“What, so they were bank robbers? Smugglers? Drug dealers?”
“All of the above? Yeah. So, that’s what I think Layne and Nolan are into. Last few years, what with the economy tanking and the last election, the movement’s been making a comeback, getting popular again. Guys like that’ll use the whole thing as a cover and a recruiting ground.”
“Can we go home now?” she said. She had a sour look on her face. She’d been gripping the door handle for the last five miles as the Jeep bounced over barely-there roads.
“Just half an hour.”
“What does Amelia say about all this?”
“She says it can’t hurt to look.”
“No, I mean about the militia stuff. Your family.”
He turned inward a moment and got nothing articulate. Just the quiet watchfulness she had when he was immersed in modernity.
“Says it’s not her world,” he answered and left it at that.
“Someday I’m going to talk you both into letting me interview her on the show.”
I believe that would be a bad idea. Cormac agreed, and if Kitty hadn’t talked them into it by now, she never would.
“There it is,” he said, steering the Jeep around a curve and to a turnout. The place would be just around the next hill.
As he left the Jeep, he put his hand in his pocket, keeping hold of a bit of sage and the lighter, more to steady himself than any thought that he’d be able to use it. If they ran into trouble, there’d be guns, and Amelia didn’t know any spells to protect against that. They’d either have to run for it or talk their way out of it.
One step at a time.
Kitty moved ahead, her nose tipped into the air, flaring. When she glanced back at him, she looked worried. “I don’t like this.”
He steered her on, over a rise and into a dip between hills, not quite big enough to be a valley. Treeless, gravelly earth sloped downward to a weather-worn, unpainted shed. He didn’t see anyone, but Kitty was right, something was off here. Like a roomful of people holding their breath.
Back in the day, the shed hid the entrance to the abandoned mine tunnel where the weapons stockpile was kept. Now, the whole thing looked deserted. That was probably the idea.
“Cormac, something’s wrong here,” Kitty said. She’d gone into full danger stance, her shoulders bunched up and her back hunched, like hackles rising. Her arms hung at her sides, her fingers curled into claws. She stopped, knees bent, like she expected to have to run.
“What do you smell?”
“That’s just it, it’s not a smell, it’s a feeling, it’s just wrong. Dead, rotten, evil—Cormac, I remember this, from back in Walsenberg—” Her shocked eyes and the edge of panic in her voice triggered his own memories.
“Skinwalker,” he said. “Shit.”
Right pocket, arrowhead charm.
He took out the arrowhead, tied to a simple leather cord, and pulled it down around his neck. It said something, that he didn’t remember half the stuff Amelia had had him keep in his pockets. The Navajo arrowhead was a simple enough charm, but promised sure protection against skinwalkers: shape-shifters, but not lycanthropes. It was a very dark kind of magic. A skinwalker was a specific type of Navajo magician, required to perform human sacrifice in exchange for their powers. The last skinwalker Cormac encountered was a woman. Killing her, even in defense, had sent him to prison. Something about “excessive force…”
So, Nolan didn’t have a werewolf working with him. He had one of these bastards.
He was about to tell Kitty to get back in the Jeep when the wolf came at her, crashing through the pine trees at the edge of the clearing and charging. Her, not him—maybe it could tell what she was and identified her as the bigger threat. Or maybe the arrowhead charm actually worked. Whatever it was, the wolf slammed into her, jaw open and angled for her neck. She didn’t have time to run.
He’d never missed the presence of a gun in his hand more than he did now. But right now, even if he had a gun, he wouldn’t have been able to shoot because they were tangled up together—no way to get a clear target on the other wolf, the skinwalker.
Kitty looked thin and willowy and blond and breakable, but she’d been in scrapes before and was stronger than she seemed. Curling her own lips to show teeth, she let the wolf knock her over, then kept rolling to get herself on top. She went for eyes and groin, tearing with bent fingers that were suddenly looking longer, sharper than human.
