For all his injuries, he squeezed back just as tight. I couldn’t breathe, and that was okay.
“I’m all right,” he said, his voice weak. “I’ll be all right. I won’t go.”
“I love you. I love you, Ben.”
He kissed me. He could only find my ear because I pressed myself so tightly to him, my face against his neck. I responded, turning so my lips met his. He held my head, his fingers digging in my hair, and we kissed. I could taste the blood on his lips and face. I didn’t want to come up for air.
Ben slumped against me, and I had a moment of panic. Maybe he wasn’t all right after all, maybe he was dying, maybe—
He rested his head on my shoulder. He’d let himself relax, settling into my embrace. He wasn’t going to shift, he wasn’t going to die.
He murmured, “She kept saying, ‘We’ll give you back to her in pieces. We’ll show you to her in pieces, before we take her apart.’ And all I could think was, Don’t hurt her. Please don’t hurt her.”
Together, we sighed. The world had paused for a moment, and we took advantage of it.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” I tried to get a look at him, at his injuries. But I didn’t want to move. I wanted to keep him close.
“I feel like shit,” he said, and chuckled. “Dack’s with them, he’s one of the bad guys.”
“I know. He’s gone, he went away.”
“Did we win? Did the good guys win?”
“Yeah, the good guys won. Let’s take a look at you.”
He winced as he straightened, and we surveyed the damage: bruises everywhere, cuts on his arms. His shirt was so torn it practically fell off him. Slash marks covered most of his body. Face, neck, chest, stomach. They looked deep and oozed red. The skin around the wounds separated when he breathed. She’d wanted to make it slow, which I supposed I ought to be grateful for. It kept him alive for me.
“Oh my God,” I whispered, wincing in sympathy.
He shook his head. “It’s already better. Now that she’s stopped, it’s better.”
“You should lie still for a while.”
“As long as you keep me company.”
I smiled. “Okay.”
The noise from the pack—ugly, wet noises—had stopped. The wolves remained. Most had Changed to their four-legged selves, pushed over the edge by the blood and violence. But they were all calm now, lying down, licking their paws, or each other’s muzzles. A couple of human forms sat among them, watching them. Their arms were bloody.
There was no sign of Carl.
The wolves gathered around me and Ben. The whole crowd of them, over a dozen, formed a circle around us. When they noticed me looking at them, they glanced away, bowed their heads, laid back their ears, lowered their tails. All signs of submission. All body language that said, You are the leader now.
“I’m not ready for this,” I whispered into Ben’s neck.
“Didn’t you say you wanted kids?”
Not like this. One kid, maybe. A child of my own flesh and blood. Not . . . not a dozen killers. Still, I giggled, high-pitched and nervous.
“O alpha, my alpha,” Ben said, and I punched his arm—very gently. He kissed my forehead.
Shaun hadn’t joined the others in the kill. He’d stayed back, near me. Watching over us.
“You okay, Ben?” he asked.
“Getting there.” He showed no inclination to try the next step of struggling to his feet, but that was fine. We could stay here awhile. We were safe now.
“What are you doing here?” I said, choking on the lump in my throat. “All of you.” A couple of the wolves had perked up their ears, listening to us.
“Mick was watching the house, but when the cop got there he went into the hills. Lost phone reception, so Becky and Wes came looking for him. They caught Carl and Meg’s scent and followed them. Then Rick called me about Ben and Dack. He said he sent the cops here as well. They should be here any minute.”
I let out a bitter laugh. Rick probably thought calling the cavalry made up for sending Ben into danger in the first place.
“Thank you,” I said, instead of swearing a blue streak.
“You looked like you were doing just fine,” Shaun said.
I shrugged. To be honest, I was glad to not have to shoot Carl in the end. I didn’t regret not being the one to pull the trigger on him.
“Wolves hunt in packs,” I said, and left it at that.
Police sirens howled, far at first, but quickly growing closer. Sounded like three or four cars.
