They were both watching him when he caught sight of them, and the expression of disbelief and anger was so brief that Tex actually doubted he’d seen it.
Laura had no such doubts.
“If you want answers,” she told Scarlet furiously, “ask him!”
Fred managed to look innocent and slightly offended at the same time. “What do you mean, Jenny? Are you okay? What happened?”
“What I don’t understand,” Laura said, voice heartbroken, “is why. Why would you try to hurt Jenny? Why would you try to hurt me? What did we ever do to you?”
Tex was still watching Fred’s face, held back from roaring across the tile to smash the man into the ground only by Laura’s hand on his arm.
For just a moment, Fred looked shocked and angry, but it was so swiftly masked in hurt innocence that Tex might have been fooled if he hadn’t been watching for any sign of guilt.
Before he could do more than growl, there was a streak of fur, and the otter that Gizelle had been holding bolted towards Fred, shrieking in fury.
Fred stepped back, nearly tripping on the first step up to the bar deck.
The otter chittered and growled and seemed bigger than an otter ought to be.
Gizelle dashed after the creature, and knelt a short space away from it, gazing intently at it. “Use your words,” she scolded gently. “Remember yourself!” She ignored Fred completely.
Tex was still trying to figure out how to attack Fred without stepping on the otter or mauling Gizelle on his way, when the otter shimmered, seemed to hiccup in form.
It was the most painful shift that Tex had ever witnessed, as if otter and human were fighting for control of the form. Fur stretched, limbs took unnatural shapes and lengths one at a time. Finally, it became...
“Laura?”
He had to check to see that Laura was still standing at his side, mouth open in shock.
“Jenny!”
Then his mate was leaping into the chaos, weeping and throwing her arms around a mirror image of herself.
“You’re not dead, I couldn’t feel you anymore, I thought you were gone.”
“Couldn’t,” Jenny said, awkwardly. She was swaying, as if exhausted and not sure how her own limbs worked. She picked up a hand, which Tex realized still had short webbed fingers and claws and inspected it thoughtfully. “Lost.”
Gizelle looked at Laura warningly. “She’s not very found yet,” she said.
Tex was not looking at Fred anymore, captured by the drama unfolding.
“I’m not sure if this simplifies or complicates matters,” Scarlet said mildly at his elbow.
Fred turned as if to flee, and Tex caught the motion out of the corner of his eye. He moved without thinking, crossing the space between them and grabbing him by the back of the neck. His bear wanted to crush the loathsome man, bite his windpipe, and maul his smug face, but Tex reined him back, satisfying his blood lust with a simple shake that left Fred gasping for breath.
Laura wrapped her towel around Jenny’s naked shoulders and drew her to one of the lounge chairs. “What happened?”
“She needed help,” Jenny answered, in a sing-song voice that Tex knew wasn’t hers. “I saw a place for me.”
“Was it Fred?” Laura asked, desperately. “Did he booby-trap my car so that you got hurt?”
Jenny cocked her head at her. “Booby-trap?” She considered. “Yes. And another car, long ago.”
Laura sucked her breath in. “Our parents?”
“They had things he want. Things he valued. Mo-ney?”
“There was no money,” Laura scoffed. “We were paupers.”