around her.
“Shit, it’s cold.” Taran adjusted the silk scarf around her neck before digging her hands deep into her cropped leather jacket. “Is this damn place far from here, Aric?”
Taran’s enthusiasm always made her endearing.
Aric shrugged. “I don’t think so. We just need to follow the path. It will lead us in the direction of where the old possum said he’d scented the magic.”
“If we need to go off the path, I’ll carry you,” Gemini told Taran quietly.
Taran’s vixen smile reddened Gem’s face. A sweet move if he hadn’t taken a step away from her. Then another. Taran’s shoulders dropped and she let out an exasperated sigh. Most males would have humped her in public just for breathing in their direction. She puckered an eyebrow my way. Other than a sympathetic glance, I had no clue how to respond. Gemini’s aroma didn’t suggest fear or intimidation of Taran. It suggested something my tigress nose couldn’t quite figure out.
“Are we ready?” I asked.
Aric led us through the small brick-laid alley between the antique shop and its neighboring cafe. A young couple sat in metal patio chairs sipping hot chocolate and discussing their upcoming rafting excursion along the Truckee River.
“Where you headed?” the guy asked as we passed. His casual tone suggested he hadn’t taken a good look at the two wolves and the tigress. Our predators’ side sparked a sense of danger and fear, although we didn’t consciously project either. Most humans kept their distance. Far distance.
“Just for a walk,” Aric answered him. He pulled me closer. “You girls want anything from the cafe?”
The chilly and breezy fifty-degree afternoon felt more like a hot beach day in August around Aric. The closer he drew me in, the more the warmth accelerated between us. If anything, I needed a cold drink to squelch back the intensity. “No, thank you. I’m fine, wolf.”
“How about wine with dinner following our walk?” Taran suggested.
Aric’s hand skimmed down my back. “Even better,” he murmured.
We reached the end of the alleyway and stepped onto the worn, frozen path. The snow had melted, but it seemed the grass hadn’t quite recovered from the winter’s bashing. The rain and warming sunshine of April would soon resuscitate it. Come summer, the shop owners would struggle to maintain the large section of lawn. For now it lay asleep. Parts of it yellow, other parts balding. Only a few shoots of green daring to make an appearance.
The path widened as we traveled up a small incline leading into the forest. “Would you like to have dinner with me?” Taran asked Gemini. She tried to sound casual, but I recognized the underlying hope. He hadn’t, after all, responded to her suggestion.
Gemini gave a stiff nod but didn’t speak. And his silence wasn’t due to his shyness. His entire demeanor changed as the thick-pined forest swallowed us whole. His dark watchful eyes took everything in. Except he wasn’t the only predator reacting to unknown territory. Aric’s touch turned from affectionate to protective once the trees shadowed the path and blocked out the faint afternoon sun. My tigress stepped forward, sharpening our sense of smell, sight, and hearing. Even Taran knew better than to speak. Chitchat didn’t allow the full use of our senses.
My ears focused on the sounds of the forest, ignoring the way Taran’s boots passed along the hard ground. Ravens cawed in the distance and a few chipmunks and rabbits scampered along the crisp pine needles. As we drew farther in, the sounds of the forest reduced to the brush of branches in the wind. Nothing moved. Nothing breathed. Just us.
The world of the living vanished in one gradual space of time. “Do you feel that?” I whispered to Aric.
Aric nodded. “Yeah. Stay close to me.”
Funny. That was usually my line to my sisters when evil was afoot.
The path curved to follow along the Truckee River. The melting snow from the mountains had caused the river to rise to the edge. Chunks of ice slid over the roaring rapids. I shuddered, dreading an accidental soak. Swimming remained a skill I’d never mastered. And by the looks of the raging stream, it wasn’t an optimal place to learn.
The firs along the river dwindled. Benches fashioned from tree trunks rested between the more open spots. A beautiful place to enjoy, I supposed, minus the intensifying creepiness digging a hole into my chest.
The growing heaviness forced Gemini to escort Taran next to me so he and Aric could flank our sides. But then something stirred in the wind, like the heavy sweep of an invisible sail. Pained howls blasted my ears, and the gallop of massive paws shook the ground beneath our feet, sending pebbles to roll like marbles along the trail. Taran instinctively reached for me. The wolves didn’t possess her ingrained response. Then again, they never had my unique ability to rely on. I grasped their wrists and
We probably could have sprinted out of the way, but I would have risked contacting one of the bears. Animals and my “weirdness” didn’t play nice. With my protective shields down, I’d fall to the ground in a massive seizure and emerge as Celia the Bear. Considering that I’d have no way to
Aric’s and Gemini’s mouths parted as they examined their forms. I’d never
“It’s all right,” Aric said. We stepped back onto the path cautiously, unsure what lay ahead. Aric didn’t finish watching the bears disappear around the bend. Instead his preternatural side searched where I searched, in the direction they’d run from. “Gem,” he said, his voice bordering close to a growl.
Gemini slipped his sweater over his head, revealing the muscular T-build common of all wolves. Taran’s jaw fell open and I think she might have drooled. “Will you hold this?” he asked.
She nodded. This time it was her turn to fall speechless. Gemini cracked his neck from side to side. A large black wolf punched his head through Gemini’s back, sniffing the air. Like solidifying ink, he slid his powerful form onto the hard soil and sped off in a blur of black. The human half of Gemini that remained blinked his dark eyes. “Come. I’ll let you know if I find anything.”
Gemini’s ability to split into two remained, hands down, the coolest supernatural feat I’d ever seen. Taran squeaked when he whisked her into his arms and raced after Aric and me.
My tigress made us fast, faster than wolves. Common sense, and the realization that “danger lurked, Will Robinson,” kept me from bolting ahead. Aric still felt I moved too quick despite being a breath behind me. “Don’t get ahead of me, Celia.”
“I found it,” Gemini’s low voice said behind us. “This way.”
The path veered in two separate directions. One led deeper into the woods. Gemini kept us on the one paralleling the river.
The sour stench of death stung my nose just as Gemini’s other half appeared before us, baring his teeth. We followed behind him. Our pace slowing as we ambled down a small, steep hill where an abandoned mill hugged the edge of the river. The large broken wheel sat in the water, moving just enough to squeal. The rest of the large structure dented inward where the moss-covered roof had partially collapsed. A death trap in the making, and one long forgotten. Someone should have demolished it decades ago, but the small town didn’t strike me as possessing funds to see its destruction through.
The closer we neared the mill, the more the foul odor increased, its acidic scent sharp enough to make my eyes water. “Son of a bitch,” Taran muttered. Her blue eyes blanched to clear. Something skulked inside. And it didn’t want us there.
Aric whispered into his phone. “We found something. Track us.”
“On our way,” Koda said on the other end.
Gem eased Taran onto the ground as we crept onto the rickety porch steps. A few good tigress strikes and the moldy and graffiti-lined brown building would collapse inward. Too bad we had to investigate before sending it, and the malevolence lurking inside, to hell’s trash heap.
A padlock the size of my palm lay discarded on the mud-splattered floor, its hook twisted as if broken off.
