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you call them? Werewolves? Werebears?
     
    “Tell me you’re going to bite her now.” Eric said.
     
    “No.” Joe said.
     
    “Fine. I’ll bite her.”
     
    “ No one is biting her,” Joe said firmly.
     
    “Joe, what’s happening?” Sierra asked.
     
    She looked around wildly for a way out, but the angry crowd was closing ranks around her, their eyes glittering in the torchlight.
     
    “Is she really a reporter?” someone called out.
     
    “You better bite her or fucking eat her, Joe. We can’t just let her leave,” Eric said.
     
    A few members of the crowd shouted out their approval.
     
    “Everyone calm down!” Joe said loudly. Sierra immediately recognized it as the voice he used during speeches. Dominant, commanding, but also calming and reasonable.
     
    “Now, I can assure you I did not tell Sierra about this place. She followed me here. But I can also assure you she has no intention of telling anyone else. You’re all perfectly safe. She’s sorry for the scene she caused, and didn’t mean to put anyone in danger. I’m going to take her home now.”
     
    Joe grabbed her by the arm and started to march her away though the crowd.
     
    “What if she does tell someone?” Eric asked and he stepped into their path.
     
    “Then I will deal with her.”
     
    “But that’s not good enough! How can you be sure-”
     
    “Are you challenging me, Eric?” Joe asked, fury blazing in his eyes.
     
    The crowd went silent . After a moment’s hesitation. Eric looked down at his feet.
     
    “No sir.”
     
    “Good.”
     
    Eric moved aside and they walked back out of the town.
     
     
    *
     
    They walked in silence back to the truck. Joe climbed into the driver’s seat and held out his hand for the keys, which Sierra handed over mutely. Joe turned the truck around and tore down the dirt road like a bat out of hell.
     
    Sierra had never seen him angry like this. If there was anything politicians were good at it was maintaining their composure. But Joe was pissed.
     
    A few miles down the highway, he eased off the gas and pulled on to the shoulder.
     
    “Let me see your arm,” he said.
     
    Using a first aid kit they found in the glove box, Joe expertly cleaned the wound and bandaged it.
     
    “You’re going to need stitches.” he muttered. “The closest emergency room is a few miles from here. You can tell them it was a raccoon. They won’t ask too many questions. I can’t go in with you.”
     
    “It’s okay,” she assured him.
     
    “If someone recognized me-”
     
    “It’s alright.” she said. “I understand.”
     
    Joe suddenly punched the steering wheel.
     
    “Why did you follow me?!” he shouted at her. “Do you have any idea the damage you’ve caused?!”
     
    “I thought you were stealing from charity!” she shouted back at him. “And kidnapping children! And running illegal bear fights!”
     
    He stared at her for a moment, then burst out laughing.
     
    “Actually,” he said between bits of laughter, “I am running illegal bear fights. You got me there. But I promise you the participants are willing.”
     
    He pulled the truck back on to the highway.
     
    “So how did Brenda get out of her cage?” he asked her.
     
    “She told me bad people kidnapped her.”
     
    He chuckled.
     
    “I don’t know what we’re going to do with that conniving little girl.”
     
    “Do you have to keep her locked up?”
     
    “Only during the full moon and a couple of days before and after.” he explained. “The shifting can be spread with a bite, but it’s also genetic, so all the kids get it. Most of them don’t shift for the first time until after puberty, but it starts sooner in some. The young ones can’t control when they shift, and they don’t have control of themselves in bear form. So they have to stay locked up to keep people safe. But you try telling a six-year-old she can’t go to the fight with all the other kids.”
     
    “And you’re all…shifters?