"Disease-ridden vermin, like I said." Another sniff. "What is that?"
"I don't know, but--"
A floorboard creaked down the hall. Clay let out a silent "shit." Nick automatically reached for the nearest door--the one to the rat room--but stopped before we had to say anything.
Jeremy and Antonio turned the corner, coming down the hall.
"Find something?" Antonio whispered. "We thought we heard sounds of a scuffle."
I shot a covert glare at Clay and Nick, but only said, "Clay found a nest of sick rats. They gave us a start. Sorry."
Jeremy knelt beside the dead pair of rats.
"They smell diseased," I said. "What is it?"
"Nothing I recognize. You said there's--"
Claws scrabbled against the closed door. Jeremy pointed. I nodded. He waved for us to step back, then eased the door open a crack and leaned into it for a better look.
At the base, tiny teeth and claws flashed in the opening. Beside me, Clay rocked forward onto the balls of his feet, tensed, ready to spring if the rodent somehow managed to squeeze through the half-inch crack. After a moment, Jeremy pulled the door shut.
He turned to us. "I'm going to get a better look in there."
Jeremy motioned Clay to the door, to act as rat-punter, then gestured for Antonio and Nick to stand guard on either side of the hallway, in case Rose was still in the building. I backed up Jeremy's nose...from the hall.
Clay swung open the door and drop-kicked the first rat that lunged at him. The next two rats fell back, hissing and chattering. From where I was, I caught a glimpse inside--a small room with a blanket and a few boxes. They took two steps into the room, then Jeremy tapped Clay's shoulder, telling him to retreat. A last kick and squeal, and Clay went to close the door, but Jeremy stopped him.
"What's that?" he said, pointing at the floor. "Here, hold them off and I'll grab--"
Clay darted forward and snatched up whatever was there.
"Or you could do it for me..." Jeremy said as Clay backed out and slammed the door.
"What is it?" I asked.
Clay held up what looked like a half-chewed cocktail sausage. Then the smell hit me.
"A finger," I said with a small shudder. "A chewed finger. Isn't that--" I fought my revulsion and took a deeper breath. "It's Rose's."
"Think the rats got her?" Nick said.
When we all turned to look at him, he said, "What? She smells like she's rotting, right? And rats are scavengers."
Jeremy shook his head. "I think the rotting is what caused the finger loss, not the rats."
"So she's...falling apart?" I said.
"The extremities would be the first to go."
"Beyond the 'ewww' factor, this might be something we could use. If she falls apart, does that count as 'dead'?"
"With our luck, it won't," Clay said. "Maybe we should save this. In case we have to find all the pieces and reassemble them before we can close the portal."
"I don't think we want to be found carrying concealed body parts," Jeremy said. "And as soon as we get near a bathroom, I want you to wash your hands--well."
I walked beside Jeremy as we headed down the hall. "Could you tell what those rats have?"
"Not by smell, but there were several diseases commonly carried by rats a hundred years ago that you don't see often now."
"You think that's what it is then? Like the cholera and Rose's syphilis. Something else I released from the portal."
"It isn't your fault, Elena. There's little the Victorian era can throw at us today that we can't cure."
"So far..." I said. "But what if the next thing--"
"If we can get this portal closed, there won't be a 'next thing.' Concentrate on that, starting with finding a zombie who can lead us to the controller." Jeremy stopped and looked around. "We'll split up here. I doubt Rose is in the building, but she may return."
Fatherhood
WE FINISHED SEARCHING THE BUILDING, BUT FOUND NO sign of Rose. At eleven, Jeremy sent Clay and me to look for Zoe. This time, both Clay and I went into Miller's. Our entrance caused only the barest ripple of interest from the regulars. One sweep of the bar told us Zoe wasn't there.
"You looking for Zoe again?" the bartender asked.
I nodded and approached the counter. "Has she been in?"
He shook his head. "Might not be, either. You got lucky last night. If she does pop by, I'll tell her you were looking."
I thanked him and we left.
