Hitting a moving target can sometimes be a challenge, and I knew that before my change, I probably wouldn’t have been able to get this one. However, I kept my eye on the target and hit it, sending the ping-ping ball flying back over the net where it hit the corner of the table and bounced off before Dani could get it.

“All right,” Dani conceded. “You won that one.”

Playing ping-pong with Dani was a lot more fun now that I was able to keep up with her. Sure, she was still better than me, but not by very much at all. In fact, out of the five games we’d just played, I’d managed to win two of them.

“Do either of you want to play?” I called out to Nicole and Rebecca, who were sitting down talking with each other.

Nicole and Rebecca paused and both looked at me with a strange expression. Then they turned back to each other and played a quick game of rock paper scissors, with Nicole appearing to lose.

“I’ll play Dani,” Nicole said, giving me a slightly disappointed look before smirking at Dani. “It’s time to teach you a little humility…”

“What was that about?” I asked Rebecca as I joined her.

“We were just talking about you behind your back,” Rebecca answered with grin.

“Oh?” I responded, a little surprised that she’d be so honest about that.

“It’s nothing bad,” Rebecca told me with a chuckle. “We were just talking about how you haven’t left the base since you came here, other than for the missions and that doesn’t count.”

I nodded at that, then tried to keep the bitterness out of my voice as I said, “I haven’t exactly had a lot of choice.”

“Well, that’s changed,” Rebecca told me, putting a hand on my shoulder. “You’re part of Angel Squad now and we aren’t confined to base. Today, the two of us are going out for a change of scenery…and to get you some new clothes.” She gave me a wry smile and added, “We don’t mind sharing our clothes, but we thought you’d probably feel better if you could pick out your own.”

I smiled back at that and admitted, “That would be nice.” My sisters and I could all wear the same clothes, but it would definitely be nice to have some clothes I could call my own. And of course, I wouldn’t feel like such a mooch. Then I pointed out, “You said just the two of us…”

“Nicole and I had to decide which of us would take you,” Rebecca admitted wryly. “Roberts doesn’t like us all to leave at once. For one thing, having all of us angels together in public can draw a little too much attention. But more importantly, he wants at least some of us available in case we get a mission.”

“You two have fun,” Nicole called back to us, not taking her eyes from the ping-pong table.

A short time later, I found that Rebecca and I weren’t actually going out by ourselves. We were being joined by Hannah, who was dressed in civilian clothes, which surprised me just a little bit. Until now, every time I’d seen her, she’d been wearing her uniform.

“Officially,” Hannah stated with a grin, “I’m going along to keep an eye on you two and make sure you don’t get into any trouble. Unofficially…I’ve been meaning to pick up a few things.”

“I’m just glad you agreed to play chauffeur,” Rebecca told her with a chuckle.

We climbed into Hannah’s car and left the base, which was the first time I’d done this without a helicopter. As we drove right out the front gate, I suddenly felt as though a weight had been taken off my shoulders. I’d just been given a bit of freedom that I hadn’t been expecting and this did wonders for easing the bad mood I’d felt since our mission yesterday.

A short time later, we arrived at a large department store, the kind I would have avoided like the plague before my change. After we stepped through the main entrance, Rebecca and Hannah paused to look around.

“I figured we’d just worry about getting you casual clothes today,” Rebecca told me. “I mean, you’re still figuring out our own style and there will be plenty of time for other clothes later.”

I nodded at that, actually feeling relieved that she wanted to keep things casual. “I have a feeling that Nicole wouldn’t have stopped at casual…”

“You’re right,” Rebecca agreed with a chuckle. “But she wouldn’t have been nearly as bad as Dani.”

“Dani?” I asked in surprise.

“That girl loves to shop,” Hannah told me with a broad grin.

I gave Rebecca a skeptical look, but she just nodded agreement. “You might not guess it, but Dani loves shopping and trying on new clothes more than any natural born girl I know. If she brought you, you can bet that you would have spent most of the day trying on clothes and new looks.”

“And you probably would have left without getting what you actually needed,” Hannah added.

I shook my head at that, still having a hard time imagining that of Dani. “Well, if I want to try out new things I could always raid your closets…”

“Very true,” Rebecca agreed, giving me an amused look. “Nicole has a nice collection of shoes and skirts if you want to try those out. Dani has some sexy dresses…and I think she still has a fetish outfit she bought back when she was going through that lesbian phase…”

Hanna snickered at that and said, “I’d actually pay money to see her wearing that.”

We were still chuckling over the image as we began shopping, starting in the shoe section. To my relief, Rebecca didn’t even suggest that I try on high heels and instead focused on getting me the shoes I needed. She didn’t even bother looking at any shoes for herself, though the same couldn’t be said for Hannah.

“I like these ones,” Hannah said, trying on a pair of low heels that looked almost comfortable.

I ended up with three pairs of shoes, which was more than I’d been expecting but they all served a purpose. One was a pair of running shoes for training, one was a pair of comfortable shoes that I could wear most of the time, and the last pair were just some comfortable slippers. And after I was done getting what I needed, I still needed to wait another five minutes until Hannah was through.

