Chapter 258 Chapter 258
“She’ll be fine.” His mother said softly.
Jesse moved, so he could keep an eye on Leah and talk to his parents at the same time.
“She’s lovely.” His mother smiled at him.
“Evanna thought you should meet Leah first.” He told her in a hushed voice.
“Is that normal? To switch like that?”
He blew out a breath, “I have no idea.” Jesse motioned to Thera, “how do you feel about cat sitting?”
His father gave him an astonished look.
“Leah, well Evanna really, will be going with me on some retrieval runs and I don’t think Thera will blend in while we’re in the city.”
“I suppose, if the creature agrees, we could.” His father said with a smirk.
“I’m going to talk to Leah about it and see what she thinks. If she won’t stay with you, I’m not sure what we’re going to do with her.”
“When?”
He looked at his mother, “the next few days. We have several locations now to go into.”
His mother covered her mouth for a moment, then nodded, “we’ll get something set up for her. It will give your sisters something to do, they miss school and their friends.”
Jesse nodded slowly, “it’s going to be that way for a while, Mom, no school.”
“What’s going on?” His dad crossed his arms over his chest, no longer in father mode, but in sub-leader frame of mind. “We’ve been getting calls from different divisions in the Alliance all of a sudden.”
Jesse watched Leah for a moment, leaving it up to his sisters to have her feeling comfortable and smiling. He continued to watch while he spoke. “Someone in the Alliance or close enough ties to get information is feeding it to Aiden Tomas.” His mother’s gasp had him look back to his parents.
“That explains Deshon telling me to watch out for anyone acting out of character.” His dad ran his hand along his jaw. “Do they have any idea who?”
“How do you know this?” His mother’s eyes were filled with worry.
“We,” he smirked, “actually, Thera and Evanna caught one of Tomas’ shifters on Blair’s land. A jackal,” he looked at his father, “the Alliance doesn’t have any clans of the type,” his father tilted his head, giving Jesse his undivided attention, “we got the information out of him.” He decided not to give details to protect everyone.
“I’m assuming we’re not to share this information with anyone.”
He nodded, glancing briefly back to Leah, “I’m sure Shepard will share when the time is right.”
“That makes what you’re doing more dangerous.” His mom touched his arm.
Jesse put his hand over hers, “we’re adjusting plans and protocol to compensate for that, Mom. We’ve got a good team put together too,” he smirked, “Calum is on it.”
“Oh,” she grinned, “well, I guess having him watch your back, is the best we could hope for.”
Grinning, Jesse watched his sisters for a moment. “Leah’s entire clan was gone, most Tomas took.” He turned to his dad, “if we find some of them, I’m going to bring them to you.”
The amused look faded on both his parent’s faces. His father nodded, “we’ve been building a dorm building, in preparation since the Alliance sent out notices that many of our kind were being rescued.”
Jesse nodded, “that’s good.” He paused, “also probably how the traitor got the information as well.” He rolled his shoulders, trying to keep the rising tension from setting in, “some of them that we get out will never have even known clan life,” he motioned to Leah, “she got out and back to find only a few elders left in hers, so she doesn’t understand much of how a clan works.”
His mother leaned against his shoulder, “we’ll help, in any way we can.”
“Now I know why you look like you haven’t slept in weeks.” His father now stood on the other side of him, “that’s a lot to deal with and finding your mate as well.”
“It’s been eventful.” Jesse mused quietly. “Blair, you remember him?” His father nodded, “he went in to transport remaining members of a clan, nine females,” his father’s eyes went wide, “one was his mate, he’s the new Alpha of a clan now.”
“Jesus.” His father blew out a breath, “and I was complaining about having to rearrange the common house for this online schooling.” He smirked at him, “I think you young guys have it a bit worse.”
Jesse laughed, “maybe.” Leah looked over at him, her look assessing all was well, she offered him a small smile and then looked back to what Joslin was saying.
