I looked at Ben, who shrugged and said, “Hey, you’re the expert.”
Why did people keep thinking that? I must have been doing a good job of fooling everyone. Werewolves were werewolves—that
didn’t make them any more prone to having unlikely things like this happen to them, did it?
As a matter of fact, it did. This thing had already proven it would go after the whole pack, not just me. A moment of dizziness
made me hold my head to steady myself. I had to make this stop. There had to be a way to make this stop.
Ben put his hand on my leg, and the touch anchored me. Brought me back to the table, the conference room, Hardin, the horror
of the situation. Didn’t stop tears from falling.
Hardin watched me. “You do know something. What is it?”
Once again, I explained the trip to Vegas, the cult, the sacrifice, the attacks, Grant’s potion, and my suspicion that Mick
hadn’t used it. If nothing else, there’d be no such thing as a secret Babylonian cult lurking in Sin City anymore.
Everybody
was going to know about it at this rate. Not that everyone believed me. I’d have thought that Hardin would be beyond disbelief
after everything she’d seen and studied, but her expression was blank.
She said, “That doesn’t get me any closer to figuring out what happened or who to arrest.”
“Yeah, well, sorry about that.”
“What’s the likelihood of this happening again?” she asked.
Likely. Very likely. I didn’t want to think about it, so I turned away, biting my lip.
“Do you want to talk about some kind of police protection?” she said. She was being as nice as she’d ever been to me, but
her voice was still businesslike, almost harsh, when what I wanted was for someone to pat me on the head and say, “There,
there.”
Ben said, “Police protection isn’t going to do a whole lot of good for people burning up from the inside.”
“I can’t sit around doing nothing,” she said, scowling.
“Trust me, Detective, as soon as I find the magic spell that will make all this go away, I’ll let you know,” I said.
She made an offhand gesture that might have been saying, touché. “I’ll keep digging on my end. But the usual request applies:
If you find out anything, let me know, right?”
“You too, I hope.”
“Will do. Thanks for stopping by.”
She escorted us to the front door, said the farewells, then went back in. I almost said something to her about taking a break,
getting some sleep, food, fresh clothes. I was worried about her and didn’t want her to burn out—metaphorically or literally,
given the circumstances. Every time I saw her she looked harried beyond all reason. But the door closed, she was gone, and
I lost my chance.
Leaning against Ben, I prompted a hug. We clung to each other, squeezing comfort into each other.
I muttered into Ben’s shoulder, “This isn’t a coincidence, this can’t be a coincidence. Spontaneous human combustion isn’t
spontaneous when you’re being haunted by a heat-generating demon.”
“That makes sense,” Ben agreed.
“This is my fault. I’m the reason this is happening, and now I’ve put everyone in danger—”
“Kitty. You couldn’t help it. You couldn’t know. What were you supposed to do, let those guys in Vegas kill you?” Ben said.
If I could go back, knowing what I knew now, knowing I could save Mick’s life, maybe everyone’s life . . . I might have let
them kill me. I looked at him, despairing, my eyes large and shining.
“Let’s go home,” he said and kissed the top of my head.
“Even though we might burst into flames with no warning at any minute?”
“Kitty.” He gave me a reprimanding look.
In the car and on the road, I slumped and looked out the window, watching the world go by. Wondering how to stop an enemy
that we couldn’t see, couldn’t identify, couldn’t anticipate.
I said, “I can’t believe I’m the closest thing he has to next of kin.” It wasn’t fair that he didn’t have anyone. I hadn’t
known him well enough to be the emergency contact in his wallet.
“You might not have noticed, but most people who get stuck as werewolves aren’t the kind who have close ties to big families.
Present company excepted, of course.”
“I’d noticed,” I said. “I am constantly reminded that this isn’t the life I signed up for.”
“Does that include me?” He quirked a wry smile.
Erp. I could see now how my statement could be taken the wrong way. Especially since a relationship with Ben had been about
as unexpected as getting attacked by a werewolf in the first place.
I leaned my head on his shoulder. “I’m the last person to complain about the pleasant little surprises that happen along the
way.”
It was the unpleasant ones I was getting sick of.
