then when it was time, I took over.”
“So which is your true love? The business or the baking?”
She frowned at him as if she hadn’t ever considered the question. “They’re both me. And neither. I’m also a single parent, a bad jazzercise dancer, and someone who likes to eat candy and read slutty romance novels. How do you separate one part from another?”
Good question. He’d been trying—and failing—to keep areas of his life partitioned from one another. But he couldn’t imagine being a harmonious whole person either. It just wasn’t in his nature. Good thing he was saved from answering by arriving at the tree.
Henry was already coming down, his nimble form dropping from the branches like a monkey. He might be small for a shifter, but the young father had always been deceptively quick. “Evening, Max,” he said, his tone neutral, his head tilted to the side in submission.
“Hello, Henry. This is Becca, Theo’s guardian.”
The man flashed his teeth in a warm grin. “My mom had to keep watch for me, too. But don’t worry. Instinct runs deep and keeps us safe.”
Becca flashed a grateful smile, but Carl couldn’t stop himself from correcting the young man. “It’s not instinct. It’s his good head that will save the day. Don’t ignore the man in favor of the animal.”
Henry’s eyes narrowed. “Seems to me the animal is what counts in situations like this.” He gestured around the dark land. “Open field, reacting on a dime, heading by feel to your home—that’s something that will confuse a man. Never a bear.”
Becca blew out a breath. “Why do I get the feeling that this is an old argument?”
“Because it’s all chicken and egg,” Carl answered. “Which is more important? Who rules what?”
“Max here is a thinker. His uncle was a doer,” Henry responded. And it was obvious Henry preferred action. But that’s because he was too young to remember Maximus Prime.
“But wouldn’t you want brain behind the brawn?” Becca asked.
The man’s eyes grew flinty at that. “’Course you do. But there’s a point where there’s only brain and no brawn, and that’s disaster.”
Carl barely restrained a growl. “You’ve been waiting a long time to say that to me, haven’t you?”
The man nodded with a quick slash of his chin. “I got children and I don’t want them Detroit assholes getting—”
“I don’t, either,” Carl interrupted, trying not to air all the political dissent in front of Becca. “But before you start talking about brawn, ask your grandfather what he thinks. Oh wait. You can’t because he was disemboweled by my uncle. And do you know why? Because your grandfather gave his best pumpkin to his pregnant wife for her craving.” His uncle’s clan tax had declared that the best crop always went to Maximus Prime. “Brutality is never the answer.”
“You don’t have to go that far,” Henry countered. Then before Carl’s grizzly took over completely and disemboweled the young father, Henry raised his hands in surrender. “I’m worried. People are saying you can’t even keep Nick in line.”
Carl growled low in his throat, scary enough to silence Henry and make Becca shy away. He hadn’t meant to frighten her, but he was holding on to his position by the barest thread, and he couldn’t afford to let a low man on the totem pole challenge him. Not even verbally. “You ought to be grateful that I don’t maim people whenever they smart mouth off to me.”
A deliberate reminder. Ages ago, Maximus Prime had permanently lamed Henry’s father. Even if Henry couldn’t remember the horror of those many years ago, he would remember his father’s permanent limp. Henry’s hard gaze flickered for a moment, then dropped.
Submission . Good .
But then the kid had to add an extra dig. “We’re just damned scared, is all. Them Detroit—”
“I know!” Carl barked. “Everybody’s scared and acting out. When the fuck are people going to think