“Not at all.” The priest made a calming gesture with a hand. Like a saint in a religious painting. “But I would ask you to consider letting this go. I’d hate to have to call the police about a trespassing violation.”
Cormac just smiled. He’d heard shit like this a hundred times before. “I’ll get out of your hair, then.” He started to turn away.
“Also consider, that even a monster is a creature of God, and God does take care of His own,” the priest said.
Cormac looked at him. “You believe in a God that creates monsters? Monsters who murder?”
“We don’t get to choose God. We don’t get to make God. God makes us.”
“You know who it is,” Cormac said. “You know
“And we’re all God’s children,” Father Patrick said firmly. “I’m going to make that phone call now.”
Cormac walked away.
It could be the priest. If he’d been a werewolf a long time, if he had the experience, maybe he could shape- shift that quickly and appear so calm just an hour after attacking Cormac, after getting shot at. But Cormac wasn’t sure that made any sense.
Something screwy was going on here. Cormac didn’t care what the old man said, he had to take care of it. He had to make the kill soon, because the full moon was still a couple days away and he had a feeling that would be too late. That monster this morning wasn’t a creature of God; it was a pure cold killer. A child of Satan. Didn’t matter what kind of fancy theology you dressed it up in.
Someone was lounging on the hood of his Jeep. One of the students—an honest-to-God Catholic schoolgirl in a knee-length plaid skirt, cardigan, crisp shirt, and maroon tie, the knot hanging loose, about halfway down her chest. Her black hair—dyed, probably—was in a ponytail, with loose wisps hanging around her face. She was looking away at something and seemed to be chewing gum.
This place was too damn crowded, and too many people had seen him already.
Cormac was practically in front of her when she decided to look at him.
He made the automatic assessment: she was older, maybe seventeen, and full grown. “Big boned” was the polite way of describing her sturdy frame. Not quite big enough to be the wolf from last night. But he had to acknowledge the rather predatory look to her. She definitely didn’t seem afraid of him.
“What’s your story?” he said, resting his hands on his hips.
“I was framed,” she said. “They weren’t my drugs.”
Chuckling, he looked away. “You out here scuffing up my Jeep for a reason?”
She gave the Jeep a long, pointed look. Pale mud caked the wheel wells, the paint job had gone from olive green to pale green over the years, and rust spots had broken out across the hood, where the paint had been dinged by rocks and hail. Not to mention the shot-out window.
“I heard you talking to Father Patrick. And … I don’t know. I shouldn’t even be here.” She slumped away from the Jeep and started to walk away.
“Hold on there,” Cormac said. “What have you seen?”
She glanced nervously toward the school and bit her lip—a physical expression of the tension he’d been feeling since he arrived. So it wasn’t just him. “The other kids tell ghost stories. They talk about hearing noises— howling, banging on the windows. When I first got here, I thought it was just the usual thing; they’re always trying to scare the new girl. But they don’t go out at night. This is my third boarding school and I’ve never been to one where kids didn’t break curfew. But here, they don’t. They’re scared.”
“You know that for sure?”
“Yeah. And it’s not just them. No one goes out at night. It’s the kids who double-check the locks on the doors and windows. We’ve all heard the noises. The sisters say it’s bears or coyotes. But I don’t think that’s what it is.”
“And what do you think it is?”
She ducked her gaze. “It’s crazy.”
Cormac gave a wry smile. “People always say that to me. Listen, something killed some cattle on a ranch ten miles or so out, and it wasn’t coyote or bear. I tracked the thing back here. I think it may be living around here, and I think it’s not going to stay happy just killing livestock.”
The fearful look in her eyes showed shock, but not surprise. He had a feeling he could have said the word “werewolf,” and she wouldn’t have been surprised.
“I’ll get it,” Cormac said. “Whatever it is.”
“Okay. Good,” she said. Her smile was nervous. “I should get back—”
“Hey,” he said, before she could scurry away. He had a bad idea and hated himself for even thinking it. “Would you mind doing something for me?”
He asked the girl to walk across the campus at midnight. That was all. Back and forth between the dormitory and the old school building, across the longest stretch of lawn, slowly and leisurely. She’d looked at him like he was crazy, and Cormac hadn’t wanted to defend himself. He wasn’t crazy, just driven. And he lived in a different world than most folks, a world where monsters like vampires and werewolves existed.
Which was, in fact, one definition of crazy.
Cormac had promised he would be there, that he wouldn’t let anything happen to her. And that he would fix whatever the trouble was. He tried to tell himself that even if something did happen to her, it was a small price for getting rid of the werewolf. He didn’t ask for her name on purpose.
He was nervous. He’d never worked with live bait before. Not intentionally.
He left the Jeep, plastic sheeting taped over the driver’s side window, at the motel. It would be too hard to hide, and the werewolf would recognize it right off. Easier to sneak around on his own. But without the Jeep he didn’t have an escape route.
It was all in the setup. No reason he’d need an escape route, unless this went south. Really far south.
The open lawn separated the campus’s buildings from the street. A few trees, towering cottonwoods for the most part, with some maples scattered around and a few clumps of shrubs made up the landscaping. Not a lot of cover available. A long sidewalk led from the street to the church doors, and a couple of tall, well-trimmed shrubs served as a sort of gate at the end of the sidewalk. Cormac settled here with his rifle. The spot offered a view of the lawn, and was downwind from most of the campus. The werewolf wouldn’t be able to smell him.
He arrived early and waited there for more than an hour. All the lights in all the buildings went off at 10:00 P.M., except for a porch light over the door of the church. A faint light was visible within as well, over the altar, filtered through stained glass. Cormac supposed the door to the church was unlocked, if tradition held. Maybe that would be his escape route. Ironic.
Midnight came, and he didn’t see anything. The girl might have decided not to help him after all. He couldn’t blame her. He’d give it another half hour, then go looking for the monster himself. He had to be able to flush the werewolf out somehow. Quietly, he flexed his legs and arms, stretching in place to keep the blood flowing, to keep warm.
There she was. He recognized the dark figure by the shape of her ponytail. Out of the uniform, she wore torn jeans and hugged a short leather coat around herself, hunched over, as if cold or fearful. She stomped down the walk aggressively, like she had something to prove. Cormac might have wished for her to be more skittish—to move like a prey animal. But she was alone, obviously nervous. That would have to do to attract the wolf.
She made her way quickly across the open space, taking the concrete sidewalk from the dorms to the school building. She moved more quickly than he’d have preferred, just short of jogging, looking nervously around her the whole time.
The werewolf wasn’t going to go for such obvious bait, Cormac decided. But he wondered. It was losing control, that much was clear. Killing livestock was the first step. Attacking people was the next. It had to know it was losing control—so why stay here? The town was rural, but this spot was full of tempting targets—a hundred kids, easy pickings. He had to conclude that the monster just didn’t care. Or the thing thought it could handle itself—and it was wrong.