Near home, I spotted a familiar motorcycle and rider in the rearview mirror. Same helmet, same jacket, following about three
cars back. Peter, still at it. I wished I had gotten a phone number from him, so I could call him. Tell him to stop this.
He wasn’t going to learn anything I hadn’t already told him, and I really didn’t want him getting caught up in this demon
business.
M
y first job was to tell the rest of the pack what had happened. We’d lost one of our own, and anybody could be next.
Ben took the notepad where I kept everyone’s contact info away from me. “I’ll make the calls,” Ben said. “I’m a lawyer, I’m
used to giving people bad news.”
I let him. That left me to call Odysseus Grant.
His phone rang. And rang. He didn’t answer. Either he was busy, or he had finally gotten sick of me and wasn’t taking my calls
anymore. I tried not to think the worst: Something had happened to him, he’d confronted the Band of Tiamat, or they’d confronted
him, and it had ended badly. And I’d never know.
I turned on the computer and called up web sites for Las Vegas newspapers, looking for something spectacular and out of the
ordinary: mass murder, fires, chaos in the streets. But I didn’t find anything unusual, at least not by Las Vegas standards.
A couple of crooked politicians were exposed, a tycoon announced plans for a new resort. If something had happened, it might
have been so subtle it hadn’t made the news.
Or maybe he was busy and not answering his phone.
By the time I’d finished, Ben set his phone down, blowing out a sigh. He pursed his lips.
“Well?” I said.
“I told Shaun and Becky. They’ll spread the word. They want to talk. That’s probably not a bad idea.”
“Show some kind of leadership so the troops don’t lose faith?”
“Something like that. They suggested meeting in the mountains. I told them we could be there in a couple of hours, for anyone
who wants to talk.”
The forest where we spent full moons would be heavy with the memory and smell of shifting, of turning wolf and running. Feelings
would run high there. I wasn’t sure everyone could handle it. I didn’t want any more trouble than we already had. “I’m not
sure that’s such a good idea.”
Ben ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “I would have told them New Moon, but so much for that.”
We were running out of territory.
“Okay,” I said. “But we’d better get going. I want to get there first.”
“Occupy the high ground?”
“Something like that. I just think it’ll go better if we’re there already. It’s a dominance thing.”
“It usually is,” he said.
The human side could be as sarcastic as it wanted about pack dynamics, but the pack still seemed to win out in the end.
W
e were too late. We arrived at the remote parcel of land where we parked on full-moon nights, and Shaun, Becky, and a half
dozen others had already arrived. I bristled, because it meant they had the same thought I had and wanted to make a statement.
It was almost a challenge.
They’d carpooled in a couple of cars, which were parked to the side. They lined up along the barbed-wire fence that marked
the property: arrayed in a straight line, leaning on fence posts or standing in tough poses, arms crossed, glaring, frowning.
Ben parked the car in front of them. We got out and leaned on the hood. Stared them down. I tried not to think about the OK
Corral.
Most of these people knew me in the old days, when I was a new wolf, weak, bottom of the pecking order. Back then, being submissive
was far easier than trying to stand up for myself. Being submissive meant the bigger, badder wolves looked out for me. Most
of the time. When they weren’t beating me up themselves. It had seemed like a fair trade at the time.
That meant some of these wolves remembered how easy it used to be to knock me around. They had to be wondering, how tough
was I
really
? How easy would it be to nudge me out of that top spot?
I got a lot of mileage out of the fact that me returning to Denver as a badass alpha had confused the hell out of some of
them. It put them in “wait and see” mode. But I was running out of time to prove my worth. I had to convince them they were
better off with me in charge than not.
What a mess. I wondered if this was the demon’s main purpose all along: not to destroy me directly, but to undermine my position
in the pack to the point where the other wolves did the job.
I thought about what a real badass alpha werewolf would do in a situation like this, and all I could think was drill sergeant,
screaming at the troops to get them in line, punishing them for questioning my authority. I didn’t want to do that. I wasn’t
very good at that sort of thing. I wasn’t a drill sergeant, and we weren’t in the army. We were supposed to be a family.
