Cael (Were Zoo Book 11)

good.”
“That sounds perfect,” Cael said. He opened the restaurant’s website and made a reservation for two for six thirty on Tuesday night. “Let’s meet for ice cream around eight.”
“That works for us,” Justus said.
“We’re so happy you met your...” Trina’s voice trailed off as several patrons walked into the shop. “Special someone,” she said with a low voice and a smile.
“Me too. Thanks for your help. I need to get back to work.”
“I should too, but I’d rather stay here and ogle the cutie behind the counter,” Justus said.
Cael shook his head with a laugh as he left the shop. He knew he didn’t have to check with Novi to see if she liked the idea of the steak house, because she’d told him she wanted to be surprised.
And he was definitely hoping to surprise her in more ways than one.

Chapter Seven
As Novi got ready for work on Tuesday, she mulled over what to say to her mom. Novi was working until four, and then Cael was picking her up for their date at six. She had no idea what he was planning because she’d asked him to surprise her. All she knew was that she should dress casually. On Monday, she’d found a cute denim mini skirt in the donation bin at the store, and matched it with a turquoise top with short, ruffled sleeves. The clothes hung in her closet, freshly washed and ironed.
Despite being ready to see Cael again—more than ready, actually—she hadn’t told her mom anything yet. Not about the safari tour or meeting Cael or the hours they’d spent on the phone talking since meeting on Saturday. She was head over heels for him, and she’d only spent a couple hours in person with him. She couldn’t shake the feeling that they were fated to meet, that he was her Mr. Right, and there was an answering echo of contentment within that part of her that felt feral.
And there was something Cael had said to her the day they met that she hadn’t been able to shake.
He’d asked if she took after her father physically.
At the time, she’d thought he might mean the growling and other odd physical stuff, but she’d convinced herself that he must mean did she actually look like her father. But now, she was almost one hundred percent sure that Cael knew there was something different about her and it was related to her father. She just wished she could talk to her mom about that without her freaking out.
It begged the question—was there something different, really different, about her father that she’d inherited?
Was the part of her that felt like a feral barn cat when she got emotional more than just simple emotions?
She wanted to confide in Cael, but she was afraid he’d think she was nuts. And what would she say anyway? That she thought her dad was part animal and she’d inherited some of it too?
Shaking her head, she finished tying her tennis shoes and grabbed her phone from the dresser.
Taking in a deep breath, she opened her bedroom door and walked into the kitchen to find her mom stirring honey into a mug of steaming tea and looking at her phone.
“Morning,” Novi said. She grabbed an apple from the bowl on the counter and sat, rubbing the shiny skin and thinking about what she would say.
“Hello, did you sleep well?”
“Not particularly.”
“Oh?” Her mom looked up at her. “What kept you up?”
This was it. It was tell her now or keep hiding the truth.
“I met a guy.”
“At work?”
“No...at the park.”
Her mom’s brows dropped down, a wrinkle forming between them. “What park?”
For a moment, Novi didn’t say anything, but she decided in that split second that she didn’t want to hide anything from her mom about Cael because she liked him, and she thought there might be more there than just a guy she could date for a while and have fun with.
She thought Cael might be her future.
“I went to the safari park on Saturday afternoon, and after the tour, I met a guy named Cael there. He’s the vet for the safari animals. We ate dinner together, and he took me into one of the paddocks to meet Tank, the park’s mascot, and we’ve been talking on the phone ever since.”
The words rushed out of her like a dam breaking, and she inhaled deeply to catch her breath when she was done.
Her mom said nothing, just stared at her with the same brown eyes Novi had herself.
“I told you it wasn’t safe,” her mom said finally. “Places like that use photos for publicity all the time. Your father could see your picture and know where we are.”
“Mom, we haven’t seen him in almost two years. We’ve moved three times since then, and there’s no reason to think he’s watching advertisements for a safari park on the East Coast.” Novi rubbed her temple. “Aren’t you tired of running? Because I am.”
“For a guy.” Her mom’s brow arched, her gaze boring into Novi.
“Yes. No. Not just him. But I really like him.”
“You don’t know him.”
“I know enough about him to know I want to see where it goes. I don’t want to fall in love with him and then have to disappear because we may or may not still be on my father’s radar.”
Yes, she was very sure her father was dangerous. He’d made that abundantly clear. And there was also the pesky little fact that he didn’t think Novi should even be alive.
“Do you think there’s something different about him?” Novi blurted out.
“Who?”
“My father.”
Her mom’s brows furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean really different. Like not...” She let the sentence die. Was she really going to say she wanted to know if her mom thought her dad wasn’t