Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

I n comic books and other visual mediums, people who were very surprised or choking were sometimes depicted as going "*", to show their distress.

Aoife was fairly certain she went *.

It felt like a small, soundless squeak in the back of her throat, as if a mouse had lodged there and put up a weak protestation of the situation. It also felt like all of her breath was lodged on the wrong side of that *, although logically there wasn't a correct side of it, if air couldn't get either in or out.

There was a lion in the office.

More specifically, Elliott Harkness, the incredibly hot maybe-billionaire-animal-trafficker, had… turned into the lion in the office.

He was now sitting very, very still, except the fluffy tip of his tail twitched lightly. He'd wrapped that tail around his front toes, just like any cat, and gazed at her with enormous dark brown eyes. He was a beautiful lion, well-fed, glimmering gold in his tawny fur, his mane thick and dark, and Aoife said, "Oh my feckin' god, you're the lion in the enclosure. Not in the enclosure. You're the lion on the loose?" Her voice rose and rose and rose until the last word was another mouse squeak.

Elliott turned back into a human. He was still wearing his clothes. Aoife had no idea how that worked, since the lion definitely hadn't been wearing any clothes. He stood with his hands in front of his crotch, shoulders caved and a sheepish expression on his face. It somehow looked exactly like the human equivalent of a cat wrapping its tail around its toes in embarrassment.. "I'm the lion on loan," he said again in a rather small, apologetic voice.

Dr. Kelly put her forehead down on the desk and groaned.

Aoife rotated her head toward Dr. Kelly so slowly she could hear the muscles in her neck creaking. "You knew." Her voice remained up there in mouse-squeak-territory, but then dropped suddenly, surprising even herself. "You knew . You knew! You knew he was a lion! You know—oh my god . Are they all lions? I mean are they all—whatever he is? Do they all do that? The bears and the elephants and the golden eagle , Dr. Kelly, how does a human being who weighs sixty kilos turn into a bird with a mass of five kilos, Dr. Kelly, how does that work? "

Dr. Kelly groaned again, and shook her head against the desk. Elliott raised his hand to about shoulder height, and in the same rather small voice, said, "I have a theory about that."

Aoife swung toward him. Well, she wanted to swing toward him, but she'd only moved her head to look at Dr. Kelly, which meant she didn't really have the option for a whole-body thing going on for a proper swing. Still, she whipped her head toward him so vigorously she thought she might actually spin her entire body around anyway. " Well, go on then! "

"It's the magic, of course," Elliott said with a nervous smile. It was absurdly cute. Aoife didn't want it to be cute, and also inhaled to tell him that was a useless answer, but he went on hastily. "No, I know, of course it's the magic, but besides that, it's like a cat shifting its mass. You know how a cat steps on you and?—"

"Yes," Aoife said impatiently. "Sometimes they have the weight of a thousand suns driving into your boob with one paw, and sometimes they creep across a bridge of tissue paper without disturbing it. What does that have to do with anything?"

Elliott took a rather eager step forward, his dark eyes bright with enthusiasm. "So I think shifters are like that. We borrow or release mass when we need it. Bird shifters release a lot of mass, obviously, but it's all there in the ether for us to use then. And a lot of us are bigger than true animals—you should see shifter wolves—so it, it adds up , but it's always available if we need it."

Aoife stared at him. After a while he moved from one foot to another, uncomfortably, so she stared at him some more, and when he began digging his toe against the floor, she said, "That doesn't make any sense."

"But it sort of does," he protested hopefully. "If you can buy into the idea that cats shift their mass…"

"Well, but they don't!" Aoife started strongly there, but faltered. Technically, she knew they didn't. Emotionally, though…

She bared her teeth, and Elliott beamed. "See? See ? It does make sense! I mean. It's the magic. But I think there's a cosmic balance to where the mass goes!"

"Okay, but what about your clothes ?" Aoife, dismayed, heard herself ask the question, which meant she was fundamentally accepting Elliott's premise. "And if there are bigger shifters and smaller shifters doesn't that mean a big one has to shift at the same time as a small one to deal with the mass exchange?"

"No, no." Elliott took another eager step toward her. He was close enough for her to catch his scent now, and he smelled remarkably good. Not like a lion. Although Aoife didn't know what a lion smelled like up close and personal, to be fair. She'd never smelled one. Which was obvious, because she was still alive. Elliott smiled again, even more hopefully. "See, it waits . It goes, like…where Highlander swords go."

Aoife, after another long silence, said, "The Highlanders used claymores," and after an even longer one, sighed. "No, I know what you mean. The movie immortals with the conveniently disappearing swords. Did you know in the old cartoons, Optimus Prime's truck bed used to do that too?"

" See ?" Elliott said triumphantly.

"That was a cartoon !" Aoife wailed.

"Magical disappearance and transference of mass!" Elliott said gleefully. "It's a good theory, isn't it?"