I sighed, resigned. I didn’t know how I was going to explain all this.
“Wes!” Shaun called out to one of the pack who was still human. The man stood, displacing a couple of wolves who’d settled in near him. Wes trotted over. “Help me clean up.”
Before moving off to where Meg lay, Shaun said to me, “We’ll take care of it.”
The two men pulled Meg’s body off the ground, hoisting its arms over their shoulders. Meg’s long, dark hair fell forward, masking her face. Quickly they dragged her into the hills, out of sight. There were places they could make bodies disappear. The pack cleaned up its messes. I watched her go, surprised at the hate still welling in me at the sight of her. Gone, she was gone, I had to remind myself. She couldn’t hurt us anymore.
Ben brought me back to earth.
“Nice of them to give us some warning,” Ben said. “It’s Detective Hardin, isn’t it?”
“Oh, probably.”
“Should we go meet her? Where’d you put the gun? Ergh—” He tried to get to his feet, then slumped back, halted by pain.
“I dropped it. I’ll look for it in a minute. Hardin’ll take care of herself.”
Sure enough, five minutes later, Hardin and a half-dozen officers came from the street, emerging around the cottonwoods. They fanned out, like they expected resistance in force, and they all had weapons drawn.
The wolves, the pack, had gone, fading into the hills. Only Ben and I remained, covered in drying blood, sitting in the dry summer grass, drenched in the morning light.
I put my hands harmlessly in the air and tried not to look like a target. “Hi, Detective.”
“Kitty? What’s going on here? Is everything okay? Oh, my God!”
She’d gotten her first look at us. We were a mess.
“It’s over. It’s all over,” I said.
She hesitated, clearly at a loss for words. Not that I could blame her. Frankly, I didn’t much care what she made of all this anymore. She could figure it out on her own.
“Do you need to go to a hospital?” she said finally, picking what seemed to be the most immediate problem.
Ben wore a punchy grin. Either he was feeling better or he’d completely lost it. “Naw. I just need to spend a day in bed with my girlfriend taking care of me.”
Awe, he was so cute. A day in bed . . . sounded great. I wondered—was he too hurt to cuddle?
I asked, “Do you need us for statements or anything or can we go?”
“I ought to lock you both up,” she said.
I batted my eyelashes innocently. Please, no more, just let me sleep . . .
She sighed. “Go. But I’ll call you later.”
“Thanks. Oh—and Dack’s still loose,” I said.
Hardin shook her head and smiled. “My guy staking out the house caught him speeding in a car I suspect is stolen. We’ve taken him into custody.”
“Silver-painted cell?”
“You got it.”
“And everyone lived happily ever after,” Ben said, smiling vacantly.
Wow, I needed to get him home before he really did lose it. “Come on, Prince Charming.” He had to lean on me and move very slowly, but he managed to stand. He was creaking like an old man.
“Don’t forget the gun,” Ben said.
Hardin looked at me. Watched me the whole time while I hunted around in the grass. I finally found it by the smell of spent powder.
“Do you have a permit for that?” sh
e demanded.
“Yes, I do,” I said quickly, returning to Ben’s side.
She opened her mouth, pointed at me like she was going to say one thing. Then she shook her head. “You stay out of trouble. Try to stay out of trouble.”
I smiled. “Thanks, Detective.” I pulled Ben’s arm around my shoulder and encouraged him to lean on me as we walked.
I couldn’t guess what Hardin and her people would make of this. They’d find a lot of blood on the ground. A few shell casings. But no bodies. Nothing else to pursue. It ended here. Maybe, finally, it ended here.
Ben and I traveled to the street by the trailhead, and I walked him toward the BMW.
“Wow. You upgraded,” Ben said.
“It’s a loan.”
“I hate to get blood all over that nice leather seat.”
Too late. I’d already opened the door and lowered him into the passenger seat. “It’s Rick’s car. He’ll appreciate it.”
As we pulled out to the road and headed for home, Ben murmured, “The world looks better in the light, doesn’t it?”
