Authors: R. E. Butler
Saturday evening, as Rue got ready to go to work, she thought over what had been bothering her about Dom having a real future. Growing up, she hadn’t known anything but the panther way of life. In some ways, getting banished from the clan had been a good thing for her life because it showed her that there were other ways to live. When her clan had banished her, she had thought her life was over and that it would have been better if they had just killed her. Barely sixteen and having lived a sheltered life within the clan, she hadn’t known what life was like outside of the protective walls of her family. If it weren’t for the jewelry box that her parents had allowed her to take with her — the one with a false bottom where she had saved money since she was a little girl — she would have had nothing. For a long while, she stayed in the woods and hunted for small game to keep her belly full, slowly moving north and away from the clan’s traveling area. But eventually, as she drew closer to human cities, she ran out of woods and had to spend time in her human form. She had no identification, no birth certificate, no way to get a job, which she would need when her money ran out.
She first stopped in Columbus, Ohio, and after buying a wig to cover her white hair, she found waitressing work at a small diner. The owner didn’t care that she had no ID; he only cared that she put in a hard day’s work and didn’t break any dishes. At night she slept in a park. One of the waitresses let Rue sleep on her couch for a while, and eventually, the two became roommates. However, because Rue was afraid to really let anyone know who she was, they never became friends. The only friends Rue had ever known were within her clan, but they had turned their backs on her in her time of greatest need. She didn’t trust people who said they were her friends, no matter how much she ached for a truly friendly smile or a warm hug.
In time, she made enough money to afford her own place, and she thought she could carve out an existence in Columbus. But one night after she’d been gone from her clan for three years, she smelled panthers, and even though her fear had been great, she knew they weren’t her clan. As long as she kept the wig and her shirt on, they wouldn’t know she was banished. The three young males had been handsome and arrogant, and the oldest of the three had scented her immediately. Before then, it had never occurred to her that she should hide her scent.
The oldest male, who said his name was Anon, came by with his friends a few nights in a row and eventually convinced Rue to go out with him. She had been desperate for contact with another panther, and even though she knew that she would end up having sex with him, she hadn’t cared. She just wanted to feel
something
. While she slept next to him on a dirty hotel mattress, he discovered that she was wearing a wig overtop of her white hair. She had woken up with him pulling her shirt off to see the brands on her back. In his rage at her deception, he had nearly beaten her to death. He hadn’t killed her, or the baby she hadn’t known she was carrying, but he had taught her a valuable lesson. She knew in that moment she would never be able to trust anyone with her true identity.
She didn’t want that for Dom, though.
Walking from her room, she found her son making a sandwich in the kitchen. “I have an idea.”
“Uh oh,” he said, laughing.
She chuckled. “No, really. How would you feel about moving up to Canada?”
“Um, why?” He looked at her with one eyebrow raised and took a big bite of the sandwich.
She told him about her desire to see him able to live a freer life. “There are places up there where the people don’t care what a person can shift into. And I thought, too, that we might call ourselves something besides panthers. Maybe a rare breed of white leopard. I don’t know of any leopard pards in North America, so we should be able to claim that without anyone questioning us. “
He swallowed the bite of food and put his sandwich down on a plate. “Why?”
“Don’t you want to have a girlfriend who can see your hair?” She reached up and tugged a lock of his silky, white hair.
He made a face, but then sighed. “Are you lonely, Ma?”
“Never.”
“Be honest.”
It was her turn to sigh. She
was
lonely, but it wasn’t about her, it was about him. “Honey, I don’t want you to live a solitary life because of what we are.”
He stared at her silently in the way that told her he was trying to figure out what was really bothering her. Finally, he said, “Canada’s cool. The craft site is international, and I heard that shipping is cheaper up there, so it’ll save my customers money.”
She could have cried right then. He was so sweet and caring. “Honey, you’re the best son a mom could dream of.”
He bent his six-foot-one frame and hugged her, resting his cheek on her shoulder. “You’re the best mom.”
Fighting back the sudden tears, she patted his back and said, “Canada?”
“You bet.”
He kissed her cheek, straightened, and then picked up his plate. “Have a good night at work, Ma.”
“I will, hon. Don’t stay up too late.”
He rolled his eyes with a smile and walked toward his room.
As she headed to work, she started to make plans for heading to Canada. She had enough money to get them there, and Titus had an old van that she could probably trade her car for so they didn’t need to worry about renting a truck for their belongings. During the years, she had never bought any furniture because clothes could be packed in a jiffy, but not large items. She’d be sorry to leave the area, but she was certain it was the right thing for her and Dom.
She parked behind the bar and walked through the employee entrance at the back of the building. Stopping to stow her purse in Titus’ desk drawer, she was about to walk out of his office when Titus appeared in the doorway.
His serious face made her stop short, and as he shut the office door and turned to face her, everything inside her went still with worry.
“Rue, you know that I’ve never asked you anything about your history or what type of shifter you are. I’m a business man, and you’re a great employee and that’s all that has ever mattered to me.” He paused and she felt the weight of his eyes on her, as her worry spiked in spite of her attempts to stop it. “There are two males and two females in the bar tonight. They came in about a half hour ago. They’re some kind of cat shifter, and I thought it would be best if you maybe didn’t work tonight. Unless you’re
not
a cat shifter.”
He glanced at her hair briefly, the brunette wig suddenly feeling very heavy, and she exhaled the breath she’d been holding and said, “I am, but I don’t think I should tell you any more than that.”
