“O-kay. Follow me.” The walk from the wagon house to the lane only took half a minute. But it was all uphill, and Kozma was sucking air after the first five steps.
I whispered, “He’s coming. I can feel him. Too far away to hear us. Too close to dodge. Hide in the trees.” I handed Kozma the keys to the Range Rover as I described where it was parked. “It’s unlocked, and you’ll find a change of clothes in the back. When you see it’s clear, get your ass to town.”
“How can I ever repay you?” he asked as he took the chain and looped it around his finger.
“Make sure the rental agency sends the vehicle back tomorrow. And look, I know your league is going to be pissed when you tell them what happened. Just keep them away from this Trust for at least a week, okay? By then our business with them will be finished and you can do anything you like with them.”
From the light in his eye I figured whatever he had in mind wouldn’t be pleasant. But, remembering the shot we’d just heard and the sudden absence of the wolf’s imprint, I didn’t really care. “Fair enough,” he said.
I met Rastus halfway down the hill. He didn’t even bother to hide the Makarov he held, which told me two things. The son of a bitch could pick his handguns. And I’d just hopped on a thin, shaky wire. Was it a bad thing that the head-banging, mosh-pit groupie in me craved a showdown? Maybe. It’s not such a big deal when your only weapon is an emery board and your greatest skill is accessorizing. But given time and a little luck I could take out a small village if I freed that wild child inside me. And the fact that I could feel her clawing so close to the surface? Not a good sign.
On my back I carried the black bag holding my miniature armory plus Dave’s pack. My left hand gripped the handle to my ratty old traveling trunk; my right held Vayl’s suitcase minus an outfit for Kozma. I tightened my fists until it hurt. Maybe the pain would help me think straight.
“What’s all this?” asked Rastus, waving his gun at me as if he thought I might be concealing several more Special Ops types in Vayl’s Samsonite. His voice had roughened since its encounter with my
I shoved my trunk at him so hard he either had to grab it or be trampled. “What’s it look like?” I demanded. “Disa said you were coming twenty minutes ago. Where’ve you been?”
“I . . .” He gestured back toward the garage, realized that was a story he shouldn’t tell. His eyes strayed toward the wagon house. “I have some—”
“Here.” I unloaded Dave’s pack, hung it over that waving arm, making it sag enough that if the Makarov went off it would take a chunk of my thigh with it. “You know where our suite is, right?”
“I’m kind of busy . . .”
I dumped Vayl’s suitcase at Rastus’s feet. Then I got in his face, started poking him in the chest. “You vamps think you’re so special, don’t you? Think you’re better than everyone else on the planet! Too good to do dishes or take out the trash or carry luggage for mere humans!” I gave him a push that nearly toppled him over. “Well, you and your Trust can go fuck yourselves for all I care!”
I stomped into the courtyard, deposited myself in a chair, and ignored him as he spent thirty seconds trying to figure out what to do with his gun, finally decided it would be okay in the pocket of his coat, and then spent another minute trying to load up the stuff I’d dumped on him.
I waited for him to disappear inside the villa, then I checked out the keys I’d lifted from his jacket pocket. Hey, it wasn’t in my nature to leave myself without wheels.
While I listened to the music of the Range Rover rolling Kozma away from imminent danger, I noted that one set of keys belonged to the minibus I’d seen parked just outside the garage. A couple looked like house keys. One might’ve been to a lockbox or safe. And also hanging from the chain was a remote opener for the garage door.
Looking back to make sure Rastus had committed himself to his delivery job, I went out the gate and thumbed the remote just enough to allow myself room to crouch down and get a good view of the floor.
Like Kozma, the wolf had changed. He sprawled in a pool of his own blood as if he meant to swim in it. His lips were still drawn back in a snarl, his fighter’s eyes wide and angry.
I ducked under the door, closed it, and moved to his side. While I hunted for a pulse I reached out with that extra sense Vayl had been nurturing since day one. There it was, the smell of werewolf, so faint it barely penetrated the vampire din coming from the mansion. And the pulse—also hardly existent.
“Aw, geez.
I knew enough about Weres to kill them, and that was about it. So the bullet Rastus had used must’ve been silver. Even if it had gone completely through his body, it had probably left enough residue to cause a fatal poisoning. But Rastus had played it lazy with that single shot. If you want to make sure a Were is dead, you have to cut off his head. Because he’s capable of sending himself into a trance while he tries like hell to heal. Which is what this guy seemed to have done. I supposed that meant he had a chance. If we had a place to stow him. If we could find somebody to draw out the silver and pump in a buttload of antidote.
I stared around the garage, searching for inspiration.
A workbench stretched across the far wall. Shelves full of paint, oil, fertilizer, and whatnot filled both sides of the place. A garbage can full of shovels and rakes took up one corner. Other than that—only blood.
“He must’ve lost half his supply already,” I whispered hopelessly. I was so bummed the Were was going to die I didn’t even blink when a face,
“I love the mad,” said the face with an anguished smile. “They are so much more interesting than the sane.”
“Jesus Christ, could you at least not talk to me while I’m losing my mind?”
The face twisted. “That name is anathema to me. And I am already in enough pain. Can we at least agree that you will abstain from holy references and I will treat you as if you were stable until after we have saved the Were?”