We went back to the warehouse, where we hung out with the others, waiting for Rose. When she didn't show up by two, Jeremy declared the night a bust. That was an understatement. The whole day had been a write-off, and we were no closer to finding Shanahan or a zombie or closing the portal than we had been when we woke up. Shanahan hadn't even called me back about the investment.
A jab in the stomach woke me the next morning, and I started awake, hands flying to my belly, twisting to tell Clay that I'd felt the baby move, I'd finally--
"Sorry," Nick mumbled.
I wasn't surprised to see Nick sleeping beside me. I'd have been more surprised if he hadn't been. When the Pack was together, shared sleeping arrangements were common...which isn't as kinky as it sounds. Our goofing around does push the boundaries of platonic pretty hard sometimes, but Clay and I are monogamous, fanatically so, as Nick often grouses. A wolf thing, one mate for life and all that.
"That was you? The jab?"
"Yeah." Nick blinked and rubbed his hand over his face. "Stray elbow. Next time, tell Jeremy you need a king-size bed--" He stopped. "Oh, you thought it was the baby kicking. Shit. I'm sorry."
"Don't be," I said, turning before he saw my expression. "It's this guy's fault." I prodded Clay, who was sprawled over two-thirds of the mattress. "Bed hog."
"It still could've been the baby. He could be practicing his rat-punting in there, and you're just passing it off as indigestion."
I leaned over to kiss his cheek. "Thanks."
I looked back at Clay, whose face was buried in the pillow. I laid my hand between his shoulder blades, and felt his back rising and falling in soft, steady snores.
"He's wiped," I whispered. "Too many nights worrying about me. We should let him sleep."
Nick nodded and we grabbed our clothes, then slipped into Nick's room to shower and dress.
We were checking out the room service menu when the door swung open and Clay wheeled in, wearing only his jeans, his curls mussed, eyes bleary but dark with worry that vanished as soon as he saw me.
"Whoops," Nick said, snaking a hand around my waist. "He caught us. We were about to get food without him."
I forced a smile. I knew why Clay had come bursting in. For ten years, anytime he'd gone to bed with me and woken up alone, there'd been a good chance that I wasn't just in the next room.
It had always happened like that. We'd get back together for a while--days, maybe weeks--then one morning, I'd wake and see him beside me, and my brain would scream, "What the hell are you doing? Have you forgotten what he did to you?" and I'd run.
Since I'd accepted that I wanted to stay, we'd had our spats, but I never took off. Yet sometimes, if I wasn't beside him in the morning, he wouldn't so much as use the bathroom until he knew where I was.
"You sleep okay?" he asked, still standing in the doorway.
I nodded. He nodded. Silence thudded down.
After a moment, he waved to the room service menu. "Go ahead and order."
"Glad we have your permission," Nick said.
Clay made a face and started to retreat.
"Hold on," Nick said. "Since you're up, we might as well eat someplace with tables. There's a restaurant across the road. Elena and I'll head over. You can catch up."
Clay hesitated, but he couldn't very well refuse, not without implying that Nick couldn't protect me.
"I'll shower and be right there."
We loaded up plates, then headed to the sidewalk patio to eat. Although it was lunchtime, the o
nly other patrons were one couple who'd stayed inside, out of the late morning heat, so we had the patio to ourselves.
I ripped the top off my orange juice. "So you're going to be an uncle. Think you're up for it?"
When Nick murmured something and picked up his bagel, I laughed. "Oh, I'm kidding. We don't expect you to--"
He shook his head. "I want to be an uncle, Elena. A 'drop the kid off and I'll spoil him rotten' kind. I'll have fun teaching the little guy everything that'll drive his dad crazy. Payback time."
"Good. I just thought...well, you haven't seemed very happy about it. I understand that. Your friends are going to be parents. Things will change--"
"Sure, but it wasn't like you guys were out partying with me in the first place. Hell, I had to twist Clay's arm to get him out to a club even when he was single, and then it was a couple of drinks, no girls and home by midnight for a run or a hunt, because that was his idea of boys' night out. You coming along was a godsend, because at least he'll socialize a bit for your sake. But fears that our wild partying days will be curbed by a new baby?" He snorted a laugh. "If anything, a baby might drive you guys out of the house more often, and I'm not complaining about that."