Morning was progressing nicely. In the east, the sun had risen fully, and the sky had finally turned blue. I glanced at him—he’d closed his eyes, and his breathing had turned deep and regular. He’d fallen asleep.
I smiled. “Yeah, it does.”
Epilogue
About a week later, at twilight, I went to Carl and Meg’s house. The place had an empty, haunted air to it. I wasn’t sure what would happen to it. Ben said the bank would probably foreclose when the next couple of payments didn’t come in. They’d discover it was abandoned. Maybe Carl and Meg would be reported as missing, if they hadn’t already, and if they had a will or next of kin the house would go to them. If not, everything would go up for sale, and that would be that.
I had decided to move the pack to a different den. I wasn’t sure where, yet. A few days ago we’d spent the last full moon—our first under the new management—in national forest land due west of Denver, along I-70. New territory for us. Untainted, I thought of it. The night went smoothly. The pack fed well on deer, slept and woke calmly. I was still getting used to the way they all slouched and ducked their gazes around me.
I was relieved that I’d managed to keep everyone safe. That was my job now: keeping them safe, keeping the peace.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to do what Carl and Meg had—buy a house and make the place home for both halves of my being. Or if I wanted to find an even wilder place and save it for the wolves. For the pack. Maybe I’d put it to a vote.
In the meantime, I had to come here one last time. I’d picked up some flowers on the way over—a mixed bouquet, not too big. Lilies, daisies, baby’s breath. Happy, colorful flowers.
T. J. hadn’t had a funeral. He didn’t have a grave. But I remembered the spot where he’d died, thirty yards or so from the house, toward the hills, among the prairie grass and a smattering of pine trees. At least, I thought I remembered the exact spot. I wanted desperately to remember where that was, but I hadn’t been thinking clearly that evening.
Walking out, I found the place where the shape of the ground looked right, along with the placement of the trees, the distance from the house, and the line of the hills. T. J.’s blood and scent had been washed away by a winter full of snow and spring full of rain. I smelled the pack, all the other werewolves running and breathing. But not him.
I sat on the ground and lay the flowers on the spot.
“Hi, T. J.”
It hadn’t even been a year since he died, but sometimes it felt like forever. He felt like a distant memory. Then, suddenly, I’d feel a stab through my heart all over again. I’d hear a sad song, drink bad coffee in an all-night diner like T. J. and I used to do after I got off my shift at KNOB, and all over again I’d be so angry that he wasn’t still here.
It was a beautiful summer evening, the sky darkening to a deep shade of blue, a cool wind washing away the day’s heat. The scent of the hills swept over me.
I kept talking. Explaining. “Well. We got them for you. Revenge and all that. I feel bad because I didn’t mean to. I didn’t want to shoot her, I—”
I stopped, swallowed, shut my eyes. I’d killed her. And those two vampires, couldn’t forget them, however easy it would be to call them monsters, inhuman, inconsequential. They’d been people, too. This wasn’t the first time I’d killed someone, but the first time it had been Wolf who did it, out of instinct and self-defense, and he’d been a wolf and deranged to boot. It had seemed like a dream. And Arturo’s two vampires had been to save myself and Hardin. It had happened so fast, it hardly seemed real. But Meg had been all me, wide awake, pulling the trigger. As much as I hated her, it still left a hollow spot inside me. I’d done something a normal, civilized person wasn’t supposed to be able to do. I could still see the look on her face.
I wondered if I was ever going to have to do this again. The thought left me drained.
I tried again. I had to talk to T. J. “I didn’t come back here wanting revenge. But maybe I should have. Maybe I should have been trying to get back at them all along, and—” I wiped my eyes. I’d never stop crying, would I? “So here I am. Back where I started. I just wish you were here, too. I don’t think I can do this. Even with Ben, I’m just not sure.”