“All right,” he nodded. “If you want to come out to the bar to take a peek at them, you can hide behind me so you won’t be seen. Then you can take off if you feel like you need to, and I’ll still pay you for the night.”
She smiled up at him. “You don’t have to do that, Titus.”
“It’s not your fault that you can’t work tonight.”
She followed him out into the bar and stood just behind him and slightly to the side so she could scan the bar. Her gaze roamed the patrons quickly, and the moment that she saw two males from her past, her heart almost fell out of her chest. She clapped her hand over her mouth to smother the gasp of surprise and couldn’t believe she was staring at her cousins, Nelson and Rich. They were part of her parents’ clan, a few years older than her, and ones who had seemed almost happy to watch her punishment be carried out. Two females were with them, but she didn’t recognize them.
Rue turned and walked out of the bar and back into Titus’ office. Lifting her purse from the drawer, she fished her keys from the front pocket and squeezed them in her fist to stop her hand from shaking.
“I do need to go, Titus.” Her eyes stung, but she refused to cry in front of her boss.
He nodded. “I had Patty eavesdrop inconspicuously, and she said they were talking about a place called Ashland and a ceremony of some sort. I passed by to drop off some beers to another table and an iPad they were looking at on the table had a map of Indiana on the screen. It sounds like they’re just passing through, so you should be fine to come back to work on Monday night. I’ll let you know if they show up again, though.”
She hugged the big male tightly. “Thank you, Titus, for everything.”
“Go on, then, Rue. Enjoy your weekend and don’t worry about your past out there in the bar. Just focus on the future for you and your son,” he said gruffly.
She didn’t leave, though. She pulled her car around to the front parking lot and noticed a fifth-wheel camper attached to a pick up. Parking a few rows away, she watched the door, and when her cousins and the females walked out an hour later, she wasn’t surprised when they got into the truck. She marked the license plate down on an old receipt and watched as the truck pulled out of the parking lot.
She stared at the entrance to the parking lot for a long time, making sure they didn’t come back, and then she went home. After showering off the heavy perfume from her skin, she put on a sleep shirt and robe and went out into the family room. Dom brought her a glass of milk and asked what she was looking up on the computer.
She explained about seeing her cousins and opened up the Internet program and typed
Ashland, Indiana
into the search bar.
“So they’re going to a wedding or something?” Dom asked, looking over her shoulder.
“Titus said ‘ceremony’ so I’m thinking bonding ceremony. The clans will gather from all over for a ceremony. They’re normally performed on Saturdays, so if they’re heading there now, then the ceremony is most likely next weekend.”
“What’s a bonding ceremony?”
“That’s usually what the young panthers do when they’ve found their mates, but they’re not twenty-one yet.”
“Twenty-one?”
She looked over her shoulder at him and realized how little she’d told him about his heritage. It hadn’t mattered in a way because they would never be part of a clan again, so she had never bothered to tell him. Swiveling around to face him, she said, “Panthers don’t mate until they’re twenty-one.”
His nose wrinkled as he frowned in thought. “So everyone stays a virgin until they’re twenty-one? Why?”
“Not everyone holds off on having sex until they meet their mate. Males and females can be promiscuous if they choose, but once he or she has found a mate, if either of them are younger than twenty-one,
then
they have to wait to have sex. It’s just the way of panthers. If mates meet before they’re twenty-one, they’ll have a bonding ceremony. The male will ink his mate’s name and his clan name on his back, and he’ll give a ring to the female.”
“Like a promise ring or an engagement ring?”
“Exactly.”
He made a humming sound and looked past her to the computer screen. “So you think your cousins are going to Ashland to a ceremony?”
“I think so.”
“That means that your whole family will be there?”
“The clan, yes. Panthers use bonding ceremonies like family reunions. Whoever is having the ceremony will have invited the entire family, and that means a lot of different clans from all over the country.”
He looked at the computer screen for a few quiet moments, and she thought about how he’d never known what it was like to be part of a clan. He leaned over and clicked around on the town of Ashland. Then he opened a new tab on the browser and went to a better map program, switching to a satellite view. Clicking and zooming, he navigated around the town as she watched with amusement.
“Here, Ma, look,” he said, touching the screen with his index finger. “Those are RVs.”
Ashland appeared to be a farming town, but one section of the town had dense woods. A clearing showed what looked like a small hotel with a big yard and lots of vehicles parked on the grass, and on the other side of the woods was farmland, where a large number of RVs and fifth wheels were parked.
Her heart ached sharply. Her family – her clan – was there in Ashland for a bonding ceremony. If things had been different, she would be there with them, too.
“So this means that someone in your family, maybe a cousin, is getting mated?”
She shrugged and turned away from the screen. It hurt to see her family gathered when she couldn’t be there. “I have a lot of cousins and they’re scattered all over the country in different clans. My fourth cousin Dag has sons who are a few years older than you. They were infants when I shifted at sixteen and was banished.”
“Would Dag hate you if he saw that you were albino?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“But it does. Maybe they’re in Ashland because his kids are getting mated, and we can go there and talk to him. If he won’t reject us, then we can join with his clan.”
She stood and hugged her son. “Oh honey, it doesn’t work like that. I’m banished.”
“Banished by your clan, not by all clans,” he argued. “Aren’t you curious?”
“Of course, but you know what they say about curiosity and the cat.”
He snorted. “Ma, I don’t know what’s going on, but I feel like we should go there.”