The thing was dark, hulking, snarling, and its eyes glowed an otherworldly, gemlike red. It didn’t have any of the grace or power of a natural wolf, or even an oversized lycanthropic variety. It was a bundle of hate and wrongness, biting and slashing. Kitty was holding her own, mostly because her supernatural speed and agility allowed her to duck and dodge. She was strong enough to knock the other wolf back once or twice, to get in a few hits. But she couldn’t do much else, not as a human.
Cormac ran to the back of the Jeep and to the emergency kit he kept there. Digging around, he found the pair of roadside flares stashed in it. Ran back to the fight.
The beast slashed and snapped at Kitty; a flash of red sprayed—that was Kitty’s blood. She was using her arms to block, and they were taking damage. Both were snarling, growling. He couldn’t tell which noises were coming from whom.
Holding the flares in one hand, he lit them with his lighter. Even in daylight they glowed red and threw off sparks. Holding them aloft, he stalked toward the fight, making himself as big and threatening as he could, hoping to scare off the attacker. He swung his arms, making arcs of smoke and fire.
It worked. The skinwalker kicked and writhed to get out from under Kitty—opening more scratches, but Kitty didn’t seem to notice. As it scrambled into the open, it turned and ran, back stiff and tail straight out like a rudder. A werewolf would have had its tail tucked between its legs, getting driven off after a fight like that. But a skinwalker was a human in wolf skin, not a being made up of parts of both.
“Kitty?” he called at her.
Crouching, she stared out into the woods, growling with every breath, an amber sheen in her eyes. Her T-shirt was ripped and hanging off her, revealing skin and bra. She’d torn it off herself, and was now shoving down her jeans. Her teeth were long, and her face was stretching.
“Kitty,” he repeated warningly, even as he backed away to give her room. Her wolf half would recognize him. At least, it had before.
“Gotta track down that bastard,” she muttered, her voice thick.
“No, you don’t—”
She was already shifting. Adrenaline and blood had pushed her wolfish instincts over the edge. Even as she stripped, a sheen of gray and tawny fur sprouted over her naked skin as her limbs seemed to melt, twisting into new shapes. She grunted once in pain, but other than that the change seemed to flow through her, like she’d flipped a switch and let it happen. He looked away, unable to face full-on the sight of her caught between one shape and another, her form distorted.
Then it was over, and an oversized wolf—long, rangy legs, lean body, pointed ears focused forward—was shaking off the last of her clothes. Without looking back she launched into a ground-eating run, chasing the skinwalker into the woods. She might very well be even more pissed off at the thing than he was.
When shots fired—explosive punctuation to the already chaotic encounter—Cormac crouched to take himself out of any line of fire. Looking, he found a man some thirty yards off, near the worn-out shed, aiming a rifle in the direction Kitty’s wolf had raced off.
Chapter 13
FURY GRABBED Cormac, with an urge to race over, yank the rifle out of the guy’s hands and beat him over the head with it until his skull caved in. Then keep going. He didn’t do that, because that was likely to get him shot. A quick assessment—the shots hadn’t gotten her. Kitty was still running, quickly disappearing into the trees. The gunman kept shooting anyway, wasting bullets.
Ben was going to kill him for getting her into this.
How were we supposed to know it was a skinwalker, not a werewolf? My God. Even Amelia sounded breathless.
Cormac wasn’t so sure Ben would understand. If the roles had been reversed, he’d be inclined to break the other’s neck for putting Kitty in danger. Kitty wouldn’t even be able to stop him. Fortunately, Ben was a lot more rational than that. He’d at least wait for an explanation. He might not ever talk to Cormac again after, but he’d listen to the excuses first.
In the end, he recognized the gunman, which kept Cormac from murdering the guy straight off. Thickset, bearded, in a green canvas jacket and faded jeans. Jess Nolan, of course. Cormac tipped his head back, looking heavenward in a vague prayer, then stood, held up his arms and the flares in a show of peace, and called out. “Hey!”
His eyes buggy with shock, Nolan swung the rifle around, but lowered it when he saw Cormac. He squinted like he didn’t believe what he was seeing.
“Bennett? Cormac Bennett, is that you?”