Then, the wind stopped for a moment, and the world became very still. Quiet, like the pause before a sigh. A while back, a medium—a channeler, the real deal, not a fraud—told me that T. J. was looking out for me. That some part of him was watching—not a ghost, not an angel, nothing like that. Just . . . a presence. A voice. It sounded like my own conscience reminding me. Straightening out my path a little. I heard it now.
I’m proud of you, Kitty. You’ll do fine.
Or maybe I imagined it. Not that it mattered. It sounded like what he’d have said, if he’d been here.
I smiled. “Thanks.”
I returned to the street, to my car, and drove away.
Detective Hardin took me out to lunch. Nothing fancy, just a hamburger place near the police station. But it made me nervous. I wondered what she wanted.
After we ordered and the server moved out of earshot, she pulled a manila folder out of her attaché case. I knew it. Please, no bodies, no blood, no mauling, no death. I didn’t want to help on any more cases.
“There’s been another robbery,” she said.
I needed a minute to think about that. I was expecting death and mayhem and she was talking a robbery? Oh, yeah—last month, the case she was working on before all the other crap happened.
“Any new leads?”
“Oh, I think so.” She handed me the folder.
I opened it and found a couple of photos. They had the familiar, low-res, black and white appearance of security footage. The setting was your average, soda and cigarettes stuffed convenience store. The site of Hardin’s robberies maybe? Instead of a blur at the counter this time, a very clear, very familiar figure stood collecting the goods. Male, dark hair, sunglasses. His partner, a woman with a big ponytail, looked straight at the camera and waved. Charlie and Violet.
I couldn’t help it. I covered my mouth to stifle a laugh. All a trick of the light.
Hardin jabbed her finger at the picture. “I knew I recognized them. We never got a clear shot before, but I just knew. I’m gonna get those two. Do you know I’m about to write a memo recommending that twenty-four-hour convenience stores put garlic and crosses in their doorways? I can’t believe I’m going to do that.”
“If it makes you feel better, robbery is beneath most vampires. I think those two do it because it’s fun. For them,” I quickly added. Actually, the more I thought about it, the funnier the whole thing got. Vampire crooks? Perfect. Just perfect.
“I’m still going to get them.” She put away the folder. “I don’t know how, but I’m going to do it.”
That was next on her list—she’d gotten werewolves into custody. Now she had to figure out vampires. And if anyone could do it .
. .
That made me wonder. “Last full moon. What happened with those werewolves you arrested?”
She blew out a sigh. “I commandeered a whole row of cells at county. Put silver paint in them, put each one in a separate cell. Got all my people out and watched the whole thing on closed circuit TV. Never seen anything like it.” She shook her head, and her gaze turned vague, sliding to a different place, like she was recalling a nightmare. I supposed she was. “One of them kept throwing himself against the bars. I thought he was going to kill himself. In the morning he had welts all over his body—from the silver, not from bruising. The others snarled at each other for twenty minutes, then paced back and forth all night. We had our own zoo. But it worked. I think we can hold them as long as we need to.”
“Give them something to eat next time. Raw meat. It might settle them down.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
I was curious. “What did you think of Dack?”
“I had to look in an encyclopedia to figure out what he even was. African wild dog? Where do they come up with this shit?”
I shrugged. Who knew? It only demonstrated that just when you thought you’d come to the end of what could possibly surprise you, something did.
“I’m in over my head,” Hardin said. “I keep wondering which one of these things is going to get me. I keep going like this, something is going to get me.”
I couldn’t argue. She was like me. When this happened to me, I’d started reading. Delving. And that only touched the surface of what might be out there.
“Do you remember Cormac?” I said.
“The assassin? The one that went after you? Yeah.”
“You should talk to him. He’s in Cañon City, in prison—”
She snorted, interrupting. “About time. That guy’s a menace.”
Yeah, well . . . “His family’s been doing this sort of thing for generations. He knows things that aren’t in the books. He can help you. Give you some advice, maybe.”
“So, I go talk to him, pick up some pointers, maybe get a few months shaved off his sentence for helping out?”