Thank goodness for family. Jena patted Missy’s shoulder and ducked back behind the counter. Her boy’s aunt. Jena’s grandmother. Missy’s huge clan. It was a close-knit community, the one place their kind didn’t have to hide.
Tucked into an isolated canyon in the middle of the Mojave Desert, miles away from the state highway that the tourists drove, was the little town of Cambio Springs. It was an isolated town, made of the descendants of seven families who had made their way west over a hundred years before. Seven families that discovered something very unusual about the mineral springs that gave the town its name.
Dev stood and walked to the counter. “Well, I’m outta here, Jen. Did you see that Alex was back in town?”
“Really?” Jena looked up from the ketchup containers she was filling and walked over to the cash register. “Have you seen him?”
“Just saw his Lexus out at Willow’s.” Alex McCann was one of her late husband’s many cousins and one of her closest friends in high school. He’d moved, like so many of the younger people, when he went to college. Still, as the oldest McCann of his generation, she suspected he’d be back sooner or later.
“At Willow’s, huh?” She gave Dev a sly smile. Willow McCann, Alex’s sister, was one of the few girls Dev hadn’t bagged, and not for lack of trying. “He’s probably just out for a visit.”
“He still doing the real estate thing in L.A.?”
“As far as I know. There’s some kind of town meeting tomorrow night. His dad probably asked him to show up.”
Dev lowered his voice and glanced at Missy, who was married to the town’s young mayor. “Anything I need to be there for?”
Jena shrugged. Monthly town meetings were a tradition in the Springs, and the oldest members of the seven families made up the council. It was an archaic kind of government, but when you were running a town full of various shapeshifters, normal rules of city government didn’t always apply. Sure, they elected the mayor… but he pretty much did whatever the elders asked him to do.
Alma Crowe, Jena’s grandmother and a member of the town council, poked into Dev and Jena’s conversation. “Nothing the tribes need to be concerned about.”
“You know we’re always available, Alma.”
She leaned down to kiss his handsome cheek. “I know. You’re a good friend for asking.”
The various tribes along the Colorado River had known about Cambio Springs for ages. But sharing a history of wanting to be left alone, they’d tacitly helped to keep the Springs a secret. And it really wasn’t that hard. What did the outside world care about a dusty desert town in the middle of nowhere? If you weren’t a resident or a friend of one, you were sure to receive a cold shoulder. Visitors, if they happened to come around, didn’t stay long.
Jena’s voice dropped so Missy couldn’t overhear her. “It’s probably just Matt pushing another plan to create jobs since the airfield shut down.”
Dev said, “It would be nice if one of them worked.”
The military air base that had provided half the town with jobs had shut down in the latest round of federal budget cuts, and more and more families had to move away. Moving away meant hiding. Though Jena and the rest of the town could shift at will, some of the myths were true. Come the full moon, the urge to change was almost overwhelming. Except for the oldest and strongest of them, full moons meant feathers, fur, or scales. That meant that families who moved were forced to keep secrets. And as someone who had lived “away,” Jena knew just how hard that was.
“It’ll all work out,” Alma reassured them. “It always does.”
Dev paid his bill, still glancing at Old Joe Quinn’s hat hanging on the wall behind her, and whistled as he made his way out the door. The continuous hum of conversation flowed around her as Jena went about her tasks for the day. Old men argued. Mothers fed boisterous children. Silverware clattered, the kitchen bell rang, and Jena Crowe saw it all.
Read them all in Kindle Unlimited:
Shifting Dreams
Desert Bound
Waking Hearts
Thank you for reading Fate Interrupted! If you’re curious about more of Elizabeth Hunter’s work, check out her website at:
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Acknowledgments
You got to read Megan’s story!!! I really hope you loved it. I love these ladies so much, it was like visiting old friends to be back with them.
And speaking of old friends, I’m writing the next Ben and Tenzin book right now, so I hope you keep an eye out for The Bone Scroll in Fall of this year.
To my readers, thank you so much for your love, support, and enthusiasm. I don’t always get to respond to your emails and messages, but trust me, I do read them, and I appreciate them so much. (Except for you, Maegan. You know why.) It has been such a pleasure writing Megan, Katherine, and Toni’s stories. It honestly feels like a privilege every time I hang out with any of my Paranormal Women’s Fiction gang. They are the women I want to hang with and the kind of friends I aspire to be.
To Gen, Kelli, Chevella, Bobbie, and Wendy, MY GIRLS. I want to thank you for your friendship, laughter, advice (dubious as some of it may be), and support. The past year has been challenging on so many levels, and our socially distanced Wine Wednesdays were a lifeline to me.
To my publishing team, Amy Cissell, Anne Victory, Linda, everyone at Damonza, and all the hardworking publicists at Social Butterfly PR, I want to say thank you. I truly appreciate all that you do to make my business run smoothly.
To my family.
Husband of mine, you are the best husband in the world, and I am completely unbiased. I have done studies, and it is the truth. My love for you is bigger than the skies in Omo.
Kid of mine, you are the best kid in the world, and I am completely unbiased; it’s just science. I love you more than Star Wars. Please don’t grow up too fast.
And to the rest of you crazy mob, you are completely who I modeled the Dusis after. So now you know what I think of you all. Obviously, you’re the best.
About the Author
ELIZABETH HUNTER is a USA Today and international best-selling author of romance, contemporary fantasy, and paranormal mystery. Based in Central California, she travels extensively to write fantasy fiction exploring world mythologies, history, and the universal bonds of love, friendship, and family. She has published over forty works of fiction and sold over a million books worldwide. She is the author of the Glimmer Lake series, Love Stories on 7th and Main, the Elemental Legacy series, the Irin Chronicles, the Cambio Springs Mysteries, and other works of fiction.