“And ever since I took the position, crime rates have been increasing,” Rollo said, gripping the steering wheel.
“You can’t blame yourself for that, Commander. Since shifters returned from the war and began settling on Fate Mountain, everything is different. Some humans are uncomfortable with shifters taking positions of power now; that’s all it is.”
“It doesn’t help that the police chief and most of the police department is run by shifters,” Rollo said.
“The world is changing, Commander,” Damien said. “The humans will have to get used to us being on equal terms with us eventually.”
“The Shifter Equality Act was supposed to take care of that, but we all know that human prejudice runs much deeper than any act of Congress.”
The Shifter Equality Act had guaranteed shifters the same rights and privileges as humans. It also protected them from harassment and persecution. Before the war, the world had been much different for shifters. They’d suffered for years after the Great Shifter Council announced their existence to humans. Shifters suffered everything from segregation to police brutality. Life had been hard for Rollo’s generation, growing up.
“But things are getting better,” Damien said. “Just look at all the guys who are mating with human women nowadays. You know Corey Bright started that shifter/human dating website called Mate.com, right?”
“I’ve heard of it.”
“Have you signed up yet?”
Rollo took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He had signed up for Mate.com over two years ago when the site had been released. That was when he had first come back to Fate Mountain and was then appointed police commander. But over the last two years, no matter how many times Rollo checked the app on his phone, he still hadn’t been matched with his fated mates.
“I signed up a long time ago. Hasn’t done me any good,” Rollo said.
“I’m sorry to hear that, sir.”
“Have you signed up?” Rollo asked.
“No. I don’t think I’m so ready for a mate. I’ve got a lot of things going on in my life right now, and I just don’t think that a mate would mesh with my private work.”
“Private work?” Rollo asked.
Rollo knew that Damien was a tech whiz and a bit of a hacker. Those skills proved valuable for the police department. But Damien was secretive about what he did in his free time. Rollo suspected that it wasn’t one hundred percent above board. But he and Damien and the rest of the Bear Patrol had been a crew for a long time.
They had all served in special forces during the war. Rollo had led them back then and led them again now after they’d settled on Fate Mountain. He would not question Damien’s ‘hobbies’. He owed his friend that much respect.
“I can’t really talk about it. But I have important work that requires privacy and focus. A mate would just get in the way of that.”
“We all have important work to do. We’re the police department,” Rollo said.
When shifter draft required all male shifters between the ages of eighteen and forty to join the military, Rollo had gone off to war to fight for his country and left behind his career as a police detective in San Francisco. After the war, he and his crew settled at on Fate Mountain and got jobs at the police department. Rollo had not expected to be appointed police commander only a few months after joining the force. But that’s the way things had worked out.
Now, instead of being a detective, he was in charge of the whole department. But Rollo was used to leadership. He’d been the commander in his crew’s special forces unit in the Marines. When they had all been discharged after the war, they’d decided to settle in the burgeoning new shifter community in Fate Mountain Village.
Rollo pulled up to the police department, and he and Damien got out of the SUV. Damien grabbed his forensics case from the back of the car and carried it into the police department behind Rollo. The dispatcher greeted him from the front desk as he and Damien made their way into the back offices of the police station. There was a wide open room where his crew each had their own desks.
“I’m going to get this evidence to the lab,” Damien said lifting his forensics case as he continued through the offices towards the small forensics laboratory.
“Let me know as soon as you find anything,” Rollo said.
Rollo saw movement out of the corner of his eye from behind the glass door of his office. He turned toward his office door, tilting his head curiously when he found his deputy inside with a young man Rollo had never seen before.
“Commander,” Deputy Knox Carter said as Rollo entered the office.
Knox was giving Rollo one of his shit eating grins that told Rollo his second in command was up to something. Rollo circled around to sit behind his desk and regarded the two men in front of him.
“What is it, Knox?” Rollo asked. “Who is your friend?”