"True. But a baby will mean Clay and I will have to be more careful, take things easier."
Nick lifted his brows.
"A bit easier."
"I'm not worried. I'm thrilled for you guys. And I'll love being an uncle. That's the role I'm cut out for. Uncle-hood."
A shadow crossed his face, but he hid it behind a quick swig of coffee.
"That's it," I said softly. "You're thinking about yourself. Fatherhood."
"Can you see me being a father?"
"Do you want to be?"
A sharp shake of his head. "Never really thought about it before."
"Before Clay and I started talking about it...and talking about it, and talking about it." I shook my head. "Three years of 'should we or shouldn't we.' Must have driven everyone crazy."
"You had a lot of stuff to consider. But now that the baby's coming...My father...He's even more excited about it than I am."
"He loves kids."
A nod as Nick dropped his gaze to his coffee cup.
"Is that it? You feel like you should give him one? A grandson?"
"Shouldn't I? Hell, what else do I give him? I'm forty-three, never left home, piss around his company pretending I'm working..." He cut himself off with a snarl of disgust. "And I can't even bother bringing him home a grandson?"
"Do you think he cares? My God, Nick, if you think your father expects you to have a son for him...Antonio would never--"
"Of course, he wouldn't. He doesn't expect anything of me. And he's never disappointed."
I leaned forward and moved my leg against his. As I opened my mouth, he moved back fast, gaze flying over my shoulder.
"Clayton's coming," he said. "Don't--"
"I wouldn't."
"And...forget I said a thing, okay?" He leaned back and made a face. "I'm just...in a mood these days. You've got enough to worry about--"
"I can always use a distraction. I won't forget it, whether you want me to or not."
I looked over my shoulder and called to Clay, "Better hurry. I've been eyeing your bagel."
Clay walked up to the table and put his hand on my shoulder. "It's yours, darling. You two divvy up my plate. I'll get more."
I smiled up at him. "Thanks. Oh, and if you could--"
"Yeah, I'll top up your coffee." He took my half-full mug, but waved off Nick's. "You're not pregnant. Get your own. You can move that table over here too. Jeremy and Antonio are on their way."
"Are they bringing Jaime?" I asked.
Clay shrugged, as if it didn't matter to him one way or the other. That was no bad reflection on Jaime. Clay might not have been particularly interested in Jaime as a person, but he didn't dislike her either, which was, with Clay, about as much as an outsider could hope for.
Jeremy did arrive with Jaime...and with news. Cholera cases were still trickling in--either unreported incidences from the original outbreak or secondary contamination.
"The hospitals are scrambling," Antonio said, "but it's under control. The problem now is convincing people of that."
"Like SARS," I said. Just a year ago, the WHO had issued an advisory against traveling to Toronto after the outbreak had been contained, and the city was still reeling from the effects.
"The memory of SARS only serves to magnify the panic," Jeremy said. "As with that Walkerton water contamination case. People are understandably nervous and, apparently, many have decided to squeeze in an unplanned week at the cottage."
"Traffic jams on the 400 northbound instead of south this morning, I'll bet. I'm afraid to ask: anything...new?"
Jeremy hesitated, as if as reluctant to say anything as I was to hear it. "Reports in two papers about an outbreak of rat bites in the downtown area, but it pales in comparison with the water contamination problems."
"So far," I muttered. "Any signs of things spreading beyond Toronto?"
He shook his head. "Everything appears to be contained to the city, and primarily the core."
"It's likely to stay that way too," Jaime said, her first words since we exchanged good mornings. "The effects are usually localized."
"So--"
The ring of my cell phone cut me off. An unfamiliar local number appeared in the display.
"Shanahan?" Nick mouthed.
"Let's hope so," I said before I pushed the talk button.
"Good morning," sang a chipper female voice. "I'd ask to speak to someone specific, but I don't have a name. I suppose I could ask for the lovely lupus I met the other night."
"Hello, Zoe," I said. "You got my message?"
"Message?"
I told her about my visit to Miller's.
"Ah, no. Message undelivered. I didn't stop in last night and Rudy can be a bit protective, so he didn't phone me to say you'd called. Here, let me give you my number, in case that happens again."
