“Black tattoos?” Cole asked.
“That’s right. No real pattern. Just a bunch of lines that’re probably covering a whole lot of needle tracks. He’s not dangerous, though. Just some poor old junkie. You have any trouble, just give us a call.”
“I should be fine.”
“So you’re riding with me, Paige?”
“Sure thing.”
Officer Stanze gave them a curt nod and walked back to his car.
After the policeman moved away from the window, Paige said, “He seems nice. A lot younger than I thought he would be. I know I haven’t slept much, but I don’t look too bad, do I?”
“No,” Cole grunted. “What interview was he talking about?”
“I told him I was coming to interview him for the MEG newsletter,” Paige said as she fussed with a few stray pieces of hair sticking out from the mostly disheveled whole. “He’s a fan, so that worked out really well. I asked him to show us where those people were supposedly attacked by dogs so I can write up a story. It was when you were bitching about the traffic. Check out that park and see what you can find. If there are Half Breeds around, that’s the sort of place they’d make a den.”
“You seriously want me to look for Half Breeds in this park. Alone?”
“This park and the other one, North Terrace Park.” As Cole fumbled for something to say, she told him, “You’re gonna have to be on your own sometimes. Remember that run we made to Indiana?”
“Yeah, but that was just one little Chupacabra and it only ate dogs,” Cole said.
“But you found the den, so you know what to look for. You can handle some sleeping Half Breeds.”
“Oh, so they’ll be sleeping?”
Climbing out of the car, Paige said, “They don’t like the sun, remember? We need to find as many as we can before more people are killed or turned. You’re ready to head out on your own for a bit, so just wander the parks and use your radar to zero in on any hot spots.”
Stanze poked his head through the window of his cruiser and asked, “You want to do this some other time?”
“No,” Paige replied. “I’ll be right with ya.” She gripped the Cav’s door as if she was going to tear it off. “All right, Cole. Let’s see if I can spell it out for you. There’s a park over there where a bunch of animals who look like inside-out Dobermans have probably made a den. Where do you think you should look for them? Under a picnic table where a bunch of kids would have already found them? What about by a water fountain? Maybe they’re on the swings!”
“All right, all right. I get it.”
“You’ve seen Half Breed dens. Just look for a hole by some trees off the beaten path. It’ll be big enough for a man-sized thing to crawl into and is probably hidden by leaves or branches or something. Use what you already know and let the scars do the rest. It’s just something you’ve got to go out and do, Cole, so go out and do it.”
“What if I run into trouble?” he asked.
“Deal with it.”
He gritted his teeth and was about to snap back at her when he realized he was just looking for someone to hold his hand. As soon as he thought of it that way, the little drill instructor voice in his head called him a few degrading names and then everything was fine. “All right,” he said. “I’ll look around, but I’ll save the good stuff for when you decide to stop flirting with the cop. What about Alvin?”
“He should be easier to find,” Paige said as she moved away from the window. “Just listen for the high-pitched singing.” By the time she’d walked to the cruiser, Officer Stanze was holding the door open.
Chapter 13
Werewolves came in a variety of flavors. In his short time with Paige, Cole had found out this little fact firsthand. Full Bloods were the worst of the lot. Mr. Burkis was one of those, and if reports from other Skinners were to be believed, there weren’t many more like him. Half Breeds were another story: part shapeshifter and part unnaturally occurring plague.
As Cole picked his way through the more heavily wooded sections of Penn Valley Park, he ran over what he knew about the creatures he was hunting. As far as the moon cycles were concerned, Hollywood had gotten it partially right. Half Breeds liked their moons full, but that didn’t mean they were limited by them. And they did like to sleep. That was most likely due to the pain.
When Half Breeds changed from human to werewolf, there was no changing back. That was another thing the movies had gussied up. Full Bloods could shift back and forth just fine, but Half Breeds were pulled apart and forced into their animal form. Changing a human skeleton to that of a four-legged monster required every bone to be broken, reshaped, and then held together by knots of muscle. Not only did this make Half Breeds flexible, but it tended to put them into a perpetual state of being pissed off. The only transformation they went through after that was into a resting state where most of their fur was sucked back under their skin and their muscles relaxed. Paige called that the “peeled grape stage,” and it was a fitting name. The first Half Breeds Cole had ever seen were in that stage, which made it very easy to understand why they kept out of the sunlight during that time.
Half Breeds tended to be only slightly smaller than when they’d been human and burrowed into the ground to make their dens. This meant he had to look someplace where a hole could be dug and the creatures could come and go without being seen. If they’d picked a spot near the portable bathrooms or next to the road, they would have been found already.
Strolling away from the main path in the park, all Cole found was several dozen yards of open, grassy park broken up by the occasional tree. Some teens in baggy shorts and freshly faded T-shirts were gathered at one of two picnic tables. As soon as they caught him studying them, the group flicked away whatever they’d been smoking and meandered to their second favorite spot.
In the end it was the application of common sense to uncommon circumstances that brought Cole to a patch of uneven ground at the west side of the park. The presence of shapeshifters caused the scars in his hands to burn. That pain was almost constant within the city, but had grown even worse with every step he took toward a wall of trees separating one spot from the rest of the park. At the base of two of the bigger trees, almost covered by an overhang of loose turf, he spotted a hole that was slightly bigger in diameter than his head. Approaching it, he was reminded of another fun fact regarding Half Breeds: they stank.
Wanting to make sure he hadn’t simply found a rabbit’s final resting place or garbage that had been collected by raccoons, Cole got onto his hands and knees for a closer look. He almost reached out to pull up the turf awning but was stopped by another bout of common sense. It was a big enough relapse for him to reach for his weapon, but not big enough to do the truly smart thing and drive to some other city.
“All right,” he muttered as he slipped the forked end of the weapon under the earthen flap and lifted it. “Let’s see what we got here.”
The hole’s covering was thick with moisture and heavier than it looked. Keeping the flap propped up, he pressed his head against the ground, peered inside, and was almost knocked out by the stench that drifted up from below.
The odors of wet earth, animal urine, and rotten meat all washed through his nose to drip down the back of his throat. He lifted his head, took a few breaths of cleaner air, and then gazed down into the hole again. The second time wasn’t quite as bad, but half of putrid was still pretty damn awful. All he could see were a few shapes that could very well have been wet rocks. One problem with that theory: wet rocks wouldn’t be panting.
Keeping his ear pressed against the ground forced Cole to acclimate to the stench. Clawed feet scraped against the dirt as the shapes inside the hole huffed and wheezed. Before too long he could see a little better in the dark. “Ahhh,” he whispered under his breath. “There you are.”
The den was smaller than a decent-sized television set, and two Half Breeds were curled up in it. They squirmed every so often or twitched when one’s paw touched the other in a tender spot. Considering that both of the creatures were slick masses of exposed muscle and protruding nubs of bone, every spot had to have been pretty tender.
