Free In this Night We Own (The Commander Book 6) by Randall Farmer

be able to find him.  They said, even if they did, they doubted they’d find our money.  My people’s life savings was in that bank account and it’s all gone now.”
    Tonya tried to think of what to say about such a disaster.  She couldn’t fix the young Focus’s problems.  Only Transforms should have their hands on the money, until the Focus knew whom to trust.  Transforms should handle all significant household business, because only the Transforms were committed to the success of the household.  The normals always had other options.  She remembered the old joke about bacon and eggs for breakfast – the chicken is involved, the pig is committed.  The normals are involved, the Transforms are committed.
    Not advice this touchy new Focus would want to listen to right now.
    “I’m so sorry.”  She couldn’t come up with anything else to say.
    Gail laughed a bitter laugh.  “We screwed up, and since I’m the Focus, I guess it’s ultimately on my shoulders that we screwed up.”
    This Focus didn’t sound like a screw-up, though, just ignorant.
    “Is anybody dead?” Tonya said, already sure she knew the answer.  She put a mental checkmark in her mind next to Lori, and her comment about an Arm in her household.  The more she butted heads with Lori, the more impressed she got.
    “Well, no,” Gail said.  “Not yet.”
    “Is anybody crazy?”
    “Noooo.”  She snorted.  “Though I’d hate for me and my Focus attendants to get a psych evaluation.  We’ve had a few tough moments that, fifty years ago, would have gotten us locked away for hysteria.”
    Tonya repressed a chuckle.  This one was a strong one.  How strong, though?  How hard had she been on her people?  How many did she have tied up all day, living off spoon-fed baby food?  “Well then you’re doing better than quite a few new Focuses.  Especially attempting to run a Focus household based on those ridiculous government pamphlets.  Deaths aren’t at all unknown in new Focus households.”
    “You’re serious, Focus Biggioni?  People dying?”  Tonya could almost fill in the blanks – there are Focuses with that level of uncontrol?  Tonya smiled.  Gail’s was a comment she would have made, at a similar stage in her career.
    “Absolutely serious.  Call me Tonya.”  The least she could do was offer her friendship to this touchy yet ignorant young Focus.  “You should hear some of the things that happened in the early years.  When you rip people loose from their existing lives and throw them all together into a new one, with no moorings to hold on to, you can get all sorts of strange things.  Did you ever read Lord of the Flies?”  Or talk to Focus Young of Denver, who Transformed five months ago and who believed in Transform natural selection with herself as ‘nature, red in tooth and claw’ to the tune of five dead Transforms so far?
    “That’s a scary thought, Tonya,” Gail said, a lot friendlier than she had been a few minutes earlier.  “I guess there’s more room to screw up than I’d thought.”
    “Being a lone Focus is tough.  Look, I’ll tell you what I can do.  I’m going to put you in touch with Beth Hargrove.  She’s another Focus in Detroit, she’s been a Focus for about five years, and she was nineteen when she transformed.  She’s a friendly, outgoing person, and I think you’ll like her.  I think you’ll find her a lot easier to deal with than Wini Adkins.  Does that sound acceptable?”
    Tonya was only medium impressed with Beth Hargrove.  Beth would do better with a little more steel in her spine, but she was young, friendly and intelligent.  And any help this new Focus would take would be an improvement over her current situation.
    “Do you think she’ll want to talk to some beginner juice jockey?”
    Juice jockey?  No contact with other Focuses, just past her transformation, and the one thing she learns is the slang.  “Certainly she will.”  Especially after I