I jotted it down. "You remembered something?"
"After a night of mind-clearing thievery and a morning of mind-settling yoga, I do believe the memory files are creaking open. I'm just running off to the library right now, but perhaps we could meet for lunch?"
"Which library?"
"At the uni. Getting a head start for my fall classes. Got to keep the mind sharp. At my age, it's the first thing to go." A tinkling laugh. "Or, with vamps, the only thing to go. Are you familiar with the campus?"
"York or U of T?"
"U of T."
"Very. Give me a place and time, and I'll be there."
Professor
WE'D BEEN AT THE UNIVERSITY ONLY FIVE MONTHS AGO, when Clay had done a stint of lectures, filling in for a hospitalized colleague. We hadn't come to this particular cafeteria, though. I'd avoided it, sometimes going several buildings out of my way rather than grab a drink or snack at this one. Clay knew why, though we never discussed it. When Zoe suggested this cafeteria, I'd been tempted to insist on someplace else, but hadn't. I needed to get past this.
This was the cafeteria I brought Logan to the first time I'd met him, and the one we'd always used when he came to the university to see Clay and me. Logan, my Pack brother, the best friend in those years when I'd fought my ambivalence about the Pack, about being a werewolf, and about the man who'd made me one. Logan, dead five years now.
Five years. My breath caught when I even thought about it, as if unable to believe so much time had passed when the pain was still so sharp, when I could look down the hall, see those empty tables and see him there.
"I can grab Zoe," Clay murmured, his breath warm against my ear. "Bring her outside instead."
I shook my head.
"Can you grab us some cold drinks?" Clay asked Nick, with none of his usual mock-bullying bluster. He even reached for his wallet, but Nick waved him away.
Logan's relationship with Clay had been an uneasy friendship even before I
came along. They were too different for anything more. After Clay bit me...well, they'd never been close after that. Clay hadn't been able to control his jealousy of my friendship with Logan when I was often barely on speaking terms with him. Logan had never forgiven Clay for biting me, not after he'd sworn he'd never hurt me.
I remembered the first time Logan saw Clay after he bit me. I'd finally asked Jeremy to revoke Clay's banishment, and a week later, Logan had come to Stonehaven. He hadn't known Clay was back, and we hadn't known Logan was coming. At the time, I'd been out grocery shopping with Nick while Antonio and Jeremy had gone to Syracuse.
When Nick and I came back, we found Clay and Logan on the back patio. I can still see--no, I can hear it. That's what I remember--hearing the dull thwack of fist hitting flesh.
We'd raced to the back door. There was Logan--good-natured, easygoing Logan--beating the hell out of Clay. And Clay? Clay just let him--just took it, his face already swollen and cut, his shirt bloodied, blood flying from his mouth.
In the years that followed, I'd thought of that scene, and I would tell myself that Clay had staged it, that he'd let Logan whale on him because he'd wanted me to see him taking it, like a little boy getting a whupping he thinks he deserves.
I knew better, even then. Clay was incapable of plotting and carrying out a ruse like that. He'd taken the beating because he'd thought he deserved it, and because he'd thought Logan deserved to be the one to dish it out.
Clay cleared his throat. I looked over at him.
"I've been thinking," he said. "I know you don't want to talk about names...for the baby, I mean. And this probably isn't the time, but I've been thinking about it for a while, and maybe you wouldn't want to, but if you did, if we have a boy..." He shrugged. "Logan's a good name."
My throat constricted, and I couldn't answer.
After a moment of silence, Clay looked around the almost empty cafeteria. "I don't see--oh, there she is."
I smiled. "Don't sound so thrilled."
"I don't know why she needed to do this in person." He looked over at me. "No, I do know. I just wish she could have saved us the bother."
I performed introductions.
"My, my," Zoe said, checking out Nick. "You boys don't come in ugly, do you? It's a good thing I wasn't born a werewolf, or I might have had some serious conflict."
Nick grinned, that easy grin of his that makes women's stomachs flip, and the most blatant come-on sound almost sweet. "If you do start feeling conflicted, I can help."