Page 10 of To Kill a Badger (The Honey Badgers Chronicles #6)

N elle watched Keane Malone walk out of the massive double doors in the very front of the sports center.

There were other entries that shifters used to enter the building that would take them directly to the elevators that went deep underground to their stadiums, arenas, skating rinks, and everything else they needed that full-humans should never know about.

He exited exactly fifteen minutes from when she’d told him to meet her.

Impressive. She usually only saw that kind of timeliness from Tock.

Full-humans instinctively moved out of the cat’s way without even realizing what they were doing or why.

It was always entertaining to watch full-humans react to the apex predators among them.

Mothers pulled their children closer and scurried past Malone to get inside the building.

Men kept their eyes lowered and held their breaths until they’d passed him.

Children ignored him altogether because they were reaching out for the panda ice skater walking into the building.

They wanted nothing more than to hug the woman loudly chewing on a bamboo stalk.

It was different for honey badgers, though.

No one ever noticed them. It’s what made their kind so dangerous.

They could slip their way into and out of all sorts of situations.

Entire empires had toppled because honey badgers had started some shit and then eased their way out.

Not even caring about the nightmare they’d left behind.

It was the giant apex predators that had created this whole “other” world that kept them fed, protected, and entertained.

Badgers didn’t need that. They could fit in anywhere.

“What are you wearing?” the cat asked, once they were standing next to each other on the corner.

Deciding not to slap him based on his tone alone, Nelle questioned, “What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s a little fancy, isn’t it? For going to the doctor, I mean. Can I even afford this guy?”

Ohhhh! He wasn’t insulting her, per se. He was more freaking out about his obvious poverty. Okay. Fair enough.

Nelle glanced down at what she wore. Black jeans; dark red T-shirt; six-inched-heel, short, designer boots that cost thousands of euros; and gold-and-emerald jewelry around her neck, wrists, and dangling from her ears to really set the casual outfit off.

However, instead of earnestly explaining fashion to a male who would never understand it, she decided to be a little more flippant and said, “I dress for my mood. Today I felt very . . .”—she thought a moment before tossing off, “New York Swan off to see Truman at La C?te Basque.”

Not surprisingly, the cat simply stared at her with that constant frown on his face, only now it was deeper and seemed more confused than usual. She didn’t care. Poor thing. Not understanding literary references because he lived in a world of nothing but football and—

“Aren’t you a little young to be a Swan?” he queried. “And borderline trashy.”

“Excuse me?”

“They were all matrons with adult children. You’re not even thirty.”

Unable to hide her shock, Nelle gawked at Keane Malone. She didn’t know whether to slap him for calling her “borderline trashy” or hugging him for understanding her reference. “You know who Truman Capote was?”

His frown got even deeper. But he looked less confused now and more pissed off. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“Uh . . . nothing. We should go.”

“I do read .”

Did he? Or did he just read about Truman in an old Vanity Fair article while at the dentist’s office?

“Yeah. Sure. Okay,” she said to avoid a continuation of this conversation, since she didn’t want to have him lambasting her for assuming he was a big, dumb jock. They both knew he was; why keep going until his feelings were really hurt?

Thankfully, he seemed to take her response at face value and, suddenly, raised his arm.

“What are you doing?”

“Hailing a cab. Why? Is the office near here, so we can walk? Or do you want me to call a car for Her Majesty, which I loathe on moral grounds. Yellow taxies are the backbone of Manhattan.”

Nelle held her hand up to stop whatever speech he was about to give.

“I don’t care,” she told him honestly. “And it doesn’t matter. I already have a car.”

“You called a car?”

“No. I have a car.”

Her driver had pulled up and, blocking the street, came around to open the door for her.

“Miss Zhao.”

“Hello, Charles. This is Keane Malone. He likes taxies. We’ll be going to see Dr. Weng-Lee.”

“Of course.”

“And,” she said to Malone, “this is Charles. He’s my driver and personal security.”

“Why would you need security?”

“Just get in the car,” she growled out between clenched fangs.

This cat was really starting to get on her nerves.

* * *

Personal security? This woman has personal security? Why? If he were to be honest, it was everyone else that needed personal security to protect them from her.