While we were waiting for Hannah to finish up, a saleswoman stared back and forth between Rebecca and me before finally asking, “Are you two twins?”

“No,” Rebecca answered with a faint smirk. “Quadruplets. We have two sisters at home.”

“Oh my,” the saleswoman responded with a look of surprise while I tried to keep from laughing at her expression.

As we went to look for pants and shirts, I realized that shopping with Rebecca was almost like shopping with a guy. She wasn’t all that interested in trying out clothes for herself and remained focused on helping me get what I needed. And since she already knew my clothing sizes, the whole shopping experience was much more efficient than I ever would have guessed. Ironically, I found myself wishing that we could slow down a bit more so I could experiment with how certain clothes would look on me, but I was too embarrassed to mention it.

“You have got to try this on,” Hannah said, holding up a blouse that looked kind of sexy and even revealed a bit of cleavage. I blushed at the idea of wearing something that feminine.

“It looks nice,” Rebecca said, looking over the shirt and seeming to approve. However, she didn’t say anything more and merely waited to see what I’d do.

“Why not?” I asked after a moment, snatching the garment from Hannah’s hands and going into the changing room. When I came back out a minute later, I asked, “What do you think?”

Hannah looked me over for a moment before saying, “It looks really good on you.”

I nodded at that, looking myself over in the mirror and feeling self-conscious. It was a bit more feminine and revealing than I was really comfortable with, but it did look good on me. And as I silently reminded myself, I was a woman now so there was absolutely no shame in dressing like one.

“If you don’t buy it,” Rebecca said after a moment. “I will.” Then she chuckled and added, “And you can bet that whichever of us ends up with it, Nicole will be borrowing it.”

I laughed at that, then responded, “It might be fun having her borrow my clothes for a change.”

After I went to the changing room to switch back into my own shirt, I came out and wordlessly put the blouse into the cart along with everything else I was going to buy. Rebecca and Hannah grinned at each other but neither of them said anything.

The lingerie section was the last area we went to, and by this time, I’d already been wearing bras long enough that they weren’t such a big deal. I smiled faintly as I went through the racks, knowing that before my change, I would have avoided this section of the store entirely. But now, no one looked at me twice…except for another saleswoman who’d noticed that Rebecca and I were twins.

When we were done shopping, we went to a nearby restaurant for an early dinner. The waiter was a young man who couldn’t have been more than twenty-one and he stared at both Rebecca and me, though he tried to look as though he wasn’t. I blushed at the attention, surprised to find that a part of me actually kind of liked it.

“It’s so nice to have a day off,” Hannah exclaimed once we were seated at the table. She leaned back in her chair and said, “The colonel isn’t exactly a slave driver, but you have no idea how much paperwork he throws at me…”

“I know what you mean,” Rebecca said. “I mean, as far as having some time off. It’s nice to have a day where we don’t have to worry about training or going after demons.”

Then Hannah asked, “Did you hear, there was another demon outbreak in Canada yesterday…”

“Another?” Rebecca asked with a wry look. “You make it sound like they get them all the time. What’s this…their second one ever?”

“Third,” Hannah pointed out. “They had that one in Toronto where they quarantined the entire city to make sure it didn’t spread. There was the one in Vancouver last year, and this one was in a small town in Alberta.”

“I heard about the Toronto outbreak,” I commented, remembering how it had been all over the news a few years ago. A demon had appeared and the Canadians had dealt with the demon and then locked down the entire city for a week to make sure no one else had gotten infected and could spread the virus. “I don’t remember hearing about the Vancouver one though.”

“The Canadians were pretty efficient about it,” Hannah said. Then she grinned and asked, “Did you hear about that outbreak in Mexico last year?”

“I don’t remember,” I responded, though I hadn’t been paying attention too much to outbreaks in the news. That kind of news had always been depressing.

Hannah chuckled and explained, “A small town got infected and most of the people were either killed or turned demon. A local cartel started fighting back against them and were actually able to kill all the demons. By the time the military arrived, the demons were all dead and so were most of the cartel members. All they had to do was take care of the surviving cartel members who’d been infected but hadn’t gone demon yet.”

“Holy shit,” I gasped, imagining how much bloodshed there had to have been.

“It reminds me of that thing in Arizona last month,” Rebecca said. “We got deployed because there was a demon, but by the time we arrived, all his neighbors had already hunted him down and killed him.” She snorted at that and added, “We ended up with three infected civilians to deal with instead.”

I scowled, thinking about the demons we’d fought yesterday. It had been hard to watch a person turn demon right in front of me, to see him lose his humanity and turn into a snarling monster. I had a feeling that I’d be having nightmares about that for some time to come.

“Can we talk about something else?” I asked quietly. “I really don’t want to think about demons right now.”

Rebecca nodded at that, giving me a look of understanding. “Then what should we talk about?”

Hannah grinned at that and answered, “Guys.” She looked to me with a mischievious gleam in her eyes as she said, “I heard through the grapevine that you might have a crush on someone.”

I blushed bright red at that, noticing that Rebecca suddenly looked a little guilty. I groaned, closing my eyes and silently wishing that I hadn’t said anything about changing the topic. Demons would have been MUCH more comfortable than this.