” Charlotte asked, unable to help it. Her owl wanted to know more about these people.

“They asked him that too, apparently it made no difference to him. Six one way, half dozen the other.”

“They asked? Who are they , sir?”

“James,” he told her. “For today at least, call me James. You’re right, this isn’t the time for games.”

She nodded, waiting for him to answer the question.

“They are the police who interviewed the family,” he told her. “Don’t fret, it was all by the book, they had a counsellor and legal representation with them, even family members present. They weren’t being harassed, it was just an honest attempt to find out where the fuck it all went wrong.”

“Okay, so no justified cause for the neighbour’s prejudice then,” she concluded.

“None at all. The neighbours were canvassed, it’s a medium sized apartment building, quite a few families with kids, mixed species place too. The daughter was popular and well accepted by the human children there, the families did what they could to form a neighbourhood, walking school buses and weekend cookouts when they could. It was a great little community, aside from the curmudgeon who lived next door to them. She hated kids. Hated shifters more, but she was always yelling at the kids, no matter what species they claimed.”

“Has she had an eval?” Charlotte asked.

“Yeah,” he said, sighing. “She failed. Moderate dementia, she should be in a home. Isn’t able to cook, clean or wash herself. She’s been kept in the geriatric ward at the hospital while they try to find her next of kin. She won’t be returning to her apartment, there was melted plastic on the stovetop, all the food was off, and she was still eating it. The place was a dump, full of roaches and stuff nobody should be exposed to.”

“Mosquitos, cockroaches, and batshit old women,” Charlotte muttered to herself.

“What?”

She looked at James, confusion clear on his face, and wanted to laugh. “You know that saying, after a nuclear holocaust, the only thing left will be roaches?”

He nodded.

“Well, I’ve amended that, because I think mosquitos will outlive us all. Although I suppose they’ll die from a lack of blood or something. Anyway, I’ve amended my list, because the amount of toxic food she was likely eating, should have killed her. It’s like immunity to microorganisms is her superpower or something. An older woman with food poisoning? How the fuck did she survive that? So, it’s mosquitos, cockroaches, and batshit old women who are going to survive the holocaust.”

James didn’t laugh, but his lips twitched, then he grunted. “You’re probably right, you know. She’ll fucking live longer than even shifters do.”

That was a scary thought.

“Well, there goes my big reveal,” Natasha said with a sigh. She’d been assigned to look into the woman. “Although I have an update on her next of kin. There’s a son and daughter, both are horrified, and they’re putting her into care. The daughter said the woman’s husband had left her years ago, and she always said it was for a shifter, but she’d secretly met the woman, even went to the wedding when he remarried, and she was as human as they got. Her mother was always angry and prejudiced after that.”

Of all the stupid things to come together, this was what had ended a little girl’s life? A bitter old woman with an imagined grudge, a baby cop who panicked on the job, then took his own life, and a little girl woken in the middle of the night by loud noises, who panicked when she saw her parents held at gunpoint.

There was no conspiracy, no sinister goal, just some bad choices, poor instincts, and fear. Nothing she could really fight against, not really. They could broach education of people in general, better training for the cops, especially those coming onto the force, and pushing to allow shifter law enforcement officers to assist on call-outs where a shifter was suspected to be involved.

This could have been avoided. It should have been avoided. Which was the biggest tragedy of the whole thing.

“I’ve got something else that might interest you, although we’re not supposed to have it,” Natasha said, watching her carefully.

Was this a test? Were they checking her loyalties or her ability to get them into trouble.

“Not supposed to have it how,” Charlotte asked. “As in you overheard something, or a source divulged the information without fear or favour? Or did you somehow obtain this illegally, because I cannot be a party to that.”

If it was a test, she had passed it, because the level of tension in the room lowered a degree.

“My source divulged it without any prompting. She’s a bit of a gossip, but her heart is in the right place. However, if we let on that we know this, then they will definitely dig into things, and she could end up getting into trouble.”

“Who else in the room knows this?” Charlotte asked.

“We all overheard it,” Tony said drily. “The woman was positively gushing, desperate to tell someone what she knew.”

“Then this information, whatever it is, needs to be confined to this room. Whatever her reasons, she’s done us a favour, and we may need to use her again. I’d rather protect our sources where we can.”

Natasha nodded as if this were par for the course. It probably was, but given this was Charlotte’s first time in the room with the big players, she wasn’t taking anything for granted.

The whole scene before her was surreal. These were the most powerful shifters in the country, at least politically anyway, and they were doing her scutwork. Making enquiries, tapping sources, and collating data. This was the kind of stuff she did for Grace, and had not the woman in question been indisposed, Charlotte was pretty sure she would have been here doing the same thing for Grace.

Then again, Grace wasn’t the speechwriter, so maybe not. Still, it was a heady sensation to have such power at her fingertips, even for just a moment.

“The Islington is confirmed,” Roxanne called out, her gaze steady as Charlotte turned to see her. “The grand ballroom. There’s a stage and room for two hundred seated guests. The White House press advisor was practically giddy at that. You can be assured they’ll be tapping all the media outlets they can.”

