Nothing. Not a goddamn thing.
CHAPTER TWO
Pausing in sweeping the shiny floor of the indoor basketball court, Havana sighed at her friends. Her head was pounding, so she didn’t appreciate the echoing sounds of the ball bouncing, sneakers squeaking on the floor, or the curses and grunts. “Could you two both stop goofing around and help me tidy up so we can shut the place down?”
Bailey stilled, her face all innocence. “We were just checking that the ball wasn’t deflating. Turns out it’s fine.”
“Now how about that,” Havana said dryly. “Go retract the bleachers into the walls, please.” She looked at Aspen. “Could you put the rest of the sports equipment back? And could you maybe find the little beanbag I saw your bearcat run off with earlier? I know she hid it somewhere.” Why bearcat shifters stole and stashed objects—most of which they couldn’t possibly have a use for—Havana didn’t know. The full-blooded animals of their kind, which humans referred to as red pandas, didn’t appear to do it.
“Will do,” replied Aspen, idly plucking at the dark choppy layers in her long, angled bob. The tall, curvy female then strode off in that catwalk-haughty way she had.
“Thank you.” Havana turned back to sweeping the floor. For years they’d worked at the rec center, which was exclusive to lone shifters. As sad as it was, loners were often targeted, so it was a dangerous lifestyle. The rec center was a safe place where they could relax, have fun, and meet others in their situation. It made them feel less alone. It gave them somewhere to “belong,” even if only for a few hours a day.
The center had saved Havana. She’d been living on the streets when a regular here had coaxed her into checking the place out. The owner and manager, Corbin, had offered her a place to stay at his large house, which was a foster home of sorts for homeless lone shifter children.
Aspen had already been living there when Havana arrived. Bailey came along a year later. The three of them were different breeds of shifter, but they’d become so close they were like sisters.
They considered themselves a miniature yet unofficial clan of sorts. Their co-worker and close friend, Camden, kind of loitered on the edges of it. They all lived in the same building. Bailey was Havana’s roommate while Aspen and Camden lived in the neighboring apartment.
It wasn’t always easy for loners to find accommodation. There was a lot of prejudice against them from both shifters and humans alike. Plus, Havana had to conceal that she was a shifter if the landlord was human—devils hadn’t yet come out of the shifter closet. Many species hadn’t, including Tate’s kind. Ugh. She tried her best not to think about him, but her thoughts often circled back to him.
A week had gone by since she broke things off. She hadn’t heard or seen anything of him during those seven days. But then, she hadn’t thought he would. Sure, he hadn’t liked that she’d ended the fling, but she’d bet that was only because he would have preferred to be in control of when it ended—Alpha males were all about control.
The first thing she’d done after leaving his house was text Aspen and Bailey, asking them to meet her at a local bar so Havana could get blitzed. They’d drank shots, trash-talked male shifters, and contemplated calling Tate to inform him that he was a fuckface—something they thankfully hadn’t done, because she’d have been mortified when sober. They’d topped off the evening by fighting with some bitchy jackals who apparently had an issue with loners. All in all, it hadn’t been a bad night.
Done sweeping, Havana blew out an upward breath, making her bangs lift. She’d worked extra shifts at the center over the past week, hoping to ease her devil’s annoyance. The animal was in a super foul mood.
It wasn’t until Havana stalked out of Tate’s house that she realized her devil had expected him to ask Havana to stay. The devil had believed he’d offer Havana more; that he wanted her bad enough to overcome whatever commitment issues he had. When he’d instead let her go, he’d pissed the devil off to such an extent that she’d slammed a mental door on him. She’d been in a huff ever since, and Havana couldn’t seem to snap her out of it.
The devil hadn’t reacted quite as dramatically when Dieter got all cozy with an eagle shifter, nor had she seemed surprised. Maybe the devil hadn’t expected him to commit. Really, Havana shouldn’t have hoped for it either, given that Dieter disliked the lone shifter lifestyle and wanted to join a flock.
He’d been born to an eagle shifter couple who were loners, so he’d never known anything different. He wanted that sense of belonging that came with being part of a flock. He had this grand notion that his life would be a bed of roses if he was ever accepted into one. He didn’t understand why Havana liked being a loner.
Unlike him, she hadn’t been a loner all her life. She’d once been part of a devil shifter clan. Contrary to what Dieter believed, being part of something didn’t always give you a sense of “belonging.” The members didn’t always look out for their own. Didn’t always take care of you. Sometimes they even took from you … leaving you all alone in the world.
The heavy door swung open, making the hinges creak. She turned to see Corbin walk inside. The grizzly had opened the center many years ago in memory of his younger sister, Celine. Their parents had been lone shifters, so there’d been no one to take in Corbin and Celine when said parents died in a house fire. The children ended up living on the streets, and poor Celine later died a terrible death at the hands of a hyena clan. Corbin tried to help others in the way no one had helped him or his sister. He was gruff on the outside but gooey on the inside.
He’d taken many loners under his wing over the years, giving them whatever support he could, providing jobs for them at the center, and helping them find safe accommodation—sometimes at the local homeless shelter for lone shifters. He was seriously ace, in her opinion.
“Almost done in here?” he asked.
Havana smiled. “I think so, yeah, we—Bailey, get off the maintenance trolley.” The weirdo was balancing on it while spinning in circles. Havana didn’t know if it was a black mamba thing or a Bailey thing, but the female had a seriously short attention span. Bailey’s mind switched context fast and often, so she had a habit of blurting out questions that were usually unrelated to whatever was happening around her. Most people found it kind of endearing.
Bailey pouted, which somehow looked cute. “Fine, fine.” She hopped off the trolley and flicked her sleek hair—which she’d recently dyed a striking silver that suited her perfectly—over her shoulder. She was a pretty thing with her deep-set eyes, oval face, and the high cheekbones any female would envy. It was clear she had some Asian ancestry.
Mambas possessed the same notoriously bad temper as devil shifters and often picked fights purely for shits and giggles. But people tended to assume that Bailey wasn’t as fierce and feisty as her inner snake. Mostly because she looked so sweet and innocent. Yeah, she really wasn’t.
With her default unimpressed expression, Aspen looked aloof and disinterested in people. Yeah, she absolutely was. But that was a bearcat thing. They gave zero fucks about what went on outside their own little world—they didn’t like to complicate their lives.