Dr. Kelly no longer had her head on the desk. She'd sat up to watch the two of them, her gaze popping back and forth like she'd been given front row tickets to… Aoife didn't do sports, and her analogy fell apart before she got to the end. Front row tickets to something that bounced back and forth a lot. Tennis, she guessed. Maybe basketball.

Aoife threw her hands upward. "Okay, but what about your clothes?"

"Those just come with us," Elliott said. "Anything right up against our skin, except other people and living things basically just comes with us. It's not a mass thing."

"Of course it isn't." Aoife wheeled toward Dr. Kelly, rotating on her heel. "And you know about this. Are you a—a shifter?"

Dr. Kelly gave Elliott a positively dire look before sighing toward Aoife. "As a matter of fact, yes, I am, which is not information I intended to share with you and hope you'll keep to yourself."

"Well, obviously, " Aoife said, offended. "But how—what—why?!?"

She did not, in truth, feel she was expressing herself very clearly, but the two shifters— the two shifters! —in the room looked rather like she'd said exactly what she meant to. Dr. Kelly sighed again. "There's been a shifter population as long as there have been true humans. Maybe longer, I don't know. There are different heritages, different histories, but…we've been here a long time, Aoife. And we're very cautious about telling anyone, so we have to be creative in ways to keep ourselves safe. The wildlife park is one of our temporary sanctuaries."

"Was that what it was built for?" Aoife demanded.

In Dr. Kelly's defense, she looked startled. "No, the park is considerably older than its sanctuary status. It's only been used as a waypoint since I took over, because…well, because I was aware of the need."

"Who else knows? I mean, here? Who else who works here knows?"

Dr. Kelly held her breath a moment, then exhaled. "I won't be telling you that, because the fewer people you feel comfortable talking to about it, the less risk there is of our exposure. I'm sorry. It's not really about you. It's a survival tactic."

"But…!" Aoife spluttered, then stomped a foot and turned to Elliott again, as if expecting he would somehow back her up.

Which was ridiculous. She'd only met him about twelve seconds ago. Strangers, especially strangers with important secrets, didn't just go around supporting random wildlife park employees in their desire to know stuff about their secret lives.

Elliott, his gaze dark and delicious on hers, said, "She's safe," to Dr. Kelly in such a low crooning voice that Aoife felt her skin tingle with it. The tingle settled in more deeply, too, tightening and heating places that had no business being tight and hot at work. She tried very hard not to blush, and was pretty sure she failed.

Dr. Kelly, inexplicably, said, "Oh, you have got to be kidding me."

"No," Elliott said in that same, almost sing-song warm voice. "No, I'm not. You can trust Aoife with anything, Maureen. I can trust her with everything , so you can too."

"What," Aoife said in what she was sure was a nice measured tone, and not an ear-splitting shriek, "are you two on about?"

"You're," Elliott began, and Dr. Kelly, with great haste and volume, said, " a trustworthy employee, Aoife ."

Elliott turned a startled look on the director, whose eyes were feverishly bright as Aoife, too, gawked at her. "A trustworthy employee," Kelly repeated at volume. "And occasionally, when we meet people, we just know that they're trustworthy!"

It sounded for all the world like she was speaking in capitalized words, and talking to Elliott at least as much as she was to Aoife. We Just Know They're Trustworthy!

Aoife, in cautious protest, said, "But you didn't tell me until just now…? Did I—" Offense flew through her and she put her arms akimbo. "Wait a minute, are you suggesting you didn't used to think I was trustworthy? What've I done to deserve that, I ask ye!"

Kelly looked like her eyes would explode at Elliott, as if whatever was going on was entirely his fault. Well, he was the one who'd turned into a lion, so Aoife supposed he was at fault. On the other hand, Kelly could have explained things at any point in their conversation before Elliott arrived, so Aoife didn't know what to make of it.

Elliott, almost as cautiously as Aoife had spoken, said, "We don't all always sense the same trustworthiness about people as each other?"

Dr. Kelly gave a huge, dramatic, pointed nod of agreement while Aoife pulled her gaze back to Elliott, who was being large and apologetic and extremely attractive, which turned out to be a deadly combination for Aoife. She could think of all kinds of things that she might enjoy having him plead for, with those huge dark eyes of his.

She was almost certain that was not where her thoughts were supposed to be going. It took her a moment to recollect herself, and when she did, she said, "'We don't all always sense the same trustworthiness about people as each other' is a terrible mess of a sentence."

"Well, but you knew what I meant, right?" he asked hopefully. "The people I instinctively trust aren't necessarily the same ones Dr. Kelly would, but if I can trust you, she knows she can?"

Since that was more or less what Aoife had understood him to mean, she nodded.

"Please," Elliott said, and Aoife was increasingly certain she had a long, long list of things she'd like to have him say please about. "Please, can I take you out to breakfast and explain this all a little better?"

To Aoife's dismay, before she could speak, Dr. Kelly said a firm, "No. Aoife's got a fundraising tour group to meet in nine minutes."

Aoife's gaze snapped to a clock on the wall. " Crap ."

"Take a golf cart," Dr. Kelly said wearily, and Aoife bolted for the door.