Cormac hadn’t thought he was famous until the last few days. He’d had a reputation years ago, but he figured it wouldn’t have survived his time in prison plus a couple of years of mostly staying out of trouble. Oh well.
“Jess Nolan,” he said by way of reply. A statement as well as an expression of annoyance.
Nolan’s laugh was nervous, like he was pretending to be happy to see him, and trying to ignore what had just happened. Tucking the rifle under his arm, he came over, holding his hand out like he expected Cormac to shake it. Cormac had his hands full of road flare and didn’t move.
“What are you doing out here, Bennett?” He tried to sound casual, but kept looking back into the trees. Trying to decide which was the bigger threat, Cormac or the werewolf he’d just seen go tearing off.
Cormac took a pointed look at the torn grass and bloodied ground where the fight had taken place, as well as the abandoned-looking shed and mine entrance. “Just out for a walk with a friend. You’re a little jumpy with that gun, you think?”
His nervous smile dropped. “Friend—you don’t mean that wolf?”
“I do. I figure that’s why you’re out here—just you and a wolf, out for a walk?”
“Sure. I guess.” He was standing between Cormac and the shed. Guarding it.
“You want to tell me about the skinwalker?”
“The what?” he said flatly. Cormac wasn’t buying the dumb act.
“You’ve got some jumpy Navajo wizard working for you patrolling the place, right? Maybe getting in fights?”
“How do you know about that shit?”
Cormac gave him a look; his patience was gone. “I’m not interested in your stash, Nolan. I’m going to go track my friend down now, and I’d appreciate it if you called off your buddy before she gets to him.” And so Cormac didn’t have to keep looking over his shoulder.
“Your friend? A werewolf. I thought you hunted down werewolves.”
Yeah, so did he. His father’s memory chastised him yet again. “Yeah, well, there was this girl. What the hell you doing out here that you need muscle like that? What is it Layne thinks you’re doing out here?”
“Layne sent you?”
“I’m out here on my own, but yeah, I’ve talked to him, and I want to know what the hell’s got the two of you so worked up.”
“Layne’s crazy,” Nolan said. “Paranoid. I’m trying to stay out of his way, but he keeps thinking I’m moving in on him, but I’m not, I swear. I mean, I might have hassled him a little, but that’s it. You go tell him I’m not moving in.”
“He thinks you have a werewolf working for you.”
“No, that’s just Eddie.”
Eddie the skinwalker. Shit. “So, you still keeping a stash out here? Is that it? What are you planning on doing with it?”
Flustered now, Nolan looked like he was thinking of denying it. But then he shook his head. His hands might have been shaking. “You’re right, I’m keeping the stash up, and Eddie’s helping me keep an eye on the place. I got a right to it. You can’t have it back.”
“I don’t want it back. You keep it. Shit, have fun with it.”
“Trust me, when the Feds come around to take everyone’s guns, I’ll have the fallback. I’ll sell the whole thing off on the black market and make an absolute shit-ton of money.”
“Yeah, you and the thousand other guys in the state who are thinking the same thing.” Cormac was just pushing the guy’s buttons now. Hard to resist—he kept getting redder.
“Why aren’t you carrying?” Nolan shot back. “You gone soft?”
“Naw, I just got tired of people mistaking me for someone like you.”
Nolan raised the rifle again with rigid arms, stiff hands, and a furious glare. Even as close as he was, the guy was angry enough to miss Cormac if he actually fired. But Cormac put up his arms again and tried not to smirk too hard.
“Take it easy,” Cormac said. “I’m not here for you or your stash, I just came to see if anyone was still out here. I’ll be glad to leave just as soon as I track down my friend. You want to maybe help me out, maybe try to find your guy before he gets torn up?”
“There’s no way anything can hurt Eddie, not when he’s all wolfed out like that.”
“You ever actually meet a real-live werewolf? Or just Eddie’s version of one?” He didn’t answer, which meant no. “Let’s go save your friend’s ass.”
Turning his back on Nolan and his rifle, he found a bare spot of dirt to set the flares on until they burned out, then gathered up Kitty’s clothes, torn and probably useless as they were, to set them on the Jeep’s passenger seat for when she came back. Pulled the blanket out of his emergency kit, along with a canteen of water, and started walking. Footsteps crunching on gravel indicated Nolan was following.