And while she sat in her personal car with a security guy she didn’t need, she was looking down her pug nose at him. He knew she saw him as nothing but some knuckle-dragger wandering around, drooling, trying to scare innocent schoolchildren, and afraid of fire.

Then again, who cared? This woman’s life was none of his business. So he would just sit here and wait to arrive at the, he was sure, overpriced doctor’s office.

Keane thought he wanted some fresh air, so he pushed a button on the door, and the window went down.

The vehicle they were in was a hundred-thousand-dollar car, and the window made absolutely no sound when he lowered it, which fascinated him.

His SUV—which the insurance company had just totaled out due to Mads landing on the front end after being thrown off a roof not too long ago—had made all sorts of weird noises and did not have this level of smooth ride.

Wanting to hear the silence again, Keane closed the window, then opened it .

. . then closed it . . . then opened it . . . then—

“What are you doing?”

The badger was glaring at him.

“Nothing.”

“Stop playing with the window.”

“It’s not like you can hear it.”

“I can hear you pushing the button, and it’s driving me nuts!”

“Okay, fine.”

He closed the window since the AC was on and went back to looking around the back of the car.

That’s when Keane noticed a line of water bottles sitting inside the door.

They each had their own hole, snugly fitting inside.

He studied them while the car sat in traffic until he picked one up by the top and dropped it.

Then he grabbed the second one. Dropped it.

Then the third. He liked the little “pop” sound the holder made when he pulled each bottle out.

So once he’d taken them all out, he put them back and proceeded to pull each one out again.

“Now what are you doing?”

Keane looked at Nelle. “Huh?”

“What are you doing with my water bottles?”

He shrugged. “Nothin’.”

“Stop playing with the water bottles,” she growled through clenched teeth, her fangs now gone.

“Fine.”

Now really bored, Keane looked out the window and resisted his urge to keep messing with the bottles. Comfortable in silence, Keane was surprised when he heard, “So what do you read?”

“Why are you asking?”

“Because I’m interested?”

“I doubt it.”

“Uh-huh.” She was quiet a moment before she asked, “Do you think I’m not interested because I don’t care about other people?”

“That,” he replied, his gaze focused on a naked man arguing with two cops on the street. “And because you’re vapid.”

Charles made an oooph sound from the front.

“You think I’m vapid?”

“Yes.”

“What makes you think I’m vapid?”

“Well”—he felt her small fist tap his chest, and he turned in time to see she was very close to him and taking a selfie of them with her camera—“just a guess.”

The badger moved even closer until she could relax against him fully, then took another picture.

“You are extremely judgmental,” she surmised, studying the pictures she’d taken before moving back to her spot on the other side of the car.

“I’m a cat. I judge all of you and, of course, find all of you lacking. Except my niece,” he added. “Because she’s amazing. And my sister and my mom, because I’m wisely afraid of my mom and adore my sister.”

“As long as you know yourself,” Nelle said, now completely immersed in whatever was on her phone.

“Are you ever not using your phone?”

“Why would I not use it? I have constant access to information, shopping, my friends.”

“You have friends?”

“I have lots of friends.”

“People you know in real life?”

She looked away from her phone and stared at him a moment before asking, “Why would I need to know them in real life?”

“How do you call someone a friend that you don’t personally know?”

“It’s easy.” She held her phone up and pointed at some social media app. “See all these people replying to my recent comments on that new mobster TV show . . . all friends.”

“How are they your friends?”

“We chat almost every day.”

“Personally, I feel a friend is someone that, if you bump into them on the street, you would recognize them and say, ‘Hi, Joe.’ Not have to be reminded who they are and then say, ‘Hi, love my kitty cat underscore lover thirty-nine.’ ”

She gazed at him a moment before asking, “Is that really your online name?”

“I do not have an online name, and never ask me that again.”

* * *

“This is not a doctor’s office,” Keane announced when they walked through the front door of Dr. Weng-Lee’s business, the ting-ling sound of the bells over the door nearly drowning him out.

“I never said I was taking you to a doctor’s office,” Nelle pointed out before nodding at Layla behind the counter.

“I’m leaving.”

Christ! Cats were so moody! “Calm down. If anyone can help you, it’s Dr. Weng-Lee.”

“Licensed physicians do not have storefronts in Chinatown next to Shang Hai Hot Chicken franchises.”

“I love their chicken.”

Keane growled. “That’s not the point.”