Chapter Six
Chapter
Six
Colbie
Ileave through the back door of my bakery, the urge to avoid the gorgeous shifters fierce inside me, but as I pass the door to the bookshop across the alley, the screen bangs open, and Brock appears.
Brock isn’t a super tall man, maybe five-ten, but he is fit, though his muscles aren’t anything on the watch team’s.
Maybe it’s a shifter thing, and all of them are fit and have incredible bodies because they shift into animals and run or fly everywhere.
I look down my curvy body, sucking in my slight pouch from tasting my own creations. Damn it, I need to add some exercise to my daily routine, not just the walk between my apartment and business.
“Colbie,” he hisses, his chestnut hair all awry like he’s been running his hand through it.
His black-rimmed glasses are slightly askew as well.
This is the most frazzled I’ve ever seen him.
Usually he is immaculately put together, the epitome of cool, calm, and collected.
His partner, Niles, is usually the flighty scatter-brained one.
“Girl, I have been trying to pin you down for days. Why did I see some of Watch Team One leaving your kitchen on Monday morning with a child in their arms?” He puts a hand against his chest, looking aghast. “Were you the human involved in finding Prince Archie? It’s all anyone is talking about.
So much juicy gossip, not to mention the sacking of the night watch operator for dereliction of duty, but who knows what’s true and what’s false.
Now dish,” he demands, putting his hands on his hips, and I sigh.
There’s no way I’m walking away without telling him what happened.
“Yeah, when I arrived early Monday morning, I found him huddled up under some of your boxes near the dumpster. Poor thing was soaking wet from the drizzle and terrified.”
He gasps and leans against the wall like this news is so shocking he needs the wall to hold him up.
“Oh my goddess. Where do you think he came from?” His eyes narrow, and I see a calculating look in his gaze.
This man lives and breathes gossip, both of them do, and I’m pretty sure he thinks he has a line straight from the source’s mouth, which is so much better than all the ideal gossip he has already heard.
“I’m not sure if that’s something that is public knowledge, so it’s probably best if I don’t repeat what I heard.
I’m sure you understand.” I start to edge my way down the alley to the street.
I know this man, he will grill me until he has wrung every last drop of gossip from my mouth, and I really don’t want to be responsible for adding to the rumors that are apparently floating around the shifter side.
“What are you doing with the door open, love?” I hear Niles call out to his mate. Crap, if I stop now, I’m never going to get away, and they will wear me down until I tell them everything they want to know.
“I’m just talking to Colbie about the other day,” Brock calls back, and I pick up my pace.
“Colbie’s there? What does she know?” Niles’s voice gets louder as he comes closer.
Out the corner of my eye, I see the tall blond man appear next to his partner, but I just wave, walking faster down the alley, away from the two men.
“Got to go, my mom is expecting me.” I hurry around the corner and onto the street, heaving out a sigh of relief.
I have no doubt they will try even harder to pin me down to get the gossip, but I’m probably safe for the rest of the weekend.
They will be enthralled with all the pageantry for the next couple of days, at least until the new king or queen has been revealed.
Hopefully that will be enough to get them to forget about the whole Archie thing.
The streets are way more crowded than I was expecting, and I bump into a woman who glares at me and snaps, “Watch where you’re going.”
I hold up my hands and apologize, but she doesn’t even stop. I groan as I take in the number of humans flooding our streets, each and every one of them praying and hoping they are going to be the next shifter king or queen.
The parade will start in the shifter zone tomorrow, winding its way through there so shifters can give their thanks to the current king and queens before heading to the neutral zone.
The retirement party will then be held in the Aramis Arms, the fanciest hotel in the area.
At the zenith of the full moon that night, the goddess Aramis will appear to send out the magic which will pick the next king or queen.
It is supposed to mark the chosen human with the goddess’s symbol.
King Lucas’s appeared down one side of his face, but it’s different for each of the chosen.
I hear excited chatter and speculation all around me, but I’m not interested in it one bit.
I have no delusions of grandeur like a lot of these people seem to have.
I’ll leave them to their dreams of being king or queen and having magic, I am happy just the way I am.
The thought of being responsible for a whole race is fucking terrifying, and having magic and being able to shift?
Pass. The idea of all my bones breaking and reforming into something new makes me want to hurl—although I’m not sure if that’s how it works exactly.
When Archie shifted, I didn’t hear any bones cracking, so maybe it’s not so violent, and he didn’t seem to be in any pain, but it still isn’t for me.
It takes me longer than normal to walk the distance between the bakery and our apartment building, but I refuse to get annoyed.
Instead, I just smile and stay out of the crowd’s way.
I hate confrontation, and the vibe in the air feels like we’re one sharp word or elbow strike away from an all-out brawl.
All this tension in the neutral zone is weird.
It’s an area that prides itself on being exactly what it claims to be.
I catch sight of a night watch team patrolling the area, and the crowd gives them a wide berth.
Maybe there needs to be a few more available.
I watch as a small scuffle breaks out and they step in to break it up.
Instead of hanging around to gawk, I keep my head down and move quicker in the direction I need to go.
Finally, I get to the block our apartment is on.
“Mom, where are you?” I call out as I enter her studio through the back alley.
Mom’s studio sits on the bottom floor of our apartment building.
Above it are two stories with two apartments on each level.
I live on the top level in one of the apartments, and Mom lives in the one directly above her studio.
She convinced the landlord to put in a set of stairs leading directly to the downstairs retail space.
We’ve lived here as long as I can remember.
I only recently moved into my own apartment the last two years.
Prior to that, I lived with Mom while I went to university and took pastry classes.
Mom’s and my relationship has been contentious over the years.
I love her, but I am not sad to live separately. She is a difficult woman to please.
“I’m with a client,” she sings back, and I wince.
Shit, I’m going to get it now. I fill the kettle and turn it on before pulling out her fancy set of china she saves for her clients.
If I’m going to annoy her while she’s with someone, then the least I can do is make everyone a cup of tea, though they may prefer glasses of champagne, so I grab a fancy bottle out of the fridge and some flutes.
I can hear more than two voices, so I go for four just in case.
While I wait for the kettle to boil, I plaster on my customer service smile and move out into the studio.
My mom is a gorgeous, statuesque woman, a former fashion model turned designer.
I get my long black hair from her, but unlike her six foot frame, I max out at five-five.
She says it’s my paternal grandmother’s fault.
She was a small woman, and apparently, I get my boobs and hips from her too—not that I ever met her.
Both of my father’s parents died before I was born, and my father only blew into my mother’s life long enough to make me and cause some deep-seated damage to my mom’s psyche before blowing out again.
Her parents tell me she was a different person before him and she loves me, but my father’s departure made her feel inadequate, and now she strives to be the best at everything and expects the same from me.
She has three women with her. They look kind of familiar to me, but I’m not sure why. “Hi, would any of you like a glass of champagne or a cup of tea?” I offer, and my mother’s steely glare softens a little.
“Your Majesties, I’m not sure if you remember my daughter, Colbie. Colbie, this is Queen Layla, Queen Mia, and Queen Evelyn.”
I freeze in shock at my mother’s words before quickly dipping into a curtsy. “Your Majesties.” When I look up, my mom is beaming. Well, at least I did something right.