Truth was, he didn’t think Kitty would actually kill the guy. She was certainly capable of it, but right now, she was angry, not homicidal.
“Bennett, what are you doing hanging out with a werewolf?” Nolan, still trailing, demanded. Cormac didn’t feel the need to answer. “I know your rep, your dad’s rep. You kill werewolves.”
Cormac ignored him.
The two wolves left a clear trail, tearing through underbrush and kicking up soil. Nolan was muttering the whole time and Cormac almost told him to shut up so he could listen for the wolves up ahead. Then he figured, why bother? Kitty wasn’t going to stop and wait. Eventually, she’d have to bed down, and that was when he’d be likely to find her. His goal was to keep the skinwalker away from her when she did. He’d need Nolan for that.
“You never told me how you got mixed up with a skinwalker,” Cormac prompted, looking over his shoulder at the lagging Nolan.
“Nothing to tell. We’re just a couple guys with a business.”
“He’s Navajo?”
“Half Navajo—how’d you know that, you haven’t even seen him. I mean, not really seen him, as a human.”
“Just knew it.” Really, half of the trick to seeming omniscient was paying attention.
“So are you back in the business? You disappeared for a while there—a couple of the guys thought you were dead, you know? But if somebody really was having a werewolf problem—”
“No,” he said. “I’m not back in the business.”
He heard something up ahead and held out his arm to get Nolan to stop and be quiet. It was snarling, the tearing of underbrush in a scuffle. He crept forward as if he were hunting, watching for that flash of movement.
With her supernatural strength and animal instincts, Kitty had overtaken the skinwalker, forcing him to engage her in a crowded stand of pines. The two animals circled, taking swipes at each other and dodging. Kitty was easy to spot—pure wolf, her muzzle wrinkled back to show a snout full of teeth, ears flat to her head, hackles making her appear twice as large. The other one—he snarled, snapped, growled, showed teeth, and sprang out of reach of Kitty’s claws easy enough. But he wasn’t a wolf. His tail was loose, its position undetermined, his ears were up like radar dish
es, and he bounced like a dog. His red eyes were visible as glowing points.
The skinwalker had managed to keep out of her way this long, but unless he got lucky, she’d eventually pin him. Cormac had no idea if the guy’s magic would protect him from the bite of a werewolf, but he was pretty sure Kitty wouldn’t want to find out. She’d feel responsible for the guy if she infected him. Cormac would just as soon she killed the bastard.
“Kitty!” he called.
Nolan stared at him. “Its name is Kitty?”
Cormac just glared. Her ears came up for a split second, but she never let her attention waver from her enemy. “Kitty, we got this, back the hell off!”
Nolan took the cue. “Eddie! Get out of there! Just leave it!”
The growling dropped off; the two creatures put a fraction more space between them. But they continued circling, heads down and muscles tensed.
“I’m not breaking up that fight,” Nolan declared.
Cormac’s hand itched for a gun. He could fire it into the woods to get their attention. Kitty wasn’t going to break off until the other wolf showed some sign of submission. But he wasn’t really a wolf, and so it wasn’t likely to happen.
“Nolan, tell him to drop his gaze and his tail.”
“What?”
“He needs to break eye contact, get his tail down so she’ll leave him alone. Do it!”
“Eddie! You heard him. He knows what he’s talking about, do what he says, okay?”
The scraggly wolf turned and looked at Nolan, and Cormac swore he could read the animal’s expression: What, seriously? Disbelief and frustration. But he gave a shake, dropped his gaze, and let his tail fall. If not a show of submission, it at least said that he wasn’t going to put up any more fight.
In response, Kitty backed up a step. Her gaze fell, her tail relaxed. Her fur was still sticking straight up—she wasn’t going to trust the guy if she could help it. The standoff continued, since neither one of them was going to walk away.
“Kitty, it’s okay. I got this.” Her ear flicked, but otherwise she didn’t move. “Go sleep it off. Please,” he said.