Sadly, Tock’s mother hated that name. Hated the way Mira lived and had trained her children and grandchildren to live. Of course, Tock’s mom, Ayda, was a pacifist, or what Mira had apparently once called a “hippy with no redeeming value, trying to make the woman who gave her life feel bad.”
The biggest problem between them was that Tock was not a pacifist. She was anything but a pacifist. Also allegedly said by her grandmother, Tock was “a vicious little badger that knows how to break a man,” which was supposedly the reason Mira Malka-Lepstein had a special place for Tock in that cold badger heart of hers. Something that did not sit well at all with Tock’s mom, who wanted more for her daughter than a lifetime of checking her home for listening devices and assuming any man coming out of the shadows was trying to assassinate her.
So the two—mother and grandmother—did the sort of passive-aggressive family fighting over Tock that Nelle found fascinating. It was so full-human in its subtlety. Because there was nothing passive aggressive about Nelle’s clan. They were more aggressive-aggressive. Meaning that if Nelle had to toss her sister out the window to get her point across, then that’s what she had to do . . . and had done. More than once. And why her mother would then state in no uncertain terms, “This is why your sister hates you. You understand that, yes?”
Yes. That she understood. Direct, clear, concise. Downright brutal in its clarity.
And brutality was something Nelle could always respect.
*
“You need to calm down.”
“They’re pissing me off.”
“Everyone pisses you off. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t calm the fuck down.”
Keane understood what his brother Finn was saying, but he was just so angry.
He really hadn’t thought much about it when his brother had texted that he was going off with Tock. Thought maybe they were hooking up. He could understand it. Tock was pretty and had the kind of long legs his brother loved on a woman. If Shay wanted to distract himself for a little while with a honey badger, who was Keane to question? But if he’d known that idiot was going off with a honey badger on some kind of crazy “secret agent assignment,” he would have yanked his dumb ass back before he’d made it out of Michigan.
Now, yes, it was true he’d been working with the honey badgers to find out who’d killed his father, but so what? He’d do anything to not only find the assholes behind his father’s death but to rain down the kind of vengeance his kind was known for. He wouldn’t stop until his father’s killers were in their graves or their remains had been spread across the Eastern Seaboard. Either scenario would suit him. And if that meant working with and spending time with the most difficult and annoying species known to man, then fine.
That didn’t mean, however, he was willing to lose any more family to this vendetta he had against his father’s murderers. He wouldn’t lose his brothers or sister over that. Not now, not ever.
So seeing Shay lying there . . .
“You need to breathe,” his brother flatly warned, and Keane realized his fangs were sliding out of his gums again.
Deciding Finn was right for once, Keane took a few deep breaths. He did need to calm down if he was going to deal with all these new badgers and the doctors and nurses who, for some reason, seemed to be made up mostly of lions and snow leopards, which was just weird. All he truly cared about right now was Shay’s health and safety; the last thing he needed was to be kicked out of this hospital because he couldn’t keep himself from biting off the heads of a few honey badgers who had managed to piss him off.
Keane stood in the hallway, away from the room with all the badgers—so that he didn’t have to see their stupid faces and get angry all over again—with Finn standing silently beside him. Just when he thought his anger was finally under control, he heard the ding of an elevator. An older female walked out, a phone glued to her ear. She spoke in a language he didn’t know and looked around at the different rooms before turning and heading away from him and Finn. Keane didn’t think much about it until he saw Charlie MacKilligan slip out of a doorway to follow her. Still nothing noteworthy except he could see Charlie was carrying a pump-action shotgun.
Eyes wide, he glanced at Finn and, without saying a word to each other, they both ran down the long hallway after the insane honey badger who was genetically related to their baby sister. They were cats and fast so they caught up quickly, before Charlie could do anything. Keane wrapped his arms around her waist at the same time Finn tried to yank the gun from her hands. When he couldn’t get it loose, Keane spun away and went in the opposite direction with Charlie clasped tight against his chest.
“Hi,” he heard Finn say to the female who had just turned around. “If you’re looking for the honey badgers, they’re in the opposite direction.”
The female’s high heels clicked on the floor as she passed Keane. Her eyes, dark and suspicious, were looking at him so hard, he could do nothing but turn again with Charlie still clasped against him so the She-badger wouldn’t spot her or her weapon.
Thankfully, Charlie didn’t put up a fight. He played football with her now, and she was the strongest, meanest fighter he’d ever seen. He was not in the mood to get his ass kicked by a tiny, rabid animal if he could help it.
When they heard a door close somewhere down the hallway, Keane dropped the crazy female and pushed her away from him.
“Are you insane?” he wanted to know.
“According to my therapist, I just need to focus on what’s important. And what’s important is putting that bitch out of my misery.”
Finn grabbed the shotgun again and tried to pull it from her. His brother was using both hands; Charlie held on with only one. It was sad. After about ten seconds, Charlie finally told Finn, “You know you won’t get it from me unless I give it to you.”
“I am aware of your freakish strength,” Finn said. “But I’d appreciate if you’d just give it to me. Please.”
She released the weapon and Finn let out a long breath. “I swear,” he muttered. “You two.”
“What does that mean?” Keane wanted to know. “Unlike her, I don’t use guns. I simply tear the spine from my enemies.”
“And I like to avoid too much mess,” Charlie announced.
“How is a shotgun less messy?”
“Angle of the weapon.”
“Really?” Keane nodded. “I didn’t know that.”
“Stevie says it’s all about physics.”
“Could both of you stop it?” Finn snapped. “When I was hoping you two would eventually get along, I didn’t want it to be over the way people should cleanly die for pissing you off.”
“I told that old bitch to leave my sisters alone and she didn’t listen to me,” Charlie argued.
“See?” Keane said, nodding again, “I totally get that.”
Finn briefly closed his eyes, which meant he was really getting annoyed. He tried to hide it but his feline temper was no better than Keane’s.
“I understand you are both upset, but Stevie and Shay are both adults who can make their own decisions. Stevie wanted to help. Good for her! It seems the help is greatly needed. And Shay is going to be okay. You can yell at him when he’s better,” he said to Keane.