Mate Marked(40)

“A bulldog in a dress?” Castleberry looked Erika up and down in contempt.

“Cecil Castleberry?” Louise smacked him across the face with her purse, so hard that he yelped in surprise and pain. “Blow it out your ass.”

The entire crowd gasped and fell silent. They all turned to stare at Chelsea to see what she would do.

She gave a brisk round of applause.

“Hear, hear,” she said. “And no, I can’t arrest Miss Louise for assault, because I just resigned from my job.”

“If you hadn’t, we’d have run you out of town,” Castleberry sneered at her. “That new girl, Holly, contacted the mayor’s office this morning to file a complaint,” he said to the crowd of shifters. “She said that Chelsea has been having an affair with her mate.”

Several of the pack members made involuntary retching noises and clutched at their stomachs.

“She did not have an affair with anybody’s mate!” Rosie said, stepping forward. “If Roman was mated, she didn’t know about it. Nobody in town knew about it. He’s the one who takes the blame there!”

The room was dividing up. Half the pack was moving to one side, with Rosie and Louise and Erika, glaring at Mr. Castleberry. Barbara was snapping pictures. Erika was looking around with her fists clenched, deciding who she wanted to punch.

The rest of the pack was crowding arouhnd Cecil Castleberry, but they were starting to look doubtful. He saw that he was losing his audience.

“Anyway! That’s not all Holly had to say! She also did some research and found out some interesting things about Chelsea,” he continued haughtily, rubbing his injured cheek. “Things you didn’t tell us,” he added, addressing Chelsea directly. “Like the fact that your mother went feral and you’re a psychic.”

There was a collective gasp from the crowd.

Chelsea felt the blood draining from her face.

It was true. Her mother had gone feral.

Her mother had been psychic, but she’d been the opposite of Chelsea; she didn’t broadcast her emotions. Instead, she’d been bombarded by other people’s emotions all the time. Eventually it had driven her mad.

Her father hadn’t been able to handle having a crazy mate, and he’d run out on his family when they were young.

Chelsea’s mother had turned feral right in the middle of a grocery store and attacked several shoppers, gravely injuring them. She’d been taken out by a police officer’s silver bullets. Chelsea had been three at the time. She’d spent the rest of her childhood and teenage years in foster care; nobody had wanted to adopt a child with her history, and her powers, which most people didn’t understand.

“So,” Esther said indignantly, “You’ve been reading our minds all this time? And I even made you a dog bed!”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Erika interrupted, looking annoyed.

“You could have told me Susan’s campaign strategy,” Lorena added, looking wounded. “And who’s going to vote for me. I mean, I brought you coffee cake.”

“I have not been reading anyone’s mind!” Chelsea cried. “I’m not even capable of mind-reading, not that I’d do it if I could. I’m classified as being a member of the psychic family, but I’m not a mind-reader. I’m a type of empath. A reverse empath. I don’t sense other people’s emotions; I broadcast my own. Other people tend to feel some of what I’m feeling. But I take medication to control it.”

“I don’t believe you,” Mr. Castleberry said, his expression wary. “Are you reading my mind right now?” He clapped his hands over his ears and began backing up. “You are, aren’t you? Stop it!”

“Why? What do you have to hide?” Erika called. “I’ve heard rumors that you were misusing chamber funds. Is that true?”

“Lies! All lies! Stop it!” Mr. Castleberry shrieked, backing all the way up to the door. He flung the door open and turned and ran. Outside, he tripped, scrambled to his feet and then got back up and kept running.

“I will leave tonight,” Chelsea said, standing up abruptly.

“But we don’t want you go!” Rosie protested, and there was a chorus of agreement from half the pack. “Even if you don’t want to be sheriff. We like you. You should stay.”

“She’s a mind-reader!” one of the crowd members yelled. “She can’t stay here!”

“She doesn’t read minds, and we all turn into animals and howl at the moon, so we’re not exactly the ones to point fingers at anyone who’s different,” Barbara said.