wrong. When I realized what I was taking photos of, I gave you a call.”
A snake doesn’t change his spots. It had been only a matter of time before Nyelund tried his tricks on a new victim. Kyle and I’d been keeping an eye on him, but we’d missed the receptionist. Ben said she’d been working for him for about two months—right after she moved to the Tri-Cities.
“She’s seventeen,” I told him.
George grinned at me, his eyes enraged. “Is she, now? And look at him with that camera. Wrapped up like a great big birthday present. Thanks, Warren.”
“Don’t mention it.” I tipped my imaginary hat to him. If Nyelund hadn’t been so obliging, I’d have resorted to being a credible witness, but this was better.
IT WAS VERY LATE WHEN I MADE IT TO MY NEXT STOP. THE BACK DOOR wasn’t locked and let me into the kitchen. I waited a minute and listened. Only one person in the house, and that person was asleep.
I walked into the living room, toward the stairs that led to the bedrooms. I’d been thinking about this all night, and I still hadn’t made up my mind what I was going to do.
Instinct was one thing; proving what I knew was an entirely different proposition.
I’d planned on a little sleuthing and then interrogation—but then the lights of a car driving past illuminated the top of a curio cabinet where there were a bunch of photos. One of them caught my eye and I went over and picked it up.
I didn’t need the light to see it; one of the benefits of my condition is superb night vision. I stared at the photo of a pair of happy people for a moment, then replaced it.
I went into the bedroom and did what I had to do. Nadia didn’t even wake up when I snapped her neck. It was easier than snapping the neck of the zombie she’d made of the woman she’d killed.
I searched the room and found a few things. From the bedroom, I called Nadia’s great-aunt.
“You call me late, my little sticky bun. Did you find out something I can use?”
“No,” I told Elizaveta. “It was Nadia.”
“You are wrong,” she pronounced. “Nadia does not have the skill to animate the dead.” She’d always underestimated Nadia. Everyone had. Everyone but me.
“Nine thousand dollars was transferred into one of her bank accounts two weeks ago and another last week.” Ten thousand or over, and the feds start to pay attention. “Last year she made a hundred and ten thousand dollars; she listed her profession as artist. From her bank records, she made four or five times that much this year.”
Elizaveta would not consider Nadia’s profession as an assassin an issue.
“She worked exclusively for humans,” I told her. “She keeps copies of her contracts. Her employers all knew she was a witch. It was her edge.” That would be an issue. Mundane folks tend to get all frightened when they figure out they have monsters in their midst, and it results in things like the Inquisition and the witch hunts that wiped out the majority of the witch bloodlines in Europe a few centuries back.
“You are at her house.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Wait there for me. Do not do anything rash.”
I looked at Nadia’s face. “No, ma’am. I don’t do rash.”
I WAITED IN THE DARK, SITTING IN THE LITTLE ROCKER IN NADIA’S ROOM, until Elizaveta came in.
She stared at her great-niece for a moment and then said in a very chilly voice, “I told you not to do anything rash.”
“It was already done,” I informed her.
“It was
“Folks think that your grandson is dead,” I told her.
I figured he wasn’t. Like I said, witches draw their power from suffering, from sacrifice, like Nadia using my blood to mend the window at Dr. Sullivan’s. I wasn’t providing Elizaveta anyone else to torture.
Elizaveta stared at me, gray eyes sharp as a harpy’s. Witches don’t have much trouble seeing in the dark either.
“She moved against what was mine,” I told her. “That made stopping her my business. I’m a wolf, ma’am. Not a cat. I don’t play around with my prey.” I had liked Nadia, the Nadia I thought she was anyway. It was better that I killed her quickly.
I reached out and handed her the ring I’d found in Nadia’s jewelry box. “This is Toni McFetters’s wedding ring. When you put out the body for the police to find, it will cause fewer questions if she’s wearing that ring. The clothes she was wearing are in a paper bag in the closet—a pink running suit. Maybe she should die of natural causes. I’m sure you can figure something out.”
She took it and sighed, her voice softening and the Russian accent gone. She sounded old. “You know, it is very difficult to raise a witch so that they do not self-destruct. I myself had six siblings and only two of us survived. My sister had no talent at all. The temptations are so great.”
She looked at Nadia. When she looked back at me, the accent had returned. “She had a crush on you, my little Texas bunny. Otherwise she wouldn’t have been so foolish as to do this where I might find her out.”
“She knew that I’m gay,” I told her, startled.
She laughed. “Forbidden fruit is the sweetest, Warren, my darling. She thought she could change that if you would just look at her. I imagine getting paid to kill your boyfriend was too much temptation for her to resist.” She smiled sweetly at me, waiting for me to understand that this was all my fault.
She cared for Nadia, I thought, but she cared more that I’d robbed her of the opportunity to get more power. Maybe she was also ticked that I’d seen what was going on under her nose before she did.
I hate witches.
“Nadia made her choices,” I said abruptly, standing up. “I need to get home.”
As I walked out of the bedroom, Elizaveta said, “Tell your Alpha that Nadia has decided that she wants to explore the world. She already has tickets to France. No one will much notice when she doesn’t come back.”
Meaning that Elizaveta would live with my killing Nadia and wouldn’t break the deal she had with the pack. When I’d called Adam to warn him what I had to do, he’d told me that was what Elizaveta would do.
I didn’t slow down or reply.
DESPITE WHAT I’D TOLD ELIZAVETA, I HAD ONE MORE STOP TO MAKE. FOR this one I would be the wolf. It took me a while to shed my human form for the wolf, longer than usual. Probably because I’d been shot; physical weakness makes the transformation harder for me.
The second-story window, the bedroom window, was open, and I jumped through it from the ground. I landed with a thud, but my victim, like Nadia, didn’t wake up. I needed this one awake. So I made more noise, letting my claws tick on the hardwood floor.
It wasn’t hard. I was very, very angry.
“Wha—”
He turned on the light, but I was already out in the hall. Just around the corner. I made a little more noise.
He grumbled, “Damned mice.”
He walked into the hallway where I waited for him.
I CRAWLED INTO BED, EXHAUSTED, WEARY TO MY SOUL.
“Warren?” He pulled me close. “Baby, you’re freezing.”
If he asked, I would tell him.
“Can you sleep?”
I nodded.
“Fine, tell me about it in the morning.”
I took the comfort he offered gratefully.
WE WERE AWAKENED BY THE AMBULANCE.
Kyle went out to find out what he could while I showered. He came in while I was drying off.