“Are you able to,” his mom glanced over at the girls for a second, before giving him a concerned look, “are you able to proceed with a normal mating?”
Jesse tried not to smirk at her and failed, he nodded slowly, “it’s a little more complicated, but from what I’ve been told it will actually help her and Evanna stabilize a bit.”
“Oh, that’s good.” She didn’t look relieved, “I’ve been reading a lot about it,” she lifted one shoulder in a slight shrug, “I suppose it’s good that it’s only two of them.”
Jesse nodded, “yeah, the biggest struggle has been getting control of their cat.” He glanced to his father, “she came out when they were sixteen,” he turned to look back to Leah, “when they escaped from Tomas.”
“Oh my goodness.” His mother’s eyes glistened with tears. “She’s so strong,” she whispered.
“Yeah, she is, but doesn’t think so.” He cleared his throat, “I’m hoping to find her mother at one of the locations, and her sister.” He thought of the information Noah had told him regarding Ashtyn, “there’s a lot of children involved too.”
“Well,” his mother’s tone was harder now, “any you bring to us will be looked after, you know that.”
“I know.” He smiled down at her.
“Hug your boy, Mother, we’ll drag the girls out of here so they can have some quiet.” His father gripped Jesse’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “You keep in touch when you can.”
“You know I will.” His mom leaned into him and wrapped her arms around him.
“You be careful, Jesse.”
Dropping a kiss on the top of her head, he hugged her back. “I always am.”
“Girls.” His dad stepped back over to stand in front of their SUV, “we have to get going. You have classes soon.”
Reluctantly, they got up and came back toward them. Leah followed and went straight to Jesse to stand beside him.
His mom gave her one of those caring, motherly looks. “It was lovely to meet you.” She smiled, “you get my number from Jesse and if you have any questions about anything, you call me.”
Leah nodded, her face a little flushed, “thank you.”
Jesse could feel the anxiety pouring off her and put his arm around her and hugged her against him. “We’ll see you in a few days.”
They stood together and watched them go down the hill. “That wasn’t too bad.” Jesse looked down at her, she was hugging the tablet still.
“Your sisters are so,” she smiled up at him, “energetic.”
Jesse laughed, “that’s one way to put it.” He jerked his chin toward the tablet, “do I want to know what movies they loaded up for you?”
“Oh, they said you wouldn’t enjoy them at all.” She smiled, “they’re chic flicks.” She enunciated carefully.
He snorted, “Oh great, that’s just what I need playing in the background.” Pulling out his phone, he checked the time. “We have time for a run before the doctor’s session.”
“Oh,” she nodded, “I’d enjoy that.” She smiled, “I’ve never felt Minn this calm and wouldn’t mind running when I’m not scared she’ll take over.”
Jesse hugged her and turned to walk them to the trailer, “you guys are doing great, learning to work with her.”
“It’s different.” She said quietly. “So much is different.”
When she looked up at him, he couldn’t tell what she was thinking. There was something there though, the way she was looking at him had changed, she wasn’t as apprehensive as she’d been before. Whatever they were doing with the doctor and communicating back and forth must be helping. He could only hope that the changes continued in a positive way. His cat reminded him he’d said run and was more than ready to go for one. “We’ll talk about everything after a run.” He glanced at the sky, “I think we’re going to see snow by tonight, so I just want to go over where they marked the areas for the fence.”
She stepped into the trailer, “there’s probably already snow on the mountain.”
He paused and looked at the forlorn expression on her face. “When things have settled down, and we know it’s safe, we’ll go back there and visit.” He grimaced, “after winter, I don’t even want to think about the trek up that mountain in the snow.”
She grinned, “it’s quite a chore.”
“I have no doubt.” He dropped a quick kiss on her mouth and then backed away. “I’m going out to shift, come out when you’re ready.” He turned and left quickly, knowing if she started stripping in front of him it was going to try his restraint. He didn’t know if she was as comfortable with her body as Evanna was, but after the last painful shift, he wasn’t sticking around to find out.