When we first meet Nicolette, she is seen through the eyes of people who love her. In the case of Vane, he is grateful to her for taking him and his brother in when no one else would. She’s extremely kind to Vane because he reminds her of her. He’s in love with another species and he shouldn’t be. She relates to him, and she wants to help him.

In the case of Wren, she knows he’s emotionally damaged. He has no other family (Vane fought for his sister and for Fang- he understands family and family loyalty). Wren doesn’t in her mind. More than that, you have to remember that she took in Josef under much the same circumstances as Wren and in the end, Josef was so jealous over the love her family had, that he turned on them and killed two of her sons. She never got over that. And she’s turned her hatred for Josef onto Wren. Personality conflict from the very beginning.

The irony is that she welcomed Josef in against Papa’s wishes. Papa sensed something wrong when Nicolette didn’t. This time Papa knows that Wren is all right, but again, Nicolette doesn’t listen. In her mind, she can’t afford to. Wren is just too much like Josef. He’s antisocial, secretive, etc. Vane was never any of those.

And then there’s a little matter of who Wren is in love with. A senator’s daughter. If Maggie’s father finds out about them, he will kill all of them. She’s terrified of what humans will do with the Were-Hunters. He is a powder keg and Nicolette refuses to lose anymore children.

So it’s not that she’s different. I just showed another side to her. We are all that way. We all have many, many sides to us and we’re judged radically different depending on the person we meet. One might think us sophisticated while another would think uneducated idiot. Everything’s relative. To me, this is what makes the people in my books seem real.