“Hi,” I said, as neutrally as I could. Not cheerful, not angry, not scared. Definitely not scared. They had every right to
be here asking questions. No need for me to get all defensive about it. Ben stood next to me, looking surly. The muscle of
the operation. Good cop/bad cop. That made me want to smile. “Is everyone okay? Did anything unusual happen to anyone else
last night?”
“Besides Mick dying?” said Dan. One of the tough guys, lanky and muscular. Not so tough that he liked to stick his neck out,
usually.
“Yeah,” I said softly. “Besides that.”
I tried to read the body language. People were scared, trying to cover it up with anger. Bunched shoulders stood in for raised
hackles. Eyes glared and lips were open, just a muscle twitch away from being bared. But they weren’t threatening me, not
yet. Nobody was glaring at
me.
They glared at the ground, or off to the side, or at my shoulder, but they didn’t make eye contact to offer a direct challenge.
I hoped my neutral tone put them off-balance. If I wasn’t aggressive, maybe they’d be less likely to show aggression, and
we could do this without fighting about it.
“He’s really dead?” Shaun said. His arms were crossed, his dark eyes serious.
I nodded. “I saw his body at the morgue.” Now I was glad I had done it, so I could say that with confidence.
“It was the thing. The same thing that went after us the other night?”
“I think so. He seemed to have burned to death.” There were winces, a couple of hushed exclamations.
“Why him?” Becky—average height, sharp features, short auburn hair—asked.
Shaun said, “He didn’t want to use that stuff you gave us. He didn’t think it would work. I don’t think he even opened the
jar.”
That didn’t surprise me, but it made me sad. “He didn’t trust me.”
“I think he didn’t believe there was a situation he couldn’t fight his way out of.”
My inner self diverged. I wanted to hang my head, shed tears, apologize. Because I was sorry. Maybe I couldn’t have kept him
alive in spite of his own stubbornness, but I was the one who brought this down on us all.
I couldn’t react that way. Wolf couldn’t. I couldn’t let my back slouch an inch. I had to keep my gaze up. I had to be strong
and not show a bit of weakness, or none of them would trust me.
Not that any of them ought to be trusting me, but I couldn’t think that, either.
“What are you going to do about it?” Becky asked.
A death called for vengeance. Or at least justice. If nothing else, stopping the thing that did this meant it wouldn’t happen
again. That was all I really wanted. Now, if this had been a rival pack of werewolves attacking us, we’d have known what to
do. But this demon was invisible, untrackable. My confidence sounded hollow.
“I’m in contact with someone who might be able to stop this thing,” I said. “He seems to know exactly what to do. The bad
news is he’s a vampire.”
“It always comes back to the vampires,” Dan said.
“Yeah, that’s exactly how they like it,” Shaun answered. “What kind of deal are you going to have to make with this guy?”
“I don’t know yet. I’m meeting with him and Rick tonight. I won’t give up our autonomy, but I have to do what I can to keep
us all safe.”
“You could try keeping your head down,” Dan said.
A few huffs of agreement answered, as well as a short laugh. Not keeping my head down had gotten me in trouble with the old
alphas. And look where that had gotten me.
“Good advice to follow there,” I said, glaring at him. He ducked his head and glanced away, like a good lupine subordinate.
“You guys want the old management style back, I’ll step aside and leave you to it.” That came out more angry than I meant
it to.
Nobody said anything. Score one for my side.
“The potion works,” I said. “Use it. Know that I’m doing something. I’m not going to let this slide. Any questions?”
“Let us know if there’s anything we can do,” Shaun said.
“Thank you.”
Gaze down, Shaun came over, nodded at Ben, squeezed my hand, then continued on to the other cars. Then came Becky, Dan, and
the five others, one by one, all with their gazes lowered, all giving me a brief touch to show that yes, we’re still a pack.
I tried to reflect comfort at them. Yes, this is our territory, and we’re going to be all right. We watched as they drove
away.
That left me and Ben, masters of the territory, leaning against the car, side by side, touching along the lengths of our bodies.
We could lend each other our backbones. It was a beautiful day to spend in the woods, one of those fall days where the temperature
spiked and drenched the world in golden sunlight. I breathed deep, taking in the rich forest air, chilled by the mountains
around us. The air itself made me want to run. I let out the breath with a sigh.