Page 23 of Targeted By Fate
I left Lake to round up our brothers and took Keane aside. “This is bad. Are you sure you want to be involved?”
“Of course. I’m part of the pack.”
At headquarters, I consulted with Alpha before he spoke in front of pack members.
“This latest incident involved the death of Crescent Moon shifters, our kin, and we assume the Ironclaw shifters are again responsible.”
The initial deaths, on the night I met my mate, were on our territory but the shifters who died were from packs in and around the city.
“But Alpha, how are they bringing in the drugs?” one shifter asked, and the rest of the crowd murmured in agreement.
“Rather than storing the drugs in a warehouse, they’re hiding them in children’s toys, and that is how they are getting through customs and to the general population.”
Children’s toys. The scumbags. We had to stop this.
“I have a suggestion.” Keane put up his hand.
Alpha nodded. He preferred using as few words as possible.
“Why not inform the human authorities? The drugs may be intended for shifters, but if the police discover drugs secreted in toys, they won’t know who the intended victims are.” He elaborated and explained that most of the police didn’t know we existed.
I was so proud of my mate for his suggestion but wondered how Alpha would react. Shifters liked to deal with our problems ourselves and not farm out the responsibility to humans.
“That’s an excellent idea, Keane.” Alpha approved.
We had contacts in the police department, but it would be sensible to do it anonymously because the police might think we were dealing and just going after a rival gang.
But we had suspicions humans in law enforcement had been bribed by the Ironclaw Alpha. We bribed them too, but we weren’t hiding drugs, just expecting them to overlook run-of-the-mill city hall business.
“That was clever,” I whispered to my mate after the meeting.
Ezra, being the tech genius, was tasked with planting anonymous messages while we waited, hoping it couldn’t be traced back to us.
The raid was front page news a few days later, but Alpha informed us not to get too cocky.
“They won’t give up. They’ll find another way.”
12
KEANE
Now that I had settled into my new home with Boaz, received my replacement ID, thanks to losing mine behind the dumpster, and had recuperated, it was time to get back to the job hunt. As much as I dreaded it, not because I didn’t want to work—I did, but being rejected time and time and time again? That was crappy.
And then add to that, the last time I went out to pound the pavement, I’d been drugged. And that experience turned job hunting from being awful and bad for my self-esteem to also being dangerous. But I couldn’t let it get me down. I needed to do this. My mate deserved a mate who contributed.
I’d listened to far too many podcasts about how to get jobs lately, hoping for a hint of how to be successful and for a glimpse at what the current job market looked like. I was trying to find something… anything… to give me a leg up. They talked a lot about how to “brand” yourself, and there were a few hints on what to say when asked why you were fired from your last position. That was pretty helpful, given that saying, “My boss was a cheating asshole and I happened to see him out with his side piece, so he fired me to cover his own butt” wasn’t good optics.
I pulled up my job search profile and started browsing again, seeing if any company I was interested in had any listings. And then I took the risk—I started looking at jobs I didn’t quite qualify for, not in the truest sense, and decided that was the route to go. As long as I could sell myself, that tiny missing skill wouldn’t be noticed, right?
I filled out online application after online application after online application, only stopping when my mate insisted, telling me I’d done enough for the night. And then before I could get too in my head about all I could be doing to find work, he distracted me in the best possible way… with his tongue.
From the beginning, I knew that my place was by my mate’s side. Other than grabbing some things from my apartment, I hadn’t been back. He was mine and he was my home. Full. Stop.
Boaz offered to help me get a job, and he would, but I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to always be dependent on him. I wanted him to be able to depend on me, too. I couldn’t keep staying with my mate, eating his food, letting him spoil me, and not contribute. It just wasn’t in me.
He insisted I was contributing, by learning how to protect myself and by staying safe andblah blah blah. He never “blah blah blah-ed” or talked over me, but that was how my brain processed it. This was all self-imposed.
When I woke up, I declared today the day I was going to get a job. I printed out a bunch of résumés, threw on my best business casual, and headed to a new part of town. I was going to wait around for interviews that may never come. I was gonna do this.