“Then we need to tap ours too,” Charlotte countered. “Who’s on that?”

“I'll do it,” Roxanne volunteered. “I’m not great with research and talking points, but I can tell people what to do like a pro.”

Charlotte snorted, she bet the hawk shifter could too. The woman’s stare was enough to make a person shit themselves at a thousand paces, and she bet her voice was just as effective over the phone.

“Madam, your belongings have arrived,” Wilson said at her elbow. “I’ve taken the liberty of bringing your laptop to you, and your belongings are in your suite. Your clothes are being pressed, refreshed and hung as I speak, and a female intern is selecting a series of outfits for you to choose from.”

“Thank you, Wilson, you’re a lifesaver,” Charlotte said. “I might need to borrow someone to direct me to my suite when it’s time. One of the guards, Zeke, got me here, but I’ve yet to map out the layout of this place in my head. It’s not a strength of my owl unless we’re looking down at a place.”

WIlson looked around the room, a confused expression on his face. “Ms Kelsing is not available?”

She couldn’t help it, a slightly hysterical giggle slipped past Charlotte’s lips before she could stop it. “Ms Kelsing, Bonny Kelsing, the young and rather impressionable lioness ?”

The aide’s lips moved as he repeated her words silently to himself, trying to work out the nuance.

“Oh fuck,” Brent Moorehouse, governor of the shifters said. Yeah, he got it, being a large cat himself. “She’s in a pheromone haze?”

“Yeah, one good whiff of our president, and she was all but unconscious.”

Wilson winced. “My apologies, Ms Bailey, I had forgotten that little peculiarity of lion shifters. I will find you someone suitable.”

“Actually, Zeke suggested someone called Roly. He sounds amazing on paper, and he’s supposed to be showing up at some point. If he gets here in time, then I’m hoping he can show me to my suite.”

“Uh, that would be me,” said a quiet voice from the doorway. “But I’m afraid I don’t know my way around the upper floors. I’ve never had cause to go up there.”

As soon as Charlotte laid eyes on him, she knew the man was going to work. Yes, one eye was distinctly cocked to his left, almost like he was trying to look over his shoulder, and if what Zeke said was correct, he could probably do that anyway. The other one, the darker one, was directed right at her, and while his posture was slightly stooped, as though he was trying to avoid notice, his gaze was fixed upon her, unwaveringly. It was almost like a challenge, like he was daring her to look beneath the surface and see the treasure he was, and from the intelligence she saw glittering in just one eye, he was going to be the find of a century.

Slowly a smile curled across her lips. “Welcome to the team, Roly.”

He gave a slight head bow of acquiescence, but if she hadn’t been watching him so carefully, her owl enhancing her sight, she would have missed the slightest flinch that preceded it.

Roly entered the room, joining her and Wilson where she stood, clutching her laptop bag to her chest.

“Do you even like being called Roly?” she asked, guessing at the cause of his discomfort.

“It’s a nickname,” he replied neutrally.

Charlotte shook her head. “You’re a smart man, Roly, or so I’ve been told. If you’re going to work for me, Roly, then I need you to be honest. I think we’re going to get on like a house on fire, Roly, our friendship is going to be the stuff of legends. I know I have no right, and I know it’s early in the game, Roly, but I’m going to need you to trust me to have your back. So when I fucking ask you a question, Roly, I expect you to answer it.”

Yep, she was right. Every time she said that name, his body gave away his dislike of it. It was a flicker of an eyelid, a twitch of his lips, the slight hunching of his shoulders. This name, this nickname, was associated with whoever had tried to put him down here, and there was no way she was going to be associated with that.

“How about Fitz?” she asked him. “I like Roland, it’s a good name, but I think you and I have to have something a little more personal than that. When it’s just us, you can call me Char, and if you like it, then I’ll call you Fitz.”

The man watched her carefully, clearly thinking about her offer. “I can work with that,” he said finally.

“Good. Then your first task is to work with Wilson here to get me a guide until the two of us can learn our way around where we have to go. Does he stay on site here too, Wilson?” she asked.

“No, ma’am. His residence is secure, and any threat against him would be at the same level as someone not working in the building. He’s a shifter, that’s target enough.”

Which was sadly far too true.

“Alright then, I’m going to work on the speech of my life, I’m going to be crabby, demanding, and a real bitch. Just remember, I don’t mean a lick of it. I’m simply stressed out. If you don’t mind, I take my coffee white with one sugar. No creamers, can’t stand the stuff. Don’t let me drink more than four a day, or you’ll regret it. If you get me one now, please, that will be number two.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, with a degree of resignation.

“Oh, and Fitz?”

“Ma’am?”

“I’ve had less than an hour to become accustomed to the idea of having an assistant. Until this morning, I was an assistant. So, cut me some slack. I promise, you are not a dogsbody, I will not chain you to a copy machine, but right now, I need people to do things for me, even basic things, until I can get my feet under me and really get going.”

His dark eye brightened a little, and he gave her a more enthusiastic response this time. “Yes, ma’am!”