She stared at him. "You're telling me that those things are out there, right now? That what I dreamt is real?"
He nodded. "The man you heard in your dream said the word 'Lycaonia'. That is the name of the shifter paranormal city. It's about eight hours south of here. A couple months ago, a spell was cast to bring all the unit warriors their mates. Shortly after that the Unit Commander, Aiden McKenzie began dreaming of his mate. There's a pretty good chance that the man's voice you heard in your dream was your mate's," he explained.
Rheia was stunned. All her life she secretly dreamed of finding a paranormal of her own for a mate. Her last boyfriend had fallen woefully short of the standards she had set using her brothers as examples of manhood. In addition to being self-absorbed, he'd left the night she brought Penny home and never returned, saying he didn't want a child in his life.
"Maybe he will be a vampire," Athan said softly. When she looked up his eyes were twinkling.
"I hope to all the Gods she does have a mate. I for one was not willing to lose her to old age," Dax said, walking up to hand Athan a gun.
"Aiden, I have a situation here," she heard Radek say, holding his phone in one hand, his gun in the other.
Marco walked over to her. "I'm heading upstairs to pack for Penny. Did you want me to pack for you as well?" he asked.
"Pack?" Her head was swimming.
"Honey, you can't stay here. You have to go to Lycaonia," he explained gently.
"But my house! My things!" she protested.
"We can pack up all your things and send them to you," Dax offered.
"What about my house? This is temporary, right? I can come home later when you kill these things, right?" she asked desperately.
Marco shook his head, sadness in his eyes. "Pumpkin, if your mate is in Lycaonia, that's where you belong."
"This was my parent's house. I grew up here! Why is this happening now? Penny's been here almost a year?"
Marco growled low. "That sonofabitch Bruce Johnson at the Herald just released an exposé about the recent murders and linked them back to Penny's parents. He let the cat out of the bag that they were survived by a little girl that may have witnessed the murder. He also mentions that the poor orphan was adopted by a local humanitarian and surgeon. He must've hacked the records, because that was not for public consumption."
"Let's just get you and Penny to safety, then we can figure things out," Athan said, squeezing her hand.
She turned to Marco. "Our suitcases are in my closet. Pack as many of her things as you can, she'll need familiar things around her. I'll be up in a second to pack my clothes." He jogged up the stairs and out of sight.
"Commander, I need to send her to you. It's ten pm now, she should be arriving around six am, can you have someone watching out for her? Yes, sir, yes, sir. I'm going to give her directions. Your idea to have unit warriors outside the four cities is starting to pay off, isn't it? If we can save even one mate... yes, sir. I'll check in later with more details. Goodbye, sir." Radek ended the call and turned to her. "Aiden McKenzie will have someone waiting for you, to escort you into the city. You need to go pack, Pumpkin Dumpling." He pointed to the stairs.
Feeling numb, she turned and walked up the stairs. She went to Penny's room first. Marco was making her dollies walk then jump into the suitcase. Penny watched intently, a serious look on her face. The little girl didn't have much. She had refused all of her toys from her parent's home except a small, handmade cloth doll. Rheia believed that Penny's mother had made it for her. Penny rejected everything else, including her old clothes.
Even later Penny hadn't expressed much interest when they'd gone shopping, so the amount to pack for her daughter was painfully small. Not wanting to disturb the two, she turned and made her way to the master bedroom. It took her two years after her parent's fatal car accident to move into the master bedroom. Marco had left the large and medium size suitcases open for her on her bed. Looking around the room with a critical eye, she decided to pack her clothes and toiletries in the large suitcase and pack her sentimental items in the medium suitcase.
She emptied her small closet and nightstand into the large suitcase and frowned. She had a lot of space left over. Ironically, she hated clothes shopping as much as Penny. She mostly lived in her scrubs, rotating between the same seven pair. The rest of her wardrobe was comprised of some tee-shirts, a couple pair of jeans, sweaters, a couple nightgowns and undergarments. Her clothes selection was as pitiful as her daughter's. She transferred the clothes and toiletries to the medium suitcase and zipped it shut. In the larger suitcase she packed the small set of fairy tale books her father had read to her as a child, all of her mother's jewelry, her own favorite books, a small shoebox of keepsakes, three photo albums, and the accordion file which held all of her legal papers. Looking down at the nearly full suitcase she realized there was only one more thing she had to have with her. She turned and raced downstairs to the kitchen. Lovingly she wrapped her mother's china tea service, which included a teapot, a creamer, a sugar bowl, and four cups with saucers in her kitchen towels and headed back upstairs with them in a laundry basket.
When she first came to this home, she hadn't been that much older than Penny was now. She could clearly remember her mother sitting her down at the table and making her a pot of sweet chamomile tea. All the ugliness of her past slipped away as she sat holding that delicate teacup. She carefully packed the small tea service in the suitcase using her kitchen and bathroom towels to keep it safe. She zipped up the suitcase and stood back.